UDC

82.091+82-193.1:82-92

Authors

Tat’yana V. Strukova
Orel State Institute of Culture; ul. Leskova 15, Orel, 302020, Russian Federation;
e-mail: tatam08@rambler.ru

Abstract

The article analyses literary riddles in verse by anonymous authors published on the pages of monthly and weekly periodicals in the late 18th century (Chto-nibud, Rastushchy vinograd, Prokhladnye chasy, and Novye ezhemesyachnye sochineniya). Having emerged in the mid-18th century, the genre of Russian literary riddle in verse had never been a subject of special research. This paper is intended to fill the gap in the study of the genre of literary riddle in verse, which not only reflects the cognitive worldview and vision of the poets, but also externalizes numerous artistic experiments. Without considering the characteristic features of this genre, the understanding of the literary process in the second half of the 18th century would be incomplete. Beyond all doubt, riddles reflected their authors’ world outlook and aesthetic vision. In the riddles published in the magazines Chto-nibud and Rastushchy vinograd, folk origins can be traced on the level of subject matter (depiction of household items) and methods of creating enigmatic images (use of cognitive metaphors, oxymoron, and negative parallelism). At the same time, however, the riddles of anonymous authors differ significantly from folk riddles in terms of narrative structure and composition. Most of the riddles published in the aforementioned magazines have an informative and heuristic orientation. In addition to describing material objects and presenting empirical categories (hence the use of implicit description by means of antithesis and comparison), which are unusual for the folk genre, riddles in the magazines Prokhladnye chasy and Novye ezhemesyachnye sochineniya introduce ethical and philosophical concepts. The main specific feature of these enigmatic texts is their function of readers’ edification.

Keywords

literary riddle in verse, folklore tradition, literary tradition, interpretive field, enigmatic image

References

1. Gukovskiy G.A. Rannie raboty po istorii russkoy poezii XVIII veka [Early Works on the History of Russian Poetry of the 18th Century]. Moscow, 2001. 352 p. 
2. Maslova A.G. Prostranstvenno-vremennaya kartina mira v russkoy poezii nachala 1760-kh godov (po materialam zhurnala “Poleznoe uveselenie”) [Space-Time Image of the World in Russian Poetry in Early 1760s (Based on Materials of the Magazine “Useful Entertainment”)]. Vestnik Moskovskogo gosudarstvennogo oblastnogo universiteta. Ser.: Russkaya filologiya, 2011, no. 6, pp. 107–112. 
3. Maslova A.G. Poetika vremeni i prostranstva v russkoy poezii posledney treti XVIII v. [Poetics of Time and Space in Russian Poetry of the Last Third of the 18th Century]. Kirov, 2014. 499 p. 
4. Morozova E.A. Romanticheskoe dvizhenie v russkoy literature XVIII – nachala XIX vv.: tvorchestvo v “narodnom dukhe” [Romantic Movement in Russian Literature of the 18th – Early 19th Centuries: Creativity in the Spirit of the People]. Moscow, 2003. 154 p. 
5. Denisova E.A. Struktura i funktsii enigmaticheskogo teksta (na materiale russkikh zagadok i krossvordov) [Structure and Functions of the Enigmatic Text (Based on Russian Riddles and Crosswords)]. Moscow, 2008. 226 p. 
6. Abdrashitova M.O. Miromodeliruyushchaya funktsiya zhanra zagadki v fol’klornom diskurse [World-Modelling Function of the Genre of Riddle in Folklore Discourse]. Tomsk, 2012. 23 p. 
7. Larionova O.N. Kognitivnaya sostavlyayushchaya russkikh zagadok [Cognitive Part of Russian Riddles]. Vestnik Tyumenskogo gosudarstvennogo universiteta, 2010, no. 1, pp. 264–269.