Aesopian Language of Soviet Era Children\u27s Literature: Translation, Adaptation, and Animation of Western Classics

Soviet writers frequently used social critique encapsulated in the form of children’s stories since the beginnings of Soviet children’s literature in 1918. Translation became one outlet for Soviet authors, who for political reasons were pushed to the outskirts of the Soviet literary scene. Russian children’s authors adopted a special form of retelling the stories by retaining the plot line, but by tweaking the characters and original settings to make them more recognizable by the Russian readers. This art of retelling and resettling of western characters onto Soviet surroundings created a space for social critique that was distinguishable to a skillful adult reader. The story that enjoyed the most popularity was Boris Zakhoder’s adaptation of A.A. Milne’s Winnie-the-Pooh (1960). The central inquiries for my project will focus on how foreign classics were adapted and how they were converted into voice of freedom, democracy, and creative imagination through different media (animation)