NOVELINĖ PASAKA „EDIPAS“ (AT 931). INDIVIDUALAUS ATLIKIMO ATSPINDŽIAI UŽRAŠYTAME PASAKOS TEKSTE
THE NOVELLA TALE “OEDIPUS” (AT 931): REFLECTIONS OF AN INDIVIDUAL PERFORMANCE IN THE RECORDED TALE TEXT

Summary/Abstract: The international folk tales’ classification by A. Aarne and S. Thompson contains a subgroup of the novella tales, defined as “The Tales of Fate” (“Die Schicksalserzählungen” in German), and comprising AT 930–949 types. Tales attributed to these types are characterized by an especially prominent theme of fatal destination and the irrevocability of the destined fate. These folklore texts clearly reveal the idea of all the future events in the human life being predestined in advance, rather than constituting an accidental sequence, therefore human attempts at changing one’s fate are usually doomed to failure. It should be noted, that prophecies related to wedding and death are especially difficult to dodge. Such “fatal” context defines quite strict and canonical structure of these tale types: prophecy – attempt to elude its coming true – prophecy comes true. It would seem that variation possibilities for thus structurally framed folklore pieces are very scant, as the course of action in the tale is already established, and the task of the performer is simply to tell it. The subject of analysis in the present article is the novella tale “Oedipus” (AT 931). According to the catalogue of the Lithuanian folk narratives, eight variants of this tale have been recorded.

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