An essay is one of the varieties of a story - a small form of epic literature. An essay differs from a short story, another type of story, in the absence of a quick and acute resolution of the conflict. Also, there is no significant development of descriptive image in the essay.

Essay as an epic genre

Often the essays touch upon civic and moral problems society. The essay is described as a combination of fiction and journalism. There are such types of essay as portrait, problem and travel.

Famous examples of essays are “Notes of a Hunter” by I. Turgenev, essays by K. Paustovsky and M. Prishvin, and satirical essays by M. Saltykov-Shchedrin.

The composition of essays can be diverse - these are individual episodes that tell about meetings and conversations, this is a description of the conditions and circumstances of the lives of individual characters and society as a whole.

What is more important for the essay is the author’s general idea, which will be revealed in just a few episodes. Therefore, for an essay, colorful and expressive language is important, which will be able to emphasize the main point narratives.

The role of the title in a work of fiction

Obviously, the title is a general definition of the content work of art. The title expresses the thematic essence of the work, and therefore plays an important role for it.

The main function it plays is to convey to readers the main theme of a work of art in a few words. But this is not just a convenient and short designation of the key idea of ​​the text; most often, the title contains a symbolic designation of exactly the thought that the writer asks you to pay attention to.

This is a kind of compositional technique that emphasizes the theme of the work. The title plays a very important role - it helps readers to correctly interpret and understand the writers' intentions.

A striking example of an original and meaningful title is the work of N. Gogol - “Dead Souls”, which can be understood both in the literal and figurative sense.

Ways to express the author's position and evaluate the hero

In his works, the author tries to express his personal position on a particular topic, and does this artistically. But in order to correctly and reliably convey to the reader their vision of the situation, writers use certain methods of expression.

The most common ways of expressing the author's position are the symbolism of the work, its title, portrait and landscape sketches, as well as details.

All these artistic elements are very important in order to give artistic expression to certain events and narratives. Without this, the author cannot express his own assessment of the main character; he shows this through his portrait description, symbolism and associations.

One of the most important components of the text is its title. Being outside the main part of the text, it occupies absolutely strong position in it. This first a sign of a work from which acquaintance with the text begins. The title activates the reader's perception and directs his attention to what will be stated next. The title is “the compressed, undisclosed content of the text. It can be metaphorically depicted as a twisted spring revealing its capabilities V deployment process."

The title introduces the reader to the world of the work. It expresses in condensed form the main theme of the text, determines its most important storyline or points to it main conflict. These are, for example, the titles of the stories and novels by I. S. Turgenev “First Love”, “Fathers and Sons”, “New”.

The title can name the main character of the work (“Eugene Onegin”, “Oblomov”, “Anna Karenina”, “Ivanov”) or highlight the end-to-end image of the text. Thus, in A. Platonov’s story “The Pit” it is the word foundation pit serves as the form of a key image that organizes the entire text: in the foundation pit, people decided to “plant... the eternal, stone root of indestructible architecture” - “a common proletarian building, into which the working people of the whole earth will enter for an eternal just settlement.” The “building” of the future turns out to be a terrible utopia, devouring its builders. At the end of the story, the motifs of death and the “hellish abyss” are directly related to the image of the pit: ...all the poor and average men worked with such zeal in life, as if they wanted to be saved forever in abyss pit." The foundation pit becomes a symbol of a destructive utopia, alienating man from nature and “living life” and depersonalizing him. The general meaning of this title is revealed gradually in the text, while the semantics of the word “pit” is expanded and enriched.

The title of the text can indicate the time and place of action and thereby participate in the creation of the artistic time and space of the work, see, for example, titles such as “Poltava” by A.S. Pushkin, “After the Ball” by L.N. Tolstoy, “In the Ravine” by A.P. Chekhov, “The Gorge” by I.A. Bunin, “Petersburg” by A. Bely, “St. Nicholas" by B. Zaitsev, "In Autumn" by V.M. Shukshina. Finally, the title of a work may contain a direct definition of its genre or indirectly indicate it, causing the reader to associate with a specific literary genus or genre: “Letters of a Russian Traveler” by N.M. Karamzin, “The History of a City” by M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin.

The title may be associated with the subject-speech organization of the work. In this case, it highlights either the narrative plan or the character plan. Thus, the titles of texts can include individual words or detailed remarks from characters and express their assessments. This technique is typical, for example, for the stories of V.M. Shukshina (“Cut it off”, “Strong man”, “My son-in-law stole firewood from the car”, “Stalled”, “Pardon me, madam”, etc.). In this case, the assessment expressed in the title may not coincide with the author’s position. In the story by V.M. Shukshin’s “Weird”, for example, the “oddities” of the hero, causing misunderstanding of others, from the author’s point of view, testify to the hero’s originality, the richness of his imagination, poetic view of the world, and the desire to overcome the power of the standard and facelessness in any situation.

The title is directly addressed to the recipient of the text. It is no coincidence that some titles of works are interrogative or motivating sentences: “Who is to blame?” A.I. Herzen, “What to do?” N.G. Chernyshevsky, “For what?” L.N. Tolstoy, “Live and Remember” by V. Rasputin.

Thus, the title of a work of art realizes various intentions. It, firstly, correlates the text itself with its artistic world: the main characters, the time of action, the main spatial coordinates, etc.: “Gu- - sowing" A.P. Chekhov, “Hadji Murat” by L.N. Tolstoy, “Spring in Fialta” by V.V. Nabokov, “Youth” by B.K. Zaitseva. Secondly, the title expresses the author’s vision of the depicted situations, events, etc., realizes his plan as integrity, see, for example, titles such as “Hero of Our Time” by M.Yu. Lermontov, “Crime and Punishment” by F.M. Dostoevsky, “Ordinary History” by I.A. Goncharova. The title of the literary text in this case is nothing more than first interpretation works, and the interpretation offered by the author himself. Thirdly, the title establishes contact with the addressee of the text and implies his creative empathy and assessment.

In the event that the first intention dominates, the title of the work most often represents the name of the character, the nomination of the event or its circumstances (time, place). In the second case, the title is usually evaluative; finally, “the dominance of the receptive intention of naming reveals targeting titles to the perceiving consciousness; such a name problematizes the work, it seeks an adequate reader interpretation.” An example of such a title is the name of the Roma in N.S. Leskova “Nowhere” or “Gift” by V.V. Nabokov.

There is a special relationship between the title and the text: when opening a work, the title requires a mandatory return to it after reading the entire text; the main meaning of the title is always derived from a comparison with the work that has already been read in full. “Just as the ovary unfolds gradually in the process of growth - with multiplying and long sheets, so the title only gradually, sheet by sheet, opens the book: the book is the title expanded to the end, while the title is a book compressed to the volume of two or three words.”

The title is in a peculiar theme-rhematic relationship with the text. Initially, “the title is the theme of the artistic message... The text, in relation to the title, is always in second place and most often is a rheme. As you read a literary text, the title construction absorbs the content of the entire work of art... The title, passing through the text, becomes the rheme of the entire work of art... Function nominations(naming) the text is gradually transformed into a function predication(assigning a characteristic) to the text.”

Let us turn, for example, to the title of one of B.K. Zaitsev’s stories “Atlantis” (1927). The work is largely autobiographical: it tells the story of the future writer’s last year of study at the Kaluga Real School and lovingly depicts the life of old Kaluga. Word Atlantis it is never used in the text - it is used only as its first frame sign; at the end of the story - in the last sentence of the text, i.e. in his strong position- a generalizing metaphor appears, correlating with the title: Through excitement, excitement, there was life ahead, to go through it, it prepared both joys and sorrows. Behind are Voskresenskaya and Alexandra Karlovna, and the wheel, and Capa, and the theater, and the streets with the vision that illuminated them for the first time- everything sank into the depths of the light seas. The text, thus, is characterized by a kind of ring composition: the title, as the semantic dominant of the work, correlates with its final metaphor, likening the past to the world going into the depths of the waters. As a result, the title “Atlantis” acquires the character of a rheme and, in relation to the text, performs the function of predication: the feature it highlights applies to everything depicted. The situations and realities described in it are compared with the flooded great civilization. “Into the depths of the seas” goes not only the years of the hero’s youth, but also quiet Kaluga with its patriarchal life, and old Russia, the memory of which the narrator keeps: So everything flows, passes: hours, love, spring, the small life of small people... Russia, again, always Russia!

The title of the story, thus, expresses the author’s assessment of what is depicted and condenses the content of the work. Its predicative nature also affects the semantics of its other elements: only taking into account the symbolic meaning of the title in the context of the whole is the polysemy of a repeating adjective determined last and lexical units with the semantics “sink”, “go under water”.

By organizing the reader's perception, the title creates expectation effect. Indicative, for example, is the attitude of a number of critics in the 70s of the 19th century. to the story by I.S. Turgenev “Spring Waters”: “Judging by its title “Spring Waters”, others assumed that Mr. Turgenev again touched upon the still not completely resolved and clarified issue of the younger generation. They thought that with the name “Spring Waters” Mr. Turgenev wanted to designate the overflow of young forces that had not yet settled into the shores...” The title of the story could cause the effect of “deceived expectations,” but the epigraph that follows it:

Happy years,

Happy Days -

Like spring waters

They rushed by! -

clarifies the meaning of the title and directs the recipient’s perception of the text. As you get acquainted with the story, not only the meanings expressed in it are updated in the title, but also the meanings associated with the deployment of images in the text, for example: “first love”, “ardor of feelings”.

The title of the work of art serves "actualizer" almost all text categories." Yes, category information content manifests itself in the already noted nominative function of the title, which names the text and accordingly contains information about its theme, characters, time of action, etc. Category completeness“finds its expression in the delimiting (limiting) function of the title, which separates one completed text from another.” Category modalities is manifested in the ability of the title to express different types of assessments and convey a subjective attitude towards what is depicted in the work. Thus, in Bunin’s already mentioned story “The Raven,” the trope placed in the title position rated: in the character called the raven, the “dark”, gloomy beginning is emphasized, and the narrator’s assessment (the story is characterized by a first-person narration) coincides with the author’s. The title of the text can also act as an actualizer of its connectivity. In the same story “The Raven,” the word-symbol in the title is repeated several times in the text, while the end-to-end image varies; the repetition is associated with the reversibility of the tropes. Comparison is replaced by metaphor, metaphor by metaphorical epithet, epithet by metamorphosis.

