Translated from the Greek "τρόπος", trope means "revolution". What do paths mean in literature? Definition taken from the dictionary by S.I. Ozhegova says: a trope is a word or figure of speech in a figurative, allegorical sense. Thus, we are dealing with the transfer of the meanings of concepts from one word to another.
Formation of trails in a historical context
The transfer of meanings becomes possible due to the ambiguity of certain concepts, which, in turn, is due to the specifics of the development of the vocabulary of the language. So, for example, we can easily trace the etymology of the word "village" - from "wooden", that is, indicating a building material made of wood.
However, finding the original meaning in other words - for example, such as "thank you" (original meaning: "God save") or the word "bear" ("Knowing, knowing where the honey is") - is already more difficult.
Also, some words could retain their spelling and orthoepy, but at the same time change their meaning. For example, the concept of "philistine", understood in modern perception as a tradesman (that is, limited by material, consumer interests). In the original, this concept had nothing to do with the values of a person - it indicated the territory of residence: “urban inhabitant”, “rural inhabitant”, that is, it denoted a resident of a certain area.
Paths in Literature. Primary and secondary meanings of the word
A word can change its original meaning not only over a long period of time, in a socio-historical context. There are also cases when a change in the meaning of a word is due to a specific situation. For example, in the phrase “fire burns” there is no path, since fire is a phenomenon of reality, and burning is its inherent property, trait. Such properties are usually called primary (basic).
Let's take another example for comparison:
"The east burns a new dawn"
(A.S. Pushkin, "Poltava").
In this case, we are not talking about the direct phenomenon of combustion - the concept is used in the meaning of brightness, colorfulness. That is, the colors of dawn in color and saturation resemble fire (from which the property “burn” is borrowed). Accordingly, we observe the replacement of the direct meaning of the concept “burning” with an indirect one, obtained as a result of an associative connection between them. In literary criticism, this is called a secondary (portable) property.
Thus, thanks to the paths, the phenomena of the surrounding reality can acquire new properties, appear from an unusual side, look more vivid and expressive. The main types of tropes in the literature are as follows: epithet, simile, metonymy, metaphor, litote, hyperbole, allegory, personification, synecdoche, paraphrase(a), etc. Different types of tropes can be used in the same work. Also, in some cases, there are mixed trails - a kind of "alloy" of several types.
Let's look at some of the most common tropes in the literature with examples.
Epithet
An epithet (translated from the Greek "epitheton" - attached) is a poetic definition. Unlike the logical definition (aimed at highlighting the main properties of an object that distinguish it from other objects), the epithet indicates more conditional, subjective properties of the concept.
For example, the phrase "cold wind" is not an epithet, since we are talking about an objectively existing property of the phenomenon. In this case, this is the actual wind temperature. At the same time, we should not take the phrase “the wind blows” literally. Since the wind is an inanimate being, therefore, it cannot "blow" in the human sense. It's just about moving air.
In turn, the phrase "cold look" creates a poetic definition, since we are not talking about the real, measured temperature of the look, but about its subjective perception from the outside. In this case, we can talk about the epithet.
Thus, the poetic definition always adds expressiveness to the text. It makes the text more emotional, but at the same time more subjective.
Metaphor
Paths in literature are not only a bright and colorful image, they can also be completely unexpected and far from always understandable. A similar example is such a type of trope as a metaphor (Greek "μεταφορά" - "transfer"). Metaphor takes place when an expression is used in a figurative sense, to give it a resemblance to another subject.
What are the tropes in the literature that correspond to this definition? For example:
"Rainbow Plants Outfit
Kept traces of heavenly tears "
(M.Yu. Lermontov, "Mtsyri").
The similarity indicated by Lermontov is understandable to any ordinary reader and is not surprising. When the author takes as a basis more subjective experiences that are not characteristic of every consciousness, the metaphor may look quite unexpected:
"The sky is whiter than paper
rose in the west
as if crumpled flags are folded there,
dismantling slogans in warehouses"
(I.A. Brodsky "Twilight. Snow ..").
Comparison
L. N. Tolstoy singled out comparison as one of the most natural means of description in literature. Comparison as an artistic trope implies the presence of a comparison of two or more objects / phenomena in order to clarify one of them through the properties of the other. Paths like this are very common in the literature:
“Station, fireproof box.
My partings, meetings and partings "
(B. L. Pasternak, "Station");
"Takes like a bomb,
takes - like a hedgehog,
like a double-edged razor.”
(V.V. Mayakovsky "Poems about the Soviet passport").
Figures and tropes in literature tend to have a composite structure. Comparison, in turn, also has certain subspecies:
- formed with adjectives / adverbs in comparative form;
- with the help of revolutions with unions “exactly”, “as if”, “like”, “as if”, etc .;
- using turns with adjectives “similar”, “reminiscent”, “similar”, etc.
In addition, comparisons can be simple (when the comparison is carried out according to one attribute) and expanded (comparison according to a number of attributes).
Hyperbola
It is an excessive exaggeration of the values, properties of objects. “..Over there - the most dangerous, big-eyed, tailed Sea Girl, slippery, malicious and tempting” (T. N. Tolstaya, “Night”). This is not at all a description of some kind of sea monster - this is how the main character, Alexei Petrovich, sees his neighbor in a communal apartment.
The technique of hyperbolization can be used to mock something, or to enhance the effect of a certain feature - in any case, the use of hyperbole makes the text more emotionally saturated. So, Tolstaya could give a standard description of the girl - a neighbor of her hero (height, hair color, facial expression, etc.), which, in turn, would form a more concrete image for the reader. However, the narration in the story "Night" is conducted primarily from the hero himself, Alexei Petrovich, whose mental development does not correspond to the age of an adult. He looks at everything through the eyes of a child.
Alexei Petrovich has his own special vision of the surrounding world with all its images, sounds, smells. This is not the world to which we are accustomed - it is a kind of fusion of dangers and miracles, bright colors of the day and frightening blackness of the night. Home for Alexei Petrovich - a big ship that went on a dangerous journey. The master of the ship is mother - great, wise - the only stronghold of Alexei Petrovich in this world.
Thanks to the technique of hyperbolization used by Tolstoy in the story "Night", the reader also gets the opportunity to look at the world through the eyes of a child, to discover an unfamiliar side of reality.
Litotes
The opposite of hyperbole is the reception of litotes (or inverse hyperbole), which consists in the excessive underestimation of the properties of objects and phenomena. For example, “little boy”, “cat cried”, etc. Accordingly, such tropes in the literature as litote and hyperbole are aimed at a significant deviation of the quality of the object in one direction or another from the norm.
personification
"The beam darted along the wall,
And then slithered over me.
"Nothing," he whispered,
Let's sit in silence!"
(E.A. Blaginina, “Mom is sleeping ..”).
This technique becomes especially popular in fairy tales and fables. For example, in the play "The Kingdom of Crooked Mirrors" (V. G. Gubarev), a girl talks to a mirror as if she were a living being. In the fairy tales of G.-Kh. Andersen often "come to life" various objects. They communicate, quarrel, complain - in general, they begin to live their own lives: toys (“Piggy bank”), peas (“Five from one pod”), slate board, notebook (“Ole Lukoye”), a coin (“ Silver coin"), etc.
In turn, in fables, inanimate objects acquire the properties of a person along with his vices: “Leaves and Roots”, “Oak and Cane” (I.A. Krylov); "Watermelon", "Pyatak and Ruble" (S.V. Mikhalkov), etc.
Artistic tropes in literature: the problem of differentiation
It should also be noted that the specifics of artistic techniques are so diverse and sometimes subjective that it is not always possible to clearly differentiate certain tropes in literature. With examples from one or another work, confusion often arises due to their correspondence to several types of tropes at the same time. So, for example, metaphor and comparison are not always amenable to strict differentiation. A similar situation is observed with metaphor and epithet.
Meanwhile, the domestic literary critic A. N. Veselovsky singled out such a subspecies as an epithet-metaphor. In turn, many researchers, on the contrary, considered the epithet as a kind of metaphor. This problem is due to the fact that some types of tropes in the literature simply do not have clear boundaries of differentiation.
Means of enhancing the expressiveness of speech. The concept of a path. Types of tropes: epithet, metaphor, comparison, metonymy, synecdoche, hyperbole, litote, irony, allegory, personification, paraphrase.
A trope is a rhetorical figure, word or expression used in a figurative sense in order to enhance the figurativeness of the language, the artistic expressiveness of speech. Tropes are widely used in literary works, oratory and in everyday speech.
The main types of tropes: Epithet, metaphor, simile, metonymy, synecdoche, hyperbole, litote, irony, allegory, personification, paraphrase.
An epithet is a definition attached to a word that affects its expressiveness. It is expressed mainly by an adjective, but also by an adverb (“to love passionately”), a noun (“fun noise”), a numeral (second life).
An epithet is a word or a whole expression, which, due to its structure and special function in the text, acquires some new meaning or semantic connotation, helps the word (expression) to acquire color, richness. It is used in both poetry and prose.
Epithets can be expressed by different parts of speech (mother-Volga, wind-tramp, bright eyes, damp earth). Epithets are a very common concept in literature, without them it is impossible to imagine a single work of art.
Under us with a cast-iron roar
Bridges instantly rattle. (A. A. Fet)
Metaphor (“transfer”, “figurative meaning”) is a trope, a word or an expression used in a figurative meaning, which is based on an unnamed comparison of an object with any other on the basis of their common feature. A figure of speech consisting in the use of words and expressions in a figurative sense on the basis of some kind of analogy, similarity, comparison.
There are 4 “elements” in the metaphor:
An object within a specific category,
The process by which this object performs a function,
Applications of this process to real situations, or intersections with them.
In lexicology, a semantic relationship between the meanings of one polysemantic word, based on the presence of similarity (structural, external, functional).
Metaphor often becomes an aesthetic end in itself and displaces the original original meaning of the word.
In the modern theory of metaphor, it is customary to distinguish between diaphora (sharp, contrasting metaphor) and epiphora (usual, erased metaphor).
An extended metaphor is a metaphor that is consistently implemented over a large fragment of a message or the entire message as a whole. Model: "The hunger for books continues: products from the book market are increasingly stale - they have to be thrown away without even trying."
A realized metaphor involves operating a metaphorical expression without taking into account its figurative nature, that is, as if the metaphor had a direct meaning. The result of the realization of a metaphor is often comical. Model: "I lost my temper and got on the bus."
Vanya is a real loach; This is not a cat, but a bandit (M.A. Bulgakov);
I do not regret, do not call, do not cry,
Everything will pass like smoke from white apple trees.
Withering gold embraced,
I won't be young anymore. (S. A. Yesenin)
Comparison
Comparison is a trope in which one object or phenomenon is likened to another according to some common feature for them. The purpose of the comparison is to reveal new, important properties that are advantageous for the subject of the statement in the object of comparison.
In comparison, the following are distinguished: the object being compared (object of comparison), the object with which the comparison takes place (means of comparison), and their common feature (base of comparison, comparative feature). One of the distinguishing features of comparison is the mention of both compared objects, while the common feature is not always mentioned. Comparison should be distinguished from metaphor.
Comparisons are characteristic of folklore.
Comparison types
There are different types of comparisons:
Comparisons in the form of a comparative turnover, formed with the help of unions as if, as if, exactly: "A man is stupid as a pig, but cunning as hell." Non-union comparisons - in the form of a sentence with a compound nominal predicate: "My house is my fortress." Comparisons formed with the help of a noun in the instrumental case: "he walks like a gogol." Negative comparisons: "An attempt is not torture."
Crazy years, the extinct fun is hard for me, like a vague hangover (A.S. Pushkin);
Under it is a stream lighter than azure (M.Yu. Lermontov);
Metonymy
Metonymy (“renaming”, “name”) is a type of trope, a phrase in which one word is replaced by another, denoting an object (phenomenon) that is in one or another (spatial, temporal, etc.) connection with the object that is indicated replaced word. The replacement word is used in a figurative sense.
Metonymy should be distinguished from metaphor, with which it is often confused: metonymy is based on the replacement of words “by adjacency” (part instead of the whole or vice versa, class representative instead of the whole class or vice versa, receptacle instead of content or vice versa) and metaphor - “by similarity”. Synecdoche is a special case of metonymy.
