The language of a work of art. Specifics of the language of fiction

In the linguistic environment, there are different opinions about the identification of fiction as an independent functional style of speech. It is known that texts of various genres and styles - popular science, artistic journalistic, colloquial - can have signs of artistry. But this does not allow us to consider them works of fiction. This means that a literary text is different from a non-fiction text.

One of the distinctive features of fiction is the lack of standardization, since the author work of art has freedom in choosing linguistic means than authors of texts of other styles. Indeed, the search for new words, combinations of sounds, speech patterns is the undoubted task of the author of a literary text, but this does not mean that the language of fiction is limited in use. And as you know, the main feature of a literary text is its form.

All works of fiction are written in prose or poetry. Writing prose and poetry are two completely different activities. And very few managed to combine the qualities of a poet and a prose writer. Every reader is able to distinguish a prose work from a poetic work. But many linguistic means that authors of poetic texts use are inappropriate in prose texts, and vice versa.

There are many genres of fiction: short story, short story, story, novel, essay, poem, poem, drama, comedy, etc. Texts of different genres are written differently. They differ, first of all, in form (prose or poetic), volume (short story and novel, poem and poem), the degree of detail described (for example, in a novel, unlike a story, the action takes place over a long period of time, the characters are numerous, the author’s reasoning lengthy), composition, form of communication (stories are read, plays are listened to and watched) and therefore require the use of various linguistic means.

Writing a text in a certain genre is a conscious act: the writer follows the requirements of the genre of the text; he cannot write a text outside the genre. Each author, when starting to create a text, must choose a genre, building his text in accordance with the requirements of this genre. A literary text is always unique, not similar to other texts either in content or language. Therefore, it can be argued that a writer must have his own unique individual style.

There are many works devoted to the description of the language of A.S. Pushkina, N.V. Gogol, A.P. Chekhov and other authors. We can say that the “general” stylistics of the language fiction is based on the individual stylistics of individual authors - only in this case it is possible to study the linguistic features of literary movements. Artistic language changes over time, and these changes are associated with the discoveries that writers and poets make in their works.

The writer's style is individual. However, this does not mean that it will be repeated from work to work. While maintaining general stylistic features, his language will change depending on the task that he sets for himself.

The author's search for his own language and style is linguistic creativity. The attitude towards language as something created unites many writers of various literary movements. Writing a work of art would be impossible if the language itself did not provide writers with certain techniques that allow them to create something new in the language. These methods of speech expressiveness (tropes, rhetorical figures) are associated with unusual word usage. These include comparison(a figurative expression based on a comparison of two objects or states that have a common feature perfect bear);metaphor(based on the transfer of a name from one item to another based on the similarity of these items They fall from the maples all day longsilhouettes of crimson hearts (N. Zabolotsky)); metonymy(based on the contiguity of objects or phenomena Paris is worried, the audience greeted the president standing up);personification(a type of metaphor consisting in the use of a word naming a living object or its attribute to name or characterize an inanimate object time flies, melancholy takes over, Nozdryov’s Village is long agorushed away out of sightclosed fields);epithets(artistic definitions blind love, chilling politeness, dense ignorance, marmalade mood);hyperbola(exaggeration I've told you this a hundred times);litotes(understatement man with a fingernail).

It should be noted the author's imagery, which can manifest itself not only in word usage, but also in word formation and word combination Some distance away it was getting darkboring bluish pine forest color; But this is not the case, and the fate of the writer is different, daring to bring out everything... - the amazing mud of little things that have sunk our lives, allthe depth of cold, fragmented, everyday characters , whichteeming ourearthly , sometimesbitter and boring road , Andwith the strong force of an inexorable cutter who dared to display them prominently and brightlyon the eyes of the people N.V. Gogol ).

