Poems and Songs of Vladimir Vysotsky. A Ballad of Fighting.

Text.

Commentary to “A Ballad of the Free Archers”.

There is a good old saying: “Potior visa est periculosa libertas quieto servitio.” (“A dangerous liberty is preferable to a quiet servitude.”)

And it is pertinent to quote here a clause of the Roman civil law: “Vim vi repellere licet.” (“It is lawful to repel force with force.”)

The ballad was written for the film “The Arrows of Robin Hood”, see commentary to “A Ballad of Time”.

Another noble robber, Alim, lived in the author’s homeland Crimea (the presented collected stories are in Russian).

The presented text is adapted from George Tokarev and Eugenia Weinstein’s translations.

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