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# Belinsky on the tragic in folk poetry and a folklore tale of Masha and Echo
- URL: https://theparnassian.com/en/strashnyi-russkii-folklor/
- Published: 2025-03-09T17:55:34.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-02T18:35:22.000Z
- Author: Alexandr Radayev
- Tags: Books, Society, Ethnography

Frightful Russian folklore. Masha has lost her way in the forest; Echo answers her and tells her that if his father-in-law is struck dead by thunder and his mother-in-law burnt up by lightning, then he will drench his wife in tears and dry her out with grief until she dies, and will take Masha to wife.

Belinsky speaks of this in his article on folk poetry:

> The contradiction between the social order and the reasonable needs and strivings of human nature places society in a tragic position. In our folk poetry there is an abyss of tragic elements, bearing witness to the depth and terrible strength of the Russian spirit, which, caught in contradiction, took its revenge upon itself and upon everything around it