Family Saga as a Genre of World Literature

This article questions the reasons for the interest in the genre of saga, and discusses the peculiarities of its construction depending on the time and place of its origin, starting with the oral tradition. This genre is defined firstly by describing the life of no less than three families during a considerable span of history of a country, it also includes precise environmental details, such as dress and behavior, and exact dates of events against which the life of the heroes flows. Yet there are some differences in the choice of the narrator (whether it is the heroes themselves, or an objective observer of the events), the way of presenting time and space, ways of communication, etc. These differences are analyzed in the examples of four novels representing four literary traditions. The specifics of Russian literary tradition are also emphasized.