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Folklore narratives

Folklore narrations have a narrative discourse structure (initial situation, conflict, evolution of the conflict, resolution and final situation.) which may be more or less complex. Although we have already seen that this narrative discourse is also present in verse compositions, here we consider only prose narrations. They are traditional, popular and oral narrations. In general they re characterized by the presence of a succession of events of human interest; by its thematic and action cohesion that expresses a process of improvement or degradation of the main character that connects with human behaviour; and by the dramatization of its form and temporality. However, apart from these common characteristics, the variety is immense. Stith Thompson, who has studied them deeply, lists the following:

• Märchen "is a quite long story that contains a sucession of motifs or episodes. It takes one to unreal world without definite characters or a location, it´s full of fantasy. In this land of never ever, humble heroes kill opponents, take the throne and marry princesses."
• Novell. Structurally similar to the former. "The action takes place in the real world, in a definite time and place, and although the world of fantasy appears, it contains an apparent truth for the hearers, which does not exist in the Märchen.
• Heroe story "is a much more inclusive term than Märchen or Novella, since this type of story can be as fantastic as the first or rather pseudo-realistic as the second".
• Sage: other similar terms are local tradition, local legend, migratory legend and popular tradition. "this form of story envisages an extraordinary event that is supposed has truly happened. It tell the legend that really ocurred, in the past , in a specific place, a legend originally from the place, but that probably will be told in many other places, even remote places of the world". In these there are fantastic beings people believe in and in which a fantastic or absurd historical episode takes place. Its structure is simple with an only motif.
• Explanatory story (etiological): a very similar type to the former. They are stories that explain the origen and characteristics of living beings and natural and human phenomena.
• Myths. It is a very confusing term. It narrates events ocurring in a time and space previous to the present order. The characters are holy beings and demi-god heroes. They explain the origen of things through the action.
• Animal stories: when human characteristics in animals do not appear within the framework of a myth. They explain the vividness of an animal or the awkwardness of another by enhancing deception.
• Schwank (pranks, humoristic anecdotes, funny and obscene stories): the action is characteristically human and however some animals may appear. They form cycles round a personal character, they are easily remembered and have great mobility.
• Legend: a primitive literary form. Used individually when it designates the life of a saint. They are devout stories normally transmitted through literary collections and on occasions through oral tradition.
• Saga: literary stories of heroic times, particularly from Scandinavia and Ireland.

So that we do not get lost among all these categories, we should have two criteria to distinguish them, in the first place, narrations that belong to the collectivity and individual narrations; and, in second place, narrations not predominantly "historical" and narrations that are perceived as "historical". So, life stories are "historical" and individual; folk tales and accumulative and entertaining narrations, collective and not predominantly "historical"; and legends, myths and events, collective and perceived as "historical".

• Download PDF1 Folklore narrations:definitions, genres and stylistics
• Download PDF2 Study overview of folklore studies in Navarre

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