Teffi - Skazochka - a leshii in a French forest

[Alexandra Smith]

Dear Robert,

I totally agree with Svetlana's comment that the phrase "videt'  
nevozmozhno" suggests that one can't look at this spirit (leshij)  
without laughter. It implies that he makes others laugh and his  
laughter is infectious.
I think that your description of the boy as being somewhat hysterical  
is not out of place. Julia Kristeva points out that children often  
laugh when they are frightened. In her book "Desire in language: a  
semiotic approach to literature and art" (Oxford, 1980) Kristeva says:  
“During the
period of indistinction between ‘same’ and ‘other’, infant and mother, as
well as between ‘subject’ and ‘object’, while no space has yet been
delineated (this will happen with and after the mirror stage-birth of the
sign), the semiotic chora that arrests and absorbs the motility of the  
anaclitic
facilitations relieves and produces laughter” (Kristeva 1980, 284).
Kristeva points to the fact that children lack a sense of humour,
but they easily laugh “when motor tension is linked to vision (a
caricature is a visualization of bodily distortion, of an extreme, exaggerated
movement, or of an unmastered movement; when a child’s body is
too rapidly set in motion by the adult […]; when a sudden stop follows a
movement” (ibid.).
As for the description of Teffi's leshii,  his image reminds me of Vrubel's
portrayal  of Pan. You could see Vrubel's image here:  
http://dic.academic.ru/dic.nsf/enc_pictures/638/Врубель

The image of Pan is related to  the two images found in Roman  
mythology: Favn and Sylvan (Silvan). The latter is often presented in  
mythology as a spirit of the wood.

All best,
Sasha Smith








--------------------------------------------
Alexandra Smith (PhD, University of London)
Reader in Russian Studies
Department of European Languages and Cultures
School of  Languages, Literatures and Cultures
The University of Edinburgh
David Hume Tower
George Square
Edinburgh EH8 9JX
UK

tel. +44-(0)131-6511381
fax: +44- (0)131 -651 -1482
e-mail: Alexandra.Smith at ed.ac.uk




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