Example: "All flags will visit us", where "flags" means "countries" (a part replaces the whole). The meaning of metonymy is that it singles out a property in a phenomenon that, by its nature, can replace the rest. Thus, metonymy essentially differs from metaphor, on the one hand, by a greater real relationship of substituting members, and on the other hand, by greater limitation, the elimination of those features that are not directly noticeable in this phenomenon. Like metaphor, metonymy is inherent in language in general (cf., for example, the word “wiring”, the meaning of which is metonymically extended from action to its result), but it has a special meaning in artistic and literary creativity.
In early Soviet literature, an attempt to maximize the use of metonymy both theoretically and practically was made by the constructivists, who put forward the principle of the so-called “locality” (motivation of verbal means by the theme of the work, that is, their limitation by real dependence on the theme). However, this attempt was not sufficiently substantiated, since the promotion of metonymy at the expense of metaphor is illegitimate: these are two different ways of establishing a connection between phenomena that do not exclude, but complement each other.
Types of metonymy:
General language, general poetic, general newspaper, individual-author's, individual-creative.
Examples:
"Hand of Moscow"
"I ate three plates"
“Black tailcoats flashed and rushed apart and in heaps here and there”
Synecdoche
Synecdoche is a trope, a kind of metonymy, based on the transfer of meaning from one phenomenon to another on the basis of a quantitative relationship between them. Usually used in synecdoche:
Singular instead of plural: "Everything is sleeping - both man, and beast, and bird." (Gogol);
Plural instead of singular: "We all look at Napoleons." (Pushkin);
A part instead of a whole: “Have you any need? “In the roof for my family.” (Herzen);
The generic name instead of the specific one: "Well, sit down, luminary." (Mayakovsky) (instead of: the sun);
The specific name instead of the generic one: "Better than all, take care of the penny." (Gogol) (instead of: money).
Hyperbola
Hyperbole (“transition; excess, excess; exaggeration”) is a stylistic figure of explicit and intentional exaggeration, in order to enhance expressiveness and emphasize the thought said. For example: "I've said this a thousand times" or "we have enough food for six months."
Hyperbole is often combined with other stylistic devices, giving them the appropriate coloring: hyperbolic comparisons, metaphors (“the waves rose like mountains”). The character or situation depicted can also be hyperbolic. Hyperbole is also characteristic of the rhetorical, oratorical style, as a means of pathetic uplift, as well as the romantic style, where pathos is in contact with irony.
Examples:
Phraseological units and winged expressions
"sea of tears"
"fast as lightning", "lightning fast"
"as numerous as the sand on the seashore"
“We haven’t seen each other for a hundred years!”
Prose
Ivan Nikiforovich, on the contrary, has trousers with such wide folds that if they were blown up, the whole yard with barns and buildings could be placed in them.
N. Gogol. The story of how Ivan Ivanovich quarreled with Ivan Nikiforovich
A million Cossack hats suddenly poured into the square. …
... for one hilt of my saber they give me the best herd and three thousand sheep.
N. Gogol. Taras Bulba
Poems, songs
About our meeting - what is there to say,
I waited for her, as they wait for natural disasters,
But you and I immediately began to live,
Without fear of detrimental consequences!
Litotes
Litota, litotes (simplicity, smallness, moderation) - a trope that has the meaning of understatement or deliberate mitigation.
Litota is a figurative expression, a stylistic figure, a turnover, which contains an artistic understatement of the size, strength of the meaning of the depicted object or phenomenon. Litota in this sense is the opposite of hyperbole, so it is called inverse hyperbole in another way. In litotes, on the basis of some common feature, two heterogeneous phenomena are compared, but this feature is represented in the phenomenon-means of comparison to a much lesser extent than in the phenomenon-object of comparison.
For example: “A horse the size of a cat”, “A person’s life is one moment”, etc.
Many litots are phraseological units or idioms: “turtle pace”, “at hand”, “the cat cried money”, “the sky seemed like a sheepskin”.
There is a litote in folk and literary tales: “Boy-with-a-finger”, “man-with-nail”, “girl-inch”.
Litota (otherwise: antenantiosis or antenantiosis) is also called a stylistic figure of deliberate softening of an expression by replacing a word or expression containing the assertion of some feature with an expression that denies the opposite feature. That is, an object or concept is defined through the negation of the opposite. For example: “smart” - “not stupid”, “agree” - “I don’t mind”, “cold” - “not warm”, “low” - “low”, “famous” - “notorious”, “dangerous” - “ unsafe", "good" - "not bad". In this meaning, litote is one of the forms of euphemism (a word or descriptive expression that is neutral in meaning and emotional “load”, usually used in texts and public statements to replace other words and expressions that are considered indecent or inappropriate.).
... and love for his wife will grow cold in him
Irony
Irony (“mockery”) is a trope, while the meaning, from the point of view of due, is hidden or contradicts (opposed) to the explicit `meaning`. Irony creates the feeling that the subject matter is not what it seems. Irony is the use of words in a negative sense, directly opposite to the literal one. Example: “Well, you are brave!”, “Smart-smart ...” Here, positive statements have a negative connotation.
Forms of irony
Direct irony is a way to belittle, give a negative or funny character to the described phenomenon.
Anti-irony is the opposite of direct irony and allows the object of anti-irony to be underestimated.
Self-irony is irony directed at one's own person. In self-irony and anti-irony, negative statements can imply a reverse (positive) connotation. Example: "Where can we, fools, drink tea."
Socratic irony is a form of self-irony, constructed in such a way that the object to which it is addressed, as if on its own, comes to natural logical conclusions and finds the hidden meaning of the ironic statement, following the premises of the “not knowing the truth” subject.
An ironic worldview is a state of mind that allows you not to take common statements and stereotypes on faith, and not to take various "generally recognized values" too seriously.
"Did you all sing? This is the case:
So come on, dance!" (I. A. Krylov)
Allegory
Allegory (narrative) is an artistic comparison of ideas (concepts) through a specific artistic image or dialogue.
As a trope, allegory is used in poetry, parables, and morality. It arose on the basis of mythology, was reflected in folklore and developed in the visual arts. The main way of depicting allegory is a generalization of human concepts; representations are revealed in the images and behavior of animals, plants, mythological and fairy-tale characters, inanimate objects, which acquire a figurative meaning.
Example: justice - Themis (a woman with scales).
The nightingale is sad at the defeated rose,
hysterically sings over the flower.
But the garden scarecrow is shedding tears,
who secretly loved the rose.
Aidyn Khanmagomedov. two loves
Allegory is the artistic isolation of extraneous concepts, with the help of specific representations. Religion, love, soul, justice, strife, glory, war, peace, spring, summer, autumn, winter, death, etc. are depicted and presented as living beings. The qualities and appearance attached to these living beings are borrowed from the actions and consequences of what corresponds to the isolation contained in these concepts, for example, the isolation of battle and war is indicated by means of military weapons, the seasons - by means of the flowers, fruits or occupations corresponding to them, impartiality - by means of weights and blindfolds, death through clepsydra and scythes.
That with a quivering relish,
then a friend in the arms of the soul,
like a lily with a poppy,
kisses with the heart of the soul.
Aidyn Khanmagomedov. Kissing pun.
personification
Personification (personification, prosopopoeia) is a trope, the attribution of properties and signs of animate objects to inanimate ones. Very often, personification is used in the depiction of nature, which is endowed with certain human features.
Examples:
And woe, woe, grief!
And grief girded itself with a bast,
Feet are entangled with bast.
folk song
The personification was widespread in the poetry of different eras and peoples, from folklore lyrics to poetic works of romantic poets, from precision poetry to the work of the Oberiuts.
paraphrase
In stylistics and poetics, periphrase (paraphrase, periphrase; “descriptive expression”, “allegory”, “statement”) is a trope that descriptively expresses one concept with the help of several.
Paraphrase - an indirect reference to an object by not naming it, but describing it (for example, “night luminary” = “moon” or “I love you, Peter's creation!” = “I love you, St. Petersburg!”).
In paraphrases, the names of objects and people are replaced by indications of their characteristics, for example, “writer of these lines” instead of “I” in the author’s speech, “fall into a dream” instead of “fall asleep”, “king of beasts” instead of “lion”, “one-armed bandit” instead of "slot machine". There are logical paraphrases (“the author of Dead Souls”) and figurative paraphrases (“the sun of Russian poetry”).
Often the paraphrase is used to descriptively express "low" or "forbidden" concepts ("unclean" instead of "hell", "get by with a handkerchief" instead of "blow your nose"). In these cases, the paraphrase is also a euphemism. // Literary encyclopedia: Dictionary of literary terms: in 2 volumes - M.; L .: Publishing house L. D. Frenkel, 1925. T. 2. P-Ya. - Stb. 984-986.
4. Khazagerov G. G.Persuasive speech system as homeostasis: oratorics, homiletics, didactics, symbolism// Sociological journal. - 2001. - No. 3.
5. Nikolaev A.I. Lexical means of expression// Nikolaev A.I. Fundamentals of literary criticism: a textbook for students of philological specialties. - Ivanovo: LISTOS, 2011. - S. 121-139.
6. Panov M.I. trails// Pedagogical speech science: Dictionary-reference book / ed. T. A. Ladyzhenskaya, A. K. Mikhalskaya. M.: Flinta; Science, 1998.
7. Toporov V.N. trails// Linguistic Encyclopedic Dictionary / ch. ed. V. N. Yartseva. M.: Soviet Encyclopedia, 1990.
Phraseological units and winged words
“sea of tears”, “fast as lightning”, “lightning fast”, “numerous as sand on the seashore”, “we haven’t seen each other for a hundred years!”, “the [drunk] sea is knee-deep… [but zha - up to his ears]”, “who is old rumpled-no - that eye out! And who will forget - both!
Antique examples
Give me a foothold and I will move the Earth. Dos moipu sto, kai tan gan kinas Archimedes
Hyperbolic Metaphors in the Gospel
« Why do you look at the straw in your brother's eye, but don't see the beam in your own eye?» ( Matthew 7:1-3). In this figurative picture, a critical person proposes to remove the straw from the "eye" of his neighbor. The critic wants to say that his neighbor does not see clearly and is therefore incapable of judging sensibly, while the critic himself is prevented from judging sensibly by a whole log.
On another occasion, Jesus condemned Pharisees for what they blind guides who strain out a gnat, but swallow a camel» ( Matthew 23:24). Also, Jesus knew that the Pharisees strained wine through cloth. These champions of the rules did this in order not to accidentally swallow a mosquito and not become ceremonially impure. At the same time, figuratively speaking, they swallowed the camel people, who were also considered unclean ( Lev.11:4, 21-24).
“Faith the size of a [tiny] mustard seed” that could move a mountain is a way of emphasizing that even a little faith can do a lot ( Matthew 17:20). Camel tries to go through the eye of a needle - also hyperbole Jesus Christ, which clearly shows how difficult it is for a rich person to lead materialistic lifestyle trying to serve God Matthew 19:24).
Classics of Marxism
What a lump, huh? What a hardened human being!
- V. I. Lenin. Lev Tolstoy like a mirror of the Russian revolution
Doctrine Marx omnipotent, because it is true.
- V. I. Lenin. Three sources and three components Marxism
Prose
Ivan Nikiforovich, on the contrary, has trousers with such wide folds that if they were blown up, the whole yard with barns and buildings could be placed in them.
N. Gogol. The Tale of How Ivan Ivanovich Quarreled with Ivan Nikiforovich
A million Cossack hats suddenly poured into the square. …
... for one hilt of my saber they give me the best herd and three thousand sheep.
- N. Gogol. Taras Bulba
And at that very moment, couriers, couriers, couriers ... can you imagine, thirty-five thousand couriers alone!
- N. Gogol. Auditor
Poems, songs
And even if I'm a Negro of advanced years,
and then without despondency and laziness,
I would learn Russian only for
what was said to them Lenin.
- Vladimir Mayakovsky. Vladimir Ilyich Lenin
I would be a wolf
gnawed out
bureaucracy.
To mandates
there is no respect.
- Vladimir Mayakovsky. Poems about the Soviet passport
I, friends, will go out to the bear without fear,
If I am with a friend, and the bear is without a friend.