Finally, the title is closely related to text categories prospections And retrospections. It, as already noted, 1 directs the reader’s attention, “predicts” the possible development of the theme (plot): for example, for a reader familiar with the traditional symbolism of the image of a raven, the title of Bunin’s story already contains the meanings “dark”, “gloomy”, “sinister” . The return of the text recipient to the title after reading the work determines the connection of the title with the category of retrospection. Enriched with new meanings, the title in the aspect of retrospection is perceived as a generalizing “rheme” sign; the primary interpretation of the text interacts with the reader’s interpretation; a complete work, taking into account all its connections. Thus, in the context of the entire title, “The Raven” symbolizes not only the “dark”, gloomy beginning that separates the heroes, but also merciless fate.

The choice of a successful title is the result of the author’s intense creative work, during which the titles of the text may change. So, F.M. Dostoevsky, while working on the novel “Crime and Punishment,” abandoned the original title “Drunk.” - nenkie”, choosing a title that more clearly reflects philosophical issues works. The title of the epic novel “War and Peace” was preceded by the titles “Three Times”, “From 1805 to 1814”, “War”, “All’s Well That Ends Well”, which were later rejected by L.N. Tolstoy.

Titles of works are historically variable. The history of literature is characterized by a transition from verbose, often double titles, containing explanations and “hints” for the reader, to short, meaningful titles that require special activity in the perception of the text, cf., for example, the titles of works of the 18th - early 19th centuries. and XIX-XX centuries: “Jung’s Lament, or Night Reflections on Life, Death, etc.”, “Russian Werther, a half-fair story, an original work by M.S., a young sensitive man who unfortunately spontaneously ended his life” - “Shot”, “Gift”.

In the literature of the 19th-20th centuries. The titles are structurally diverse. They are usually expressed:

1) in one word, mainly a noun in the nominative case or other case forms: “Left-handed” N.S. Leskova, “Player” F.M. Dostoevsky, “Village” by I.A. Bunin, “On Stumps” by I.S. Shmeleva and others; Words of other parts of speech are less common: “We” by E. Zamyatin, “Never” by Z. Gippius;

2) a coordinating combination of words: “Fathers and Sons” by I.S. Turgenev, “Crime and Punishment” by F.M. Dostoevsky, “Mother and Katya” by B. Zaitsev, “The Master and Margarita” by M.A. Bulgakov;

3) with a subordinating phrase: “Caucasian captive” L.N. Tolstoy, “Mr. from San Francisco” by I.A. Bunin, “Nanny from Moscow” by I.S. Shmeleva and others;

4) the sentence: “Truth is good, but happiness is better” A.N. Ostrovsky, “Apple Trees are Blooming” by Z. Gippius, “The Strong Move On” by V.M. Shukshina, “I will catch up with you in heaven” by R. Pogodin.

The more concise the title, the more semantically capacious it is. Since the title is intended not only to establish contact with the reader, but also to arouse his interest, to influence him emotional impact, in the title of the text can be used expressive possibilities linguistic means of different levels. Thus, many titles represent tropes, include sound repetitions, new formations, unusual grammatical forms (“Itanesies”, “Country of Nets” by S. Krzhizhanovsky), transform names already famous works(“There was love without joy”, “Woe from Wit”, “Living Corpse”, “Before Sunrise” by M. Zoshchenko), they use synonymous and antonymic connections of words, etc.

The title of the text is usually ambiguous. The word placed in the title position, as already noted, gradually expands the scope of its meaning as the text unfolds. Figuratively - According to one of the researchers, it, like a magnet, attracts all possible meanings of a word and unites them. Let us turn, for example, to the title of the poem by N.V. Gogol "Dead Souls". This key phrase takes on not one, but at least three meanings in the text of the work.

Firstly, “dead souls” is a clichéd expression of the official, business, bureaucratic style, denoting dead serfs. Secondly, “dead souls” is a metaphorical designation for “sky-smokers” - people living a vulgar, vain, soulless life, whose very existence is already becoming non-existence. Thirdly, “dead souls” is an oxymoron: if the word “soul” denotes the indestructible immortal core of personality, then its combination with the word “dead” is illogical. At the same time, this oxymoron defines the opposition and dialectical connection in the artistic world of the poem between two main principles: living (high, light, spiritual) and dead. “The special complexity of Gogol’s concept lies not in the fact that dead souls there are living souls” (A.I. Herzen)... and in the opposite way: the living cannot be sought outside the dead, it is hidden in it as a possibility, as an implied ideal - remember the soul of Sobakevich hiding “somewhere behind the mountains” or discovered only after death of the prosecutor's soul."

However, the title not only “collects” the various meanings of words scattered throughout the text, but also refers to other works and establishes connections with them. Thus, many titles are quotative (“How good, how fresh the roses were” by I.S. Turgenev, “The Summer of the Lord” by I.S. Shmelev, “Werther has already been written” by V.P. Kataev, etc.) or included in their composition is the name of a character in another work, thereby opening a dialogue with him (“King Lear of the Steppes” by I.S. Turgenev, “Lady Macbeth” Mtsensk district» N.S. Leskova and others).

In the meaning of the title they always combine specificity And generalization (generalization). Its specificity is based on the obligatory connection of the title with a specific situation presented in the text, the generalizing power of the title is on the constant enrichment of its meanings by all elements of the text as a whole. The title, attached to a specific character or to a specific situation, acquires a generalizing character as the text unfolds and often becomes a sign of the typical. This property of the title is especially pronounced in cases where the title of the work is a proper name. Many surnames and names in this case become truly telling; see, for example, a title such as “Oblomov.”

Thus, the most important properties of the title are its ambiguity, dynamism, connection with the entire content of the text, the interaction of specificity and generalization in it.

The title relates to the text of the work in different ways. It may be absent from the text itself, in which case it appears as if “from the outside.” However, more often the title is repeated several times in the work. So, for example, the title of the story by A.P. Chekhov's "Ionych" refers to the last chapter of the work and reflects the already completed degradation of the hero, a sign of which at the lexical level of the text is the transition from the main means of designating the hero in the story - the surname Startsev - to familiar form Ionych.

In T. Tolstoy’s story “The Circle,” the title is supported in the text by repetitions of various types. The beginning of the story is already connected with the image of the circle: ...The world is closed, and he is closed to Vasily Mikhailovich. Subsequently, this image is ironically reduced and “everyday” (I’ll still go for a walk and do circle), then included in a series, a series of tropes (in the middle of the urban tangle, in a tight skein lanes... etc.), it is combined with images that have cosmic and existential symbolism (see, for example: He simply fumbled around in the darkness and grabbed the usual wheel of fate and, intercepting the rim with both hands, in an arc, in a circle, would eventually reach himself- on the other side), This is emphasized by the refrain: ...The sun and the moon keep running and running, catching up with each other,- The black horse below snores and beats hoof, ready to gallop... in a circle, in a circle, in a circle. IN As a result, the title “Circle” takes on the character of a generalizing metaphor, which can be interpreted as a “circle of fate” and as the hero’s isolation on himself, his inability to go beyond the limits of his own I.

In V.V. Nabokov’s story with the same title “Circle,” the image of a circle is updated by the use of words that include the word “circle” not only as differential, but also as peripheral or associative, see, for example: The piles reflected in the water like harmonics, curling and developing...; Spinning, the linden flyer slowly fell onto the tablecloth; ...Here, as if connected by rings of linden shadow, people of the latter's analysis. The same function is performed by lexical and grammatical means with the meaning of repetition. The circle symbolizes the special composition of the story; the narrative in it also has a circular structure. The story opens with a logical-syntactic anomaly: Secondly: because a frantic longing for Russia broke out in him. Thirdly, and finally, because he felt sorry for his then youth - and everything connected with it. The beginning of this syntactic construction completes the text: And he was unconcerned- cool for several reasons. Firstly, because Tanya turned out to be just as attractive, as invulnerable as she once was. This circular structure of the text forces the reader to return again to the beginning of the story and connect the “broken” complex syntactic whole, correlate causes and consequences. As a result, the title “Circle” is not only enriched with new meanings and is perceived as the compositional dominant of the work, but also serves as a symbol of the development of reader reception.

Let's complete a number of general tasks, and then turn to the analysis of the role of the title in a specific text - the story by F.M. Dostoevsky "The Meek"

Questions and tasks

1. In the practice of translators, there is a strict rule: the title of the work is translated last, only after the entire text has been translated. Explain what this rule is about.

2. The remarkable Russian linguist A.M. Peshkovsky noted: “The title is something more than a title.” How do you understand this situation? Expand it on the material of a specific literary text.

3. Name the most important features of the title. Illustrate each feature with specific examples.

4. Analyze the connection between the title of the story by I.A. Bunin "Easy Breathing" with all the text. Explain the meaning of this title.

5. Give examples of titles of works of modern literature. What structural types of titles can be distinguished among them?

6. Many of A.N. Ostrovsky’s plays are titled with proverbs. Give examples of such titles. Show how the title-proverb relates to the text of the work.

7. How does the connection between the title and the text in lyric poetry differ from the same relationship in prose or drama?

8. In the process of working on the story “After the Ball” L.N. Tolstoy abandoned several initial versions of the title: “The Story of the Ball and Through the Gauntlet”, “Father and Daughter”, “What are you saying...” What is the reason for the choice of the title “After the Ball”?

9. Read V. Makanin’s story “Prisoner of the Caucasus.” With the names of which works of Russian classic literature Does its title match? What connections with them can be traced in the text of the story? How does the title “Prisoner of the Caucasus” differ from the traditional title “Prisoner of the Caucasus”? What interpretation of the topic is this change associated with?

10. Determine the genre of works with the following titles: “D.V. Davydov" N.M. Yazykova, “Cuckoo Eagle” by I.A. Krylova, “Ivan Tsarevich and Scarlet Alice” by A.N. Tolstoy, “How It Was” by N. Zasodimsky, “Boris Godunov” by Yu. Fedorov. How does the title help determine the genre of the work?

