Dănilă Prepeleac
Encyclopedia
Fantasy literature
Fantasy literature is fantasy in written form. Historically speaking, literature has composed the majority of fantasy works. Since the 1950s however, a growing segment of the fantasy genre has taken the form of films, television programs, graphic novels, video games, music, painting, and other...
short story
Short story
A short story is a work of fiction that is usually written in prose, often in narrative format. This format tends to be more pointed than longer works of fiction, such as novellas and novels. Short story definitions based on length differ somewhat, even among professional writers, in part because...
and fairy tale
Fairy tale
A fairy tale is a type of short story that typically features such folkloric characters, such as fairies, goblins, elves, trolls, dwarves, giants or gnomes, and usually magic or enchantments. However, only a small number of the stories refer to fairies...
by Romania
Romania
Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeastern Europe, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea...
n author Ion Creangă
Ion Creanga
Ion Creangă was a Moldavian-born Romanian writer, raconteur and schoolteacher. A main figure in 19th century Romanian literature, he is best known for his Childhood Memories volume, his novellas and short stories, and his many anecdotes...
, with a theme echoing influences from local folklore
Folklore of Romania
A feature of Romanian culture is the special relationship between folklore and the learned culture, determined by two factors. First, the rural character of the Romanian communities resulted in an exceptionally vital and creative traditional culture. Folk creations were the main literary genre...
. The narrative is structured around two accounts. In the first part, the eponymous peasant hero, shown to be poor, lazy and idiotic, exposes his incompetence and lack of foresight by becoming in involved in a cycle of barters, which results in him exchanging a pair of ox
Ox
An ox , also known as a bullock in Australia, New Zealand and India, is a bovine trained as a draft animal. Oxen are commonly castrated adult male cattle; castration makes the animals more tractable...
en for an empty bag. The second portion of the text shows Dănilă's adventures inside a forest, where he decides to become a hermit
Hermit
A hermit is a person who lives, to some degree, in seclusion from society.In Christianity, the term was originally applied to a Christian who lives the eremitic life out of a religious conviction, namely the Desert Theology of the Old Testament .In the...
, unwitting that the land is inhabited by an army of devils. Confronted by the latter, he survives a set of challenges by outsmarting his adversaries, and, although losing one eye to demonic curses, he becomes the recipient of a large fortune awarded by Satan
Satan
Satan , "the opposer", is the title of various entities, both human and divine, who challenge the faith of humans in the Hebrew Bible...
himself.
Noted among samples of 19th century Romanian humor, "Dănilă Prepeleac" earned critical attention for its creative language, the defining traits of its main characters, and echoes of larger themes found throughout European folklore
European folklore
European folklore or Western folklore refers to the folklore of the western world, especially when discussed comparatively.There is, of course, no single European culture, but nevertheless the common history of Christendom during the Middle Ages and the Early Modern period has resulted in a number...
. It also inspired works in other media, such as a 1996 film by Moldova
Moldova
Moldova , officially the Republic of Moldova is a landlocked state in Eastern Europe, located between Romania to the West and Ukraine to the North, East and South. It declared itself an independent state with the same boundaries as the preceding Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic in 1991, as part...
n director Tudor Tătaru.
Name
Prepeleac itself is a Romanian-languageRomanian language
Romanian Romanian Romanian (or Daco-Romanian; obsolete spellings Rumanian, Roumanian; self-designation: română, limba română ("the Romanian language") or românește (lit. "in Romanian") is a Romance language spoken by around 24 to 28 million people, primarily in Romania and Moldova...
word of unattested origin, designating slim wooden poles or pegs. These are used in rural society either for stacking hay
Hay
Hay is grass, legumes or other herbaceous plants that have been cut, dried, and stored for use as animal fodder, particularly for grazing livestock such as cattle, horses, goats, and sheep. Hay is also fed to pets such as rabbits and guinea pigs...
(according to a traditional method in which the pole rises above and in the middle of the rounded pile) or for drying out freshly made pottery
Pottery
Pottery is the material from which the potteryware is made, of which major types include earthenware, stoneware and porcelain. The place where such wares are made is also called a pottery . Pottery also refers to the art or craft of the potter or the manufacture of pottery...
.