Song from the movie "Secret around the world." Muses: V. Shainsky, sl. M. Tanicha
About our meeting - what is there to say,
I was waiting for her, as they are waiting natural Disasters,
But you and I immediately began to live,
Without fear of detrimental consequences! (2 times)
…
What I asked for - I did in an instant,
to me each hour wanted to do wedding night,
Because of you I jumped under the train,
But, thank God, not entirely successful ... (2 times)
... And if you were waiting for me that year,
When I was sent to dacha
, -
I would steal everything for you firmament
And two Kremlin stars in addition! (2 times)
And I swear - the last one will be a bastard! -
Do not lie, do not drink - and I will forgive treason!
And I will give you big theater
And small sports arena
! (2 times)
But now I'm not ready for the meeting -
I'm afraid of you, I'm afraid of intimate nights,
Like the inhabitants of Japanese cities
Afraid of repetition Hiroshima
. (2 times)
- Vladimir Vysotsky
Well, judge for yourself: on the wires in the USA
All the hippies with hair shaved their hair
They tore off his sweater, gnawed off his watch in an instant,
And they pulled the slabs right off the runway.
- Vladimir Vysotsky
For four years we have been preparing an escape,
We saved three tons of grubs ...
Vladimir Vysotsky
The doctrine of figures of speech arose in ancient rhetoric, where they were divided into figures of thought and figures of speech. The latter also included tropes (metaphors, metonymy, etc.), the so-called figures of rethinking. In modern science, the term "stylistic figures" is more often used. In the broad sense of the word, these are any language means, including tropes that give speech imagery and expressiveness. In a narrow understanding of the figures, paths are excluded from them, in this case they speak of syntactic figures, i.e. syntactic means of expressiveness of speech - repetitions, parallelism, inversion, anaphora, etc.
Trope(gr. tropos- turnover) - the use of a word (statement) in a figurative sense. Yes, the word eagle in its direct meaning - the name of a bird, in a figurative sense - the name of a person with qualities traditionally attributed to an eagle (courage, vigilance, etc.). The path combines the literal meaning and the situational meaning related to the given case, which creates the image.
The simplest types of tropes, with rather erased figurativeness, are often used in colloquial speech. (winter has come, the wind is howling, a sea of flowers etc. - commonly used metaphors; Moscow does not believe in tears, not everyone loves Shostakovich, survived to gray hair common metonymy).
The subject of literary analysis is individual, or author's, paths. With their help, the aesthetic effect of expressiveness, non-standardness of the word in artistic, oratorical and journalistic speech is achieved.
The number of tropes - their multiplicity, paucity or even complete absence in any text - is not an indicator of its artistry. However, the nature of the tropes, their frequency in a certain writer are essential for the study of the author's artistic thinking, for they constitute the features of his poetics.
In modern science, the composition of trails is defined in different ways. In a narrow sense, tropes include metaphor, metonymy, and synecdoche (as a kind of metonymy). This is motivated by the fact that only in these tropes there is a coincidence in one word of direct and figurative meanings. Some researchers expand this series due to cases of contrasting changes in the meanings of the word - and then irony, hyperbole and litotes are included in the composition of the tropes.
With some reservations, the composition of the tropes includes epithet, comparison, paraphrase, personification, symbol and allegory, which do not always have a tropeic (figurative) meaning. For example: rusty voice - a tropeic (metaphorical) epithet; charming voice is a non-tropeic epithet; "under the skies of Schiller and Goethe" is a tropic paraphrase (metonymy).
In the language of modern fiction, there is such a thing as reversibility of tropes, in which one object receives different trope characteristics, i.e., the comparison turns into a metaphor, the metaphor into a paraphrase, etc. For example, in I. Bunin's story "The Raven" used the comparison "my father looked like a crow." In the future, the author uses a metaphor ("he was really perfect crow"), uses metaphorical epithets ("led his crow head", "squinting at the shiny crows eyes"), comparison ("he, in a tailcoat, hunched over, raven, carefully read ... the program"), uses a metaphor in the title "Crow".
It should be noted that sometimes there is no clear boundary between different types of tropes, but there is a convergence of metaphor, personification, paraphrase and other types of tropes. For example: " shy spring" (F. Sologub) is both an epithet, and a metaphor, and personification. "And golden autumn ... / Weeping leaves on the sand "(S. Yesenin) - a metaphor, personification, paraphrase (since we are talking about leaf fall). "...Swarty autumn in the hem / Brought red leaves"(A. Akhmatova) - metaphor, personification, paraphrase. "Kazbek, The mighty king of the Caucasus/ In a turban and a brocade chasuble..." (M. Lermontov) - paraphrase, metaphor, personification.
Comparison(lat. comparison)- the simplest type of trail, which is a comparison of one object (phenomenon) with another on some basis. At the same time, the depicted gets more concreteness and brightness: "bumblebees were look like short ribbons from St. George medals"(K. Paustovsky); "Chichikov saw in his [Plyushkin's] hands a decanter, which was covered in dust, like in a sweatshirt"(N. Gogol); appears in a new perspective:" The Caucasus was all in full view / And all as crumpled bed"(B. Pasternak); new shades of meaning are found in it, subtext arises: "Like an ear of bread cut with a sickle, like a young lamb smelling deadly iron under its heart, he [Andriy] hung his head and fell on the grass without saying a single word "(N. Gogol). In the last example, the motive of the victim, doomed to death, and the motive of youth, who committed the gravest misconduct, are expressed by comparisons.
Formally, comparison consists of the following parts: 1) what is being compared is the subject of comparison, 2) what is being compared with is the object of comparison, 3) the feature by which it is compared is the basis of comparison. "Eyes like the sky, blue"(A. Pushkin). Eyes- the subject of comparison, like heaven- object of comparison, blue- base of comparison.
The comparison flag can be omitted, but it is always implied: "Swearing master, / What a mosquito sting..."(N. Nekrasov). The main member of this triad is the object. This is actually a comparison, an image: "To my poems, like precious wines/ The turn will come" (M. Tsvetaeva).
The following types of comparisons can be distinguished.
- 1. Comparative turns in which there are unions as, as, exactly, as if:"The garden is transparent, soft, like smoke"(I. Bunin); "The whole sky was clouded, like a black inline"(N. Gogol); "Above me is an air vault, /Like blue glass..."(A. Akhmatova).
- 2. Comparative subordinate clauses with the indicated unions: "The doors suddenly banged, / as if at a hotel / does not get a tooth on a tooth "(V. Mayakovsky); "Natasha, like a hunted hunted animal looks at the approaching dogs and hunters, looked first at the one, then at the other "(L. Tolstoy).
- 3. Comparative turns with words similar, like:"Ivan Ivanovich's head looks like a radish tail down; head of Ivan Nikiforovich on a radish tail up"(N. Gogol); "Shining eyes, Eugene / Stands like a formidable shadow"(A. Pushkin).
- 4. Non-union comparisons are expressed: 1) by the instrumental case of a noun: " golden frog the moon / Spread out on still water "(S. Yesenin);" Wet sparrow/ Lilac branch "(B. Pasternak); 2) the comparative degree of the adjective together with the noun in the genitive case: "Blue plumage of a drake / Dawn sparkled behind Kama" (B. Pasternak); "And more necessary than daily bread / I have a single word about him "(A. Akhmatova); 3) appendix: "Dad- crab snored softly" (A. N. Tolstoy); "And the monkey boy / Sings through sleep" (I. Bunin).
- 5. A special place is occupied by those comparisons based on the technique parallelism. These are, firstly, the so-called negative comparisons used in folklore and author's works stylized as folk poetry. The first part in negative comparisons is an image with negation, and the second, affirmative, is the subject of comparison:
Not the wind is buzzing on the feather grass,
Not the wedding train rumbles –
Relatives on Proclus howled,
(N. Nekrasov)
This type of comparison is always perceived as folk-poetic and creates a certain folklore flavor of the text.
Parallelism is also created by a comparison of a purely literary type - connecting, which is also called falling. The first part in such a comparison is a story about the subject, and the second, joined by words so, so- this is an image that should explain the very subject, although sometimes it acquires an independent character.
Her bed sleep is running;
Health, life color and sweetness,
Smile, virgin peace,
All that is empty sound is gone,
And dear Tanya's youth fades:
Thus clothes the shadow of the storm The hardly born day.
(A. Pushkin)
They mock you
They, oh motherland, reproach
You with your simplicity
The wretched appearance of black huts ...
So son, calm and impudent,
ashamed of his mother –
Tired, timid and sad
Among his urban friends.
(I. Bunin)
From the examples given, it can be seen that comparisons can be detailed, widespread, representing an allegorical story. According to this principle, E. Baratynsky's poems "Wonderful city will sometimes merge ..." and "Oh thought! You are the lot of a flower ..." and M. Lermontov's poem "The Beggar" are built. Detailed comparisons were widely used by Gogol: "... And young blood gushed in a stream, like expensive wine, which was carried in a glass vessel from the cellar by careless servants, slipped right there at the entrance and broke the expensive promise: all the wine spilled on the ground, and the owner, who came running, grabbed his head, saving him about the best chance in life, so that if God brings on old age to meet with a friend of youth, in order to remember with him the former, different time, when a person had fun differently and better ... "In this case, we are dealing with the realization of a comparison - it turns into an intrinsically valuable picture, the details of which do not correlate with the subject of comparison (narration about the owner and spilled blood).In ancient poetics, a common comparison, which is a kind of complete image that reached a high degree of independence, was designated by a special term - parabola. Thus, in the Iliad:
Like a poppy in a flower garden tilts its head to one side,
Lush, burdened with fruit and coarse spring moisture, –
So he tilted his head to one side, weighed down by a helmet.
It is necessary to distinguish between common general language, commonly used comparisons with erased figurativeness (flies like a bird, white like snow sleeping like a dead man etc.), and author's individual ones, which are a figurative and expressive means and marked by freshness, unusualness of the image. The latter quality makes itself felt especially clearly in the poems of some modern poets who compare objects that are outwardly incomparable. Their proximity is revealed only associatively, however, additional meanings are revealed in the object of comparison.
On that day, all of you, from comb to toe,
Like a tragedian in the province of Shakespeare's drama,
I carried with me and knew by heart,
Wandered around the city and rehearsed.
(B. Pasternak)
"The twelfth hour has fallen , / Like the head of the executed from the chopping block"(V. Mayakovsky); "My cat, like a radio receiver/ Green eye catches the world "(A. Voznesensky).
However, the advantages of comparison as an artistic means lie not only in the unexpectedness of the comparison, but also in the accuracy of the chosen image, which reveals the deep essence of the subject:
Anchar, like a formidable sentry,
There is only one in the entire universe.
(A. Pushkin)
"The clerk's wife ... brought all her children with her and, like a bird of prey looked askance at the plates and grabbed everything that came to hand "(A. Chekhov).
It is customary to talk about two main functions of comparisons in artistic speech - pictorial and expressive. The pictorial function is realized in the descriptive part of the text (landscape, portrait, interior): "... High and rare ... clouds, yellow-white, like late spring snow, flat and oblong like lowered sails...(I. Turgenev); "Like cornflowers in rye, eyes bloom in the face "(S. Yesenin); "... In this yellow closet, similar to a closet or chest..."(F. Dostoevsky). The expressive, or expressive, function is characteristic of evaluative and emotional comparisons, as well as unexpected, associative ones:
A life, like a shot bird
Wants to get up but can't.
There is neither flight nor span;
Broken wings hang
And all of her, clinging to the dust,
Trembling with pain and impotence ...
(F. Tyutchev)
"Your thought, dreaming on a softened brain, /Like a fat lackey on a greasy couch..."(V. Mayakovsky).
Visual and expressive functions can be combined:
crimson cancer, like a knight in red armor,
Like Don Quixote powerless and tired.
(E. Bagritsky)
"The eyes of that [Bormenthal] resembled two black muzzles aimed at Sharikov"(M. Bulgakov).
One of the most important comparison functions is the analyzing function. Comparison, as already noted, highlights, emphasizes some feature of the object or the meaning of the phenomenon, is used to characterize the characters, gives them an assessment. We find examples of such a comparison in M. Lermontov's poem "Portrait":
Like a curly boy frisky,
elegant, like a butterfly in summer,
Empty word meanings
Her lips are full of greetings.