11. Determine what expressive means of speech are used in the following titles of literary works: “The Living Corpse” by L.N. Tolstoy, “The Unbaptized Priest” by N.S. Leskova, “Donquixotic” by G.I. Uspensky, “Black Man” by S. A. Yesenin, “Cloud in Pants” by V.V. Mayakovsky, “Red Kalina” by V.M. Shukshina, “Autobiography of a Corpse” by S. Krzhizhanovsky, “Scarlet Deer” by F. Abramov.

Title and text (story by F.M. Dostoevsky “The Meek”)

The title in Dostoevsky's work is always a semantic or compositional dominant of the text, the consideration of which allows us to better understand the system of images of the work, its conflict or the development of the author's idea. Dostoevsky himself defined the genre of “The Meek One” as a “fantastic story”: in it, perhaps for the first time in world literature, the text is structured as a conditional recording of the narrator’s internal speech, close to the stream of consciousness, “with fits and starts and in a confused form.” “Imagine,” Dostoevsky notes in the preface “From the Author,” “a husband whose wife is lying on the table, a suicide, who several hours before jumped out of the window. He is confused and has not yet had time to collect his thoughts.... Either he speaks to himself, or he turns, as it were, to an invisible listener, to some kind of judge.”

Before us is a monologue of the main character of the story, who returns to the past, trying to comprehend the “truth”. The narrative is structured as “a tale, which is an oral, addressed story - a confession of a person shocked by the tragedy.” The title of the work is polyphonic: on the one hand, it expresses the narrator’s assessment and refers to his speech (this title is a quotation), on the other hand, it reflects the author’s point of view. The title “Meek” highlights the image of the heroine of the story: she is the central figure inner world text, one of the recipients of the narrator's confession, a constant theme of his monologue. The title is represented by a word denoting the moral qualities of a person, and combines the actual nominative function with the evaluative one. The dominant of the text is, therefore, associated with the expression of ethical assessment, which is generally characteristic of Dostoevsky’s works.

The title “Meek” is initially perceived only as a designation of a character and “predicts” the story about the fate of a gentle, submissive, quiet heroine. As the text unfolds, the title is semantically transformed: it represents - seems to the reader already ambiguous and in in a certain sense enantio-semic. Meek named heroine, who is characterized by other characters as proud, daring, a heroine who attempted murder and committed the mortal sin of suicide. This semantic contradiction is certainly important for the interpretation of the story. Since the title usually “collapses” the main content of the work and condenses its different meanings, let us turn to the text of the story.

The reader learns about the heroine only from the narrator’s memories and assessments. Her remarks are also few and far between, which dissolve in the narrator’s monologue: “the real “other” can enter the world of the “underground man” only as that “other” with whom he is already conducting his hopeless internal polemic.” Krotkaya's voice often merges with the narrator's voice, and her speech does not have any clear characterological features. Her name, like the name of the hero, is not mentioned in the text. The heroine and the narrator are consistently indicated by personal pronouns (I - she).

““She” is a substitute word that acquires uniqueness; a halo is transferred to it, belonging to someone they do not dare name... Lyrical understatement colors the most important moments of Krotkaya’s life - from the long silence in response to a marriage proposal to the tragic lack of clarity of her last impulses." The absence of the heroine's name is thus a sign lyrical the beginning characteristic of Dostoevsky's last story. At the same time it is also a sign generalizations. The title, firstly, indicates the contrast between two human types, characteristic of Dostoevsky’s work as a whole: “predatory (proud),” according to the writer’s definition, and “meek.” Secondly, the heroine combines features characteristic of many of the writer’s characters: orphanhood, life in a “random”, “chaotic” family, humiliation and suffering suffered in childhood and adolescence, loneliness, hopelessness of the situation (she had nowhere to go) purity, a “generous heart”, finally, a clash of a “fatal duel” with an “underground” person. The description of Meek Coy is reminiscent of the description of Sonya Marmeladova, cf.: ...she is unrequited, and her voice is so meek. The details of their appearance also coincide (see portrait of Sonya Marmeladova: clear, blue eyes, fair hair, always pale, thin face), and "children" - "skoe" beginning, which is emphasized by the author in both heroines. The image of the Mother of God - “home, family, ancient” - with which the Meek One dies, refers to the “meek” mother of Alyosha Karamazov, “stretching it from her embrace with both hands to the image as if under the cover of the Mother of God.”

The heroine of the “fantastic story,” like other characters of Dostoevsky, is portrayed as a person lost in the world of evil and doomed to exist in a closed, narrowing space, the signs of which alternately become the room (she had no right to leave the apartment), there is a corner in it behind screens with an iron bed, and finally, a coffin (the image of a coffin, repeating itself, frames the story of the Meek One). The general image of the Meek is also associated with biblical allusions. So, the title refers to the invariant motives of Dostoevsky’s work as a whole and generalizes them.

The nomination itself is also general in nature - Meek: substantivized adjective meek, replacing a proper name, it creates an essential qualitative feature that does not imply individualization. Other names included in the heroine’s nomination row in the text seem equally general: young lady - this sixteen year old- bride- woman - this beauty - heaven - a sick creature- ten year old girl- beast- innocence- criminal- the lady is blind - dead. These are either names that determine the social position of a person, or evaluative nouns, or substantivized adjectives.

The nomination row of the heroine in the text is internally contradictory: it includes names that are contrasting in semantics, combines different evaluative characteristics of the heroine and reflects different points of view on her. Within the framework of the nomination series, firstly, words with the semes “childhood”, “innocence”, “meekness” and the words criminal, beast, in which the semes “cruelty”, “violence”, “crime” are realized; secondly, the evaluative metaphor comes into opposition sky, indicating the absolute height of moral principles and involvement in eternity, and substantivates dead, blind, denoting the frailty and incompleteness of the vision of the world.

These contrasts reflect the dynamics of the characteristics of Meek in the text of the story. The narrator - the Pawnbroker wants to become a “mystery” for the heroine and consistently uses different literary masks (Mephistopheles, Silvio, etc.) in communicating with her, but he becomes no less a mystery for both him and the reader. - Xia herself Meek. Moreover, the title word that denotes it serves in the text as the subject of extensive semantization: “meekness” is interpreted by the narrator, but the essence of this concept is also determined by the author of the work, since not only the title in a collapsed form conveys the content of the text, but also the text as a whole reveals meaning of the title.

Initially, the narrator notes only the features of Meek’s appearance: pale, fair, thin, of medium height, baggy. Then, based on his observations, he concludes that the “young lady” is kind and meek. For the first time in the text, following the title, the word appears meek, at the same time, signs are immediately highlighted that, from the point of view of the narrator-usurer, are inherent in the “meek”: It was then that I realized that she was kind and meek. The kind and meek do not resist for long and, although they do not open up very much, they do not know how to dodge a conversation: they answer sparingly, but they answer.

The narrator, as we see, associates meekness primarily with compliance, the inability to “resist” for a long time. He has his own “idea” - to “take revenge” on society, to instill awe in at least one creature, to achieve his “full respect” by breaking his will. In Meek, he seeks first of all humility. However, already in the first descriptions of the heroine, details such as the ability to “flare up”, “caustic mockery” and “an amused fold on the lips” are emphasized, and the maid Lukerya calls the “young lady” “proud”: God will pay you, sir, for taking our dear young lady, but you don’t tell her that, she’s proud. The narrator's reaction to this remark is typical: the “proud” hero does not allow equality of wills, unity or harmonious dialogue. In his monologue there appears a non-normative formation with a noun-evaluative suffix proud.“Proud”, like “meek”, are contrasted with a truly proud person: ...well, proud! I, they say, love proud people myself. Proud people are especially good when... well, when you don’t doubt your power over them, and

In the following chapters, the narrator recalls how, thirsting for power, unlimited power over another soul, he began to “educate” Meek: I wanted complete respect, I wanted her to stand before me in prayer for my suffering.- and was worth it. Oh I always have been proud I always wanted everything or nothing The opposition “proud - meek” in the sub-chapters of Chapter I, however, is of a dynamic nature: it is gradually neutralized or modified. In the portrait of the heroine such a stable detail appears as incredulous, silent, bad smile, and its text field uses lexical means with the meanings “anger”, “insolence”, “struggle”, “fit”, “anger”; As a result, oxymoronic constructions appear in the text: Yes. This meek the face became increasingly bolder And bolder!; The meek one rebels (title of subchapter V). It is in subchapter V that the heroine is characterized by the narrator as a creature violent, attacking... disorderly and seeking confusion itself. To figuratively evaluate Meek, the narrator uses a paradoxical metaphor: She... suddenly shook and- what would you think - suddenly she stamped her feet on me; This was beast, it was a seizure, it was an animal in a fit. The main name of the heroine acquires ironic expression; The title of the story, taking into account the hero's assessments, expresses tragic irony. The text fields of the two characters in the story opposed to each other are moving closer together: each of them contains words with the semes “pride” and “struggle”. Both characters are designated by evaluative lexical units with the meaning of internal blindness: blind - blind. The motif of blindness is actualized by the recurring image of the veil, associated primarily with the narrator. “Veil”, “blindness” are images that reflect the power of false assessments of each other that weighs on the heroes.

After the terrible experience carried out by the Pawnbroker (Chapter VI “Terrible Memory”), it seems to him that he has won the final victory - the “rebellion” of his wife has been tamed: I won - and she is forever defeated. Wed: In my eyes she was like that defeated so humiliated, so crushed that I sometimes felt painfully sorry for her...IN In the descriptions of the seemingly “too defeated” Krotka in Chapter II, the speech means that develop the motive of pride and obsession disappear, and lexical units are repeated pale, timid, compare: She pale grinned pale lips, with timid question in the eyes; ...She looked like this timid meekness, such powerlessness after illness. The hero’s “demonic pride” in the subchapter “The Dream of Pride” is again contrasted with meekness; “Meekness,” however, is understood by the narrator as “humiliation,” “timidity,” and “wordlessness.”

