“We are no storytellers, but the performers of the epic...”. Opinions of modern narrators of the Yakut epic about their activities

Abstract

The paper contains excerpts from interviews with the modern performers of the Yakut epic Olonkho. Their practice is characterised by reliance on written records of the epic, the fragmentariness of the texts being performed, the predominance of performances in the format of competitions on massive platforms, the formation of individual performing styles under the influence of the “censorship” of experts and senior members of the performers’ community, a tendency to level dialect differences. The major topic of the interviews was the situation of the “return” of the local epic genre, the traditions of which were practically lost in the second half of the 20^th century, the “horizontal” relationships among the modern performers of the epic and their communication with the members of the expert community (folklorists, ethnomusicologists), new contexts of the existence of the reconstructed element of folklore. The revitalisation of the practice of performing and listening to the epic is part of a more general process of reconstruction of the Yakut traditional culture, the actualization of local artefacts that can become the support of the ethnocultural identity of the Yakuts in the new conditions. The experience of modern performers of the Yakut epic is indicative in the context of contemporary practises of actualising traditional forms of folklore and makes us rethink the specifics of the professionalisation of folklore performance in the post-traditional era.