Firebird (Slavic folklore) glowing if removed, and one feather can light a large room if not concealed. In later iconography, the form of the Firebird is usually that of a smallish fire-colored peacock, complete with a crest on its head and tail feathers with glowing "eyes". It is beautiful but dangerous, showing no sign of friendliness. The story of the Firebird inspired many literary works, including "The Little Humpback Horse" by Pyotr Yershov. The most famous production of the Firebird was by Sergei Diaghilev of Ballets Russes who commissioned composer Igor Stravinsky to create the enormously popular large-scale ballet score known as "The
The Firebird was looking for fresh compositional talent. The ballet was the first of Sergei Diaghilev's Ballets Russes productions to have an all-original score composed for it. Alexandre Benois wrote in 1910 that he had two years earlier suggested to Diaghilev the production of a Russian nationalist ballet, an idea all the more attractive given both the newly awakened French passion for Russian dance and also the ruinously expensive costs of staging opera. The inspiration of mixing the mythical Firebird with the unrelated Russian tale of Koschei the Deathless possibly came from a popular child's verse by Yakov Polonsky, "A Winter's Journey"