Chastushka

Did You Know?

• The close equivalent of chastushki in Western culture is the limerick.
• Originally chastushki were a form of folk entertainment, not intended for stage performance.
• Sometimes they are used as a medium for a back-and-forth mocking contest.

Form

The basic form of a chastushka is a simple four-line verse, typically using an ABAB, ABBA, or AABB rhyme scheme. Most employ trochaic tetrameter, with syllables arranged as 8+7+8+7 per line. The rigid, short structure parallels the limerick in British culture. Often several chastushki are delivered in sequence, with a full musical refrain after each to allow laughter without missing the next. Improvisation is highly valued during performance.

Content

Chastushki cover a very wide spectrum of topics, from lewd jokes to political satire, including love songs and Communist propaganda. After the 1917 Russian Revolution, content varied considerably by region; in areas hit hard by grain requisitioning, peasant chastushki were bitterly hostile, while near Moscow under Stalin, 'Soviet chastushki' favorable to the Bolshevik government were sung. In the early 1920s, Young Communists used them as anti-religious propaganda. Despite this, many chastushki of the late 1920s and 1930s were anti-government, with anti-Soviet couplets common at peasant festivals. Following the assassination of Sergei Kirov in 1934, chastushki arose relating the killing to the end of bread rationing.