She cannot be liked for a long time:
Like a chain she has a bad habit.
She'll slip away like a snake.
Flutters and vanishes like a bird.
It hides a young man
At will - both joy and sorrow.
In eyes - how light is in the sky,
Her soul is dark like the sea!
Chekhov gives a very accurate assessment of the heroine in the story "In the ravine": "... green, with a yellow chest [we are talking about a dress], with a smile, she [Aksinya] looked, like a viper looking at a passerby from young rye in spring, stretching out and raising its head.
Analyzing comparison conveys the mental state of the characters, their perception of a certain situation. This is how Pechorin sees the gorge, where his duel with Grushnitsky should take place: "down there, it seemed dark and cold, as in a coffin; mossy teeth of rocks, thrown down by a thunderstorm and time, were waiting for their prey "(M. Lermontov). Comparisons of this type are used by Dostoevsky, L. Tolstoy, Chekhov. The awkwardness and embarrassment experienced by Anna Sergeevna ("Lady with a Dog") are conveyed with the help of comparisons: "and there was an impression of confusion, as if someone suddenly knocked on the door"(A. Chekhov).
Comparison, especially common, may include other tropes or, conversely, may itself be part of metaphor, metonymy, personification. Here is a comparison, the image of which is metaphorical:
Now I have become more stingy in desires,
My life? did you dream of me?
Like I'm a spring echoing early
Ride on a pink horse.
(S. Yesenin)
The metaphor "spring echoing early" is associated here with youth, its dreams and hopes. The metaphorical epithet "pink" is also associated in the language with ideas about early youth ( pink childhood, pink dreams).
The object of comparison can be expressed by metonymy:
And he is killed - and taken by the grave,
Like that singer, unknown, but sweet,
Prey of jealousy deaf ...
(M. Lermontov)
The highlighted words are a paraphrase denoting Lensky.
Comparison can strengthen the personification, merging with it into a common complex image; "...And wind, like a boatman rowing ... / Over the lindens "(B. Pasternak); "... Bird cherry leaves, like birds with green wings, flew in and sat on bare branches "(M. Prishvin).
An extended metaphor can include a comparison and also form a single image with it:
And just as fun and catchy,
Like those watermelons at the gate
The earth is dangling in a string bag
Meridians and latitudes.
(A. Voznesensky)
Like a white stone in the depths of a well,
I have one memory...
(A. Akhmatova)
In some texts, comparisons can receive a multi-valued generalized meaning and a special depth, expressing ideas that are important for the author and, thus, turning into a symbol. In Lermontov's poem "The Poet", the first part contains a description of the dagger and its history ("It shines like a golden toy on the wall - / Alas, inglorious and harmless!"); the second part begins with a rhetorical question that shapes the image of comparison and at the same time gives it a symbolic meaning (“In our age, pampered, aren’t you, a poet, / You lost your appointment, / Exchanged for gold the power that the world / Listened to in mute reverence?” ). A detailed symbolic comparison is the famous image of Russia-troika by Gogol: "Isn't it you, Rus, that you are rushing about with a lively, unhindered troika? .."
In some cases, an associative comparison of various objects and phenomena appears in the text, but it is not formalized in the form of a comparison. For example, in the sentence: "She had a good, rich, strong voice, and while she sang, it seemed to me that I was eating a ripe, sweet, fragrant melon"(A. Chekhov). In Turgenev's story "The Singers", Yakov's singing evokes in the author the memory of a seagull on the seashore. In both cases, there is an associative convergence of objects (phenomena), but formally there is no comparison. Gogol uses a metaphor close to comparison: "And the dark string of swans flying to the north was suddenly illuminated with a silver-pink light, and then it seemed that red handkerchiefs flew across the sky.
The construction of the sentence in the form of a question and the answer to it is disputable, and the answer is given in the form of a definition or a figurative interpretation of the subject. Some researchers consider this construction to be a comparison:
What is happiness? A short moment and tight
Oblivion, sleep or rest from worries...
However, since the comparison is present here in a latent form, this turnover can be considered as a transitional case between metaphor and comparison.
Metaphor(gr. metaphor- transfer) - a type of trail based on the transfer of the properties of one object to another according to the principle of their similarity in any respect - in form, color, value, function, etc. (forest tent, golden head, river sleeps, bear- about an awkward person).
There are commonly used metaphors (see previous examples) and individual stylistic ones. The first are distinguished by somewhat erased figurativeness, automatism of use. Using them in works of art, the authors seek to revive, actualize the expressions that have already become stereotypical: "The immense vault of heaven resounded, moved apart even more immensely, it burns and breathes" (N. Gogol). The automated metaphor "vault of heaven" comes to life, being included in the metaphorical chain - "immense vault", "vault parted", "vault is burning and breathing"...
Individual stylistic metaphors are characterized by surprise, novelty and have a higher degree of expressiveness: "Life is a mouse running" (A. Pushkin); "A gift in vain, gift random, / Life, why are you given to me?" (A. Pushkin); "And you could play the nocturne / On drainpipe flute!"(V. Mayakovsky); "Heavy foreboding hoof hit Gritsatsuev in the heart "(I. Ilf and E. Petrov).
Metaphor has many varieties, transitional types, bringing it closer to other tropes. For example, there is such a kind of metaphor as a metaphorical epithet, which names not so much the real attribute of an object as a possible attribute borrowed from another sphere: "Neva sovereign flow", "sly dagger", "his yearning laziness" (A. Pushkin), "at dawn foggy youth" (A. Koltsov), "longing road, rail(A. Blok), " frog green country cars" (E. Bagritsky).
Metaphor is sometimes called a hidden or abbreviated comparison (Aristotle, Hegel). In contrast to comparison, in which both members of the comparison are present and there are usually unions ( as etc.), conjunctions are excluded in the metaphor, and the metaphor itself is a special semantic structure, a new integrity that preserves both the direct meaning of the word and the figurative, figurative one associated with it. In metaphor there is the possibility of discovering new meanings. The metaphor is not reduced to the sum of the compared phenomena, its meaning is multifaceted, "fluctuating" (Yu. Tynyanov): "In the heart lilies of the valley erupted forces"(S. Yesenin). The metaphorical meaning of the word "lilies of the valley" is based on the real signs of a flower - "delicate", "spring", "beautiful"; that is why the feeling that flared up in the heart is associated with this plant.
In some cases, the interpretation of the metaphorical meaning is difficult, since the chain of associations is subjective and complex, and the image arises on the basis of a combination of distant concepts ("associative image"). Poems of the early V. Mayakovsky, M. Tsvetaeva, O. Mandelstam, B. Pasternak, A. Voznesensky are full of similar metaphors.
Oh heaven, heaven, I will dream of you!
You can't be completely blind
And the day burned like a white page:
Some smoke and some ash!
(O. Mandelstam)
Despite the significant differences between comparison and metaphor, the boundary between them is not always clearly expressed. Some kinds of metaphor are easily converted into comparisons using an inserted conjunction. This is primarily a metaphor that governs the genitive case. It is referred to the transitional type of metaphors-comparisons: "rolls of lanterns" (B. Pasternak), i.e., lanterns, like rolls; "blade of sight" (M. Sholokhov) - a look like a blade; "Sea of Azov trough" (E. Bagritsky) - the Sea of Azov, like a trough.
A transitional type between metaphor and comparison is a nominal metaphor used as a predicate: "Life - deception with bewitching anguish"(S. Yesenin); "Your name - bird in hand/ Your name - ice on the tongue"(M. Tsvetaeva).
Some metaphors grow out of comparisons, developing and deepening them. For example, I. Bunin's poem "Falling Leaves" begins with a detailed comparison: "Forest, definitely a painted tower ... " In the future, on the basis of this comparison, a central metaphorical image grows: "And autumn, a quiet widow / Has now entered its tower."
A metaphorical image can cover a whole sentence or several sentences, making up a chain of metaphors of general semantics: "A fire of red mountain ash burns in the garden, / But it cannot warm anyone" (S. Yesenin). Rowan bonfire – the fire is burning – the fire is not warm...- such a metaphor is called expanded, or widespread.
"Virgin thickets of bird cherry and sweet cherry shyly stretched their roots into the spring cold and occasionally babble with leaves, as if angry and indignant, when a beautiful anemone - the night wind, sneaking up instantly, kisses them" (N. Gogol). In this example, two metaphorical rows make up a single complex image: 1) virgin thickets - the thickets stretched out their roots - the thickets babble, stretched timidly, angry and indignant; 2) beautiful anemone - wind; the wind creeps up and kisses them.
An expanded metaphor can make up a whole work. Such, for example, are the poems by E. Baratynsky "The Road of Life" and A. Pushkin "The Cart of Life". These are quite complex constructions in which developed metaphors, in essence, turn into allegories (allegory). So, Baratynsky's picture of driving along the postal road is transformed into an allegory: life is a road along which a person loses his "golden dreams" (another allegory with the meaning "dreams, passions, hopes of youth").
Metaphors are often used in the titles of works of art. In this case, they acquire a high degree of generalization, expressing the main idea of the work: "Smoke", "Noble Nest", "Thunderstorm", "Dead Souls", "Cliff", "Iron Stream" - all these are, in essence, symbolic metaphors.
Metaphor takes shape symbol with the concentration of artistic generalization, provided that it contains both concrete and generalized characterizing meanings, the latter predominating. The symbol is characterized by "fuzziness", the fuzziness of the meanings that it contains and which are largely determined by the historical conditions and the social position of the author. The traditional poetic symbol-metaphor is a storm. For Nekrasov and Gorky, the storm becomes a symbol of the revolution: "The storm would have struck or something ..." (N. Nekrasov); "Let the storm come on!" (M. Gorky).
Often the author makes a conscious attitude to identify the symbolic meaning of the depicted. In the novel "Smoke" by I. Turgenev, the hero watches clouds of smoke rushing past the windows of the train in which he rides, and - "everything suddenly seemed to him smoke, everything, his own life, Russian life - everything human, especially everything Russian. Everything is smoke and steam, he thought; everything seems to be constantly changing, everywhere new images, phenomena run after phenomena, but in essence everything is the same and the same ... ".
A kind of metaphor is metaphor-paraphrase, a descriptive expression in which a phrase, a sentence, or even several sentences is used instead of a single word: "But in what was he a true genius, / What did he know more firmly than all sciences ...<...>Was spider of tender passion, / Which Nazon sang ... "(A. Pushkin). Such a trope is called a riddle metaphor, the meaning of which follows from the context or extra-textual information (cultural context): steel cavalry"(S. Yesenin) - (i.e. tractor); "Autumn - red mare- scratches mane..." (S. Yesenin); "There is a camel, Desert Assargadon"(N. Zabolotsky). In the last two examples, the word in its direct meaning (a clue) precedes the paraphrase.
A modification of a metaphor can also be a metaphorical personification, or personification(lat. persona- mask, face and facio- I do), - the transfer of the properties of living beings to inanimate objects and phenomena. Natural phenomena are especially often personified: “It is difficult to say why, but it helped a lot to write the consciousness that behind the wall the old village garden flies all night long. I thought of him as a living being. He was silent and patiently waited for the time when I late in the evening I will go to the well for water for the kettle. Maybe it was easier for him to endure this endless night when he heard the strumming of a bucket and the steps of a man "(K. Paustovsky).
The road thought about the red evening,
Bushes of mountain ash are more foggy than depth.
Hut-old woman jaw threshold
Chews the odorous crumb of silence.
(S. Yesenin)
In A. Chekhov's story "The Steppe", the image of the steppe is based on numerous personifications of natural phenomena that saturate the entire text. Lonely poplar, "tanned" hills, wind and rain, birds - everything is likened to living beings, everything thinks and feels ... This is how a metaphorical symbol is born, associated with the artist's thoughts about happiness, about the homeland, about time, about the meaning of life: "And in the triumph of beauty, in an excess of happiness, you feel tension and anguish, as if the steppe realizes that it is lonely, that its wealth and inspiration perish for nothing for the world, praised by no one and no one needs, and through the joyful roar you hear its dreary, hopeless call: the singer ! singer!"
Sometimes personification is expressed through anthropomorphization, the image of inanimate phenomena, in particular, abstract concepts, by endowing them with human properties.
AND, tormented by an ominous thought,
Full of black dreams
And did not count the enemies.