It is interesting that when working on the story, Dostoevsky saw the possibility of changing the title of the work. In one of the rough drafts, next to the title “Meek”, he wrote down another version of the name - “Intimidated”. It is significant that this title follows the final one - “Meek” - and serves as a kind of clarification to it. The intended title is semantically less complex and reflects the main storyline of the text - the attempt of the Pawnbroker, an “underground man” and a “misanthrope,” to tame the heroine and educate her with “severity.” This version of the title, thus, turns out to be isomorphic to the core of the plot of the “fantastic story” - the vanity plans of the story. - chica - and highlights a new significant aspect in the interpretation of the semantics of the word meek. The use of this lexical unit in the text suggests an unexpected “revival” of its original meaning and taking it into account in the semantic composition of the story: “Meek - literally tamed.”

The narrator dreams of a pacified, “tamed” heroine, V in the feverish monologue of which, perhaps, both meanings of the word he chose to characterize the deceased are conjugated, superimposed on each other, merged.

The development of the plot reveals the collapse of the hero’s “theory”, based on “demonic pride”: The meek remains untamed, her rebellion gives way silence, and silence - suicide.

The motif of silence is one of the key ones in the story: it is no coincidence that the words of the word-formation nest “to remain silent” appear 38 times in the text. The hero of the work, who calls himself master speak silently turns out to be capable only of monologue and auto-communication, he insisted on silence and heroine began to fall silent; dialogue between him and Meek is impossible: both characters are closed in their own subjective world and are not ready to know another personality. The lack of dialogue causes a catastrophe; in the silence that separates the characters, alienation, protest, hatred, and misunderstanding ripen. Silence also accompanies the death of the Meek:

She stands against the wall, right next to the window, with her hand against the wall and her head against her hand, standing like that and thinking. And she stood there so deeply in thought that she didn’t even hear me standing and looking at her from that room. I see as if she is smiling, standing, thinking and smiling...

The death of the heroine correlates with real fact- the suicide of seamstress Maria Borisova, who jumped out of a window with an image in her hands. This fact was commented on by Dostoevsky in “The Diary of a Writer”: “This image in the hands is a strange and unheard of feature in suicide! This is some kind of meek, humble suicide. Here, apparently, there was not even any grumbling or reproach: it was simply impossible to live. “God didn’t want it,” and she died after praying. About other things, as they appear neither simple(highlighted by F.M. Dostoevsky. - N.N.), he can’t stop thinking for a long time, he’s imagining things somehow, and it’s even clear that you’re to blame for them. This meek, self-destroyed soul is involuntarily tormented by thoughts.”

Dostoevsky contrasts “humble” suicide with suicides from “tiredness” of living, from the loss of a “living sense of being,” from joyless positivism, which gives rise to “cold darkness and boredom.” The “meek” suicide in the story maintains faith. She has “nowhere to go” and “it has become impossible to live”: her soul condemned her for a crime, for “pride”, at the same time she does not tolerate substitutions and lies. The heroine of the “fantastic story” ended up in devil's circle false communications: The pawnbroker, “like a demon,” demands that she “fall, bow to him... The law of God’s world - love is perverted into a devilish grimace - despotism and violence.” With her death, the Meek One breaks this circle. In Chapter II of the story, spatial images acquire a symbolic character: twice - in the scene of a failed murder and before suicide - the heroine finds herself "near the wall", she is looking for death "in an open window." The image of a wall that appears in a situation of choice is a sign of closed space and a symbol of the impossibility of exit; “Open window,” on the contrary, is a metaphor for “clearance,” liberation, and overcoming the “demonic stronghold.” The heroine, who has maintained her faith, accepts death as the will of God and surrenders herself into his hands. The ancient, family image of the Mother of God serves as a symbol of the protection of the Mother of God.

In the plot of the story, Meek is subjected to three moral tests: the temptation to sell herself, the temptation to betray, the temptation to kill, but, overcoming them, she maintains the purity of her soul. Her singing becomes a symbol of her moral victory and at the same time “adlom”. It is no coincidence that this scene concentrates metaphors that actualize meanings: “illness,” “breakdown,” “death”: It was as if there was something cracked, broken in the voice, as if the voice could not cope, as if the song itself was sick. She sang in a low voice, and suddenly, rising, her voice stopped...

In defenseless openness to God, the heroine approaches humility. It is this quality, in the author’s interpretation, that is the basis of true meekness, different understandings of which collide in the structure of the text.

The death of the Meek One destroys temporary connections in the world she left behind: in the finale of the work, the forms of time lose their localization and specificity, the narrator turns to eternity. The infinity of his suffering and the immensity of his loneliness are embodied in the hyperbolic images of the “dead sun” and universal silence (the silence of the heroes extends to the outside world), and the word meek is included in new contrasting parallels: “The meek man is alive” and “The meek man is dead”:

Inertness! Oh nature! People on earth are alone - that's the problem! “Is there a half-dead person alive?” - shouts the Russian hero. I scream like a hero, but no one responds. They say the sun gives life to the universe. The sun will rise and - look at it, isn't it dead?

The hero of the story “generalizes his loneliness, universalizing it as the last loneliness of the human race.”

The death of one person in the works of Dostoevsky is often interpreted as the death of the world, but in this case it is death Meek, which the narrator compares with “sky”. At the end of the story, she becomes close to the “sun”, which has ceased to “live” the universe. The light and love that the Meek One could bring into the world could not manifest itself in it. The true meaning of meekness, inner humility is the “truth” to which the narrator comes in the end: “The truth is revealed to the unfortunate one quite clearly and definitively.” The title of the work, taking into account the whole, after reading the entire text, is already perceived as an evangelical allusion: “Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth” (Matthew 5:5).

The connection between the title of the story and the text, as we see, not static: it is a dynamic process in which one point of view gives way to another. In the semantic structure of the title word, as the text unfolds, meanings such as “yielding”, “not meek”, “tamed”, “timid”, “silent”, “humble”. The semantic complexity of the title counters the narrator's initial simplistic assessment.

The enantiosemic title of Dostoevsky's story is not only polysemantic, but also multifunctional. It is connected with the end-to-end opposition of the text “proud - meek” and accordingly highlights its conflict. The title serves as a sign of the lyrical beginning of a “fantastic story” and generalizes what is depicted, reflects the development of the heroine’s image and the dynamics of the narrator’s assessments in comparison with the author’s, expresses the most important meanings of the work and condenses the invariant themes and motives of the writer’s work. It finally reveals the intertextual auto-intertextual and connections of the work.

Questions and tasks

1. Determine the meaning of the title of F. M. Dostoevsky’s story “White Nights” as a sign perceived before reading the text.

2. Determine the formal semantic connections of the title with the text. Indicate which text plans it is associated with.

3. Identify the “incrementations of meaning” that develop in the title as the plot unfolds.

4. Determine the meaning of the title “White Nights”.

5. State the main functions of this title.

Introduction

The title has attracted serious research attention over the past decades. Particular interest in it is explained by the unique position of the title in the text and the variety of its functions. The title accumulates the meaning, style and poetics of the work, acts as a semantic cluster of the text and can be considered as a kind of key to its understanding. Highlighted graphically, it is interpreted by the reader as the most noticeable part of it. Linguistically, the title is the primary means of nomination; semiotically, it is the first sign of the topic.

The specificity of the title is that it is an intermediary between the titled text and the reader (his emotional and value sphere, experience and the volume of his knowledge). The headline programs the reader’s network of associations, influencing the emergence and strengthening of reader interest, or extinguishing this interest. “The network of associations formed by the title is all the information put into it by the author within the framework of the philological and historical tradition and reflected in the reader’s perception in accordance with his own cultural experience” Vasilyeva T.V. Title in the cognitive-functional aspect: based on the material of a modern American story / T.V. Vasilyeva. Author's abstract. dis. ...cand. Philol. Sci. - M., 2005 - p. 23.

To make the headline more expressive, impressive, and to attract attention to it, writers and publicists often use expressive visual arts language: antonyms, phraseological units, catchphrases, etc., combining words of different styles or semantic fields.

In my work, I decided to consider the role of the title in Gogol’s poem “Dead Souls”. The title of the poem, so spectacular and mysterious, gives rise to thought about the meaning that is hidden in it.

The role of the title in the work

Title -- definition of content literary work, usually placed in front of the last one. It is not always necessary for a work to have a title; V lyric poetry for example, they are often absent (“Am I wandering along the noisy streets” by Pushkin, “When the yellowing field is agitated” by Lermontov, “Lorelei” by Heine, etc.). This is explained by the expressive function of the title, which usually expresses the thematic essence of the work. In lyric poetry - the most expressive and emotionally rich kind of poetry - there is simply no need for a title - “the property of lyrical works, the content of which is elusive for definition, like a musical sensation.” Belinsky V.G. Division of poetry into genera and types - M., Direct-Media, 2007. - p. 29. The art of the title has its own socio-economic prerequisites. The primary function of a title in a manuscript text is to provide a short and easy-to-reference designation of a work and, in a codex containing a number of works, to separate one of them from another. Hence the low significance of the title in the composition of the text, their insignificant graphical emphasis and often not related to the theme of the work, the conventional nature of the title in terms of the number of chapters or verses, in the nature of the meter, especially those adopted in the East - “32 (stories about) monks”, “100 ( stanzas about) love”, titles according to the location of the text - “Metaphysics” by Aristotle, etc.). The evaluative nature of the title does not stand out particularly clearly, although the Middle Ages already know the transformation of “Donkey” into “Golden Ass” and “Comedy” into “Divine Comedy”. The invention of printing, creating the possibility of large circulations, led to the need to advertise the book. To this we must add the anonymity of the book - an extremely common phenomenon in the literature of the 15th-17th centuries. Both circumstances played a big role in the history of the title, which had to speak for both the author and the publisher. Often a book contains an appeal to the reader so that he buys it; the titles should perform direct advertising functions.

