Three “Snowstorms” of Russian Literature: the Title as the Keyword of a Work of Fiction

Resumen

The article examines the features of the functioning of the title word as a key word in the novels of Alexander Pushkin, Vladimir Sollogub, Leo Tolstoy with the same name "Snowstorm", in all three works the image of a snowstorm plays an important role. The frequency of the use of the keyword is noted, its syntagmatic, paradigmatic and word-formation connections are characterized, its ability to be a minimal model of the text content, thereby forming a non-trivial aesthetic meaning of the text. In the vast majority of cases, the keyword is used in the form of the nominative case in the function of the subject of a two–part sentence in the meaning of the predicated subject - the carrier of the predicative feature, the snowstorm is personified. Predicates with the subject snowstorm or its substitute pronouns express: the existence of a given phenomenon, the different phases of its development, the intensity of its manifestation, the ability to perform certain actions, including Similar to the actions of living beings, the image of a snowstorm is likened to the image of fate, which not only makes adjustments to the characters' lives, but also has a significant impact on their state of mind. Attention is drawn to the conceptual convergence of the two old spelling variants of the word "blizzard", which is reflected in the figurative parallel "blizzard – confusion of feelings". The image of a snowstorm is projected onto the mental state of the characters experiencing confusion. The paradigmatics of the keyword blizzard is represented by synonyms, both literary and dialectal. A snowstorm manifests itself through the actions of wind and snow, which are animated in an artistic context. There is a vivid, expressive, hyperbolized description of the snowstorm in the literary text. According to dictionaries, the unambiguous word "snowstorm", acting as a key word in the text, acquires semantic extensions.