‘Russian Fairy tales’ by Vladimir Dahl
In Fall 1832, military surgeon Vladimir Dahl, the future compiler of an explanatory dictionary of the Russian language, was arrested. The reason was a collection of his tales that he had written.
It seemed that nothing foreshadowed trouble: The book ‘Russian Fairy tales, from folk oral tradition translated into civil literacy, adapted to everyday life and decorated with current proverbs by the Cossack Vladimir Lugansky’ was accepted as a doctoral dissertation at the University of Dorpat. But, the Third Police Department had a different opinion: It contained mockery of the tsar, the government and the position of soldiers. And shortly after, Nicholas I, having read the book, ordered the entire print run to be confiscated and destroyed.
Dal was saved from further trouble by the intervention of the commander of the infantry corps in which he served.
Alexander Pushkin, meanwhile, valued the collection very much: Having written the fairy tale ‘The Fisherman and the Fish’, he presented it to Dahl with the dedication: “Yours from yours!”
