Merry Pictures (Russian: Весёлые картинки|Vesyolye Kartinki) is a Russian children's illustrated humorous magazine established in the Soviet Union in 1956. Its target audience is children of ages 4-11.[1] It had the largest circulation among the children's publications in the Soviet Union, reaching 9.5 million copies monthly in early 1980s.[2] [3]
In publishes verses, short stories and fairy tales, as well as board games, cartoons, rebuses, puzzles, etc.
It has a group of recurring fantasy characters, the " Club": Karandash ("Pencil", and artist), Samodelkin ("Do-It-Yourself"), Buratino, Cipollino, Neznayka, Thumbelina, Petrushka, and Gurvinek (Czhech puppet Hurvínek).[3]