Baba-Yaga and Vasilisa the Fair

Doesn't everyone use a skull as a lantern?

Greetings, readers. This week, we take a trip to Russia to read one of Baba Yaga's stories. Baba Yaga is a fixture in Russian myths, but she is always the villain. She fascinates me, partially because her house runs around on chicken legs. This week, we'll be looking at Baba-Yaga and Vasilisa the Fair.

I have truly started to wonder why the only good mothers in fairy tales are the dead ones. Vasilisa's mother loved her so much that her blessing served Vasilisa until the day she died. So, of course, this woman died when Vasilisa was young, and of no particular illness. Vasilisa's stepmother, however, had two healthy daughters, and none of them had any sickness worth mentioning. This makes me wonder about if Vasilisa had any children and how long she lived after delivering them.

In any event, Vasilisa's last keepsake from her mother was a doll which helped her do all of the ridiculous tasks that her stepmother set her to. Her father is essentially not in this story. Eventually, the stepmother finds a reason to send Vasilisa to Baba Yaga's house, in the hope that the girl would be eaten. Her excuse of needing a light was pretty flimsy, though. It would be one thing if Baba Yaga's house were nearby, but it took Vasilisa a full day to walk there. By then they obviously had lit a fire and gotten the candles burning again. It's sad that Vasilisa was so desperate to please her stepmother that she walked into almost certain death, armed with only a doll possessed by her mother's blessing. Not only does Vasilisa, or the doll, complete Baba Yaga's tasks, but then Baba Yaga gives her a light, which kills Vasilisa's evil stepfamily. It's almost like Baba Yaga was trying to help the girl, in her own extreme way. Afterwards, Vasilisa found an old woman to share a house with and managed to keep them both alive.

This bears some examination. If Vasilisa was able to find somewhere to live and a way to eat without a family, truly a feat for a single woman in this time, why did she even go to Baba Yaga's house in the first place? The only reason I can imagine that she didn't abandon her stepfamily is that she was afraid to make her own way in the world. Look at what it got her when she did: she made incredibly fine clothes, she got to marry a man she loved, and she was taken care of for the rest of her life. Again, for this time, that's a big deal. I suppose Baba Yaga is actually a hero in this story, however unwillingly.

The moral of this story would have to be either that you can find goodness in unexpected situations, or that if you're crazy talented at something, you should probably do that before you're cast adrift and save yourself some trouble. Just think, Vasilisa could have met the tsar paragraphs earlier!