, alt link , 3 vols, (first edition 1859) alt links vol. 1, vol. 2, vol. 3 Translations , 70+ fairy tales , 43 fairy tales , 178 fairy tales + commentary by Roman Jakobson, translated by Norbert Guterman, illustrated by Alexander Alexeieff Significance Prior to Afanasyev's works in the 1850s, only a few attempts had ever been made to record or study the folk beliefs of peasant Russia. Though written Church Slavonic had existed since the 10th century, it was used almost solely by the church and only for parochial written works. It was not until the 18th and 19th centuries that a sizable body of secular literature developed in vernacular Russian. Thus, Afanasyev's collections made a highly valuable contribution to the dissemination and legitimization of Russian culture and folk belief. The influence of these folk tales can be seen in the works of many writers and composers, notably Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov (Sadko, The Snow Maiden) and Igor Stravinsky (The Firebird, Petrushka, and L'Histoire du soldat). In popular culture In the 2019 film John Wick: Chapter 3, John Wick visits the New York Public Library and requests "Russian Folk Tale, Aleksandr Afanasyev, 1864." See also Charles Perrault Giambattista Basile References Bibliography Further reading External links 1826 births 1871 deaths Fairy tales collected by Alexander Afanasyev 19th-century deaths from tuberculosis 19th-century historians from the Russian Empire 19th-century male writers from the Russian Empire 19th-century journalists from the Russian Empire 19th-century philologists Burials at Pyatnitskoye Cemetery Collectors of fairy tales Folklore writers Fairy tale scholars Recipients of the Order of Saint Stanislaus (Russian), 2nd class Recipients of the Order of St. Anna, 3rd class Researchers of Slavic religion Russian ethnographers Russian folklorists Russian philologists Russian literary critics Russian male journalists Imperial Moscow University alumni Tuberculosis deaths in Russia