This article is centered on the study and description of the ways of identification and designation of the surrounding reality phenomena in two cultures - Russian and Chinese. Special attention is paid to the significance of the national-cultural specificity of the word. The article considers both general issues of ethno-cultural phenomena nomination and its specific cases, namely, the functioning of non-equivalent vocabulary and ways of its translation from Chinese into Russian. It also gives a brief overview of the distribution dynamics in modern Chinese prose and the problems of studying Yu Hua’s work in Russia. The aim of the article is to reveal the importance of translations of modern Chinese fiction as sources of studying non-equivalent vocabulary and translation strategies when working on characteristic word-markers of Chinese culture used in the novel “To Live” by the outstanding modern Chinese writer Yu Hua. The  study is based on the translation of the novel in question, made by the Russian scholar R. G. Shapiro. The article determines thematic groups of non-equivalent vocabulary in the novel “To Live” (word-designations of new Chinese life, ethnographisms, historicisms, background and connotative words) and the main translation methods of their transfer (borrowing, description, hyperonyms, etc.). Special attention is paid to approximate or inappropriate translations in the text, due to the translator’s ignorance of the semantics of non-equivalent words, which ultimately leads to an imperfect understanding of Chinese culture.

The article presents the results of the study of composites that have appeared in the Russian language in recent decades. The relevance of the research is due to the active process of replenishing in the class of composites, as well as a high interest in the study of their structure and semantics. We distinguish the binary structure of compound words (sometimes multicomponent) of varying degrees of solidity and offer four types of their classification. We also identify groups of composites by their thematic attribution.

The material under study represents complex lexical units not previously recorded in the dictionaries and provides new empirical data.

The material for the study was obtained from various sources: oral speech, fiction, advertising and journalistic texts, Internet resources - the article notes that the range of these words is genetically and structurally heterogeneous: today, the leading trend compared to the early period is the formation of a group of words in the Russian language according to a fixed analytical model: an attribute in the preposition plus a noun.

Foreign-language components easily form new words and have high activity, enter into free syntagmatic relations. Such a feature – the presence of analytical neoplasms – is a consequence of the general trend of the modern Russian language – the growth of analyticism.

The article notes that many complex words form combinations with a common component, thereby creating word-formation models, as well as single classes and word-formation fields.

The functional status, the degree of assimilation of components, the ability to enter into syntagmatic relations, as well as the frequency and other characteristics of the words considered here are not similar. The article notes that the process of borrowing, which has moved to various functional areas, as well as the formation of new complex words according to the models considered in the article, contribute to the development and expansion of the lexical composition in the modern Russian language.

This article identifies semantic characteristic of image-metaphors and establishes their frequency representation based on the anti-utopian novels “Brave New World” and “Ape and Essence” by A. Huxley. The diachronic parameter used in our study prompted the choice of the novels. First, we have identified, by means of the component analysis method, a list of diagnostic semantic features that make up the structural components of the image-metaphor semantic space in the works and organize five semantic areas: “categorical” (substantive, verbal, adverbial and adjective features), “anthropological” (anthropo-somatic and anthropo-mental features), “social” (socio-personal and socio-non-personal features), “naturalistic” (natural-biogenic and natural-abiogenic features) and “ontological” (onto-material and onto-non-material features). These semantic characteristics are determined according to both direct and figurative subjects  of the image-metaphor. Then, the task of the research was to establish statistically relevant semantic features of the considered lexical units in both texts. According to the parameter of oppositions, we have identified the semantic areas. In conclusion, we tried to correlate the results of the frequency analysis with some plot features of the aforementioned anti-utopian novels. The anti-utopian novel “Brave New World” has been recognized as the least apocalyptic novel, while the most apocalyptic novel is “Ape and Essence”.

