That is the nature of retelling a fairy tale, adding our own lived experience to the bones of the story and coming out with something new. Mrs. Yaga is my small contribution to the corpus of tales surrounding Baba Yaga, as interpreted through my youth in an immigrant family. I hope you enjoyed it.
A Chat with Michal Wojcik
Mrs. Yaga features Baba Yaga, a prominent mythical figure in Slavic culture. What drew you to this specific character? Are there any particular themes in the existing stories featuring Baba Yaga that you wanted to explore and subvert in your version?
I don’t think you can escape Baba Yaga if you have a Slavic background—she looms over tales and legends in an awe-inspiring way, and stands out as a truly unique archetype. I talked about my personal connection with the Baba Yaga in my “Inspirations and Influences” essay, about her chaotic, border-straddling nature. The first story where I became aware of this was “The Frog Princess.” It features a trio of Baba Yagas as the princess’s protectors, which is so different from what I’d associated with Baba Yaga until then.
“Baba jaga” is a derogatory word in Polish aimed at older women, the equivalent of “crone” or “hag”. It’s a loan word from Russian, and the Russian Baba Yaga is the same person as baba jędza in Polish tales. But the Baba Yagas of “The Frog Princess” weren’t just stereotypical old witches, and the Baba Yaga rarely boils down to something so simple in Slavic fairy tales. Yes, she can be a spiteful worker of harmful magic and a cannibal who delights in the taste of peasant girls and boys, but she’s also full of wisdom, a guardian, a donor, and a judge of human worth. I really wanted to engage with those seemingly contradictory qualities in my story, to reconcile the child-eater of some Baba Yaga stories (and implicit in the insult “baba jaga”) with the benevolent Baba Yaga I knew from “The Frog Princess.”
Speaking of fairy tales and folklore, are you a fairy tale enthusiast? Do you have any favorites you’d like to share with our readers? Conversely, do you have a least favorite fairy tale (you must also tell us why, of course).
I am a fairy tale enthusiast! But that enthusiasm didn’t spring from childhood; I was certainly aware of fairy tales when I grew up…my parents had Polish translations of Hans Christian Andersen and the Brothers Grimm in the house along with a book of Polish folklore, I just didn’t feel any more interested in them than I was in other children’s stories. It wasn’t until I took a comparative literature course on fairy tales in undergrad that they began to fascinate me. Reading Marina Warner’s work for the first time was a big part of that; I found her scholarship on stories like Beauty and the Beast incredibly compelling. After that, I went back to that old book of Polish folklore with new eyes. Later on I discovered Terri Windling’s anthology Snow White, Blood Red, and Jane Yolen, and Patricia C. Wrede, which deepened my appreciation of fairy tales and the art of retelling them.
My favourite fairy tale is the story of the Wawel dragon. A dragon demands the sacrifice of the King of Krakow’s daughter, but a clever cobbler defeats it by stuffing a sheep full of sulphur. When the dragon eats the sheep, it ends up trying to quench its thirst by drinking so much water from the Vistula it explodes. There’s something so delightfully gruesome about that.
Least favourite? I’m not sure, probably the Disney version of Beauty and the Beast. I much preferred Madame Leprince de Beaumont’s version of the story, where the beast was kind-hearted all along.
We’d love to hear about your experience writing short stories. Your fiction has appeared in places such as On Spec: The Canadian Magazine of the Fantastic and Daily Science Fiction—what would you say are the advantages and potential pitfalls of writing short stories?
I’ve been writing short stories ever since I was in high school; I think I submitted my first short story to On Spec when I was 17 (back when *gasp* you had to submit by mail!). I’ve always been a big reader of short fiction; I like the economy of them. A great short piece can pack a huge amount of emotional resonance in such a short space; the brevity can pare away a narrative right down to the emotional core. Conversely, an unsatisfying short story ends up cutting away too much.
They’re also a great way to experiment with unusual voices or story forms without committing too much time to them. Except that’s not wholly true: short stories can be almost as time-consuming as novels during the revision process. Every word counts. There’s a huge sense of accomplishment in writing one that really works.
What are you working on next?
I honestly don’t know. I’ve been querying a novel to agents, a flintlock fantasy set in a cross between the medieval Baltic and 17th-century New France. I have some ideas floating around a character who’s a strzyga (another creature out of Polish folklore); another idea for a novel about clerical magic in 14th century Europe based on a seminar paper I wrote in grad school. We’ll see.
Finally, a question we ask all of our interviewees: We Book Smugglers have faced threats and criticisms concerning the sheer volume of books we purchase and read—hence, we have resorted to “smuggling books” home to escape scrutinizing eyes. Have you ever had to smuggle books?
I’ve certainly faced criticism sometimes for having too many books, and I’m always running out of room for them, but I haven’t had to resort to smuggling books yet.
About the Author
Michal Wojcik was born in Poland, raised in the Yukon Territory, and educated in Edmonton and Montreal. He has a Master’s degree in history from McGill University, where he studied witchcraft trials in early modern Poland. His short fiction has appeared in On Spec: The Canadian Magazine of the Fantastic and Daily Science Fiction. Follow him on his blog, onelastsketch.wordpress.com.
Book Smugglers Publishing
Book Smugglers Publishing: Fall 2014
Hunting Monsters by S.L. Huang (10/7/2014)
In Her Head, In Her Eyes by Yukimi Ogawa (10/21/2014)
Mrs. Yaga by Michal Wojcik (11/4/2014)
The Mussel Eater by Octavia Cade (11/18/2014)
The Astronomer Who Met the North Wind by Kate Hall (12/2/2014)
The Ninety-Ninth Bride by Catherine F. King (12/16/2014)
For other original & subversive fairy tales, visit goo.gl/XE14Wl.
Copyright Information
Mrs. Yaga
Published by Book Smugglers Publishing
Copyright © 2014 Michal Wojcik
Cover Illustration by Jacqueline Pytyck
Mrs. Yaga Page 2