“S postylym nazlo mne poshla pod venets” [She went down the aisle with someone she didn’t love just to spite me]. The motif of the wedding of the beloved in some urban romances

Abstract

The article analyzes urban romances united by a motif that can be conditionally called “sweetheart’s wedding”: the character is present at the wedding of his beloved with a rival (or the girl sees the marriage of a loved one). The center of interest is the popular romance “Ah, zachem eta noch’” (“Oh, why this night”), the plot of which has been most developed over the century of its existence. Other popular songs are “V lunnom siyanii sneg serebritsya” (“The snow turns silver in the moonlight”), “Zachem ty, bezumnaya, gubish” (“Why are you ruining, crazy”), “Nad serebryanoi rekoi” (“Over the silver river”), “Ona, kak statuya, stoyala” (“She stood like a statue”). A comparison of recordings, publications in songbooks, and field recordings of these songs shows that plots based on a common central (or nuclear) motif, despite stylistic features and differing descriptions of the exposition, are implemented in a similar way in different songs: they have an invariant plot scheme, and tend to reduce the lyrical part (descriptions of the character’s lamentations) and to increase the lyric epic (tragic ending). The presence of common motifs makes it possible to contaminate songs within and outside the analyzed group of romances, but, with rare exceptions, without going beyond the invariant plot. The songs combine two wedding motivations, which correspond to two points of view on the situation: “forced marriage” and betrayal.