The story carries the name of its main character. The word Dănilă originates with either a hypocorism (the personal name Dan, which changes form after being added the diminutive suffix -ilă) or an antiquated version of the name Daniel (akin to Danilo
Danilo
Danilo is a male given name of biblical origin, meaning "God is my judge" in Hebrew. It's a very common given name in Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, and Serbian, and is used as a widespread name in Ukrainian and Russian.May refer to:...
). According to one fragment of the story, Prepeleac is the character's nickname, because adding a prepeleac was his only contribution to his family's wealth.
Dănilă's misfortunes
The plot of "Dănilă Prepeleac" centers on its eponymous hero, the youngest of two brothers. Unlike his sibling, depicted as a well-to-do peasant (chiabur) and a hardworking man, the destitute Dănilă is also "lazy" and "lackadaisical", resorting to borrowing from his relatives whatever he lacks around the house. The two are each married, and, while Dănilă's wife has all the qualities he lacks, the older brother's is a "shrew". Heeding his the advice of his mean wife and upset at always having to provide for Dănilă, the older brother asks him to change his ways. He suggests that Dănilă should sell his only valuable possession, an outstanding pair of oxen, and use the money to buy himself smaller working animalWorking animal
A working animal is an animal, usually domesticated, that is kept by humans and trained to perform tasks. They may be close members of the family, such as guide or service dogs, or they may be animals trained strictly to perform a job, such as logging elephants. They may also be used for milk, a...
s and a cart
Cart
A cart is a vehicle designed for transport, using two wheels and normally pulled by one or a pair of draught animals. A handcart is pulled or pushed by one or more people...
. The younger brother decides to do so, but on his way to the fair
Fair
A fair or fayre is a gathering of people to display or trade produce or other goods, to parade or display animals and often to enjoy associated carnival or funfair entertainment. It is normally of the essence of a fair that it is temporary; some last only an afternoon while others may ten weeks. ...
he falls victim to a string of unfair exchanges, partly motivated by his naïvite and indolence. When his oxen have some trouble climbing a hill, he sells them to a passer-by in exchange for a new cart, which he then proceeds to drag on his way to the fair. He then finds himself facing another slope, and frustration leads him to sell the vehicle to another peasant, in exchange for a goat. This trade as well leaves him unsatisfied, as the animal keeps twitching about, and he sells it for a goose. The bird's loud honks annoy him, and, once he has reached the fair, Dănilă exchanges it for an empty bag. After analyzing the chain of events which has led him to transact two oxen for a useless item, he grows despondent and concludes that "the devil [was] o' top o' me all this bargaining day".
Scolded by his brother upon returning home, Prepeleac persuades him to lend him a cart for a final time, and uses it to collect firewood. Once in the forest, he carelessly proceeds to chop of a fully grown tree, which cracks the vehicle and kills the oxen upon falling down. While contemplating the thought of not informing his brother of the loss (and instead deciding to steal his mare and ride his family out into the open world), the protagonist loses his way out of the woods. He arrives on the shore of a pond, where he attempts to hunt coot
Coot
Coots are medium-sized water birds that are members of the rail family Rallidae. They constitute the genus Fulica. Coots have predominantly black plumage, and, unlike many of the rails, they are usually easy to see, often swimming in open water...
s by throwing his axe at them, with the only result of this being that the tool falls to the bottom. After making his way home, he abides by his earlier plan, telling his brother that the oxen are stuck in thick mud, and that he needs the mare to get them out. His sibling angrily refuses, telling Dănilă that he is unfit for "the worldly life" and urging him to withdraw as an Orthodox
Romanian Orthodox Church
The Romanian Orthodox Church is an autocephalous Eastern Orthodox church. It is in full communion with other Eastern Orthodox churches, and is ranked seventh in order of precedence. The Primate of the church has the title of Patriarch...
hermit. Dănilă instead steals his brother's mare and sets back for the pond, where he aims to start searching for his axe.
Dănilă and the devils
Back in the forest, Dănilă comes to see truth in his brother's advice, and decides to build his own monastery on the spot. While selecting trees to chop down, he runs into a devil "who'd come up fresh from the pond's waters." After engaging the man in conversation, the creature is terrified by his prospects, but fails to convince him that Hell owns both the pond and the forest surrounding it. He runs back to SatanSatan
Satan , "the opposer", is the title of various entities, both human and divine, who challenge the faith of humans in the Hebrew Bible...
