The paper contrasts foreign analysis of the dynamic relations between literary folklore and literature with facts about Slovene writing and their interpretation in Slovenia. The first part, based on the work of Lihačov, focuses on the diachronic relation between folklore and literary genres, the question of whether genres are a purely literary phenomena or whether their appearance is influenced also by extra-literary factors, how independent the generic systems of literature and folklore are, their dynamic mutual dependence, and whether the disappearance of certain folklore genres leads to the creation in specific social strata of new literary genres. Grafenauer, the closest literary historian to Lihačov, promoted, even before the respected Russian medievalist, research into these parallel systems, although his starting point was a static one. The second part of the paper examines the
systems synchronically and is based on the work of the šearly structuralist’ Jolles, who compared language, literary folklore and literature to three aggregate states, and who illustrated the relation between folklore genres, referred to as »simple forms«, with the work of the farmer, cratfsman and priest. This author deals with the issue of genre in a singular way, exploring the relation between the fairy tale and the novella. His intricate execution have been conceptually adapted by de Vries, Ranke and Bausinger. Slovene examples with regard to the first points mentioned are weighty; to be sure ofthe reliability of the second more examples would be needed. The generic complexity of Trdina’s tale Pastirji na Žabjeku is incomparably more demanding than the structure of fairy tales in Križnik’s archived collection.
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