Then, having lost to a large extent their advertising and evaluative character, titles in new and recent literature often acquire a compositional meaning, replacing the frame that motivates the nature of the tale, the choice of topic, etc. (“The Investigator’s Story,” “Notes of a Doctor”). IN new literature So. arr. titles are a compositional device determined by the theme of the work. Since this latter is itself determined by the social psychoideology embedded in the work, the title becomes a deterministic component of the style. Using examples of the writer’s work, individual genres and movements, we can easily convince ourselves of this. Thus, tabloid novelists like Montepin or Ponson du Terrail intrigue the bourgeois reader with all sorts of “secrets,” “horrors,” “murders,” “crimes,” etc. The authors of pamphlets give their titles expressiveness and oratorical intensity (“J"accuse!” Zola , “Napoleon le petit” by Hugo, “Down with the Social Democrats” by Braquet, etc.).Russian tendentious fiction writers of the 60s-80s selected allegorical titles for their novels, which branded the criminal essence of the nihilistic movement: “The Haze” by Klyushnikov , “Nowhere” and “On Knives” by Leskov, “Cliff” by Goncharov, “The Turbulent Sea” by Pisemsky, “Bloody Pouf” by Krestovsky, “The Abyss” by Markevich, etc. Ostrovsky’s moralizing dramas contain corresponding titles such as folk proverbs, the edge of which is Many are directed against the tyranny of the patriarchal merchants: “Truth is good, but happiness is better”, “Don’t live the way you want”, “Don’t get into your own sleigh”, “It’s not all Maslenitsa for the cat”, etc. The ideas of early futurism are sought “to shock the bourgeoisie” (“Dead Moon”, “Cloud in Pants”); Z. decadents of the late XIX - early XX centuries. reflect the desire to go into the ivory tower, inaccessible to the uninitiated, to the profanum vulgus, by the incomprehensibility of the language: “Urbi et orbi”, “Stephanos”, “Crurifragia”, etc. Thus, the titles of proletarian literature formulate tasks characteristic of the era of industrialization of the country -- “Cement” by Gladkov, “Blast Furnace” by Lyashko, “Sawmill” by Karavaeva. In all these cases, the titles represent a thematic cluster of works, a clear formulation of their social orientation.

This role of the title causes increased attention to them. Authors consult with friends, editors, and publishers on how best to name their work (Goethe, Maupassant, Turgenev, Dostoevsky, Blok). Having come up with a successful title, they take care of keeping it secret (Flaubert, Goncharov), change the titles after publishing the work in a magazine for individual publications, in collected works, etc. Editors and publishers arbitrarily title the works (“The Divine Comedy” by Dante, “Boris Godunov" Pushkin, " Sevastopol stories"L. Tolstoy, " Little hero"Dostoevsky). But the role of censorship is especially significant here. Pushkin’s poem “Andre Chénier in prison” turned out to be without a “dungeon”, “The History of Pugachev” turned into “The History of the Pugachev Rebellion”, “Message to the Censor” into a message to “Aristarchus”, Gogol’s “Dead Souls” were banned in Moscow, in St. Petersburg passed only thanks to special patronage, but with the addition of “The Adventures of Chichikov”; in the posthumous edition (1853), the title “Dead Souls” was deleted. Gogol’s “Morning of an Official” turned out to be “Morning of a Business Man”, Nekrasov’s “Decembrist Women” turned into “Russian Women”, etc.

The title is the first thing the reader encounters when picking up a book or looking at the contents of a magazine. This is the first information about the work that should interest the reader or at least give him an idea about it. Information can, naturally, be only outline, general, but it can also give a completely specific idea of ​​the content, just like a false, misleading idea. The title can be an already condensed book, the book can be an expanded title. As S. Krzhizhanovsky writes: “The title is the book in restricto, the book is the title in extenso.” Krzhizhanovsky S. Poetics of titles. Nikitin subbotniks - M., 1931.- p. 3.

A capacious and expressive title not only leads to arousal of interest in the reader, but it also plays a significant role in the process of fixing the title of the book in the memory of the reader, or even entire generations of readers. Who Oblomov or Onegin is is often known even by those who have not read the book at all, i.e. the name from the title has become a household name (not only, however, thanks to the title, but also to the type of hero).

The title is one of the most important elements of the semantic and aesthetic organization of a literary text, therefore choosing the title of a work is one of the most difficult tasks for the author. His choice can be influenced by various circumstances related to personal and public life, as well as numerous “intermediaries” between the writer and the reader: editors, publishers, censors. The fate of the book largely depends on a well-chosen title.

1.1. Title of the work of art:

Ontology, functions, typology

The title opens and closes the work in a literal and figurative sense. The title, as a threshold, stands between the outside world and the space of the literary text and is the first to bear the brunt of overcoming this boundary. At the same time, the title is a limit that forces us to turn to it again when we close the book. In this way, the entire text is “short-circuited” into its title. As a result of such an operation, the meaning and purpose of the title itself is clarified.

The title can be defined as a borderline (in all respects: generation and being) element of the text, in which two principles coexist: external- facing outward and representing a work of art in the linguistic, literary and cultural-historical world, and internal- facing the text.

For every correctly constructed artistic prose work title is required. (The concept of a correctly constructed literary text implies that the author, when working on the text, sought to find the most effective and expressive form for conveying his idea. Therefore, despite the variety of specific incarnations, the literary text must be organized according to certain rules.)

Organization is a necessary psychological requirement for a work of art. The concept of organization includes the fulfillment of the following conditions: “correspondence of the content of the text to its title (title), completeness in relation to the title (title), literary processing characteristic of a given functional style, the presence of superphrasal unities united by different, mainly logical types of connection, the presence purposefulness and pragmatic attitude" [Galperin 1981: 25]. It is significant that the first two requirements for the text as a whole consider the text in its relation to the title. When a text receives its final name (title), it gains autonomy. The text is isolated as a whole and is closed within the framework defined by the title. And only thanks to this does it acquire semantic capacity: the text establishes those semantic connections that could not be found in it if it were not an independent whole with a given title.

“Whatever the name, it has the ability, moreover, the power to delimit the text and endow it with completeness. This is its leading property. It is not only a signal directing the reader’s attention to a prospective presentation of thoughts, but also sets the framework for such presentation” [Galperin 1981: 134].

In a book dedicated to literary creativity, V. A. Kaverin writes that “the book resists the unfortunate title. The struggle with the author begins when the last line is written” [Kaverin 1985: 5]. The book itself is called “The Desk.” The writer spent a long time looking for the right title for it. And he succeeded only in collaboration with M. Tsvetaeva. “My faithful desk!” - this is how Tsvetaeva’s poem “The Table” opens. The “brilliantly precise, sparse lines” of this poem helped Kaverin determine the entire content of his book. The title combination of words “Desk” establishes those semantic connections that the author considers to be the main ones in the book.

Consequently, the title is a minimal formal construction that represents and closes the work of art as a whole.

The title, as a formally (graphically) distinguished element of the text structure, occupies a certain functionally fixed position in relation to the text. In accordance with the basic principles of decoding stylistics [Arnold 1978], there are four strong positions in a literary text: title, epigraph, beginning and end of the text. Decoding stylistics is based on the general psycholinguistic conclusion that “the “code” on which a person encodes and decodes is the same” [Zhinkin 1982: 53]. Revealing the basic principles of the structural organization of the text, it teaches the reader to use the artistic codes embedded in a work of art in order to perceive it most effectively.

In the style of decoding, the concept of advancement is important. Promotion is an organization of context in which the most important semantic elements of a literary text are brought to the fore. “The function of promotion is to establish a hierarchy of meanings, fixate attention on the most important, enhance emotionality and aesthetic effect, establish meaningful connections between adjacent and distant elements, belonging to the same or different levels, ensuring the coherence of the text and its memorability” [Arnold 1978: 23]. Strong text positions represent one type of promotion.

The title is the strongest of these positions, which is emphasized by its isolation from the main body of the text. Although the title is the first highlighted element of the text, it is not so much at the beginning as above, on top of the entire text - it “stands outside the temporal sequence of what is happening” [Petrovsky 1925: 90]. In the article “Morphology of the Short Story,” MA Petrovsky writes that the meaning of the title is “not the meaning of the beginning of the short story, but in relation to the short story as a whole. The relationship between the short story and its title is synecdochic: the title co-implies the content of the short story. Therefore, directly or indirectly, the title should indicate some significant point in the story" [ibid.].

The functionally fixed position of the title “above” and “before” the text makes it not just a semantic element added to the text, but a signal that allows one to develop comprehension of the text in a certain direction. Consequently, the title, in a condensed form, contains information about the communicative organization of the meaning of the entire work of art. As a result of the contact of the title with the text, a single new artistic statement is born.

For prose, the rule is that the title and text go towards each other. This is clearly manifested in the process of the author’s work on the text. Most documents show that as soon as a writer finds a title for his nascent work of art, then “such a phrase that originated within the text, once it has arisen, begins in turn to degenerate the textual fabric: the pre-title growth of the draft - almost always - is sharply different from the draft that has already found its title" [Krzhizhanovsky 1931: 23]. The text is constantly being reworked to correspond to the final title: the content of the text tends to the title as the limit of completeness. Even when the text is finished, the title and the text look for a more specific match: the title either acquires a subtitle or is modified.

The borderline status and functionally fixed position of the title give rise to direct and inverse connections between the title and the text. In this regard, it is interesting to consider the connection of the title with the categories of prospection and retrospection in the text.

There is always a reader who opens a particular book for the first time. For him, the title is the starting point of his appeal to the artistic world of the work. At first, the title still has little content, but the semantics contained in one or several words of the title gives the reader the first guideline by which the perception of the text as a whole will be organized. This means that the title is the first member of the direct, prospective connection between the title and the text. The further reading process explicitly or implicitly forces the reader to repeatedly turn to the title again: perception will look in it for the basis of the connection and correlation of subsequent parts of the text, its composition. “Step by step, the material is organized according to what is specified in the title. This is, as it were, a direct order of perception of the work and at the same time the first member of the “feedback”, the meaning and significance of which becomes clear when we close the book” [Gay 1967: 153].