(referred to under the Romanian alternative Scaraoschi), who decides to let Dănilă have a barrel-full of coins in exchange for leaving the place. While the recipient of this gift ponders about how to take the barrel home, Satan's envoy challenges him to a contest of powers. The junior devil proves his own by circling the pond with the mare on his back. Dănilă then tricks him by riding the horse around the same perimeter, and claiming to have been the one carrying it with the inside of his thighs. Prepeleac refuses to take part in the devil's next challenge, which involves a sprint, claiming that it is too much beneath his abilities. Instead, he invites him to race his "youngest child", in reality a rabbit resting in the forest, and then watches as the devil fails to keep up with the animal. Dănilă employs the same type of ruse when the devil asks him to wrestle, by demanding that his interlocutor first try his hand at pinning down "an uncle o' mine, 999 years and 52 weeks of age", and then leading him into a bear's cave. Ruffled up and defeated by the beast, the devil then agrees to Prepeleac's next contest, a shrieking challenge. After listening to the impressive sounds bellowed by the creature and claiming to be unimpressed, the peasant warns him that his own shriek is capable of destroying a brain, and tells him that he should only witness it while blindfolded and with his ears muffled. The devil allows Dănilă to tie a rag over his eyes and ears, after which the protagonist repeatedly hits him over the temples with an oak beam, implying that this is the unheard sound of his own shriek. The terrified creature then runs back into Hell.
The angry Satan sends out another one of his servants, who challenges Prepeleac to a mace-throwing contest. The newly arrived devil demonstrates his power by throwing the object as high up into the sky as to render it invisible to the naked eye, and it takes three full days for the mace to come back down and tunnel to the Earth's core. While his adversary retrieves the weapon, Dănilă desperately ponders a new ruse. Eventually, he tells the devil that he will aim the mace in the direction of the Moon, where his "brothers" the Moon men will catch it, being "in great need for iron to shoe their horses." The alarmed devil pleads with him not to dispose of "an heirloom from our forefather", quickly retrieving the mace and running with it back into the water. This prompts Satan to call upon his soldiers, sending the most skilled among them to do away with the peasant. He decides to confront Dănilă in a contest of curses and spells. He is first to try, and manages to pop out one of Dănilă Prepeleac's eyes (described by the narrator as just retribution for Prepeleac's wrongdoing). The wounded protagonist then tells his adversary that, in order to fulfill his part of the challenge, he must be taken back to his house, where he has left curses and spells inherited from his forefathers. The devil solves his problems by carrying him and his treasure on his back, and, upon reaching his home, Prepeleac calls on his wife and children to come out with the curses, specifying that he means a dog-collar with spikes and the iron combs used for carding
Carding
Carding is a mechanical process that breaks up locks and unorganised clumps of fibre and then aligns the individual fibres so that they are more or less parallel with each other. The word is derived from the Latin carduus meaning teasel, as dried vegetable teasels were first used to comb the raw wool...
. His many young boys then use pounce on the devil and start scraping his skin
Carding (torture)
Carding is a sometimes-fatal form of torture in which iron combs of the sort originally designed as woolcarding tools are used to scrape, tear, and flay the victim's flesh.-Iron comb:...
with the combs. The wounded and terrified creature vanishes, while Dănilă is left to enjoy his treasure "well into his old age".
Critical reception and cultural legacy
According to literary historian George Bădărău, "Dănilă Prepeleac" is one of Creangă's writings were the fairy taleFairy tale
A fairy tale is a type of short story that typically features such folkloric characters, such as fairies, goblins, elves, trolls, dwarves, giants or gnomes, and usually magic or enchantments. However, only a small number of the stories refer to fairies...
context meets "realistic
Literary realism
Literary realism most often refers to the trend, beginning with certain works of nineteenth-century French literature and extending to late-nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century authors in various countries, towards depictions of contemporary life and society "as they were." In the spirit of...
fantasy". The plot, he notes, is similar to that of Creangă's other satirical
Satire
Satire is primarily a literary genre or form, although in practice it can also be found in the graphic and performing arts. In satire, vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ideally with the intent of shaming individuals, and society itself, into improvement...
and fantasy short stories, "Ivan Turbincă
Ivan Turbincă
"Ivan Turbincă" is an 1880 short story, fairy tale and satirical text by Romanian writer Ion Creangă, echoing themes common in Romanian and European folklore. It recounts the adventures of an eponymous Russian soldier, who passes between the world of the living, Heaven and Hell, on a quest for...
