Malachite the colour green (wadj) was associated with death and the power of resurrection as well as new life and fertility. Ancient Egyptians believed that the afterlife contained an eternal paradise which resembled their lives but with no pain or suffering, and referred to this place as the ‘Field of Malachite’. Malachite was used as a mineral pigment in green paints from antiquity until about 1800. The pigment is moderately lightfast, very sensitive to acids, and varying in color. This natural form of green pigment has been replaced by its synthetic form, verditer, among other synthetic greens. Malachite is also used
The Malachite Box to other issues, such as beauty and ugliness, life and death, order and chaos, eroticism, the relationship of people with nature and the Mountain, the mysterious in general, the place of the person in the world. Lidiya Slobozhaninova summarizes that some parts of "The Malachite Box" "become outdated, but others gain new meaning". The stories from the collection inspired numerous adaptations, including films, radio and stage adaptations. The Soviet poet Demyan Bedny was so impressed with the tales that he decided to adapt them into poetry. He began the work on 27 June 1939 and adapted the 14 original stories