To enliven speech, give it emotionality, imagery, and expressiveness, stylistic syntax techniques, the so-called figures of speech. Figures of speech can be divided into three groups. The first group includes figures that allow you to determine the relationship between the meanings of words and concepts in it: antithesis, gradation. The second group unites syntactic figures that have the property of facilitating listening, understanding and memorizing speech: repetition, unity of command, parallelism, period. The third group combines rhetorical forms that are used as methods of dialogizing monologue speech and attract the listener’s attention: appeal, rhetorical question, question-and-answer move.Antithesis(a technique based on the comparison of opposite phenomena and signs My head is thick, but my head is empty); gradation(a figure of speech, the essence of which is the arrangement of several words, phrases, phrases listed in the speech I ask you, I really ask you, I beg you - ascending gradation; Animal, alien, unsightly world... - descending gradation) . Forms repeat There are many different ones, for example, anaphora(a technique in which several sentences begin with the same word or group of words Such are the times! These are our morals!;epiphora(repetition of final elements of successive phrases I would like to know why Ititular councilor ? Why exactlytitular councilor ? ); parallelism(the same syntactic structure of neighboring sentences, the location of similar parts of the sentence in them In what year - calculate, In what land - guess... ON THE. Nekrasov); period(a special rhythmic construction, the thought and intonation in which gradually increase, reach the peak, after which the theme receives its resolution No matter how hard the people, who had gathered several hundred thousand in one small place, tried to disfigure the land on which they huddled, no matter how they clogged the ground with roots so that nothing would grow on it, no matter how they cleared away any budding grass, no matter how much they smoked coal and oil. no matter how they trimmed the trees and drove out all the animals and birds, spring was spring in the city L.N. Tolstoy); rhetorical appeal(emphasized appeal to someone or something, aimed at expressing the author’s attitude towards a particular object, giving its characteristics Love you, my damask dagger, Comrade bright and cold M.Yu. Lermontov); a rhetorical question(an effective stylistic device actively used in modern public speech in order to attract the attention of listeners and readers Don’t I know him, this lie with which he is completely saturated? L.N. Tolstoy); question and answer move(in the practice of oratory it performs the function of dialogizing monologue speech).

In the described example, you can see how the writer’s speech changes depending on what language problem he needs to solve. It is precisely such fluency in the stylistic resources of the language that is a sign of a developed linguistic personality, and the language of fiction is considered the highest form of Russian literary language.

Every day, depending on the communication situation, each person speaks, writes, communicates at work and at home, with friends and strangers, with one person or with several at the same time, and all these and many other factors force him to structure his speech in different ways. Each native speaker plays different speech roles, using the rich capabilities of their native language, and the level of development of the linguistic personality is manifested in how successfully they manage to build and change their speech.

The peculiarities of the language of fiction are:

1) unity of communicative and aesthetic functions;

2) multi-style;

3) widespread use of figurative and expressive language means;

4) manifestation of the author’s creative individuality.

To this we add that the language of fiction has a great influence on the development of the literary language.

Not all decrees

These traits are a specific affiliation artistic style. As has already been said, only the aesthetic function is entirely related to it. As for other features, they are found to a greater or lesser extent in other styles. Thus, we find figurative and expressive means of language in many genres of journalistic style and in popular science literature. The individual style of the author is found both in scientific treatises and in socio-political works. Literary language is not only the language of fiction, but also the language of science, periodicals, government agencies, schools, etc.; its development is strongly influenced by spoken language.

Being only a part of the general literary language, the language of fiction at the same time goes beyond its boundaries: to create “local color”, speech characteristics characters, and also dialect words are used as a means of expression in fiction, social environment characterize the words slang, professional, colloquial, etc. Archaisms are also used for stylistic purposes - words that have fallen out of the active language, replaced by modern synonyms. Their main purpose in fiction is to create the historical flavor of an era. They are also used for other purposes - they add solemnity and pathos to speech, serve as a means of creating irony, satire, parody, and color the statement in humorous tones. However, in these functions archaisms are used not only in fiction: they are also found in journalistic articles, newspaper feuilletons, epistolary genre etc.

Noting that in fiction language appears in a special, aesthetic function, we mean the use of the figurative capabilities of language - the sound organization of speech, expressive and figurative means, the expressive and stylistic coloring of the word. The figurativeness of a word is determined by its artistic motivation, purpose and place in the composition of a work of art, and compliance with its figurative content. The word in an artistic context is two-dimensional: being a nominative-communicative unit, it also serves as a means of creating artistic expressiveness and creating an image.