" and "Stan Păţitul", in which men who seem stupid are nevertheless able to trick devils. The story was described by the influential interwar
Interwar period
Interwar period can refer to any period between two wars. The Interbellum is understood to be the period between the end of the Great War or First World War and the beginning of the Second World War in Europe....
critic and literary historian George Călinescu
George Calinescu
George Călinescu was a Romanian literary critic, historian, novelist, academician and journalist, and a writer of classicist and humanist tendencies...
as one of Ion Creangă's writings with a transparent moral
Moral
A moral is a message conveyed or a lesson to be learned from a story or event. The moral may be left to the hearer, reader or viewer to determine for themselves, or may be explicitly encapsulated in a maxim...
, in this case "that the stupid man is lucky." In its first published form, "Dănilă Prepeleac" makes use of several rare words or dialectical constructs, in contrast to the standard lexis
Romanian lexis
The lexis of the Romanian language , a Romance language, has changed over the centuries as the language evolved from Vulgar Latin, to Proto-Romanian, to medieval, modern and contemporary Romanian.-Medieval Romanian:...
and grammar
Romanian grammar
Standard Romanian shares largely the same grammar and most of the vocabulary and phonological processes with the other three surviving varieties of Eastern Romance, viz...
. The "word's intonation" and the "implicit gesture", Călinescu argued, make dialogues between Dănilă and his fellow peasants work as a theatrical text, which could be acted without further intervention. Notably, Creangă's narrative includes an unusual presence of the comparative
Comparative
In grammar, the comparative is the form of an adjective or adverb which denotes the degree or grade by which a person, thing, or other entity has a property or quality greater or less in extent than that of another, and is used in this context with a subordinating conjunction, such as than,...
adverb
Adverb
An adverb is a part of speech that modifies verbs or any part of speech other than a noun . Adverbs can modify verbs, adjectives , clauses, sentences, and other adverbs....
mai in describing how one of the villagers trading with Dănilă behaves after their unbalanced transaction: pleacă pe costişă într-o parte spre pădure şi se cam mai duce. The approximate meaning of this is: "[he] leaves sideways up the slope [and] toward the forest and disappears more rather than less". Literary chronicler Gabriela Ursachi highlights the humorous purpose of mai in this context: "Far from being a superfluous construct, [it] suggests exactly the haste with which the happy man [...] vanishes."
A main focus of critical attention has been the manner in which Creangă depicted the story's protagonist. His string of disadvantageous transactions, researcher and theater critic Mirella Nedelcu-Patureau argues, echoes a theme common in Romanian folklore
Folklore of Romania
A feature of Romanian culture is the special relationship between folklore and the learned culture, determined by two factors. First, the rural character of the Romanian communities resulted in an exceptionally vital and creative traditional culture. Folk creations were the main literary genre...
and other European traditions
European folklore
European folklore or Western folklore refers to the folklore of the western world, especially when discussed comparatively.There is, of course, no single European culture, but nevertheless the common history of Christendom during the Middle Ages and the Early Modern period has resulted in a number...
, resonating in particular with "Hans in Luck
Hans in Luck
Hans in Luck is a fairy tale of Germanic origin, recorded by the Brothers Grimm. It is Aarne-Thompson type 1415.-Plot summary:Hans worked hard for seven years but wishes to return to see his poor mother. His master pays him his wages which amounts to a lump of gold the size of his head. Hans puts...
", the Brothers Grimm
Brothers Grimm
The Brothers Grimm , Jacob Grimm and Wilhelm Grimm , were German academics, linguists, cultural researchers, and authors who collected folklore and published several collections of it as Grimm's Fairy Tales, which became very popular...
story (and, through it, with Bertold Brecht's play Jean la chance). The recourse to unbalanced exchanges between the naïve and the shrewd is found in traditional accounts from both of two Romanian regions: Creangă's native Moldavia
Moldavia
Moldavia is a geographic and historical region and former principality in Eastern Europe, corresponding to the territory between the Eastern Carpathians and the Dniester river...
and its southern neighbor Wallachia
Wallachia
Wallachia or Walachia is a historical and geographical region of Romania. It is situated north of the Danube and south of the Southern Carpathians...
