Episode Details

The Fables of Ivan Krylov — Episode Twenty-Nine

Five fables by Ivan Krylov (1769–1844), in new English verse translations made for this show, read aloud over a gentle instrumental bed.

The Peasant and the Worker (Крестьянин и Работник, Book II, No. 19) — Walking home through the woods from the haymaking, an old Peasant meets a Bear nose to nose, and the Bear is on him, rolling and breaking him, choosing where to begin. From underneath, he begs his Worker Stepan not to give him up — and Stepan, like a new Hercules, takes half the Bear's skull off with his axe and pierces its belly with the iron fork. Krylov's opening moral has already warned us what the rescuer can expect once the trouble is off our shoulders.

The Peasant and the Snake (Крестьянин и Змея, Book VII, No. 6) — If you want to be honoured among men, choose your friends with care: that is Krylov's opening couplet, and then a Peasant befriends a Snake. She is clever, she worms her way in, until he swears by her alone — and from that day not one of his old friends or kin will set foot in his house. When he reproaches them, godfather Matvey tells him exactly why. This is the third, distinct Snake fable in Krylov — its own tale, from Book Seven.

The Peasant in Trouble (Крестьянин в беде, Book III, No. 2) — A thief climbs into the yard on an autumn night, ransacks the storehouse walls, floor and ceiling, and steals all he can: the Peasant goes to bed rich and rises so poor he might go begging with a sack. He calls in kin, friends, neighbours and godfathers — and gets a thousand pieces of useful advice: don't boast of wealth, move the storehouse closer, take a puppy for the yard. In deed, not one of them helps. Krylov's closing moral is for everyone who has ever hinted at real help.

The Peasants and the River (Крестьяне и Река, Book IV, No. 18) — Out of patience with the little streams that tear up their winter crops, wash away their mills and drown their cattle at flood-time, the Peasants go to complain to the great River herself, into whom all those streams flow. She flows so quietly and grandly, with great cities on her banks — surely she will curb them. Then they come closer, and see half of all their goods floating down her. Their closing words, as they shake their heads and go home, are the moral.

Pestilence Among Animals (Мор Зверей, Book II, No. 4) — Pestilence rages in the forests: the wolf is meek as a monk, the fox keeps fast and leaves the hens in peace, dove lives apart from dove. The Lion calls a council and proposes that the guiltiest beast give himself up as a sacrifice — and confesses first, how he tore the innocent sheep, and sometimes the shepherd too. The Fox rises to explain why that is no sin at all, the strong beasts confess and come out almost holy — and then the humble Ox lows his own small sin, five winters old. Krylov's closing line is famous: among people it is said the same.

Krylov Fables.

KacheliTV — Russian classics, read aloud.