With a sad look is he dipped
tribe of their mountains,
He put his hat on his eyebrows,
And forever calmed down.
(M. Lermontov)
Tearful autumn like a widow
In black robes all hearts cloud,
Going through men's words,
She is won't stop crying.
(A. Akhmatova)
So, there are the following varieties of metaphor: 1) the actual metaphor: "Not a person - snake!" (A. Griboedov), 2) a metaphor-epithet - "radiance unsatisfied eyes"(A. Akhmatova), 3) metaphor-comparison - "Centuries-lanterns, oh how many of you are in the dark" (V. Bryusov), 4) metaphor-paraphrase - "That was desert eternal guest- a mighty leopard" (M. Lermontov), 5) a metaphor-personification - "About the red evening thought the road(S. Yesenin), 6) metaphor-symbol - "mortal thoughts water cannon"(F. Tyutchev), 7) metaphor-allegory - "the road of life" (E. Baratynsky).
A metaphorical expression can be used in a literary text and in the literal sense - in its literal deployment. This is the so-called realization of a metaphor, a technique that sometimes creates a comic effect: "There is a moon in the sky so young that it is risky to let her out without companions"(V. Mayakovsky). In Mayakovsky's poem "A Cloud in Pants" the metaphor "fire of the heart" is realized in this way: "A charred kiss has grown on a face that burns from a crack in the lips"; "At the church of the heart the choir is engaged"; "Scorched figurines of words and numbers from a skull, like children from a burning building."
Another important type of trails is metonymy(gr. meta- turn, entanglement- name, name). Metonymy is a trope based on contiguity association. Instead of the name of one object, the name of another is used, associated with the first spatial, temporal or logical adjacency: I ate three bowls(capable instead of containing), in the cabinet crystal and silver(material and product from it), read Pushkin(author's name instead of his work), love" Anna Karenina"(artwork and its title), etc.
Metonymy is widely used in colloquial speech, which can be seen from the above examples of general language metonymy with erased figurativeness. In artistic texts, such metonyms are used both in the speech of characters and in the author's speech and serve as a means of stylizing a conversational manner. So, in "Eugene Onegin" there are many cases of the use of metonymic combinations with stylistic colloquial coloring, which are not particularly expressive: Phaedra, Cleopatra, Moina cause ... "(i.e. actresses playing these roles); "But also Didlo I'm tired of "(ballets staged by Didelot);" Amber and bronze on the table" (works made of amber and bronze); " Parterre and armchairs- everything is in full swing" (audience in the stalls); " Martyn Zadeka became later / Tanya's Favorite "(a fortune-telling book, the compiler of which was the mythical Martyn Zadek); "So that every morning Take / On duty to drain three bottles" (a restaurant owned by Bury).
But in the same novel, the poet transforms the common metonymy into figurative:
Napoleon waited in vain
Moscow kneeling
With the keys of the old Kremlin.
No, my Moscow did not go To him with a guilty head.
Not a holiday, not an accepting gift,
She was preparing a fire
An impatient hero.
Moscow here is not only a metonymic image (the population of the capital), but also a personification (kneeling, with a surrendered head).
Literary speech includes metonymic periphrases like "on banks of the Neva"(In Petersburg), "under the skies of Schiller and Goethe"(in Germany), "singer Gulnara imitating" (Byron), "he is holy for the grandchildren of Apollo"(poets). These are traditional metonymic paraphrases characteristic of the poetry of the 18th - the first half of the 19th century.
In lyrical works, metonymy, including metonymic paraphrases, serve as a means of emotional thickening of poetic speech, focusing on the mental states of the characters. For example, Pushkin's poem "For the shores of the distant homeland..." is woven from metonymic paraphrases. A group of these paths allegorically designate Italy (the shores of the distant homeland, another land, under an ever blue sky, in the shade of olives), Russia (a foreign land, from the land of gloomy exile), there are also periphrases with the meaning "you died" (You fell asleep with your last sleep ./Your beauty, your suffering.../Disappeared in the coffin urn), etc.
Metonymy has the ability to create a comic effect with a non-standard combination of words, which make it possible to perceive a single detail as a personification: "Court and life" came on the other hand and said touchy..." (I. Ilf and E. Petrov). Here "Court and Life" is an employee of the department of the newspaper with this name. "Suddenly, as if breaking loose, both halls danced and behind them the veranda also danced"(M. Bulgakov). Metonymy can also become the basis for a pun (word game): "From this history happened story"(N. Gogol). Two meanings of the word (1 - an event, 2 - a story about it) are put into metonymic relations.
In M. Bulgakov's novel The Master and Margarita, the name of the writer's restaurant, located in the house where Griboedova's aunt allegedly lived, is punning. In common parlance, the restaurant was called "At Griboedov", hence the remark of the poet Bezrodny: "I'll search Griboyedov for the time being."
Basically, metonymy is expressed with the help of nouns, however, metonymy is also found among adjectives: metonymy of a feature. Bulgakov's "man in a lilac coat" (direct meaning) turns into a "lilac client", "lilac foreigner"; a character in checkered trousers - into a "checkered citizen", "checkered specialist", just "checkered".
But, apparently, with such a non-normative combination of words, semantic transformations arise, and we are dealing with a combination of the tropes of metaphor and metonymy. Pushkin's "crafty dagger" is deceptive, treacherous, dangerous, unfaithful - the properties of both a person and an object. Thus, "evil" is a metaphor (metaphorical epithet) and metonymy.
A variation of metonymy is synecdoche (Gr. synexdoche- correlation). The essence of synecdoche is that the object as a whole is designated through its part, some detail that becomes a "representative" of these objects: a herd of twenty heads, lists of invited persons etc. Synecdoche is widespread in colloquial speech. Words that name parts of the human body (arm, leg, head, face, etc.), clothing items (fur coat, hat, boots), tools (feather, shovel) - in the meaning of "man", the use of the singular instead of the plural , the replacement of a generic concept by a specific one and vice versa - all this is replicated in everyday speech and is endowed with moderate expressiveness. Examples of such synecdoches in the language of fiction primarily serve as a means of creating a conversational style both in the speech of the characters and in the author's speech: " Beard! Why are you still silent?"; "On one sofa lies a lieutenant in a hat and sleeps ... "Get up!" the doctor wakes up papakha"(A. Chekhov); "He was famous feather in the province "(I. Goncharov); "The driver threw the door, / Slows down: "Sit down, infantry,/cheeks rubbed with snow "(A. Tvardovsky).
Sometimes a synecdoche, naming a character by the details of clothing, becomes a means of his social characterization: "Salop says chuyke, chuyka salopu..."(V. Mayakovsky). Chuyka is the upper men's clothing of merchants and townspeople, the coat is women's. "And at the door jackets, overcoats, sheepskin coats"(sailors, soldiers, peasants). In I. Ilf and E. Petrov's novel "The Golden Calf", the synecdoche "pique vests" creates an ironic image of "the wreckage of the pre-war commercial Chernomorsk." In some contexts, it becomes possible to interpret the phrase as personification, which enhances expressiveness and gives the image a touch of comic: "Pique vests gathered closer and stretched chicken necks"; "a herd of pique vests."
Metonymy and synecdoche, rising to the point of generalization, can become a metonymic symbol that expresses a polysemantic author's idea. In M. Tsvetaeva's poem "Night Swallows of Intrigue ..." the word raincoat at first it is used simply to designate clothes, i.e. in the literal sense, and then grows into a symbolic metonymic image, which, in turn, acts as a personification ("Cloak, kneeling, / Cloak, assuring: - it's dark!").
Night Swallows Intrigue -
Raincoats! - Winged Heroes
high society adventures.
Cloak flaunting a hole
Cape of the player and rogues,
Cloak - Rogue, cloak - Cupid.
Cloak, playful as a fleece,
Cloak that bends the knee
Cloak, assuring: - dark!
Watch horns. - The roar of the Seine -
Casanova's cloak, Lauzin's cloak,
Antoinette Dominoes.
The traditional metonymic symbol is the image of the Muse. In N. Nekrasov's poem "Yesterday, at six o'clock ..." the poetic cliché receives a new meaning: Muse is the sister of a young peasant woman who is beaten with a whip. This is already a real, concrete and at the same time metonymic image - a symbol of the people. Thus, in the subtext, the idea arises of the connection between the poetry of Nekrasov and the people, which is achieved by juxtaposing two metonymic images.
Do not confuse synecdoche with detail. The detail is not the name of the whole, that is, it is not used in a figurative sense. So, the button that broke away from the uniform of Makar Devushkin and rolled to the feet of "His Excellency" ("Poor People" by F. Dostoevsky) is a very important, symbolic detail, but this is not a synecdoche: "Everything is lost! All reputation is lost, all the man is gone!"
Epithet(gr. epitheton- letters, appendix). Despite the fact that the term "epithet" is one of the oldest and most commonly used terms in stylistics, there is currently no unity in its definition. There is a narrow and broad interpretation of the epithet. In the narrow sense of the word, the epithet is a tropeic means, i.e., epithets include metaphorical and metonymic definitions and circumstances.
A metaphorical epithet calls not a real sign, but transferred from another object on the basis of some similarity - " thoughtful nights", "flame greedy", "monotonous noise of life "(A. Pushkin)," solemnly and regal it was night" (I. Turgenev), "peals rumble young"(F. Tyutchev).
A metonymic epithet denotes a feature transferred from another object on the basis of adjacency, - "bold lorgnette" (M. Lermontov), "lonely dawn", " snowy noise "(S. Yesenin).
A broader understanding of the epithet suggests the recognition of the existence of both tropeic and non-tropical epithets. The latter include definitions and circumstances (adverbs answering the question "how?"), which contain emotional, evaluative, expressive shades that express the subjective attitude of the author or character to a particular person or object. From Baratynsky:
feigned do not demand tenderness from me,
I will not hide the coldness of my heart sad.
You're right, it doesn't have beautiful fire
My original love.
The accuracy and emotional richness of Pushkin's epithets are remarkable:
My cooling arms
They tried to keep you...
Not cold, but cooling... The epithet here emphasizes the futility of trying to keep the beloved.
From Lermontov:
Tears hot as a flame
inhuman tear!
A hot tear is a metaphorical epithet that is not very expressive. Its expression is enhanced by the comparison "like a flame", but special expressiveness is achieved with the help of an emotional-evaluative epithet - "an inhuman tear".
The assessment expressed by the epithet can be both positive and negative. "Sweet, kind, old, tender./ You don’t make friends with sad thoughts, ”Yesenin’s appeal to his mother determines the tone of the epithet.“ Hands were dirty, greasy, red, with black nails" (F. Dostoevsky) is an example of epithets with a negative meaning.
Non-tropical epithets also include pictorial epithets, with the help of which the real physical properties of the material world are fixed: color, smell, taste, etc. steep high clouds, golden gray with delicate white edges ... "(I. Turgenev); "This fog was variously colored. In it were pink, then gold, then blue and lilac, then purple and bronze, wide and blurry spots "(K. Paustovsky); "And the nights are dark, warm, with purple clouds, were calm, calm. Sleepily ran and flowed babble sleepy poplars. Zarnitsa carefully flashed over dark Troshin forest - and warm, dry smelled of oak" (I. Bunin). In the last example, the dim, at first glance erased epithets "dark", "warm" stand in a context that actualizes their figurative meaning by repeating the emotional "calm", using the metaphorical definition of "sleepy", "sleepy", word order in a sentence, intonation, etc. In other words, the degree of figurativeness of an epithet, its depth depends not only on the word itself, but also on the words and other linguistic means adjacent to it in the context.
And yet, the poets are driven by the desire to find bright and unusual epithets. Most often, in this case, they resort to non-standard, non-normative compatibility of the epithet with the noun. So, color adjectives refer to nouns denoting color, sound, smell, resulting in a kind of synthesis of sensations. Such epithets are called synesthetic:"azure voice" (F. Sologub), "purple smell of sage" (M. Voloshin), "green rustles" (A. Akhmatova). As a rule, synesthetic epithets are classified as metonymic.
Unexpected phrases in B. Pasternak's poem "Winter Morning":
Wadded, frozen and flannel, fort
The same horror of birches nestless
Harusnaya night than light rolls over tea,
Winter bewildered air.