The article is devoted to regular word-formation in the fictional practice. The purpose of the work is to reveal the possibilities of the regular word-formation system based on the poetry of Joseph Brodsky. Within the framework of this study, we consider the concept of “productivity” and the approaches to differentiation between word-formation type and word-formation model definitions. We have formulated the meaning of the term “a word-formation category”. The article studies the structural and semantic aspects of regular derivatives: using the method of word-formation analysis, we have identified productive word-formation types for different parts of speech, actual categorical meanings and frequency morphemes. The article identifies stylistic features of specific morphemes and analyses the combination of different-style derivatives when the image and function of lexemes that implement different word-building types are created. In the corpus of regular derivatives, we reveal the productivity of “color” paradigms, which emphasizes their semantic importance for the poetic imagery of Joseph Brodsky. In the course of our study, we noted derivational lexemes of a different order – potential and occasional. Their basis is the usual system of language, which confirms the high potential of regular word formation for a poetic text. The article concludes that regular derivatives play an important role in constructing poetic imagery.

The article considers the phenomenon of horoscopic text relevant to modern linguistics in general and analyzes it as a type of speech genre in particular. The article argues that the horoscopic text, functioning in the media space, is a cluster integrative unit created under the influence of a number of extralinguistic factors, which is directly reflected both in the linguistic means used in horoscopes and in their structural organization. The ubiquitous digitalization of the information space causes a reduction of a predictive text’s volume and brings it closer to media genres. The proof that the horoscope is a separate speech genre is the regular use of a certain set of speech acts in its texts, which make up the formula of the genre, while the range of relevant speech acts gets limited by this formula. As a result of our analysis of three hundred horoscope texts, we found that two types of a regularly used speech act can be distinguished in their structure, or two basic components of the media horoscope structure. The first component, implemented in a proposition, is represented by an assertive; the second part, perceived as a recommendation,  is represented in the form of a directive of various types. We consider that assertives can be divided into informative and evaluative; directives are verbalized by means of prescriptive and motivational varieties, phraseoreflections, promptings with a forecast, permissions and suggestions. Each type of a speech act is verbalized through a certain set of lexical and grammatical means of the language strengthening the communicative position of the author.

The article discusses the activities of Khusain Faizkhanov and the results of his work in the areas related to linguistics. Based on available source materials and indirect information, the article characterizes Kh. Faizkhanov’s proficiency in various languages, which was demonstrated by him both in his educational and research activities. The article draws attention to the factors that influenced Kh. Faizkhanov’s linguistic skills development. The range of languages that Kh. Faizkhanov knew and used in his work was wide. If he could master some of the languages due to his origin and profile of education (Turkic, Arabic, Persian), he learned others on his own, achieving the level that enabled him to use them functionally for specific tasks (Russian, Chuvash). Kh. Faizkhanov equally excelled as a linguistic theorist, which is clearly evidenced by his own textbook on the Tatar language, as a philologist, which is reflected in his work with written monuments, and as a linguist, which follows from his ability to make important, in terms of historical linguistics, methodological conclusions on the interpretation of the Volga-Bulgarian epitaphs, involving the use of information from the Chuvash language.

The issue of studying the linguistic variation, caused by the stratification of society into different strata and groups, has not been solved so far, remaining one of the key issues in modern linguistics. This article deals with the concept “nonstandard dialect” in the framework of sociolinguistic research into the German-speaking tradition, which belongs to the field of studies of linguistic variability of the German language native speakers. Nonstandard dialects may differ from other forms of language existence, as well as from the literary language at all linguistic levels: phonological, grammatical, syntactical, lexical and idiomatic. We examine various forms of the vernacular existence, including urban vernaculars. The focus is on the consideration of the features characterizing language variations at phonological and phonetic levels. This is caused by the necessity of determining sources and patterns of linguistic variations at the phonetic level, one of which, in our opinion, may be the nonstandard dialect as one of the forms of language existence. The article touches upon such notions as: colloquial language, regional norms and regional peculiarities of pronunciation. The article presents some pronunciation peculiarities of Cologne inhabitants’ urban colloquial speech at the segmental level of the German language phonetic system.

