“DO YOU WANT TO MARRY ME? YOU MUST FIRST BUY A GARMENT FOR ME!” (ABOUT A CERTAIN FAMILY NARRATIVE AMONG CHINESE RUSSIANS OF TREKHRECH’E, CHINA REPUBLIC)

This paper deals with analysis of a piece of oral prose, namely a family narrative performed among members of a certain Russian-Chinese family. Its variants have been recorded from different respondents by the author and other Russian and Chinese researchers from 2006 up to 2013. Narratives about Russian girls and women, who have got married by Chinese, occupy a special position in the oral verbal art performed among Chinese-Russian Metis population, who reside at the Autonomous Region Inner Mongolia of the Chinese People’s Republic. Their pragmatics aims to legitimize the facts of Russian-Chinese interethnic spousal in collective and personal consciousness. The Vasil’evs, who reside at En’khe the village of municipal circuit of Ergun, perform a family narrative, which is prominent among the array of such texts. It is not only a brief report about acquaintance, but an entire oral narrative about the bridegroom heroic deed, his quest for a gift to be handed to his betrothed bride. The hero conducts a sort of a fairy tale difficult task, which the maiden has set to him. The task is conducted by means of supernatural abilities, magic knowledge and possibly even the Evil power. On the basis of own field materials, the author has proved, that there exist two versions of the narrative —  the “earlier”, which corresponds with the mytho-poetic prototype, and the “later”, which has been reconsidered in the realistic aspect nowadays.