Used here occasional, i.e. created for this case, epithets - "fortkovy", "without nests"; the meaning of individual words does not have an exact definition, but the general impression is created for the reader. And behind all these details is the mood of the author himself, his perception of the picture of a winter morning. Occasional epithets are often found in Mayakovsky ("the street is writhing tongueless","the royal will lie down in about the fried sand,"heart isohanous","evening... gloomy, december").
Unusual epithets also arise with the help of oxymoronic phrases, when simultaneously incompatible, even contradictory properties are attributed to the same object: "the living dead" (E. Baratynsky), "taste the sweetest pain" (A. Blok), "merry sadness" (And Severyanin), "ice fire of wine" (V. Bryusov).
The epithet is, in all likelihood, the earliest method of separating poetic speech from the level of everyday speech. The antiquity of this technique is evidenced by folklore epithets, which are also called permanent. AT Russian folk art constantly appear: dark forest, blue sea, clear field, high tower, oak table, eastern saber, good fellow, beautiful girl etc.
Various literary trends also formed their own circle of epithets. For sentimentalists, for example, the following phrases are indicative: “gentle, meek nightingale”, “sweet nectar drinks”, “sweet hope rejoice”, “mourn the poor mortals share”, “in humble rural huts”, “sensitive, kind old woman”, “ dear, dear Erasmus" (N. Karamzin). Epithets typical of romantic poetry: "to all fiery hearts" (E. Baratynsky), "and fatal passions everywhere", "sweet dreams", "terrible visions" (A. Pushkin), "clothed with grave twilight", "with the joy of mystery "," a witness of those magical days "(M. Lermontov).
The epithet in the text is usually closely connected with other tropes - metaphors, personifications, metonyms, comparisons, as a result of which a complex artistic image is created:
Where there are cabbage patches
Sunrise pours red water...
(S. Yesenin)
It would be wrong to single out the epithet "red" here, since it is part of the metaphor "red water" - the light of the rising sun. To remove the epithet here means to destroy the metaphor.
And the night is like a harlot
Watched shamelessly
On dark faces, in sore eyes.
A chain of paths (the night looked - like a harlot - shamelessly), where the epithet "shamelessly" is associated with the comparison "like a harlot", thus, constitutes a single image (metaphor - personification - comparison - epithet).
The epithet, receiving a generalized meaning, acquiring additional meanings and shades, turns into a symbol. Usually the symbolic meaning is given through epithet, i.e., repeated throughout the entire work, cycle of poems, sometimes even the entire work of the poet. In L. Andreev's story "Red Laughter" the word "red" is the symbolic reference image. "Yes, they sang - everything was around red with blood. The sky itself seemed red, and one might think that some catastrophe had taken place in the whole universe, some strange change and disappearance of colors: blue and green and other familiar and quiet colors disappeared, and the sun lit up red Bengali fire. – "Red laughter," I said. "Something huge red, bloody stood over me and laughed toothlessly. "From the very wall of the house to the cornice, an even fiery red sky.<...>And below him lay the same flat dark red field, and it was covered with corpses. "Outside the window in the crimson and moving light stood red laugh. Here the image of "red laughter" symbolizes the horror of war, its bloody, terrible and senseless power.
The context of the entire work of S. Yesenin creates a special feeling of blue-blue tones that prevail in the poet's palette, and this, in turn, gives rise to emotional elation, an attractive "halo" of an object, phenomenon.
In the evening blue moonlit evening
I used to be handsome and young.
The heart has cooled, and the eyes have faded ...
Blue happiness! Lunar nights.
paraphrase(paraphrase) (gr. periphrasis- retelling, roundabout) - replacing a word with an allegorical descriptive expression. In Pushkin: "The spring of my days has rushed"; "spring of days" - youth; "My noon has come" - maturity has come.
In fiction, paraphrase is most often a trope - metonymy or metaphor. "All flags will visit us" (A. Pushkin) - a metonymic paraphrase (ships of all nations will arrive in St. Petersburg); "Bee from wax cells/flies for field tribute"(A. Pushkin) - here there are two metaphorical paraphrases at once.
Paraphrases were especially widely used in the literature of the 18th and early 19th centuries. The ornateness of allegorical expressions was even considered an indispensable attribute of poetic language in the era of classicism, sentimentalism and romanticism. In early Pushkin, periphrases are common, but gradually the poet abandons them. In realistic literature, periphrases persist, but they are no longer as pretentious and far-fetched as they were in the 18th century. Here is a paraphrase with the meaning "painting" by M. Lomonosov: "The art by which Apelles was glorified, / And by which now Rome has lifted up its head ..." And here are the traditional romantic paraphrases with the meaning "death" by E. Baratynsky:
We have been given youth for a while;
Until the fatal housewarming
Live is not bad for fun.
Still full, my dear friend,
Before us is the cup of sweet life;
But death, perhaps, this very hour
He will overturn her with a mockery, -
And instantly in the heart the blood will cool,
And the underground house will hide us!
"A full cup of life" symbolizes youth, the fullness of being; "underground house" - grave, coffin; "fatal housewarming" - death.
Paraphrases give the poet the opportunity to vary the expression of one thought, one theme. So, romantic poets find more and more new expressions for the theme of death, traditional in their work. Pushkin: "You fell asleep with your last sleep"; "You are already for your poet / Dressed in grave twilight, / And for you your friend has faded away"; "Your beauty, your suffering / Disappeared in the coffin urn..."; "The storm has died, the color is beautiful / Withered at the dawn, / The fire on the altar went out! .."
Paraphrases are often used as applications or invocations. In this case, they emphasize some important properties of a person or object. "Satyrs are a bold ruler,/ Fonvizin shone, friend of freedom..." (A. Pushkin); "The Poet died!– slave of honor..." (M. Lermontov); "The blue homeland of Firdusi ,/ G Gee you can’t, having caught a cold with your memory, / Forget about the affectionate Urus ... "(S. Yesenin).
Allegory(gr. allegoria- allegory) - a trope in which an abstract thought is expressed in an objective image. The allegory has two plans - along with the specific imagery, the allegory also has a semantic plan, which is the main one. The semantic plan is either openly indicated in an allegorical text, as, for example, in fable morality, or requires a special commentary. So, I. Krylov's fable "The Wolf and the Lamb" is preceded by a moral that reveals the meaning of the further narration: "The strong always blame the weak." The main idea of the fable is presented here in an extremely open form. Lines from Lomonosov's ode:
And now Minerva strikes
In the tops of the Riphean with a copy ...
require clarification. Minerva - in ancient mythology, the goddess of wisdom, which in this case means science, with whose help the treasures (minerals) of the Ural Mountains become available.
Allegory was widely used in medieval literature, during the Renaissance, Baroque and Classicism. Abstract concepts - Truth, Virtue, Wisdom, Conscience, etc. - act as actors in poetry and prose. Often mythological characters were also filled with allegorical content. Sumarokov characterized the epic style of his time as follows:
Minerva - wisdom in him, Diana - purity,
Love is Cupid, Venus is beauty.
Almost any event could be depicted as the action of mythological figures. In Lomonosov's ode "On the day of the accession to the throne of Empress Elisaveta Petrovna, 1747" one of the key images is "silence" (peace). She becomes an allegorical figure of a woman spreading abundance around her - a consequence of the world. Elizabeth, presented in the ode as the protector of the world, "kissed the silence."
In fables and parables, allegorical sound is achieved with the help of images of animals, which are assigned certain moral qualities: the fox is cunning, the donkey is stupid, the wolf is evil and bloodthirsty, etc.
For all its semantic transparency, allegory is sometimes complicated by additional semantic and artistic nuances, especially when it is personified, that is, it coincides with personification. An example of such a complicated allegory is F. Tyutchev's poem "Madness":
There in cheerful carelessness
The miserable madness lives on.
It is looking for something in the clouds with its glassy eyes.
<...>
Hearing something with a greedy ear
With secret contentment on the forehead.
And he thinks that he hears boiling strings,
What hears the current of underground waters,
And their lullaby singing
And a noisy exit from the earth! ..
The meaning of this allegory is that "mad" people are able to feel the secret life of nature, inaccessible to an ordinary person.
In the 19th century, allegories gradually fell into disuse and are found only in a few writers. So, in the fairy tales of M. Saltykov-Shchedrin, allegory is combined with fantasy and hyperbole. His images of animals satirically embody various social types: "The Wise Gudgeon", "The Eagle-Maecenas", "The Sane Hare", "The Bear in the Voivodship". The writer often accompanies allegories with hints of their hidden meaning. For example, the idea of the fairy tale "The Eagle-Patron" is expressed in the conclusion: "eagles are harmful for enlightenment" - a kind of morality, as in a fable or a fairy tale.
Allegory is close to symbol. These paths often intermingle. The difference between them is that the allegory has one meaning, while the symbol has many meanings, and its meanings cannot always be clearly defined.
Symbol(gr. symbolon sign, identification mark). Every symbol is an image, and every image is, at least to some extent, a symbol, according to S. Averintsev. A symbol is, first of all, a generalized image that includes many associative features. The symbol is multi-valued and cannot be reduced to an unambiguous logical definition. When perceiving a symbol, it is necessary to do mental work, the purpose of which is to decipher the structure of complex symbols. In Dante's Divine Comedy, specific images are filled with symbolic meaning. So, Beatrice is a symbol of pure femininity, the Mount of Purgatory is a symbol of spiritual ascent, but these are symbols that, in turn, require interpretation.
In some cases, the author himself discovers the meaning of the depicted. For example, in F. Tyutchev's poem "Look how in the open space of the river ...", a specific image is initially given: a stream with ice floes floating along it, and only a few words hint at the allegorical generalizing meaning of the work: all the ice floes "merge with the fatal abyss", all are heading "into the all-encompassing sea." And in the last stanza, the symbolic meaning of the images is revealed: the stream is life, time as such, ice floes are analogues of the fate of a particular person.
Oh, our thought is a generalization,
You human self!
Isn't that your meaning?
Isn't that your fate?
Of course, when deciphering symbols (recall that a symbol is not limited to one meaning), their meaning willy-nilly becomes impoverished.
In principle, every element of an art system can be a symbol: a path, an artistic detail, and even the hero of a work of art. The acquisition of symbolic meaning is facilitated by a number of specific conditions: 1) the repetition and stability of the image, which makes it the so-called "through image", 2) the significance of the image in revealing the idea of the work or in the system of the writer's work as a whole, 3) the image's belonging to the cultural or literary context (traditional antique or biblical symbols).
One of the most characteristic motives of Lermontov's work is the motive of loneliness, embodied in a number of symbolic images. This is a pine tree on a bare peak ("In the wild north ..."), a prisoner in a dungeon ("Prisoner", "Neighbor", "Captured Knight"), a leaf torn off by a storm ("Leaf"), a lonely ship ("Sail" ) etc.
An important symbolic detail in B. Pasternak's novel "Doctor Zhivago" is the image of a candle burning in the room on Christmas Eve, on the eve of Lara's dramatic shot at Komarovsky. In Yuri Zhivago's subconscious, the image of Lara remains associated with a candle ("And his destiny began in his life"). No wonder the image of a candle appears in a poem dedicated to Lara:
Melo, melo all over the earth
To all limits.
A candle burned on the table.
The candle was burning.
On the illuminated ceiling
The shadows lay
Crossed arms, crossed legs,
Crossing fates.
The symbolic meaning of the detail is not revealed by the author directly, it is present in the subtext: a candle is the light of love, destiny.
In the art of the Romantics, a symbolic landscape is widely represented, expressing the incomprehensible to the mind. Separate elements of nature - the sea, forest, sky, mountains - act as symbols in a romantic landscape. But even in the literature of the 20th century, in which ideas about the interaction of man and nature become more complicated, the landscape in the work of some artists retains philosophical symbolic richness. A good example of this is the prose of I. Bunin. The sea in his personifies world life - primeval, pre-temporal, eternal. "Beyond the gate, in an endless dark abyss, the sea roared all night - prematurely, drowsily, with an incomprehensible, menacing grandeur. Sometimes I went out under the gate: the end of the earth and pitch darkness, strong smelling fog and cold waves blow, the noise either subsides or grows , rises like the noise of a wild forest ... The abyss and night, something blind and restless, somehow uterine and hard living, hostile and meaningless ... "
The term "symbol" is used in different meanings and in different fields of activity. It is operated by logic, mathematics, philosophy, religion, semantics, semiotics, art and poetry. Common to all meanings is the property of the symbol "to imply something more, to hint at some kind of understatement." The symbol "is always determined by the translucence of the general species in the particular or the universal in the individual, in other words, the translucence ("light") of eternity - in the moment ".