A feature of the style of a work of art is the “image of the author” (“narrator”) that appears in it, not as a direct reflection of the writer’s personality, but as its peculiar reincarnation. The selection of words, syntactic structures, and intonation pattern of a phrase serves to create a speech “image of the author” (or “image of the narrator”), which determines the entire tone of the narrative and the originality of the style of the work of art.

Often the artistic style is contrasted with the scientific one. This opposition is based on Various types thinking – scientific (using concepts) and artistic (using images). Different shapes knowledge and reflection of reality are expressed in the use of various linguistic means.

To confirm this position, you can compare two descriptions of a thunderstorm - in a scientific article and in a work of fiction

Conversational style

Conversational style is contrasted with bookish styles; it alone has the function of communication, it forms a system that has features on all “tiers” of the language structure: in phonetics (more precisely, in pronunciation and intonation), vocabulary, phraseology, word formation, morphology, syntax.

The term “conversational style” is understood in two ways. On the one hand, it is used to indicate the degree of literary speech and is included in the series: high (bookish) style - medium (neutral) style - reduced (colloquial) style. This division is convenient for describing vocabulary and is used in the form of corresponding marks in dictionaries (words of a neutral style are given without marks). On the other hand, the same term denotes one of the functional varieties of the literary language.

Conversational style is functional system, so isolated from the book style (it is sometimes called literary language) that it allowed L.V. Shcherbe make the following remark: “Literary language can be so different from colloquial language that sometimes we have to talk about two different languages" Literary language should not be literally opposed spoken language, i.e. take the latter beyond the limits of literary language. This refers to two varieties of literary language, each with its own system and its own norms. But in one case it is a codified (strictly systematized, ordered) literary language, and in the other it is a non-codified (with a freer system, less degree of regulation), but also a literary language (beyond which there is what is partially included in literary speech, partially beyond it framework (so-called vernacular). And in the future we will adhere to this understanding. And to distinguish between the available options within the literary language - lexical, morphological, syntactic - the terms “book” and “colloquial” will be used.

The conversational style finds its expression both in written form (replicas of characters in plays, in certain genres of fiction and journalistic literature, entries in diaries, texts of letters on everyday topics) and in oral form. This does not mean oral public speech (report, lecture, speech on radio or television, in court, at a meeting, etc.), which refers to a codified literary language, but unprepared dialogical speech in conditions of free communication of its participants. For the latter case, the term “colloquial speech” is used.

Conversational speech is characterized special conditions functioning, which include:

1) lack of preliminary consideration of the utterance and the associated lack of preliminary selection of linguistic material;

2) the immediacy of verbal communication between its participants;

3) the ease of the speech act, associated with the lack of formality in the relationship between speakers and in the very nature of the utterance.

The context of the situation (the setting of verbal communication) and the use of extra-linguistic means (facial expressions, gestures, the reaction of the interlocutor) play a big role.

Purely linguistic features of colloquial speech include:

1) the use of extra-lexical means: intonation - phrasal and emphatic (emotionally expressive) stress, pauses, speech rate, rhythm, etc.;

2) widespread use of everyday vocabulary and phraseology, emotional and expressive vocabulary (including particles, interjections), various categories of introductory words;

The language of fiction is a kind of mirror of literary language. Rich literature means rich literary language. And it is no coincidence that great poets and writers, for example Dante in Italy, Pushkin in Russia, become the creators of national literary languages. Great poets create new forms of literary language, which are then used by their followers and all those who speak and write in this language. Artistic speech appears as the pinnacle achievement of language. In it, the capabilities of the national language are presented in the most complete and pure development.

The artistic style differs from other functional styles of the Russian language by its special aesthetic function. If colloquial speech performs a communicative function - the function of direct communication, scientific and official business - the function of a message, then the artistic style performs an aesthetic function, the function of an emotional-figurative impact on the reader or listener.

This means that artistic speech should arouse in us a sense of beauty, beauty. Scientific prose affects the mind, artistic prose affects the feeling. A scientist thinks in concepts, an artist - in images. The first one argues, analyzes, proves, the second one draws, shows, depicts. This is the specificity of the language of fiction. The word performs an aesthetic function in it.

