Structural-Semantic Analysis and Some Peculiarities of Lithuanian Novelle Tales
Structural-Semantic Analysis and Some Peculiarities of Lithuanian Novelle Tales

Summary/Abstract: The genre diversity of narrative folklore is represented in internationally accepted classification of tales and legends proposed by Antti Aarne and Stith Thompson. However, the preparation of national catalogues based on Aarne-Thompson system encounters problems, given that there exist narratives with contradictory genre particularities and they do not easily fall into the limits of one genre group. In her search for more objective criteria for classification, the compiler of the revised “Catalogue of Lithuanian narrative folklore” Bronislava Kerbelytė has taken the above-mentioned imperfections into consideration.She has worked out an innovatory structural-semantic analysis offolk texts, based on the investigation of structural traits and on underlying semantic features of folk narratives. We will base our investigation on the principles of this analysis, as it seems to have prospects. The article aims at disclosing the main structural and semantic peculiarities of Lithuanian novelle tales by means of structural-semantic and comparative method of research.The theoretical statements are illustrated by the so-called “Tales of Fate” / “die Schicksalserzählungen” (AT 930–949), which define some aspects of an attitude towards fate and death in Lithuanian traditional culture. The assumption is proposed that structural-semantic analysis enables to define the function, the boundaries, and the development of folklore genres more precisely.

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