In literature, the symbol is the central concept of the trend that arose at the end of the 19th century and is known as "symbolism", but there it has a special meaning, expressing ideas that are beyond sensory perceptions.
Distinguish individual and traditional symbol. The traditional one contains well-known associations and is used as a ready-made image (a lyre is a symbol of poetry in general, a bowl, a goblet, a phial are symbols of life, etc.). The sources of traditional symbolism are mythology, in particular biblical and ancient, literary tradition, philosophical concepts. Individual symbolism is revealed when getting acquainted with all the artist's work. A traditional symbol can be filled with new meanings, transformed, and become individual. The traditional symbol of loneliness - the desert is often used by Lermontov, but in different poems of the poet the meaning of this word expands, a general, complex meaning of the symbol is formed. "For the heat of the soul, wasted in the desert...". Here the desert is a secular society. "In the crowd of people and in the midst of deserted deserts / In him, the quiet flame of feeling has not died out ..." The desert is Siberian penal servitude, the land of exile; "The night is quiet; the desert listens to God, / And the star speaks to the star." The desert is an image of a deserted night Earth, aspiring to heaven, to God, a cosmic view of the Earth.
The symbolism of each great poet gives an idea of the poetic model of the world that he creates in his work.
Emblem(gr. emblema- insert, convex decoration) - an allegory in which an abstract concept is compared with concrete objects, the spiritual is equated with the material. However, the concreteness of the emblem is illusory. This is not real, but imaginary reality. So, the image of a heart pierced by an arrow, at first glance, is completely concrete, but the meaning of this image - love - is abstract.
Historically, the emblem arose as an explanatory inscription under the image of individual objects in mythological, biblical and historical scenes in art and literary collections. Emblems were widely used in the Middle Ages, in the aesthetics of baroque, classicism and romanticism, but already in the second quarter of the 19th century, the use of emblems in literature was drastically on the wane.
The emblem bears a certain resemblance to allegory: both are allegorical tropes. The sources of both are ancient and biblical myths, legends and heraldry (the compilation, interpretation and study of coats of arms). But, as A. Potebnya noted in "Lectures on the Theory of Literature", the allegory is plot-driven and dynamic, while the emblem is static.
In the poetry of the 18th century, the emblem dominated, forming complex allegorical images that require some preparation for their understanding. For example, glorifying the peace-loving policy of Elizabeth, Lomonosov resorts to such emblems:
And sword your, laurels entwined,
Not naked, stopped the war.
The sword is the emblem of war, the laurels are the emblem of glory. A sword entwined with laurels is a famous Russian weapon, the mere presence of which is enough not to open hostilities.
V. Trediakovsky has a similar image: "Sword her, olive entwined..." The olive is also the emblem of peace, thus the phrase means: peace reigned.
The names of animals and objects depicted on coats of arms and flags became the emblems of states: in Russia - an eagle, in Turkey - the moon. That is why G. Derzhavin, wishing to say that Russia defeated Turkey, writes: "...eagle/ Over the ancient kingdom of Mithridates / Flies and darkens the moon."
The attributes of various mythological figures are emblematic: the bow, arrows and Cupid's torch, associated with the image of a love feeling; lyre, tsevnitsa, a wreath of flowers, a wreath of laurels are the emblems of poetry and poetic glory. Lensky's drawings in Olga's album are traditional emblem stamps that are designed to convey the feelings of the young poet:
That in them draws rural views,
Tombstone, temple of Cyprida...
The reader of the 1820s easily perceived the meaning of such drawings: Lensky speaks of his "love to the grave" (Kyprida is the goddess of love). "Or a dove on a lyre" - poetry serves love. Christian emblems were also easily deciphered - a cross, a lampada, a candle, etc.
The 18th century odic tradition of using geographical emblems continued into the next century. Pushkin and Lermontov have numerous names associated with the Caucasus and bringing a special exoticism to Russian poetry: "Aragva makes noise before me ...", "Besht stands pointed / And green Mashuk ..." (A. Pushkin); "In the deep gorge of the Darial / Where the Terek digs in the darkness..." (M. Lermontov).
In the 20th century, in Soviet poetry, new emblematic images appeared, brought to life by official ideology - the hammer and sickle, October, the Kremlin, May:
Flag, overflowing with fire
Blooming like the dawn
And thin gold on it
Three virtues burn:
That the hammer free labor,
Serpa cast bend,
five pointed star
With a golden border.
(N. Tikhonov)
New emblems are compared with the old ones in S. Yesenin's poem "Russovetskaya":
I'll give my whole soul October and may,
But only lyre I won't give up my dear.
Hyperbola(gr. hyperbole- exaggeration) - a technique based on the exaggeration of the properties of the subject. "Told you a thousand times!" - in colloquial speech. Hyperbole is also used in artistic speech: "The entire surface of the earth seemed to be a green-gold ocean, over which millions of different colors splashed" (N. Gogol).
Hyperbole is one of the most important artistic means of folklore. In the heroic epic, the description of the appearance of the characters, their strength, feasts, etc. is presented with extreme exaggeration in order to create the image of a hero. Here is how the battle of Dobrynia and his comrade with the Tatars is depicted:
And they began to beat the great powerhouse.
And where they go, it will fall like a street,
Ai will turn, so the lanes will fall.
They fought here for a whole day
Don't give up and don't beer
Yes, they beat the great power.
A necessary accessory of the ode was hyperbole in the poetry of classicism:
Oh! if now all Russians
A burning thought opened up to you,
That would be a gloomy night from these pleasures
Changed forever.
(M. Lomonosov)
Sentimentalists created their own traditional hyperbole associated with the manifestation of feelings:
With a smile on your lips, dry the rivers of tears,
Flowing from the eyes, sadly burdened!
(N. Karamzin)
The poetics of romanticism is characterized by the high style of hyperbole: "Wonderful air is both cool and stuffy, and full of bliss, and moves an ocean of fragrance", "the majestic thunder of the Ukrainian nightingale is pouring" (N. Gogol). Danko's heart "blazed like the sun, and brighter than the sun" (M. Gorky).
Hyperbole can also create a comic intonation, which is typical, for example, of Gogol's style: "a mouth the size of the arch of the General Staff"; "harem trousers as wide as the Black Sea"; "Ivan Nikiforovich, on the contrary, has trousers in such wide folds that if they were blown up, the whole yard with barns and buildings could be placed in them."
Most often, hyperbole is a trope - a metaphor or comparison, sometimes an epithet: "And this fry, like a leviathan ,/ Floats on sea sunsets..." (E. Bagritsky); "Oh, I wish I knew that it happens, / When I set off on my debut, / That lines of blood – they kill, / They will gush in their throats and kill them!"(B. Pasternak); "Above this frantic grub...";"The earth is bursting with heat. Thermometer exploded"(E. Bagritsky).
Sometimes hyperbole is expressed by cardinal numbers: "In one hundred and forty suns the sunset burned" (V. Mayakovsky); "We are darkness and darkness" (A. Blok); "Twilight is set on me chi/Thousand binoculars on axis"(B. Pasternak). In this case, one speaks of subject exaggeration, i.e., these are not tropeic hyperbolas, but, as they are called, verbal-objective. With the help of such hyperbolas, F. Rabelais describes the meal of the giant Gargantua, who "began his dinner with several dozen hams, smoked tongues and sausages, caviar and other snacks preceding wine. At this time, four servants, one after another, continuously threw full spatulas into his mouth mustard." This kind of hyperbole was also used by Mayakovsky in the poem "150,000,000", creating the image of "one Ivan".
The opposite of hyperbole is litotes(gr. litotes- letters, simplicity), i.e., the underestimation of any qualities of the subject. Like hyperbole, litotes are used to enhance the expressiveness of speech: "What tiny cows! There are, really, less than a pinhead"(I. Krylov); "Waist in any way no thicker than a bottle neck"(N. Gogol); "The world is great, and I a grain of sand in this world(M. Twain).
Irony(gr. eironia- letters. pretense) - an allegory expressing mockery. When using irony, a word or statement acquires in the context a meaning that is opposite to the literal meaning or calls it into question. Thus, under the guise of approval, even admiration, there is a negative attitude towards the object, even a mockery of it.
I only notice in brackets
That there is no contemptible slander,
That there is no such nonsense
Not an epigram of the areal,
Which would be your friend with a smile,
In the circle of decent people
Without any malice and undertakings,
Did not repeat a hundred times by mistake;
And yet, he is a mountain for you:
He loves you so much... Like a native!
(A. Pushkin)
Some researchers attribute irony to tropes, since words in an ironic text are used not in their usual meaning, but in the opposite, i.e., there is a change in meaning (semantic shift). In Pushkin's text, this refers to the words "without malice and undertakings", "mistake", "he is a mountain for you", "loves", "like a native" ...
Irony is the discovery of the absurdity of a positive characteristic of an object. Chatsky in "Woe from Wit" says "about the mind of Molchalin, about the soul of Skalozub." I. Ilf and E. Petrov in "The Twelve Chairs" give an ironic description to the "intellectual locksmith" Polesov, who was "not only a brilliant locksmith, but also a brilliant lazybones. Among handicraftsmen with a motor<...>he was the most sluggish and the most misguided."
The highest degree of irony is sarcasm(gr. Sarcasos- letters, I tear meat) - a judgment containing a caustic mockery of the depicted. Unlike irony, where allegory exists, in sarcasm allegory is weakened or absent altogether. A negative assessment in the text often follows an imaginary praise: "You will fall asleep, surrounded by care / Dear and beloved family / (Waiting for your death with impatience)" (N. Nekrasov). Sarcasm is characterized by a tone of indignation, indignation, therefore it has become widespread in oratory, as well as in lyrical and didactic genres: "In which servant's room did / you study this knightly technique?" (F. Tyutchev).
Antithesis(gr. antithesis- opposition) - a technique of contrast, based on a sharp opposition of images or concepts. The antithesis is based on the use of antonyms - words with the opposite meaning, and antonyms can also be contextual, i.e. antonyms only in this context, as, for example, in M. Tsvetaeva:
Do not love, rich, - poor,
Do not love, scientist, - stupid,
Do not love, ruddy, - pale,
Do not love, good, - harmful,
Golden - copper half.
In the work of some poets, antithesis sometimes becomes one of the principles of poetics and thinking (Byron, Lermontov, Blok). A. Blok, with the help of antithesis, emphasizes the heterogeneity and inconsistency of life, in which, nevertheless, everything is interconnected:
Erase random features -
And you will see: the world is beautiful.
Find out where light,- understand where dark.
Let everything go slowly
What's in the world holy, what's in it sinfully
Through heat souls through chill mind.
In the poetry of the classicists and romantics, the antithesis acts as an aesthetic and philosophical principle of the polarity of human nature:
And hate we, and love we accidentally
without sacrificing anything malice neither love,
And reigns in the soul of some cold secret,
When the fire boils in the chest.
Could only be found in a person
sacred with vicious.
(M. Lermontov)
Antitheses are used in the titles of works of art, emphasizing the main ideological opposition of this text - "War and Peace", "Fathers and Sons", "The Living and the Dead", "Rich Man, Poor Man".
There is a stylistic device opposite to the antithesis. It does not consist in opposition, but in denial, in "repulsion" from the extreme degrees of manifestation of any quality. "A gentleman was sitting in the britzka, not handsome, but also not bad looking, neither too fat nor too thin; can't say so that old, however, and not too young"(N. Gogol).
A kind of antithesis is oxymoron(or oxymoron) (gr. oxymoron- letters. witty-stupid) is a paradoxical phrase in which conflicting properties are attributed to an object, which contributes to the expressive perception of the text. Most often, an oxymoron is represented by a combination of an adjective with a noun, sometimes an adverb with a verb: "a living corpse" (L. Tolstoy), "sad fun" (I. Bunin), "looks into the eyes with impudent modesty" (A. Blok), " it is fun for her to be sad so smartly naked" (A. Akhmatova).