Of course, this function is characteristic to a certain extent of other styles. Each of them strives to be expressive in their own way. However, for an artistic style, the focus on expressiveness is the main, determining one.

The word in a work of art seems to be doubled: it has the same meaning as in the general literary language, as well as an additional, incremental one associated with the artistic world, content of this work. Therefore, in artistic speech, words acquire a special quality, a certain depth, and begin to mean more than what they mean in ordinary speech, while remaining outwardly the same words.

This is how ordinary language is transformed into artistic language; this, one might say, is the mechanism of action of the aesthetic function in a work of art.

The peculiarities of the language of fiction include an unusually rich, varied vocabulary. If the vocabulary of scientific, official business and colloquial speech is relatively limited thematically and stylistically, then the vocabulary of artistic style is fundamentally unlimited. The means of all other styles can be used here - terms, official expressions, colloquial words and expressions, and journalism. Of course, all these various means undergo aesthetic transformation, fulfill certain artistic tasks, and are used in unique combinations. However, there are no fundamental prohibitions or restrictions regarding vocabulary. Any word can be used if it is aesthetically motivated and justified.

Here, for example, is an excerpt from L. Leonov’s novel “Russian Forest,” in which special vocabulary is widely and uniquely used. Its use is motivated by the fact that it is a fragment of a lecture by the hero of the work, Professor Vikhrov.

This is how darkness and disorder sets in in nature. The springs are extinguished, the lakes become peaty, the creeks are filled with arrowleaf and kuga... Thus a monster enters our house, getting rid of which will require immeasurably more effort than we spent on expelling the forest. By folk superstition, the forest attracts water and then releases it as a cloud on its further journey. This means that he harnesses every drop of water into double and triple work. The larger the forests, the more often the rain will touch the ground with the constant two hundred millimeters of precipitation that we receive on average from the ocean per year.

Colloquial speech is close to the language of fiction in its naturalness and simplicity of expression, democracy, and accessibility. It is widely used not only in dialogues, but also in the author’s speech.

Journalism is attracted to fiction by the possibility of an immediate, direct assessment of what is depicted. Artistic speech is an objectified picture of the world. When the writer has a need for evaluation, the need to speak on his own behalf, journalistic digressions appear in the work.

However, such diversity does not lead to chaos or lexical diversity, since each linguistic means in a work of art is motivated meaningfully and stylistically, and all together they are united by their inherent aesthetic function.

Such a wide range in the use of speech means is explained by the fact that, unlike other functional styles, each of which reflects one specific aspect of life, the artistic style, being a kind of mirror of reality, reproduces all spheres human activity, all phenomena public life. The language of fiction is fundamentally devoid of any stylistic closure; it is open to any styles, any lexical layers, any linguistic means. This openness determines the diversity of the language of fiction.

One of the features of fiction is artistic and figurative speech concretization.

An important feature of the artistic style is the individuality of the syllable. Every great writer develops his own style of writing, his own system of artistic techniques.

Masters of words create amazingly vivid visual and expressive means of language (tropes), constantly replenishing its treasury, from which any native speaker can take handfuls of countless treasures.

Epithet and comparison. How many of them have been invented! Many have become habitual and have lost their brightness.

The most amazing and widespread among visual and expressive means is metaphor, or hidden comparison.

Some writers use a very common trope in an original way - allegory, i.e. the embodiment of an abstract concept or idea in a specific artistic image.

Can be very expressive personification - transferring human properties to inanimate objects and abstract concepts.

Very expressive figure of speech gradation- an arrangement of words in which each subsequent one contains an increasing meaning, due to which the overall impression produced by the group of words increases. Gradation allows you to convey the deep experiences of a person in a moment of shock. Here, for example, is how Hamlet’s feelings are described in Shakespeare’s tragedy (translated by Mich. Lozinsky):

Thus, the essence of individuality is not in the absolute novelty of metaphors, images, combinations of words, but in the constant renewal of poetic formulas and their change.

However, clichés are completely unacceptable in the language of fiction - mechanically applied walking epithets, frequently used comparisons that are unable to evoke any emotions, and cliched expressions.

The language of fiction has a strong impact on the literary language and constitutes its main wealth.

