Václav Čtvrtek: About Bomin and the Doll Palela

Who are Bomiña and Palele? A fiery doll, who lights and maintains the fire in the stove, and an ashen doll with a ruffled skirt, who in turn makes sure that every unwanted spark becomes just a speck of ash. Together they farm, first at the grandmother's, who jingles her frostbitten foot like a bell, later at the grandfather's, who is troubled by a sore thumb for a change. Their stories combine older realities of rural life with fairy-tale fiction. It may seem funny to children nowadays that thanks to Bomin, Grandma saves quite a lot of money on matches, that poor Grandpa has to make buttons out of acorns, or that every good clay brick has to be fired or baked. But fairy tales are mainly meant to please and entertain, and that's what all the protagonists, except Bomini and Palela, do: shouting crows, confused thieving fox aunts, the black magician Umhuuhu and also Miroslav Táborský, who narrates the fairy tales directed by Yvona Žertová.