The Golden Key, or the Adventures of Buratino (Russian: Золотой ключик, или Приключения Буратино) is a 1936 Soviet children's book by Alexey Tolstoy (related to, but not to be confused with the one of War and Peace fame).
The Golden Key is to The Adventures of Pinocchio what Tales of the Magic Land is to Land of Oz: a very loose retelling from the times when international copyright wasn't observed in the Soviet Union, still much more popular in the former Soviet countries than the original story. However, Alexey Tolstoy did write a foreword where he credits Carlo Collodi's book: he explains he liked it so much that he told his friends about it... and told them again... and again... until a literary equivalent of Gossip Evolution ensued and Tolstoy found himself telling a completely different story, only partly similar to Pinocchio.
Since, according to Tolstoy, he read the book in his childhood, and no Russian translation of Pinocchio existed until he was in his twenties, the story appears to be, using a polite expression, part of the fairy tale. In reality, the story of Buratino appears to start in 1923, when the 41 year old Tolstoy helped a now obscure writer named Nina Petrovskaya edit her own translation of the book. The changes he made were considerable; over a decade later, he decided to make further changes.
Like Pinocchio, Buratino is a wooden puppet carved from wood by a poor and lonely old man. Unlike Pinocchio, he never becomes a real boy and doesn't have that problem at all, being simply treated as a real boy throughout the story. His nose grows long by itself when he is still getting carved but doesn't change shape afterwards.
The book has been adapted to the screen several times in the Soviet Union, with the most famous adaptation being Leonid Nechayev's 1975 live-action musical film The Adventures of Buratino.
Not to be confused with The Golden Key, a 1996 fantasy novel, or with The Golden Key, a fairytale by George Macdonald.
Tropes featured in the book:
- Adaptational Job Change: While Geppetto is a woodcarver, Papa Carlo plays the street organ.
- Adaptational Villainy: Mangiafuoco's counterpart Carabas-Barabas is the Big Bad of the story. He is terribly abusive towards his marionettes (whom he knows to be sapient), and although he does give Buratino five gold pieces, it's a case of Pragmatic Villainy because he hopes to get much larger treasures that he believes to be hidden in Papa Carlo's house.
- Adaptation Name Change: Geppetto is renamed Carlo, and Master Antonio becomes Giuseppe.
- Annoying Laugh: Buratino tells Malvina to laugh as annoyingly as possible to show they are not afraid of Carabas-Barabas.
- Ascended Extra: The marionette theatre becomes a central element of the plot.
- Butt-Monkey: Pierrot's role in Carabas-Barabas's Show Within a Show comedy. He helpfully informs the audience: "They will hit me with a stick and slap and whack me. It's a very funny comedy".
- Cassandra Truth: When Buratino wakes Malvina up at night and tries to tell her he is chased by bandits, she doesn't believe him and shuts the window. The next morning, though, as she sees him hanged on a tree, she quickly comes to his rescue.
- The Cavalry: Papa Carlo comes to Buratino's rescue at the last moment twice – in the beginning of the book, when Buratino is dragged off by Shushara the rat, and in the end, to save Buratino and the puppets from Carabas.
- Commedia dell'Arte: Sad Clown Pierrot is a major character, and Harlequin appears in several scenes.
- Defeat Means Menial Labor: Discussed in the end. Duremar, formerly one of the Big Bad Duumvirate, says he's going to ask for some menial job at Buratino's puppet theatre, because his leech-selling business is failing.
- Derivative Differentiation: The book effectively repeats The Adventures of Pinocchio for the first few pages, but then starts diverging until a complete breakoff after the A Fool and His New Money Are Soon Parted scene.
- Gender Flip: Downplayed. While the original book doesn't specify the gender of the Fox (not helping that the Italian word "Volpe" is feminine) thus it's open to interpretation, in Buratino and its adaptations the Fox character is established being female and named Alisa.
- Gibberish of Love: When Pierrot is reunited with Malvina, he starts mumbling words that are "so incoherent and silly" the narrator omits them.
- Friend to All Living Things: Malvina is adored by all the animals of the forest who constantly bring her gifts.
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Buratino is pretty lazy and stubborn, but he genuinely loves his father and his friends.
- Karma Houdini: Alisa the Fox and Basilio the Cat get off scot-free, despite robbing and trying to kill Buratino. In the ending scenes, they apparently haven't even changed much because Alisa is seen trying to get to the theatre without a ticket.
- Literal-Minded: Malvina's attempts to teach Buratino arithmetics fail because of that. She asks him how many apples he would have left if he had two apples and someone took one of them away, and Buratino replies that he won't give an apple to Someone, not even if the latter tries to start a fight.
- Neat Freak: Malvina, in spades.
- Even when she sees Buratino whom she believed to be dead and Pierrot whom she hasn't seen since escaping the theatre, she almost immediately pulls herself together and demands they wash up and brush their teeth.
- When the three of them are told Carabas-Barabas is chasing them, Malvina still rushes off to put on a new dress because her current one is stained with coffee.
- Finally, when they are forced to make camp in the woods right after a battle with Carabas-Barabas and the two bulldogs, Malvina not only insists on the usual washing up and brushing of the teeth, but gets a friendly bird to brush and curl her hair and powder her face.
- Named by the Adaptation: The Fox and the Cat are called Alisa and Basilio respectively.
- No Celebrities Were Harmed: The researchers commonly assume the book to be a Stealth Parody of the attitudes in the theatre and literature of the times. The exact people are debated about (Malvina appears to have three or four prototypes), but everyone seems to agree Carabas-Barabas is based upon Vsevolod Meyerhold (who had his theatre closed about two years after the book came out... and was shot in two more).
- Non-Human Sidekick: Malvina's most trusted friend is her poodle Artemon.
- Spared By Adaptation:
- The Talking Cricket dodges the mallet Buratino throws at him.
- The bird which tries to warn the hero about the Cat and Fox. Instead of being eaten by the Cat, like in the original, it manages to slip out of his grip at the cost of some tail feathers.
- Support Your Parents: Even when he's being completely irresponsible in other ways, Buratino wants to find a way to buy a new coat for his father (who sold the old one to buy Buratino's schoolbook).
- Taking You with Me: Two old and blind grass snakes sacrifice themselves by crawling into the mouths of the two bulldogs in league with Carabas-Barabas and killing them.
- Team Mom: Malvina aspires to be one, trying to act as a kind and nurturing mentor figure to Pierrot and Buratino. Neither appreciates it, because Pierrot is in love with her and Buratino is just annoyed.
- Took a Level in Badass: After being tricked and having several close brushes with death, Buratino grows adept at dealing with danger and becomes The Leader when he, Pierrot, Malvina, and Artemon are attacked by Carabas-Barabas.
- What Does He See in Her?: Buratino is baffled as to why Pierrot is so smitten with Malvina, whom Buratino sees as bossy and overbearing.
- What Happened to the Mouse?: Just like his counterpart Mastro Antonio, Giuseppe's only purpose is to provide Papa Carlo with the enchanted wood stump before never being mentioned again. In the 1959 animated film he at least appears in the ending among the audience members at Buratino's puppet show, playfully regretting his choice of giving the magical piece of wood to Carlo instead of keeping it to himself, while in the live-action adaptation he gets a bigger role.
- You Dirty Rat!: Downplayed with Shushara the rat – she is evil but doesn't pose any direct threat to Buratino (who, being an inedible wooden puppet, doesn't interest her) until he pulls her tail. Then she decides to snap his neck and would have done so had it not been for Papa Carlo's very timely return.