Features of artistic speech.

1. Imagery. A word in artistic speech contains not only meaning, but in combination with other words it will create an image of an object or phenomenon. The generally accepted meaning of an object takes on a specific form, which makes the object visible, tangible and perceptible.

2. Emotionality. Literary speech is emotionally charged, so it affects the reader, causing appropriate emotions. This feature manifests itself in different ways.

3. Semantic capacity. Artistic speech is particularly brevity, accuracy and expressiveness.

Imagery, emotionality and semantic capacity are achieved through the entire structure of artistic speech by the selection of words, that is, vocabulary, a special combination of words, that is, syntax; phonetic features of the language are often used.

The book sphere of communication is expressed through an artistic style - a multi-tasking literary style that has developed historically and stands out from other styles through means of expressiveness.

Artistic style serves literary works and aesthetic human activity. the main objective– impact on the reader with the help of sensory images. Tasks by which the goal of the artistic style is achieved:

• Creating a living picture that describes the work.
• Transferring the emotional and sensory state of the characters to the reader.

Features of artistic style

Artistic style has a purpose of emotional impact on a person, but it is not the only one. The general picture of the application of this style is described through its functions:

• Figurative-cognitive. Presenting information about the world and society through the emotional component of the text.
• Ideological and aesthetic. Maintaining the system of images through which the writer conveys the idea of ​​the work to the reader awaits a response to the plot's concept.
• Communicative. Expressing the vision of an object through sensory perception. Information from the artistic world is connected with reality.

Signs and characteristic linguistic features of artistic style

To easily identify this style of literature, let’s pay attention to its features:

• Original syllable. Due to the special presentation of the text, the word becomes interesting without contextual meaning, breaking the canonical patterns of text construction.
• High level organizing text. Dividing prose into chapters and parts; in a play - division into scenes, acts, phenomena. In poems, metric is the size of the verse; stanza - the study of the combination of poems, rhyme.
• High level of polysemy. The presence of several interrelated meanings for one word.
• Dialogues. The artistic style is dominated by the speech of characters as a way of describing phenomena and events in the work.

The literary text contains all the richness of the vocabulary of the Russian language. The presentation of the emotionality and imagery inherent in this style is carried out using special means, which are called tropes - linguistic means of expressive speech, words in figurative meaning. Examples of some tropes:

• Comparison is part of the work, with the help of which the character’s image is complemented.
• Metaphor - the meaning of a word in figuratively, based on an analogy with another object or phenomenon.
• An epithet is a definition that makes a word expressive.
• Metonymy is a combination of words in which one object is replaced by another on the basis of spatiotemporal similarity.
• Hyperbole is a stylistic exaggeration of a phenomenon.
• Litota is a stylistic understatement of a phenomenon.

Where is the fiction style used?

The artistic style has incorporated numerous aspects and structures of the Russian language: tropes, polysemy of words, complex grammatical and syntactic structure. Therefore, its general scope of application is enormous. It also includes the main genres of works of art.

The genres of artistic style used are related to one of the genres that express reality in a special way:

• Epic. Shows external unrest, the author’s thoughts (description of storylines).
• Lyrics. Reflects the author’s inner emotions (the experiences of the characters, their feelings and thoughts).
• Drama. The presence of the author in the text is minimal, a large number of dialogues between characters. Such works are often made into theatrical productions. Example - Three sisters A.P. Chekhov.

These genres have subtypes, which can be divided into even more specific varieties. Basic:

Epic genres:

• Epic is a genre of work in which historical events.
• A novel is a large manuscript with complex storyline. All attention is paid to the life and fate of the characters.
• A short story is a work of smaller volume that describes the life story of a hero.
• A story is a medium-sized manuscript that has the plot features of a novel and a short story.

Lyric genres:

• Ode is a solemn song.
• An epigram is a satirical poem. Example: A. S. Pushkin “Epigram on M. S. Vorontsov.”
• Elegy is a lyrical poem.
• A sonnet is a poetic form of 14 lines, the rhyme of which has a strict construction system. Examples of this genre are common in Shakespeare.