Repeat- a technique expressed in the repeated use of the same words and expressions. The so-called lexical or verbal repetition has a different "picture", a different structure. For example, doubling, or double repetition of the word: "And again, again snow / Covered up traces ... "(A. Blok); "Love love- says the legend ... "(F. Tyutchev). The repeating chain of words can be longer: "Rifles black belts, / All around - lights, lights, lights...(A. Blok).
Repeating nouns can have definitions with different arrangements: "Tatiana, dear Tatiana!" (A. Pushkin); "Misty morning, gray morning..." (I. Turgenev); "Winds, winds, oh snowy winds..."; "Rus, my wooden Rus!" (S. Yesenin).
One of the common types of repetition in poetry is anaphora(gr. anaphora- letters. unanimity) - repetition of the initial word in several lines, stanzas, phrases:
Do not sleep, don't sleep, work
Don't stop working
Do not sleep, fight the drowsiness
Like a pilot, like a star.
(B. Pasternak)
Anaphora is opposite epiphora(gr. epiphora- additive) - repetition of final words. Epiphora is a rare occurrence.
Oh happiness - dust,
And death - dust,
But my law is to love.
(E. Bagritsky)
The types of repetition are framing(ring): "Muddy sky, night cloudy"(A. Pushkin) and joint: "Forget that life was, / that there will be life, forget"(A. Blok);
"They are not made for the world / And the world was not made for them...(M. Lermontov).
The main function of the repeat is amplifying. Repetition enhances the rhythmic-melodic qualities of the text, creates emotional tension, expressiveness. In addition, repetition can be an element of the compositional organization of the text - repeating lines sometimes frame the text of the entire work, individual lines can begin stanzas, etc. So, in S. Yesenin's Persian Motives, many poems are designed in this way. In the poem "Shagane, you are my Shagane!" repetition frames each stanza and the beginning-end.
The word repeated throughout the work sometimes acquires various semantic shades, acquires special significance in expressing the author's idea, and receives symbolic depth. In this case, the repetition becomes the leitmotif of the work. Thus, B. Pasternak's poem "It's snowing" contains numerous repetitions of the title expression - at the beginning of stanzas, within one verse and in adjacent lines;
It's snowing, it's snowing
It's snowing and everyone is in turmoil...
At first, this expression is used in its direct meaning, then personification appears in comparisons (“in a patched coat / The firmament descends to the ground”, “the sky descends from the attic”), and the image of time is formed, which is “in step” with the snowfall: “Maybe year after year/follows, how it snows, / Or like words in a poem?" This association gives the key expression additional meaning and expression.
The role of repetition in psychological prose is also important. Using this technique, the author expresses intense spiritual work, the confusion of the hero’s feelings, etc. In L. Tolstoy’s novel Resurrection, Nekhlyudov, painfully experiencing his guilt before Katyusha and the unrighteousness of his whole life, endlessly repeats: “shameful and disgusting, disgusting and ashamed." At the same time, a repetition also appears in the author's speech (“he remembered”): “Shameful and disgusting, disgusting and ashamed,” he repeated to himself not only about his relationship with Missy, but about everything. "Everything is disgusting and shameful," he repeated to himself.
The role of repetition in folklore is specific, in particular in epics, where the repetition of words (including prepositions, conjunctions, particles) is associated with the creation of a special fairy-tale intonation, the tune of a folk verse.
Yes, he drove up to glorious to the city to Chernigov,
Does that one city of Chernihiv
Caught up with some power black black,
A th black black, as black crow
how at that one at the Mud something at black,
Yes, with that one birches at cursing,
Yes, that one rivers at currants,
At Togo cross at Levanidova...
A feature of folklore is the presence of non-linguistic repetitions in it, i.e. repetition of details, appeals to someone, enumeration of actions, plot repetitions, etc. Most often, such repetitions are three times (three battles, three feasts, three kingdoms, three tasks ), which in ancient times had a sacred (or ritual) meaning.
Parallelism (gr. parallelos- located or walking nearby) - one of the varieties of repetition in syntax (syntactic parallelism). The types of sentences or phrases are repeated (their verbal content is not the same), the word order also coincides, at least partially:
The forest drops its crimson dress,
The withered field is silvered by frost...
(A. Pushkin)
Here the same constructions are given: predicate - subject - definition - object.
Sounded over a clear river,
Rang out in the faded meadow,
It swept over the mute grove,
It lit up on the other side.
The predicate in the impersonal form is the circumstance of the place.
Parallelism also acts as an expressive artistic device. The expression of parallel constructions can be enhanced by antithesis, anaphora and other types of repetition.
I swear I first creation day,
I swear his last afternoon,
I swear on the shame of crime
And eternal truth triumph ...
(M. Lermontov)
"I swear" is an anaphora, "the first - the last", "the shame of the crime - the triumph of truth" - the antithesis.
In addition to the concept of syntactic parallelism, there is the concept of "psychological parallelism" (A. N. Veselovsky), or "figurative" (G. N. Pospelov). Relations between the elements of nature are considered as an analogy (parallel) of relations between people. This is a kind of allegory that arose in folklore. The first part of this type of parallelism is the depiction of nature, and the second part of human feelings.
Ah, if only the flowers weren’t frosty,
And in winter the flowers would bloom;
Oh, if it's not for me,
I wouldn't worry about anything.
F. Tyutchev:
Glittering and melting chunks of snow
Shines azure, blood plays ...
Or spring bliss?
Or is it female love?
Psychological parallelism is clearly manifested in falling comparisons:
The young maiden will change more than once
Dreams are light dreams;
So the tree changes its leaves every spring...
(A. Pushkin)
gradation (lat. gradient- gradual increase) - a chain of homogeneous members (semantic repetition) with a gradual increase (or decrease) in semantic and emotional significance. Gradation serves as a means of increasing the expressiveness of the text: "Not an hour, not a day, not a year will pass ... "(E. Baratynsky); "All facets of feelings, all facets of truth / Erased in the worlds, in years, in hours"(A. Bely). Gradation is also found in prose: "Fuck, what an abyss of embarrassment! .. It is impossible to describe: velvet! silver! fire!" (N. Gogol).
Pleonasm (gr. pleonasmos- excess) - the use in speech of words that are close in meaning and therefore logically redundant (progressive movement forward - "forward movement" is movement forward; free vacancy - "vacancy" means "free place"). Pleonasm can serve the tasks of stylistic expressiveness in both colloquial and artistic speech. "I saw This with my own eyes"(colloquial), life-being, sadness-longing, ocean-sea, stitches-tracks(folklore.), etc. In literature, such expressions are used when stylized as folklore: "I order an ax sharpen sharpen,/ I command the executioner dress up"(M. Lermontov).
In poetry, pleonasm can act as an emotionally expressive means: " subsided around you silence"(F. Tyutchev).
Pleonasm can be a means of speech characterization of a character and a means of creating a comic. In Chekhov's story, Unter Prishibeev says: "There are a lot of different things on the shore people of people,"on the beach on the sand drowned corpse of the dead person".
The extreme manifestation of pleonasm is tautology (gr. taut about- the same, logos- word) - the repetition of single-root words. Expressive tautology is characteristic of colloquial speech and folklore: "I didn't read but I know..." (colloquial), fencing a garden, miserable grief, lying down, waiting, waiting, white-white etc. Tautology is also found in poetry: "Shadow frowned darker"(F. Tyutchev); "Baptize with a baptism fire "(A. Blok). Like pleonasm, tautology can be a means of folklore stylization. "I killed him free will"(M. Lermontov); "Oh, full box "(N. Nekrasov).
Expressive artistic devices include denial, rhetorical question and rhetorical exclamation.
Denial in itself is more emotional and expressive than affirmation, but in artistic speech, especially in poetry, these qualities of negation are also enhanced in various ways:
I don't find it funny when the painter is useless
It stains Raphael's Madonna for me,
I don't find it funny when the buffoon is despicable
Parody dishonors Alighieri.
(A. Pushkin)
The negative construction "I'm not funny", being an anaphora and being a part of parallelism, enhances the expressiveness of what was said.
In E. Baratynsky's poem "Reassurance", heightened emotionality is created, in particular, with the help of an abundance of verb forms with negation:
Don't tempt me unnecessarily
The return of your tenderness ...
I already I do not believe assurances,
I already I don't believe in love
And I can not surrender again
Once changed dreams!
My blind longing do not multiply.
Not. backwaters about former words,
And, a caring friend, sick
In his slumber don't disturb!
There's a thrill in my soul
BUT not you awaken love.
It is possible to use different methods of denial at the same time: repetitions of negative words, gradations, etc. All this serves as a means of increasing emotionality and expressing denial:
No, no, no I must not I dare not can
It is maddening to indulge in the excitements of love...
(A. Pushkin)
No never mine and you nobody's you will...
Negative expression is especially common among romantic poets. In the poem "The Raven" by E. Poe, each stanza ends with the refrain "never", forcing the atmosphere of despair. Lermontov characterizes the Demon with the help of a negative formula - "I am the one whom no one loves ...".
A rhetorical question does not require an answer. It can be addressed by the author to himself, to the reader, to society as a whole, to an inanimate object, a natural phenomenon, etc. Its function is to attract attention, enhance the impression, increase the emotionality of perception. A rhetorical question, as it were, involves the reader in reasoning or experience.
In Pushkin's poem "The Singer" all three stanzas are built in the form of a detailed emotional question, and the repeating question frames the beginning and end of each stanza, that is, it is an element of the composition.
Have you heard the voice of the night beyond the grove
Singer of love, singer of your sorrow?
When the fields were silent in the morning,
The flute sound is dull and simple
Have you heard?
In civil poetry, the rhetorical question is used quite often, receiving a solemn-declamatory intonation and combined with rhetorical appeals and exclamations:
I see, my friends! an unoppressed people
And slavery, fallen at the behest of the king,
And over the fatherland of enlightened freedom
Will the beautiful dawn finally rise?
(A. Pushkin)
In meditative-philosophical lyrics, rhetorical questions often follow one after another, recreating the poet's train of thought:
How can the heart express itself?
How can someone else understand you?
Will he understand how you live? ..
(F. Tyutchev)
And where will fate send me death?
Is it in battle, in wandering, in waves?
Or the neighboring valley
Will my will take the chilled dust?
(A. Pushkin)
Rhetorical questions with the same functions are also used in prose, mostly lyrical, mostly in author's digressions: "Rus! where are you going? Give me an answer" (N. Gogol); "Are their prayers, their tears fruitless? Isn't love, holy, devoted love, all-powerful? Oh no!" (I. Turgenev).
inversion (lat. inversion- permutation, reversal) - a violation in the sentence of the "natural" word order, which enhances the expression of speech. The morning light played with blue tints- neutral, grammatically familiar word order. M. Sholokhov: " The morning light played with blue tints- inversion.
The inverse order in prose gives the utterance a colloquial, folklore or poetic coloring, that is, it performs a stylistic function. So, for example, in the "Prisoner of the Caucasus" by L. Tolstoy, with the help of word order, constructions are created that are characteristic of oral colloquial speech: "Visible he has a road from a crack - goes downhill, to the right - saklya Tatar, two trees next to it. Dog black lies on the threshold, a goat with goats walks - twitching its tails. He sees - a Tatar woman is coming from under the mountain young, in a shirt color, with a belt, in trousers and boots, his head is covered with a caftan, and on his head there is a large jug tin with water. She walks, trembles in her back, bends over, and the Tatar girl leads by the hand shaved".
Inversion with poetic coloring is found in the so-called lyrical prose and in journalism. In this case, definitions (adjectives or adverbs) are most often inverted: "Irretrievably the night passed and hopelessly the autumn and deep sky stretched over him "(A. Blok); "Sadly weak grasses rustled, a bony Tatar man crunched, sounds eternal consolation over eternal rest..." (V. Astafiev). In this case, the inversion creates an epicly colored narrative, characterized by a certain exaltation of style.
Inversion is widespread in poetry, but there it does not play the stylistic and expressive role that it belongs to in prose. The function of inversion in poetry is to expose and emphasize the verse rhythm:
And the impossible is possible
The road is long and easy
. Welleck R., Warren O. Theory of Literature. M., 1978. S. 205.