. Ethnologist
Ethnology
Ethnology is the branch of anthropology that compares and analyzes the origins, distribution, technology, religion, language, and social structure of the ethnic, racial, and/or national divisions of humanity.-Scientific discipline:Compared to ethnography, the study of single groups through direct...
Pavel Ruxăndoiu placed "Dănilă Prepeleac", alongside a fragment of Povestea vorbii ("The Story of the Word"), a poem by the Wallachian Anton Pann
Anton Pann
Anton Pann , was an Ottoman-born Wallachian composer, musicologist, and Romanian-language poet, also noted for his activities as a printer, translator, and schoolteacher...
, in a category of writings codifying that tradition.
The interest of critics was attracted to the protagonist's characterization and the problems of interpretation that it poses. According to ethnologist Şerban Anghelescu, Dănilă displays "idiocy serving to initiate", while Ursachi sees the hero as manifesting "complete, and therefore sublime, stupidity." Briefly reviewing earlier comments made about the work, literary historian Mircea Braga underlines the break between the two sections of the narrative, which seem to portray Prepeleac as two very different characters. He sees this as direct proof of Creangă's emancipation from the conventions of fairy tales, allowing the writer to progress within his own text and "annul the schematic-simplistic character" presumed by tradition. The characterization of Dănilă, as provided by critic Ioana Pârvulescu, contrasts his "stupidly intelligent" attributes with those of the "stupidly stupid" devil. Noting that Prepeleac is able to easily manipulate the devil with the myth of lunar creatures, Pârvulescu paraphrases a possible didactic
Didacticism
Didacticism is an artistic philosophy that emphasizes instructional and informative qualities in literature and other types of art. The term has its origin in the Ancient Greek word διδακτικός , "related to education/teaching." Originally, signifying learning in a fascinating and intriguing...
intent on the part of the narrator: "superstition
Superstition
Superstition is a belief in supernatural causality: that one event leads to the cause of another without any process in the physical world linking the two events....
is for stupid folk, and stupidity is the devil himself, or vice versa, the devil is stupidity incarnate."
The accumulation of negative traits is counterbalanced by the attributes of other characters, including the goodness displayed by Dănilă's wife. Contrasting the sexism
Sexism
Sexism, also known as gender discrimination or sex discrimination, is the application of the belief or attitude that there are characteristics implicit to one's gender that indirectly affect one's abilities in unrelated areas...
he identifies in several of Creangă's stories with the modern standards of political correctness
Political correctness
Political correctness is a term which denotes language, ideas, policies, and behavior seen as seeking to minimize social and institutional offense in occupational, gender, racial, cultural, sexual orientation, certain other religions, beliefs or ideologies, disability, and age-related contexts,...
, literary critic Ion Manolescu sees the manner in which Prepeleac's sister-in-law is portrayed as leading to an implicit moral: "if you want to tear a family apart, call for a woman."
"Dănilă Prepeleac" has had several adaptations for the Romanian stage, one of which has been traditionally performed at the Ion Creangă Children's Theater in Bucharest
Bucharest
Bucharest is the capital municipality, cultural, industrial, and financial centre of Romania. It is the largest city in Romania, located in the southeast of the country, at , and lies on the banks of the Dâmbovița River....
. The story also forms part of Creangă's legacy in Romania's neighbor, Moldova
Moldova
Moldova , officially the Republic of Moldova is a landlocked state in Eastern Europe, located between Romania to the West and Ukraine to the North, East and South. It declared itself an independent state with the same boundaries as the preceding Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic in 1991, as part...
. Before 1991, while the region was still part of the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
as the Moldavian SSR
Moldavian SSR
The Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic , commonly abbreviated to Moldavian SSR or MSSR, was one of the 15 republics of the Soviet Union...
, one of the leading Moldovan artists Igor Vieru, contributed original illustrations to local editions of the story. In 1996, filmmaker Tudor Tătaru directed a Moldovan-Romanian co-production of the tale, starring Mircea Diaconu in the title role.