This time I chose another old favorite of mine and with old I mean 1968.
Let's talk about "Die Abenteuer des starken Wanja" by Otfried Preußler (translated into English (as "The Adventures of Strong Vanya" which I unfortunately couldn't find to read for comparing) and 15 other languages). You may remember Preußler as the author of "Krabat" which I wrote about here.
This is also a story based on fairy and folk tales.
I'll use the names from the German original as I only know how Wanja was transcribed in the English translation. Oh, and the pictures were taken at night in the light of my reading lamp. Sorry.
Wanja is the youngest son of farmer Wassili Grigorewitsch. His older sons Sascha and Grischa are hard-working young men, but the 17 year old Wanja prefers sleeping, eating, and daydreaming.
One day, Aunt Akulina asks him to go into the woods and cut her some brushwood for a new broom. Wanja first eats the lunch she has given him and then wants to take a nap when he's interrupted by a blind old pilgrim.
The pilgrim tells him that he's destined to become Tsar, and in order to gain the strength needed for the long travel to the White Mountains, he will need to take seven sheepskins and seven sacks of sunflower seeds and stay on the stove in silence (not that many alliterations in the original 😉) until he's strong enough to lift the roof with his bare hands.
You can imagine that Wanja's family, and in fact the whole village, is slightly irritated by that. The aunt thinks he's bewitched, but Sascha and Grischa think he's simply lazy and let the villagers' mockery get to them until they decide to burn the roof over Wanja's head.
This is prevented by the blind pilgrim, and after seven years Wanja can finally comes down from the stove and sets out for the White Mountains, guided by the three kopeck coin his mother once gave him.
On the way, Wanja helps a lot of people thanks to his strength, ploughing for them, digging wells, towing a barge all by himself, and more, but he also has one adventure after the other.
He defeats the evil Och, a disgusting green monster who haunts the villages once a year and destroys one of them by blowing it to shreds. This gains him the Iron Lance hidden in the Och's pine tree.
He helps the knight Wolok against the Black Batur's gang. Wolok invites him to join the knights at Kiev, but the kopeck coin guides Wanja to a different path.
The witch Baba-Jaga, who's living in the moor and rides on an oven that has four chicken legs, has stolen all the horses from the villages around her. Wanja fights her and wins the black horse Waron.
Wanja's last adventure is to set the prisoners of the stony knight Foma Drachensohn free. Thanks to his Iron Lance, he defeats Foma and demands the armor of Iwan Wassiljewitsch (which is his full name, by the way).
Finally the White Mountains are behind him and Wanja is nearing the Tsar's city. What he doesn't know is that time is running out. If he doesn't reach the old Tsar within seven years and seven times seven weeks after the task of bringing the armor to him has been set, the Tsar's daughter Wassilissa will have to marry the evil Grand Duke because he's the noblest man in the city.
Wanja stops at an inn. The innkeeper is one of the Grand Duke's many spies, though, and is told to poison him. Luckily, Wanja has made the acquaintance of Mischa, a soldier who can also do magic. With his help, he doesn't only make it to the castle, but also escapes the attack of the Siberian bears the Grand Duke tries to sic on him before being attacked himself.
When Wanja enters the Tsar's room, he's surprised to see that the sick old man is actually the blind pilgrim he has met years before.
The Tsar says he can marry Wassilissa now if he wants, but Wanja says that Wassilissa must want him as well. He gives her the kopeck coin from his mother and she accepts saying she will wear it on her neck forever.
The book may not be a "regular" fairy tale, but it has quite a few elements of fairy or folk tales.
This begins with the three brothers who are part of several fairy tales from different countries. Usually the older ones are too sure of themselves and then give up quickly while the youngest is a bit stupid, naive or simply modest, but wins the "prize" - whatever it is - in the end even if the older brothers get jealous and try to prevent it.
Maybe you think that in this case it's understandable that Sascha und Grischa aren't happy about Wanja not pulling his weight on the family farm. If you think about it, though, Wanja's mission isn't that much fun, either.
To me as a child, it always sounded very boring having to spend all those years on the oven, eat nothing but sunflower seeds, have nothing to drink, and annoying to be mocked by the villagers and threatened by your own brothers without even being allowed to speak up!
It needs quite a lot of patience and resilience, well, and of course trust and the faith that everything is going to be alright if you are ready to alienate your family and community and risk your life just because a blind stranger has said that you are meant for greater things.
That's how fairy tales work.
Then there are of course the adventures.
Our hero has a pure and kind heart and helps others on his way for which they help him, for example by telling him about the Iron Lance, Waron, and the armor all of which he needs to tackle the last great obstacle.
Baba-Jaga and Foma try to fool him, Waron looks like an old nag and the armor is rusty. When Wanja chooses them over the stunning horses and the precious metal armors, anyway, they change to their real form which means the final defeat for his opponents.
To be honest, the only thing I used to wonder about is the question if Wanja went back home - after all he promised Akulina a golden samovar with precious stones - or if he sent a messengerto invite his family to live with him which would have been a nice gesture.
Although both books are inspired by folk tales, "Krabat" is clearly darker and deeper than "Wanja", but I love them both.
The same year "Wanja" was published, it was also made into a puppet show for TV by famous puppeteer Albrecht Roser, by the way. I have to admit, however, that the three parter was a little boring to me, not the puppeteering itself (I loved the horses), but the voices didn't do it for me.
That's it from Wanja and me.
I hope you will join me again for the next visit to my children's book cabinet!