Genres of dramatic works:

• Comedy - the genre is based on a plot that makes fun of social vices.
• Tragedy is a work that describes tragic fate heroes, struggle of characters, relationships.
• Drama – has a dialogue structure with a serious storyline showing the characters and their dramatic relationships with each other or with society.

How to define a literary text?

It is easier to understand and consider the features of this style when the reader is provided with a literary text with a clear example. Let's practice determining what style of text is in front of us using an example:

“Marat’s father Stepan Porfiryevich Fateev, an orphan from infancy, was from a family of Astrakhan binders. The revolutionary whirlwind blew him out of the locomotive vestibule, dragged him through the Mikhelson plant in Moscow, machine gun courses in Petrograd ... "

Main aspects confirming the artistic style of speech:

• This text is based on conveying events from an emotional point of view, so there is no doubt that this is a literary text.
• The means used in the example: “a revolutionary whirlwind blew out, dragged” is nothing more than a trope, or rather, a metaphor. The use of this trope is inherent only in literary texts.
• An example of a description of a person’s fate, environment, social events. Conclusion: this literary text belongs to the epic.

Any text can be analyzed in detail using this principle. If functions or distinctive features, which are described above, immediately catch the eye, then there is no doubt that this is a literary text.

If you find it difficult to deal with a large amount of information on your own; the basic means and features of a literary text are not clear to you; Examples of tasks seem difficult - use a resource such as a presentation. Ready presentation with clear examples will clearly fill gaps in knowledge. The area of ​​the school subject “Russian language and literature” is served by electronic sources of information on functional styles speech. Please note that the presentation is succinct and informative and contains explanatory tools.

Thus, once you understand the definition of artistic style, you will better understand the structure of works. And if a muse visits you and you want to write a work of art yourself, follow the lexical components of the text and the emotional presentation. Good luck with your studies!

The peculiarity of the language of fiction is that it is open system and is not limited in the use of any language capabilities. The author of a literary text boldly uses all the resources of the language, and the only measure of the legitimacy of such use is only artistic expediency. Not only those lexical and grammatical features that are characteristic of business, journalistic and scientific speech, but also the features of non-literary speech - dialect, colloquial, slang - can be accepted by a literary text and organically assimilated by it.

On the other hand, the language of fiction is more sensitive to the literary norm, it takes into account a large number of prohibitions (the meaning of gender inanimate nouns, subtle semantic and stylistic shades and much more). In ordinary speech, the words “horse” and “steed” are synonymous, but in a poetic context they are irreplaceable: Where are you galloping, proud horse, and where will you put your hooves? In the poem by M.Yu. Lermontov “A golden cloud spent the night on the chest of a giant’s cliff...” the gender of the nouns cloud and cliff are contextually significant, serving as the basis not only for personification, but also for creating an artistic image of the poem, and, if you replace them with synonyms, for example, mountain and a cloud, the result will be a completely different poetic work. The linguistic fabric in a literary text is created according to more strict laws, which require taking into account the smallest stylistic and expressive properties of the word, its associative connections, the ability to be divided into component morphemes, and to have an internal form.

A work of art may include words and grammatical forms that are outside the boundaries of literary language and are rejected in non-fiction speech. A number of writers (N. Leskov, M. Sholokhov, A. Platonov and others) widely use dialectisms in their works, as well as rather rude figures of speech characteristic of common speech. However, replacing these words with literary equivalents would deprive their texts of the power and expressiveness that they possess.

Artistic speech allows any deviations from the norms of literary language, if these deviations are aesthetically justified. There are an infinite number of artistic motives that allow the introduction of non-literary linguistic material into a literary text: this includes recreating the atmosphere, creating the desired color, “lowering” the object of the story, irony, means of indicating the image of the author, and others. Any deviations from the norm in a literary text occur against the background of the norm and require the reader to have a certain “sense of the norm”, thanks to which he can assess how artistically significant and expressive the deviation from the norm is in a given context. The “openness” of a literary text does not foster disdain for the norm, but the ability to appreciate it: without a keen sense of the general literary norm, there is no full perception of expressively intense, figurative texts.

The “mixing” of styles in fiction is determined by the author’s intention and the content of the work, i.e. stylistically marked. Elements of other styles in a work of art are used for aesthetic function.