Family played the most important role in Chaliapin’s life. Father of many children, he often said:

Chaliapin came up with fairy tales for his children, and when he couldn’t tell them in person, while on tour and rehearsals, he wrote them down in his letters. The inspiration for creating an exciting magical plot could emerge from anything. For example, an artist could come across a box of chocolates with a horse, a cat and a dog on it, and a story was immediately born in his head, which he then put to paper and sent in letters to his children.

Among well–known traditional characters, such as the Bear, the Wolf and the Horse, who often became heroes of his fairy tales, there were also creatures with funny names that he invented. There was always a place for fun and laughter in the singer’s life. For example, Prince Andrassy–Kudryash [diminutive for “curly”], Princess Desi, sisters Bebeshka–Syusyushka and Parlarlyushka [“be–be” and “syu–syu” are Russian equivalents to something like ‘coochie–coochie–coo’ and can often be heard when people are playing with small children; “–shka” at the end of the word is used to create a diminutive], the king of Bordeaux, the horse Grig, sorcerers of the North and the South, who could transform into different objects; “Shaggy–Legs” — magical creatures, who sleep during the day and protect the magical world from evil sorcerers at night.

Chaliapin often complemented these letters with miniature drawings. In one letter addressed to his oldest daughter Irina, he mentions that he “sent drawings to my little tykes.” In 1912 in a letter to her he said:

The envelope contained a separate sheet of paper, covered with images of a mustachioed, good–natured firefighter in a helmet, a chimney sweep stained with soot and with a heavy kettlebell on a rope, a jolly portly pig and characters from fairy tales.

This is what a Shaggy–Legs in one of Chaliapin’s letters to his daughter Dasya looked like: a one–eyed man with thick shaggy fur, his arm bent, hand near his temple in a military salute. Chaliapin added a caption to the picture that reads:

Stories about Shaggy–Legs were among Chaliapin’s favorites. He tried to turn his daughter’s life into a fairy tale, where there is no difference between reality and fiction.