The article raises the issue of the linguodidactic potential of coloratives (color denoting words) based on the analysis of M. Prishvin’s tale-story “The Carvel Thicket”. We suggest that any analysis of a literary work involves the study of emotional, psychological, aesthetic and linguodidactic functions of the language used by the author. It helps to show the writer’s world view and the world seen through the eyes of the characters, and to convey the atmosphere of the epoch, scene and events. At the same time, each color, while having its own national and cultural symbolic meaning, has an individual artistic interpretation, thus a special linguocultural comment is required. This Prishvin’s work includes examples of the color semantics extension of the colorative yellow enhancing its meaning. This color, in contrast to ‘red’ and ‘green’, which are used to describe the living pine forest causing admiration, symbolizes the loss of this earthly beauty at the end of the story. “The yellow mass of the round forest”, “skinned yellow whips”, “the dead ones” – in this way M. Prishvin describes the forest emphasizing this color polarity. The article pays special attention to the linguadidactic potential of coloratives: by using the linguistic analysis of coloratives we can develop speech skills formation and international students’ figurative and aesthetic thinking in the course of Russian language learning and reading Russian literature.

The article is devoted to the linguocultural meanings of nationally specific forms of vocatives used by G. Yakhina in her novel “Zuleikha Opens Her Eyes”. The research object is the corpus of language units, used in G. Yakhina’s novel “Zuleikha Opens Her Eyes”, which are selected by continuous sampling from the first part of the novel. To analyze the studied units (appellatives), we use the descriptive and comparative methods, the method of word-formation, component and contextual analyses, as well as the method of quantitative calculation. To reconstruct the world of the Tatar village, the Russian-speaking writer uses a variety of appellative words (exoticisms, diminutives, evaluative forms, etc.), which do not always adequately appeal to the content of the Tatar linguocultural discourse. In the present article, we examine appellatives, in the unity of their form and content, as units of a particular literary text in order to identify their semantic specificity, stylistic and linguocultural affiliation, while taking into account the context of their use. The transformation and substitution of linguistic units, associated with the national specificity  of the linguistic picture of the world, prevents adequate and accurate perception of Tatar linguistic culture when the author creates artistic images in her novel, or subsequently conveys the meaning in translation. Thus, the article shows how the words of a foreign culture are introduced into the text and what consequently happens to the meanings they convey.

The memoirs of N. Mandelstam are well known to a wide range of readers, but the attention of researchers to these texts is often due to the interest directed at the personality and work of O. Mandelstam. Literary critics actively use “Memoirs”, “The Second Book”, and “About Akhmatova”, but linguistic studies practically do not touch on her extensive memoirs. The article considers aspects of the author’s reflection on the language in the memoirs of N. Mandelstam. Particular attention is paid to the explication and analysis of the key oppositions “we – they”, “ours – theirs”, implemented by various linguistic  means, as well as the reflexive activity of the memoirist, which is addressed, among other things, to the characteristic features of the language of different social groups. The genre affiliation of the analyzed material allows us to touch upon the problem of self-identification and self-presentation, which are ambiguously manifested in the text due to the addressing specifics of N. Mandelstam’s ego-document. The article also analyzes a number of characteristic features inherent in the so-called “female” writing.

Metaphor is a unique phenomenon both from the point of view of language and culture, for it preserves unique relic forms of the surrounding reality perception. At present, when modern conditions of people’s lives are transformed, metaphor, as a way of realization of hidden comparison, undergoes a number of qualitative changes. In this regard, it will be relevant to turn to metaphor functioning in folklore texts, because due to its conservatism we can identify archetypal images underlying the hidden comparison. This article examines the features of zoomorphic metaphor in Russian folk riddles. The zoomorphic code is interesting for us, since the images of animals, actualized through metaphor, allow identifying national values. In riddles containing images of animals, there is a certain similarity between the image of the animal and the denotat in question; accordingly, this similarity is reflected in the metaphor, usually through a description of the action and appearance of the animal. Analyzing metaphor in the Russian folk riddle, we identify zoomorphic codes, which retain archetypal coding, expressed in the context of the whole riddle and in its correspondence to mythological ideas about the given animal. In this case, we are talking about the image of a horse, a bull. At the same time, the corpus of folk riddles reveals such zoomorphic metaphorical formations, which do not show any connection with archetypal coding. Thus, the image of a bear is deprived of mythological subtext and is used only as a means of secondary nomination of the denotation.