Thus, the title turns out to be the center of the generation of multidirectional connections in a work of art, and compositional and semantic connections appear as centripetal in relation to the title. Numerous connections that the title acquires during the reading of the text degenerate the semantic structure of its perception. The meaning of the title structure increases: it is filled with the content of the entire work. The title becomes the form into which the content of the text as a whole is cast. “Thus, the name, being by its nature an expression of the category of prospection, at the same time has the properties of retrospection. This dual nature of the name reflects the property of each statement, which, based on the known, is directed into the unknown. In other words, the name is a phenomenon of a thematic and rhematic nature” [Galperin 1981: 134].

The titles of different works relate differently to the categories of prospection and retrospection and thereby create variable relationships between the literary text and its title. Direct and feedback connections in the text can have two forms of expression: explicit (explicit) and implicit (not receiving formal expression). The direction and type of formal expression determine the degree of closeness of the connection between the title and the text.

Titles such as “The Tale of How Ivan Ivanovich Quarreled with Ivan Nikiforovich” (1834) by N.V. Gogol mainly activate direct relationships. The title presents the composition of the work in an expanded form for the reader: it contains the plot of the story (quarrel), as well as the similarities (same names) and dissimilarities (different patronymics) of the main characters. Direct connections dominate over reverse ones: the title is turned inside the text. A pronounced reverse perspective of connections is observed in question titles and proverb titles. The title-question (like “Who is to blame?” (1845) by A. I. Herzen) requires an answer that can only be given by reading the entire book. The very formulation of the question in the title is a kind of completion. The question that opens and summarizes the problem is thus addressed to the outside world; the question mark itself in the title is a call for open dialogue. Titles-proverbs aphoristically condense the content of the text following them and thereby, at the very beginning, close it into the figurative framework of phraseological unity. So, the replacement of A. N. Ostrovsky former name the play "Bankrupt" with the new "Our people - we will be numbered!" (1850) (with an exclamation mark) is by no means accidental. After all, the author in the play reveals not the fact of the hero’s bankruptcy itself, but the mutual responsibility of “his people” who make up a single whole. At the beginning of the play, an artistic conclusion is given, to which the reader will come only at the end. Such titles are mostly associated with the main body implicitly.

The most obvious connection is found in the titles, which are directly and explicitly developed in the text of the work. The main way of expressing this connection is close and/or distant repetition in the text. “The linguistic element placed in the title is clearly perceived and remembered precisely because of the individuality and importance of the latter. Therefore, the appearance of this linguistic element in the text is easily correlated by the reader with its primary presentation and is recognized as a repetition” [Zmievskaya 1978: 51].

The maximum degree of explication of the connection between the title and the text is achieved when the repeating elements of the title are continuous or appear in strong positions: the beginning and end of the text. “The beginning of the text is the first, and the end is the last thing that the perceiver encounters and becomes familiar with. Perceiving them, he is on the border of text and non-text, that is, in a situation that maximally facilitates the capture and awareness of what is specific and characteristic of a given text” [Gindin 1978: 48]. Repetition, like strong text positions, is a type of emphasis. The appearance of a linguistic element in the strongest position of the text - the title, and its repetition in another strong position (beginning or end) of the text creates a double or multiple prominence of this element.

The beginning and the end are especially noticeable in small forms. This phenomenon allows word artists to often use the technique of framing a work of art with a title structure in lyrical poems, stories, and short stories. We find an interesting construction in this sense in the story “Bachman” by V. Nabokov. The writer's title, in conjunction with the initial and final lines, encloses the text and meaning of the entire work, enclosing it in a frame. But at the same time, it seems to resurrect the hero named by the title from the dead. So, in the first lines of the story we learn about Bachmann’s death: “Not so long ago the news flashed in the newspapers that in the Swiss town of Marival, in the orphanage of St. Angelica, died, forgotten by the world, the glorious pianist and composer Bachman". The story ends with the greeting “Hello, Bachman!”, although not uttered by one of the characters, but intended by him.

Among modern prose writers V.F. Tendryakov mastered this technique perfectly. Here, for example, is the joyful frame of the story “Spring Changelings” (1973): “...And the clear, stable world began to play with Dyushka in changelings."- “A wonderful world surrounded Dyushka, beautiful and treacherous, loving to play changelings". Moreover, the last repetition of the word “shifters” is not equal to the first- it reveals new properties of “beautiful insidiousness.”

We find a more complex outline of the title theme in a larger form - the novel “Eclipse” (1976) by V. F. Tendryakov, where, in addition to the initial ones (July 4, 1974, partial lunar eclipse) and ending lines (" A total eclipse for me... Eclipses transient. Let there be someone who would not pass through them” [Tendryakov 1977: 219, 428]) the internal titles of the parts “Dawn”, “Morning”, “Day”, “Twilight”, “Darkness” also play a large role, reflecting intra-textual forms development of the main title. Here the frame repetition doubles the meaning of the novel's title word.

We find an unusual frame in the story “The Circle” by Nabokov, which begins with the lines: « Secondly, because a frantic longing for Russia broke out in him. Third finally, because he felt sorry for his then youth - and everything associated with it - anger, clumsiness, heat, - and dazzling green mornings, when in the grove one could go deaf from the willows" .

And it ends: « Firstly, because Tanya turned out to be as attractive, as invulnerable as she once was.” .

It is significant that the beginning of this text has a non-normative organization: the narrative is introduced as if from the middle, since the character is named with an anaphoric personal pronoun. At the end of the text, on the contrary, there is a similarity to the opening part with a continuation that turns us to the initial lines of the text. Consequently, Nabokov’s title “Circle” sets the circulation of both the text itself and the events described in it.

In large forms (such as a novel), the title word or phrase is often not immediately included in the fabric of the narrative, but appears at the plot-climax points of the literary text. The technique of distant repetition in this case not only organizes the semantic and compositional structure of the novel and highlights its most important nodes and connections, but also allows the words of the title to develop their metaphorical meaning in the semantic perspective of the text. In turn, the metaphorical possibilities of linguistic signs in the title give rise to the semantic and compositional duality of the entire work.

We encounter the use of this technique in I. A. Goncharov’s novel “The Cliff.” A study of the history of its creation suggests that the appearance of the title word at the culmination points of the text is explainable not only logically, but also historically. This phenomenon indicates the intratextual origin of the title.

The novel took a very long time to create (1849–1869). At first, the artist Raisky was at the center of the story, and the future novel had the code name “The Artist” (1849–1868). The story begins with Raisky. Almost the entire first part is dedicated to him. But while working on the text, Raisky is relegated to the background. Other heroes come to the fore, primarily Vera. And in 1868, Goncharov decides to name the novel after her. This title remains in the text - this is the title of the novel that Raisky was going to write. But in the process of working on the final parts of the novel (the fourth and fifth), a sharp change in plan occurs. It is associated with the discovery of the symbolic word “Cliff”, which is fixed as the title of the novel. Thanks to this word, the novel was completed. In accordance with the title word, the novel begins to be remade and shaped.

Let's trace the history of the word “cliff” through the text. The word first appears towards the end of the first part in the meaning ‘steep slope along the bank of a river, ravine’. There is also a mention of a sad legend associated with cliff, his bottom Raisky is the first to come to the cliff: he is beckoned “to cliff, from which there was a good view of the Volga and both its banks.” The second mention of the cliff is already in the second part of the novel. Marfenka’s attitude towards him is determined: “I don’t go with cliff, It’s scary there, it’s deaf!” For now, the repetition in the text is scattered, with hints.

The next time the repetition appears is in the fourth part. A contrast arises: “family nest” - “cliff”. Now already break connected with Vera, her meetings on bottom of the cliff with Mark. Here we encounter the verbal use of the root from which the word is derived break. Faith then is torn To cliff, then stops in front of him, then takes a step again towards cliff." Root repetition implements a new meaning of the word break- ‘the place where it breaks’. At the same time, the verbal meaning of the word is born and begins to dominate cliff, associated with an action or process. This occurs due to the accumulation of verbs in the text tear, tear. The characters' feelings "break through". Raisky notices in Vera the presence of the same love for Mark, “which is contained in him and was torn To her". "And passion vomits me,” says Vera. And in "zeal to some new truth» rushes to the bottom of the cliff. Two roots come into contact. Saturation occurs in the text of the verb tear, always correlated with rush up, and place cliff Distant repetitions of a word break become increasingly intimate at the climax of the novel. The final resolution into close repetitions comes towards the end of the final fifth movement. The closer to the end, the closer to the “cliff”.

Break appears before Vera as abyss, abyss, and she - “to the other side abyss when already came off forever, weakened, exhausted by the struggle, and burned the bridge behind her.” Contrasted top And bottom cliff Mark stays on day him, does not rush after Vera “from the bottom cliff to the height." Paradise remains at the top of the cliff, and “his whole novel ends cliff" He did not save Vera, “hanging over cliff at a dangerous moment." Helps her "get out of cliff"Tushin, despite the fact that "for the second time he slipped from his cliff happy hopes." He doesn't consider this break abyss" and carries Vera "through this cliff", throwing a “bridge across it” (parts V, VI).

Thus, the title “Break” is created by the text and itself creates the text, restructuring its understanding. End-to-end repetition generates not only the text, but also the subtext of the work. The cliff and the bottom of the cliff in their literal meaning serve as the place for the unfolding of the main collisions of the novel, the collision of various compositional lines. But the concentration of the conflicting feelings of the main characters in this “place” is so great that they break apart - break. Break ceases to exist simply as a designation of place, the verbal, metaphorical meaning begins to dominate in the word. The law of economy requires, without introducing new lexemes, to update their meaning whenever possible: and Goncharov, at the climax of the novel, did not separate the two meanings, the two planes of the word cliff, but united them. The combination of two meanings gave completeness to the whole plan: the author found the final title of the novel.

Analysis of the text of the novel “The Precipice” allows us to understand how the subtext of the work is born. According to T. I. Silman, “the subtext is based on at least a two-vertex structure, on a return to something that already existed in one form or another either in the work itself, or in the projection that is directed from the work to reality” [Silman 1969: 84]. Thus, in the text, “base situation” A and “repetition situation” B are distinguished: the meaning of segment B, reinforced by repetition, using the material given by the primary segment of text A, “develops at the corresponding point in the work that deep meaning, which is called subtext and can arise only on the basis of the material given at point A, taking into account those plot layers that lie in the plot space between point A and point B” [Silman 1969: 85]. Usually, in a large novel form, a whole sequence of fragments appears, which are connected by the repetition of different semantic components of one situation or idea (in this case, the idea of ​​a “cliff” and its overcoming). Based on this correlation, new knowledge appears as a reorganization of previous knowledge, and the literal and subtextual meaning become in the “theme-rheme” relationship.

