Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 23, 1912.djvu/452

428 Modern Russian Popular Songs. Mr. V. X., in his volume In the North: Impressions of the Road (1890):—"The youth of the country, when requested to sing, commonly respond by exhibiting their knowledge of the latest songs, such as you find in the collections offered for sale at the cheap bookstalls, and they can hardly be persuaded to sing the old songs." If then the remote North is thus gradually dismissing from its memory the ancient poetry, how can we expect this poetry to be preserved in Central Russia with all the distractions of its noisy and ebullient life? And indeed the evidence of the decay and disappearance of the old popular songs in the localities not far remote from the centres of culture is most complete and decisive; this evidence comes from several inquirers into the popular life, and sometimes from the people themselves, who are sadly conscious that the old poetry of Russia is dying out.

Nor is it merely in Great Russia that the weakening of the ancient poetical tradition is to be observed as manifested in the neglect of folk-songs. The poetical Little Russia, too, is forgetting her beautiful old songs, and is anxious to adopt those of more modern date. As to the growing distaste for Little Russian poetry, Prof. Sumtsov bears testimony:—"Pandura-players are a thing of the past; harpers are entirely disappearing; historical songs have passed out of memory; Christmas and New Year songs are degenerating into tedious and flabby liturgical verses; songs of springtime and weddings into improvisations on light love-themes."

In fact the ancient poetry, as civilisation develops, undergoes various transformations and corruptions decomposing its integrity, both in regard to subject-matter and to form. Under the pressure of new ideas and changes in the life of the people the themes of the songs change in details, and new poetical symbols and images replace the old.

On the other hand, besides "the general decline of popular poetry," says Professor Potebnia, "at the lower