Vladimir Propp

Dmitry Olshansky
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Vladimir Propp was a Russian philologist and structuralist who analysed the basic plot components of Russian folktales in order to identify their simplest irreducible narrative elements. His research on fairy-tales achieved world recognition as the first application of structuralism to the humanities and created the foundation for new disciplines, such as narratology, semiology and structural anthropology. Umberto Eco considers that “Saussure + Lévi-Strauss + Hjelmslev + Propp drawn up the method, which tried to be integral one, that is know as structuralism”. (Eco, p. 348). Successors such as Roland Barthes, A. J. Greimas and Claude Lévi-Strauss tried to spread this method and resolve similar tasks, looking for the narrative elements in all contemporary culture: “from newspaper…

2696 words

Citation: Olshansky, Dmitry. "Vladimir Propp". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 19 May 2008 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=3652, accessed 19 March 2024.]

3652 Vladimir Propp 1 Historical context notes are intended to give basic and preliminary information on a topic. In some cases they will be expanded into longer entries as the Literary Encyclopedia evolves.

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