Плач
The Lament
B2 · Upper Intermediate · fiction · 10 scenes · Premium story
Upper-intermediate folk horror, built on real ethnography and shown almost entirely off the page. August 1974: a young folklorist arrives in a northern village of eleven occupied houses to record funeral laments, and finds the last woman who can sing one unwilling to do it — because a lament calls, and you do not call for nothing. When Ustinya finally agrees, she agrees on her own terms, for a son the river never gave back. That night, on the ninth minute of the tape, there is a second voice under hers. Nothing is ever shown; the frightening thing is that the old woman is not remotely surprised.
Characters
- Marina Vetrova (Марина Ветрова) — Folklorist, 26
- Ustinya Tikhonova (Устинья Фёдоровна Тихонова) — Lament-singer, 81
- Klavdiya (Клавдия Ивановна) — Neighbour
- The engineer (Инженер архива) — Sound engineer, Leningrad
Vocabulary from this story
- плач — lament
- причитание — ritual lamentation
- вопленица — lament-singer
- обряд — rite
- собиратель — collector, fieldworker
- экспедиция — field expedition
- магнитофон — tape recorder
- плёнка — tape, reel
- запись — recording
- голос — voice
- напев — melodic formula, tune
- слово — word