The tales of the Russian and Soviet writer, Ural storyteller, and talented adapter of folk traditions, legends, and Ural fairy tales, Pavel Petrovich Bazhov (1879–1950), absorbed plot motifs, fantastic images, colorfulness, the language of folk traditions, and popular wisdom. The fairy tale form of narration was employed by both Russian classics such as N. V. Gogol, N. S. Leskov, V. I. Dal, and contemporaries of Bazhov: I. E. Babel, M. M. Zoshchenko, A. M. Remizov, M. M. Prishvin, and other writers. Demonstrating himself in this genre as an independent artist, P. P. Bazhov used knowledge of Ural miners' everyday life and oral folk creativity to embody moral and ethical ideas. This edition includes four of the most popular and well-known works from the collection of tales "Malachite Box," first published on January 28, 1939: "Mistress of the Copper Mountain," "Malachite Box," "The Stone Flower," and "Mountain Master" — with illustrations by the original Rostov artist Marina Valentinovna Ordinskaya.