The depth of subtext is determined by the clash between the primary and secondary meaning of a word, statement or situation. “The repeated statement, gradually losing its direct meaning, which becomes only a sign reminiscent of some initial specific situation, is meanwhile enriched with additional meanings, concentrating in itself the whole variety of contextual connections, the whole plot-stylistic “halo”” [ibid.: 87]. In other words, subtext irradiation occurs: the internal connection restored between certain segments activates hidden connections between other segments in the text. This is why tropes are so often used to create subtext - metaphor, metonymy, irony.

Explicit repetition of the title in the text can be either multiple or single. Often, a single repetition, due to its singularity, is no less significant in the structure of the whole work than a multiple repetition, but it mainly belongs to small forms. A one-time repetition is most often implemented either at the very beginning (“Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk District” (1865) by N. S. Leskov) or at the very end (“The Enchanted Wanderer” (1873) by N. S. Leskov) of the text. Thus, the words of the title “The Enchanted Wanderer” are repeated only in the last paragraph of the story. It is obvious that works of this kind are built on the “feedback” principle. Their titles “are hidden behind pages of text moving through the reader’s consciousness and only with its last words do they become understandable and necessary, acquiring the logical clarity that was previously<…>was not felt" [Krzhizhanovsky 1931: 23].

At first glance, it seems that the title and the text, linked implicitly, are characterized by a less close connection. However, such a conclusion often turns out to be illusory, since implicit relations apparently express a completely different level of connection than explicit ones. In the case of an implicit connection, the title is connected with the text only indirectly; its meaning can be symbolically encrypted. But still, it is connected directly with the text as a whole unit and interacts with it on an equal basis.

The observations of Yu. M. Lotman are useful in this regard. Defining at the semiotic level the relationship that arises between the text and its title, the scientist writes: “On the one hand, they can be considered as two independent texts located at different levels of the “text-metatext” hierarchy. On the other hand, they can be considered as two subtexts of a single text. The title can relate to the text it denotes on the basis of metaphor and metonymy. It can be realized using words of the primary language, translated into the rank of metatext, or using words of a metalanguage, etc. As a result, semantic currents arise between the title and the text it denotes, giving rise to a new message” [Lotman 1981a: 6–7].

With this consideration, explicit connections between the title and the text are realized with the help of words of the primary language, translated into the rank of metatext (that is, “text about the text”), and implicit ones - with the help of words of the metalanguage. Then the implicit connection acts as the most explicit form of hierarchical “metatext-text” relations.

The implicit form of connection between the title and the text can manifest itself in various ways. If there is a direct connection, the absence of explicit linguistic indicators of the development of the theme of the title in the text itself does not prevent the title from serving as the main “indicator” of the key theme of the work. This happens because the dominant influence of the title transfers the reader's perception to a deeper semantic level - a symbolic one. There is a symbolic, metalinguistic deployment of the title in the text, and the text acts as an expanded title metaphor.

Such, for example, is the relationship between the title “Spring Waters” (1871) and the story itself by I. S. Turgenev. The title combination is not explicitly repeated in the text. The only component where the words of the title are expressed verbally is the epigraph. Title and epigraph (from an old romance “Merry years, Happy days - Like spring waters they rushed by!”), related explicitly, determine the direction of the semantic development of the metaphor in the text: ‘movement of water’ - ‘movement of life, feelings’. Unfolding in a literary text, the title-metaphor through the semantic repetition of similar components of meaning generates a metaphorical field there.

“Spring Waters” is primarily correlated with the cheerful years of Sanin’s life, with that mighty flow, unstoppable waves which the hero was carried forward. Semantic repetition occurs at the climax of the story, at the peak of the hero’s feelings: “... from a sad shores of your sad single life plump he's in that one cheerful, ebullient, mighty stream - and grief is not enough for him, and he does not want to know where he is going will endure... It's not quiet anymore jets Uhland's romance, which recently lulled him... This strong, unstoppable waves! They flying And jumping forward - and he flies with them" .

Semantic repetitions at the beginning and end of the story are specified using the contrast method. The elderly hero remembers his life. "Not stormy waves covered<…>it seemed to him sea ​​of ​​life- no, he imagined it the sea is calmly smooth, motionless and transparent to the very bottom..." Life is still the same pouring from empty to empty, the same pounding of water". This is the beginning of the story. The end again turns us to the aged hero. Here the metaphor associated with the movement of water develops on a different plane: “He was afraid of that feeling of irresistible contempt for himself that<…>certainly will surge at him and will flood How like a wave other sensations..." The hero is overwhelmed by waves of memories, but these are not the same waves that are carried by the stream of “spring waters” - they drown him, carry him “to the bottom”. Bottom of the sea of ​​life appears at the beginning: this is old age and death, which bring “all everyday illnesses.” The end of the story is not so gloomy. This darkness is removed by the title and composition of the story, the epilogue of which again turns us to the “spring waters” of love.

A different type of implicit relationship connects the polysemantic symbolic title “On the Eve” (1860) and another story by Turgenev. According to the author, the story is named after the time of its appearance. The full title shows that Russia was on the eve of the appearance of people like Insarov. Initially, the text had the title “Insarov,” but it did not suit Turgenev, since it did not answer the questions posed in it. “On the Eve” changed the concept of the work. The title appeared “on the eve” of the text, which allows only the unique position and functions of the title as a compositional unit of communication: it is generated by the content of what it presupposes, and therefore is unthinkable without it.

Obviously, with an implicit connection, the final closure of the text with the title occurs only when, as a result of the contact of the text with the title, semantic currents arise that give rise to a single new message. Implicity is inherent in any title to one degree or another. This is manifested in the fact that the main line of explicit connection between the title and the text always interacts with additional semantic lines at the level of implicit connection.

Let us now define the functions of the titles of a literary text. The function of a linguistic element in linguistic poetics is understood as its specific purpose, in addition to the role that this element plays in the transmission of direct subject-logical information. This additional purpose is clarified and established by the general artistic system works.

The borderline status determines the dual nature of the title, which, in turn, gives rise to the dual nature of its functions. Accordingly, all functions of the title can be divided into external And internal. In this case, the reader’s position is considered external to the text, and the author’s position is internal. A distinctive feature of external functions is their communicative nature.

So, we highlight three external and three internal functions in the title of a literary text, correlating with each other:

external

1) representative;

2) connecting;

3) the function of organizing reader perception.

internal

1) nominative (nominative);

2) isolation and termination function;

3) text-forming.

Standing at number three, the interconnected external function of reader perception and the text-forming internal function work at three levels of organization of a literary text and each include three subfunctions: For) the function of organizing meaning - highlighting the semantic dominant and the hierarchy of artistic accents; 3b) function of compositional organization; 3c) function of stylistic and genre organization. In addition to general external and internal functions, each title, organizing reader perception, performs a specific aesthetic function in its specific work.

Let's consider external and internal functions in their interaction.

Title of the work of art - representative, that is, the representative and substitute of the text in the outside world. This is the representative function of the title: condensing the text within itself, the title conveys its artistic information. Nominative the function acts as the internal side of the representative function. The representative function is addressed to the reader; the naming function is carried out by the author of a work of art in accordance with the internal specifications of the text. The writer, naming the book, sets a certain task for the reader, asks him a riddle, which reading of the work helps to decipher.

When first acquainted with the work, the title implicitly - only due to its position - appears as a representative. As the text is read, as the reader dialogues with the author, the meaning of the title increases - it forms an artistic statement. In this new capacity, the title not only represents the text, but also designates it. Having passed through the text of a work of art, the title addresses the reader with its external side - the title in an explicit representative function. In this sense, it becomes not only a representative of the work, but also its substitute. Thus, “the name uniquely combines two functions - the function of nomination (explicit) and the function of predication (implicit)” [Galperin 1981: 133]. The naming function corresponds to the nomination category of the text, the representative function - predication. In this regard, interesting titles are those consisting of the names and/or surnames of the main actor. From the point of view of the primary reading of the text, the representativeness of these titles is small compared to titles consisting of common nouns: proper names appear in the title in their direct nominative function. Initially, such a title does not have a significative meaning, but only directs us to search for the main character and focuses attention on the compositional lines associated with him. As such a work is read, and even more so with the growth of its popularity and public attention to it, the proper name given in the title gradually acquires the lexical meanings of its predicates. And already in this new quality, condensing the idea of ​​the entire work into its “speaking name,” it acquires representative and other functions. The names and surnames appearing in the title acquire a certain semantics and usage, according to which they will be included in a certain literary paradigm (“Eugene Onegin” by A. S. Pushkin, “Rudin” by I. S. Turgenev, “Oblomov” by I. A. Goncharov; “Two Ivans, or the Passion for Litigation” (1825) by V. T. Narezhny and “The Tale of How Ivan Ivanovich Quarreled with Ivan Nikiforovich” (1834) by N. V. Gogol). When a proper name is used for the second time in a title, as, for example, in allusive titles (“Russian Zhilblaz, or the Adventures of Prince Gavrila Simonovich Chistyakov” (1814) by V. T. Narezhny; “Russian Zhilblaz, or the Adventures of Ivan Vyzhigin” (1825) by F. V. Bulgarin, etc.), it already performs mainly a representative function, pulling with it the theme, plot, mood of its classical model, plus the whole mass of previous variations of this theme. In such titles the role of the connecting function is great.

Connection function the title acts as external to the internal isolation and termination functions. The first title establishes contact between the text and the reader and thus connects and relates the work to other texts and artistic structures, introducing this title into the general system of cultural memory. “The book, like everything around it, is looking for opportunities to go on and beyond its cover into its outside” [Krzhizhanovsky 1931: 31]. It acquires this opportunity thanks to the connecting function of the title.

