Sinyushka's Well

[8] Nataliya Shvabauer believed that this character did not exist in the original Ural folk tradition, but the author constructed it according to the "mythological canon".

[9] When questioned about the source, Bazhov quoted the Ural anecdote about a man who was walking home drunk, and decided to drink some water from the well.

[11] In 1944 the story was translated from Russian into English by Alan Moray Williams and published by Hutchinson as a part of The Malachite Casket: Tales from the Urals collection.

[13] In the 1950s another translation of The Malachite Casket was made by Eve Manning[14][15] The story was published as "The Blue Crone's Spring".

Ilya is not interested in money, he wishes to see how The Blue Crone "turns into a lovely maid", because she only shows this face in front of brave and simple people.

The crone (Sinyushka) was one of the mythical creatures created by the populace to explain various unexplained natural phenomena.

As one of the "mountain spirits", she does not hesitate to kill those who did not pass her tests, but even those who had been rewarded by her do not live happily ever after: Ilya dies soon, this time not metaphorically but literally.

"The parallel of this act to a sexual challenge is emphasized by the fact that the protagonist attaches his pot to a long pole, which, however, turns out to be to weak and breaks in half, to Sinyushka's amusement.

Having humiliated the protagonist's male power, the magical woman forgives and eventually rewards him with riches".

[19] Denis Zherdev pointed out that Bazhov clearly defines important values in his stories, and Ilya is "an ideal man"— a "simple soul", brave, patient, and hard-working.

But in most early stories the family happiness is short-lived, as in this one, unattainable ("Beloved Name", "Yermak's Swans"), or flawed ("Zhabrei's Path", "Golden Hair").

Mariya Litovskaya criticized her for oversimplifying already simple story,[26] e.g. the ending was changed from: With this maid Ilya found his happiness.

[26] Vladimir Goryachikh composed the ballet The Living Stone (Russian: Живой камень, romanized: Zhivoj kamen) based on "Sinyushka's Well", which premiered in Nizhny Tagil in 1965.

The series included the following films: Sinyushka's Well (1973), The Mistress of the Copper Mountain (1975), The Malachite Casket, The Stone Flower (1977), Podaryonka (based on "Silver Hoof", 1978[31]), Golden Hair (1979), and The Grass Hideaway (1982).

[32] The film stars Vyacheslav Voskresensky as Ilya, Tatyana Malyagina as Sinyushka, Vladimir Kabalin as Kuzma, and Nina Lazhentseva as Lukerya.