Note 367 — Chapter V · THE DIFFERENCING ELEMENTS OF COMMUNAL POETRY

Quellien, Chansons et Danses des Bretons, Paris, 1889, p. 11, notes that one event is not likely to be treated both in the song and in the tale: “ce qui est tombé dans le domaine de la narrative prosaïque est par cela même exclu desormais de la chanson.” Communal song must seize present things; in the tales it was “once upon a time.”