At the same time, the title highlights and separates its text from other texts, from the entire external world, and thereby provides the text with the necessary conditions for existence and functioning as an independent unit of communication: completeness and integrity. Isolation is a necessary condition for the existence of a prose text, since it is fiction. “The so-called fiction in art is a positive expression of isolation” [Bakhtin 1975: 60]. Demarcation is a necessary condition for creating the internal organization of a text, a system of its connections. Therefore, the title is an active participant in the formation of the internal structure of the work. When the author finds a title for his text (for example, Goncharov - “Cliff”), and the reader deciphers the author’s intention, the textual fabric of the work acquires the boundaries of its development. Closing the text with a title ensures unity and coherence of previously separate meanings. The title becomes the main constructive device for creating coherence between the elements of the text and integrating the text as a whole. The title, thus, becomes a form of formation and existence of the text as an integral unit, becomes a form that performs the function of isolation and completion in relation to the text as content.

But the concept of text integrity is relative. Isolation of a text or its inclusion in a certain unity depends on the communicative intention of the author. The boundaries of the text itself, like the boundaries of the title, are movable. The text is subject to constant processes of change: either the “transformation of text into context” occurs, that is, the significance of the boundaries of the text is emphasized, or “the transformation of context into text” - erasing external boundaries [Lotman 1981b: 5]. Therefore, the internal function of isolation and completion is in dialectical unity with the connecting external one.

The connecting function of the title can form texts that run through all Russian literature. This, for example, is the “Petersburg Text”. From the “genre-defining” subtitles “ Bronze Horseman"("Petersburg Tale") by Pushkin (1833) and "The Double" ("Petersburg Poem") (1846) by Dostoevsky, the epithet appears in the titles of the collections "Petersburg Stories" (1835–1841) by Gogol, "Physiology of Petersburg" and "Petersburg Collection" (1845–1846) edited by Nekrasov and applies to the works included in it; these works echo “Petersburg Peaks” (1845) by Y. Butkov and “Petersburg Slums” (1867) by V. Krestovsky, etc. In the 20th century, the same tradition continues - “Petersburg Poem” (1907) - Blok’s cycle, numerous "Petersburg" of the beginning of the century, including the novel by A. Bely (1914). “This specification “Petersburg” seems to set the cross-genre unity of numerous texts of Russian literature” [Toporov 1984: 17].

The connecting function clearly reveals itself when translating titles. Differences in national consciousness often lead to re-expression of the name, the creation of a new, different one. Without knowledge of national literature, the meaning of an allusive title or a title implicitly associated with the text sometimes remains unclear. In these cases, the translator takes on the functions of an intermediary between the original text and his translation, restoring broken connections and relationships. Yes, the name famous novel Ven. Erofeev’s “Moscow - Petushki” was translated by Italian translators as “Mosca sulla vodka” (literally ‘Moscow through the prism of vodka’).

Further logic of the description leads us to consider functions of organizing perception And text-forming title functions. According to Yu. M. Lotman, the main function of a literary text is the generation of new meanings. The generation of new meanings largely occurs due to the interaction of the title with the main body of the text. Between the title and the text, a semantic and phase arises, which simultaneously expands the text in space and collects its content into the form of the title. Therefore, the title can be considered as a component of a work of art, generating the text and generated by the text.

The paradox is that it is possible to describe the text-forming function of the title at the level of the finished text only through the function of organizing reader perception.

We find an excellent analysis of this kind in L. S. Vygotsky in the book “Psychology of Art” [Vygotsky 1965: 191–213]. Vygotsky took I. A Bunin’s story “Easy Breathing” (1916) as a model. The poetics of this work is based on the interaction of the title with the compositional structure of the text. In “Easy Breathing,” the role of the beginning and end of the text is especially clear. The beginning and end of the real disposition are rearranged in the composition of the story. For what?

The content of the story is “everyday dregs,” the heavy prose of life. However, this is not the impression he gives. Bunin gives it the name “light breathing”. “The title is given to the story, of course... not in vain, it contains a disclosure of the most important theme, it outlines the dominant that determines the entire structure of the story... Every story... is, of course, a complex whole, made up of completely different elements, organized in different degrees, in different hierarchies of subordination and communication; and in this complex whole there is always a dominant and dominant element, which determines the construction of the rest of the story, the meaning and name of each of its parts. And such a dominant feature of our story is, of course, “light breathing”” [ibid.: 204]. This phrase appears only towards the very end of the story in the memories of a classy lady about a conversation she overheard about the meaning of female beauty. "The meaning of beauty is "easy breathing"- that’s what the heroine thought, oh tragic death which we learn at the very beginning of the text. The whole catastrophe of her life "this light breath." Now "it's easy breathing again scattered in the world, in this cloudy sky, in this cold spring wind,” concludes Bunin. “These three words,” writes Vygotsky, “completely concretize and unite the whole idea of ​​the story, which begins with a description of the cloudy sky and the cold spring wind” [ibid.: 204]. In poetics, such an ending is called pointe - ending on the dominant. The composition of the story “takes a leap from the grave to easy breathing." The author drew a complex, crooked composition in his story “to destroy its everyday dregs, to turn it into transparency” [ibid.: 200–201].

From the point of view of the organization of perception, the titles are unusual, which in a figurative form simultaneously convey both the semantic dominant of the work and the method of its compositional structure. Such titles are almost always cycle-forming. Thus, the prose poem “Forest Drops” by M. Prishvin breaks up into separate miniature droplets with independent titles, which flow together thanks to the collective title. From the “droplets” titles “Light of Droplets”, “Light Drops”, “Tears of Joy”, etc. and mini-texts, “Forest Drops” is born. And Prishvin’s novel “Kashcheev’s Chain” (1928–1954) breaks down into separate “links”, each of which the hero must overcome in order to remove the entire “Kashcheev’s Chain” of evil, ill will, doubt in the world and within himself.

Different functions are not equally represented in each specific title: each has its own distribution of functions. There is interaction and competition not only between external and internal functions, but also between functions of each type separately. The final version of the title depends on which functional trends the author has chosen as prevailing (internal or external, textual or metatextual).

Previously, we determined that in addition to the general functions inherent in all titles to a greater or lesser extent, each title, organizing the text and its perception by the reader, performs a particular aesthetic function in relation to your specific text. This aesthetic function cannot be successfully defined in isolation from the general functions of the title, and all the general functions of the title and their distribution are subordinated in the work to its specific aesthetic function.

The aesthetic function of the title is decisive in works of fiction, while in all other types of literature - newspaper journalistic, scientific, popular science, etc. - it acts as a secondary additional component. The dominance of the aesthetic function is explained by the fact that in a literary text not only the content of the message itself is important, but also the form of its artistic embodiment. The aesthetic function of the title grows out of the poetic function of language.

The aesthetic function of the title will take on various meanings depending on the theme, style and genre of the work, and its artistic task. Titles with a predominance of external functions will have one range of aesthetic function values, titles with a predominance of internal ones - another. A certain range of aesthetic function values ​​will be characteristic of titles whose external and internal functions are in relative balance. Titles with a predominance of internal functions can take on the following functional aesthetic meanings:

1) symbolic(“Dead Souls” by N.V. Gogol, “ Scarlet Sails"(1923) A. Green, "Ginseng. The Root of Life" (1933) M. M. Prishvina);

2) allegorical(“Crucian carp-idealist”, “The wise minnow”, “Bear in the province” (1884–1886) by M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin);

3) artistic generalization and typification(“Hero of Our Time” (1840) by M. Yu. Lermontov; “Man in a Case” (1898) by A. P. Chekhov);

4) ironic(in the titles of A. Chekhov’s satirical stories “Mysterious Nature” (1883), “Defenceless Creature” (1887), etc.);

5) disappointed expectations(in titles humorous stories M. Zoshchenko “Poor Liza”, “The Sorrows of Young Werther” (1934–1935));

6) clues(we found such a meaning in its pure form only in the titles of poems);

7) zero(“Without a title” by A. Chekhov, A. Kuprin).

Titles with a predominance of external functions have the following range of functional meanings:

8) emotional impact(“Emilia, or the Sad Consequences of Reckless Love” (1806) by M. E. Izvekova);

10) shocking(in the titles of the futurists’ collections - “Sugar of the Kry”, “Heel of the Futurists. Stihi” (1913–1914)).

The range of aesthetic function values ​​for titles with approximately equal distribution of external and internal functions is very wide. Titles in which one or another direction of function dominates can also take on these meanings. These are the following values:

11) allusive(“The Sorrows of Young Werther” by M. Zoshchenko, “Oh you, last love!..” (1984) by Y. Nagibin);

12) stylization(“Adventures of a fakir. A detailed history of the remarkable adventures, mistakes, clashes, thoughts, inventions of the famous fakir and dervish Ben Ali Bey, truthfully described by himself in 5 parts with the inclusion of essays about...” (1935) Vs. Ivanov);

13) parodies(“The Real Vyzhigin, a historical, moral and satirical novel of the 19th century by F. Kosichkin” (1831) by A. Pushkin, “A message to Ivan Vyzhigin from S.P. Prostakov, or Fragments of my stormy life” (1829) by I. Trukhachev - parodies of novels by F. Bulgarin);

14) "fantastic" attitude tasks- unreal - real” in a literary text(“The Dream of a Funny Man” (1877) by F. Dostoevsky, “Notes of a Madman” (1834) by N. Gogol; subtitles - fantasy novel (story), dream, fairy tale, etc.);

15) emphasized documentation(“Physiology of St. Petersburg”, edited by N.A. Nekrasov; “Not on the lists” (1974) by B. Vasilyeva, “TASS is authorized to declare...” by Y. Semenov);

16) aphoristic-summarizing(in title-questions like “What to do?” (1863) by N. G. Chernyshevsky, title-proverbs like “Poverty is not a vice” (1854) by A. N. Ostrovsky);

17) expressions of subjective modality(explicit modality - “Yes, guilty!” (1925) by S. Semenov, “We must endure” (2008) by O. Zhdan; implicit modality - “Easy Breathing” by I. Bunin, “Cruelty” by P. Nilin); author Kikhney Lyubov Gennadievna

CHAPTER IV ANALYSIS OF A WORK OF ART