Let's talk about "Die Abenteuer des starken Wanja" by Otfried Preußler (translated into English (as "The Adventures of Strong Vanya" which I unfortunately couldn't find to read for comparing) and 15 other languages). You may remember Preußler as the author of "Krabat" which I wrote about here.
This is also a story based on fairy and folk tales.
I'll use the names from the German original as I only know how Wanja was transcribed in the English translation. Oh, and the pictures were taken at night in the light of my reading lamp. Sorry.
Wanja is the youngest son of farmer Wassili Grigorewitsch. His older sons Sascha and Grischa are hard-working young men, but the 17 year old Wanja prefers sleeping, eating, and daydreaming.
One day, Aunt Akulina asks him to go into the woods and cut her some brushwood for a new broom. Wanja first eats the lunch she has given him and then wants to take a nap when he's interrupted by a blind old pilgrim.
The pilgrim tells him that he's destined to become Tsar, and in order to gain the strength needed for the long travel to the White Mountains, he will need to take seven sheepskins and seven sacks of sunflower seeds and stay on the stove in silence (not that many alliterations in the original 😉) until he's strong enough to lift the roof with his bare hands.
You can imagine that Wanja's family, and in fact the whole village, is slightly irritated by that. The aunt thinks he's bewitched, but Sascha and Grischa think he's simply lazy and let the villagers' mockery get to them until they decide to burn the roof over Wanja's head.
This is prevented by the blind pilgrim, and after seven years Wanja can finally comes down from the stove and sets out for the White Mountains, guided by the three kopeck coin his mother once gave him.
On the way, Wanja helps a lot of people thanks to his strength, ploughing for them, digging wells, towing a barge all by himself, and more, but he also has one adventure after the other.
He defeats the evil Och, a disgusting green monster who haunts the villages once a year and destroys one of them by blowing it to shreds. This gains him the Iron Lance hidden in the Och's pine tree.
He helps the knight Wolok against the Black Batur's gang. Wolok invites him to join the knights at Kiev, but the kopeck coin guides Wanja to a different path.
The witch Baba-Jaga, who's living in the moor and rides on an oven that has four chicken legs, has stolen all the horses from the villages around her. Wanja fights her and wins the black horse Waron.
Wanja's last adventure is to set the prisoners of the stony knight Foma Drachensohn free. Thanks to his Iron Lance, he defeats Foma and demands the armor of Iwan Wassiljewitsch (which is his full name, by the way).
 |
| Baba Yaga as you may know her is of course a very familiar figure in Slavic fairy and folk tales. |
Finally the White Mountains are behind him and Wanja is nearing the Tsar's city. What he doesn't know is that time is running out. If he doesn't reach the old Tsar within seven years and seven times seven weeks after the task of bringing the armor to him has been set, the Tsar's daughter Wassilissa will have to marry the evil Grand Duke because he's the noblest man in the city.
 |
As a child, I loved this illustration so much that I kept trying to copy it ... I was only good at doing the hair around the face, though. |
Wanja stops at an inn. The innkeeper is one of the Grand Duke's many spies, though, and is told to poison him. Luckily, Wanja has made the acquaintance of Mischa, a soldier who can also do magic. With his help, he doesn't only make it to the castle, but also escapes the attack of the Siberian bears the Grand Duke tries to sic on him before being attacked himself.
When Wanja enters the Tsar's room, he's surprised to see that the sick old man is actually the blind pilgrim he has met years before.
The Tsar says he can marry Wassilissa now if he wants, but Wanja says that Wassilissa must want him as well. He gives her the kopeck coin from his mother and she accepts saying she will wear it on her neck forever.
The book may not be a "regular" fairy tale, but it has quite a few elements of fairy or folk tales.
This begins with the three brothers who are part of several fairy tales from different countries. Usually the older ones are too sure of themselves and then give up quickly while the youngest is a bit stupid, naive or simply modest, but wins the "prize" - whatever it is - in the end even if the older brothers get jealous and try to prevent it.
Maybe you think that in this case it's understandable that Sascha und Grischa aren't happy about Wanja not pulling his weight on the family farm. If you think about it, though, Wanja's mission isn't that much fun, either.
To me as a child, it always sounded very boring having to spend all those years on the oven, eat nothing but sunflower seeds, have nothing to drink, and annoying to be mocked by the villagers and threatened by your own brothers without even being allowed to speak up!
It needs quite a lot of patience and resilience, well, and of course trust and the faith that everything is going to be alright if you are ready to alienate your family and community and risk your life just because a blind stranger has said that you are meant for greater things.
That's how fairy tales work.
Then there are of course the adventures.
Our hero has a pure and kind heart and helps others on his way for which they help him, for example by telling him about the Iron Lance, Waron, and the armor all of which he needs to tackle the last great obstacle.
Baba-Jaga and Foma try to fool him, Waron looks like an old nag and the armor is rusty. When Wanja chooses them over the stunning horses and the precious metal armors, anyway, they change to their real form which means the final defeat for his opponents.
To be honest, the only thing I used to wonder about is the question if Wanja went back home - after all he promised Akulina a golden samovar with precious stones - or if he sent a messengerto invite his family to live with him which would have been a nice gesture.
Although both books are inspired by folk tales, "Krabat" is clearly darker and deeper than "Wanja", but I love them both.
The same year "Wanja" was published, it was also made into a puppet show for TV by famous puppeteer Albrecht Roser, by the way. I have to admit, however, that the three parter was a little boring to me, not the puppeteering itself (I loved the horses), but the voices didn't do it for me.
That's it from Wanja and me.
I hope you will join me again for the next visit to my children's book cabinet!
