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Barabas: Difference between revisions
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The name of the protagonist, Barabas, is clearly chosen intentionally, with the biblical reference in mind, so that he is "automatically" antipathic to the audience. | The name of the protagonist, Barabas, is clearly chosen intentionally, with the biblical reference in mind, so that he is "automatically" antipathic to the audience. | ||
====Karabas-Barabas==== | ====Karabas-Barabas==== | ||
He's the main bad guy in [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Little_Gold_Key_or_the_Adventures_of_Buratino Zolotoi Klyuchik a.k.a. the adventures of Buratino], the russian remake of Collodi's [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinocchio Pinochio]. | |||
Karabas Barabas is a puppet master. The puppets of his theater are alive, so he doesn't actually animate them with strings : it's more like he's a tyrant and they are his slaves. The protagonist, Buratino the puppet, finds a golden key that unlocks the door to a hidden, "parallel", much better world, helps the other puppets to run away from Karabas Barabas's theater, and eventually leads them to that other world (narrowly escaping | Karabas-Barabas is a puppet master. The puppets of his theater are alive, so he doesn't actually animate them with strings : it's more like he's a tyrant and they are his slaves. The protagonist, Buratino the puppet, finds a golden key that unlocks the door to a hidden, "parallel", much better world, helps the other puppets to run away from Karabas Barabas's theater, and eventually leads them to that other world (narrowly escaping Karabas's pursuit) where they live happily ever after. | ||
Karabas Barabas's appearance is close to that of an ogre : a giant with a very long black beard. His disrespect of puppets (he wants to throw Buratino into the fire as fuel) enhances this aspect. In that he's close to the Buddhist [[Oni]] which are somewhere in between ogres and imps. | Karabas-Barabas's appearance is close to that of an ogre : he's a giant with a very long black beard. His disrespect of puppets (he wants to throw Buratino into the fire as fuel) enhances this aspect. In that he's close to the Buddhist [[Oni]] which are somewhere in between ogres and imps. | ||
The book itself (and the movies) are morally lighter than Collodi's original, being aimed at young children. Since the book and movies were produced during the Soviet era, they could have ended up ideologically heavy. Of course the tyrannic Karabas Barabas can be seen as the embodiment of capitalism, and his puppets can represent the working class, but on the whole it's just a regular (quite entertaining) book for children. Big bad guy, little good guys, domination of evil, escape, happily ever after. | The book itself (and the movies) are morally lighter than Collodi's original, being aimed at young children. Since the book and movies were produced during the Soviet era, they could have ended up ideologically heavy. Of course the tyrannic Karabas-Barabas can be seen as the embodiment of capitalism, and his puppets can represent the working class, but on the whole it's just a regular (quite entertaining) book for children. Big bad guy, little good guys, domination of evil, escape, happily ever after. There are many good moments in between (both in the movies and in the book), quotes and references that made it into the Russian culture, a popular soundtrack, etc. | ||
==Speculation== | ==Speculation== | ||