The article examines the borrowed Russian-language words in the vocabulary of the Tatar dialects, identifies the function features of Russianisms in the local dialects and describes the mechanisms of the borrowed vocabulary adaptation at the phonetic level.

The relevance of the work is the need to study Russian borrowings in the functional and semantic aspects. The purpose of the research is to study the functional features of Russian borrowings in the Tatar dialects. The scientific novelty is to disclose the functional potential of the Tatar dialectal vocabulary category under consideration.

The study is based on the “Dialectological Dictionary of the Tatar Language” (1993, 2009). As a result of the study, the article argues that the presence of such a large number of lexemes indicates the important role of Russianisms in the worldview of the people and, consequently, in their lifestyle, culture and language.

The article concludes that Arab-Persian borrowings prevail most in the accents of the middle dialect, and Russianisms are primarily recorded in the accents of the Western dialect and in the dialects of the Siberian Tatars. We have found that Russian borrowings in the process of phonetic development undergo a strong phonetic adaptation to the orthoepic norms of the Tatar language, which is due to the difference between the languages in contact at all levels of the language structure, including the system of vocalism and at the consonant level.

An autobiographical narrative has been an integral feature of women’s writing throughout the existence of women’s literature. At the present stage, within the framework of gender-marked prose, its functional field is expanding. The transformation of the autobiographical narrative in the works of the 1990s - 20s is due to the very process of the gender-marked literature formation. In this regard, we can talk about two main options for its functioning. On the one hand, the autobiographical narrative is presented as an expression of a certain femme agenda, starting from the ideology of sisterhood, which was significant for Russian fem literature of the 1990s and early 2000s, and ending with the ideas of intersectional feminism, which are relevant for the circle of authors of the late 2010s and early 2020s. On the other hand, the dynamics of the autobiographical narrative makes it possible to trace the process of the formation of a kind of “canon” in gender-marked prose, which allows not only differentiating it in relation to the literature of the grand canon, but also identifying its specificity in the context of all female prose.

In this regard, it is appropriate to talk about three variants of the autobiographical narrative transformation, coinciding with three fairly distinct periods in the formation of Russian gender-marked prose. At the first stage, the functioning of the autobiographical narrative marks the gender nature of the text, emphasizing not just the deliberate marginality and peripheralness of the narrative instance, but, mainly, its ability to convey a unique female experience. At the second stage, the autobiographical narrative participates in the formation of a gender-oriented reading model as the basis for the “crystallization” of the female narrative canon. At the third stage, the plot acting out of the narrative model takes place.

This article analyzes philosophical and romantic motifs in the poetry of Marina Tsvetaeva and Ilsiyar Iksanova. The poetry of Ilsiyar Iksanova, a representative of the romantic trend in modern Tatar poetry, is an understudied topic today. The purpose of our study is to identify the originality of philosophical motifs and symbols in I. Iksanova’s works against the background of the work by M. Tsvetaeva. In her early lyrical poetry, referring to the work by the Russian poetess Marina Tsvetaeva, Ilsiyar Iksanova determined the vector of her poetry. The article analyzes the intimate lyrical works by the modern Tatar poetess, revealing the features of the existential picture of the world in the work of M. Tsvetaeva and I. Iksanova. Scientific research indicates that the existential concept of the world is recreated in the works of I. Iksanova through the motifs of fate, love, death and loneliness. The conclusion is made about the influence of M. Tsvetaeva’s creative work on I. Iksanov’s poetry. These existential motifs in the works of the poetesses, belonging to different literatures and periods, are consonant, but not identical. In M. Tsvetaeva’s work, loneliness is an opportunity to get to know oneself. I. Iksanova, purposefully using existential motifs, comes to a refutation of loneliness and death, her lyrical heroine comes to the knowledge of the truth through love and humility. Philosophical motifs in the work of the poetesses have tied Russian and Tatar poetry of different periods together.

The article studies the mechanisms of interaction between documentary and fictional codes in O. Kolpakova’s work “Superpowers by Inheritance: My Soviet Grandfathers”, considered here as a translator of intergenerational ties. The author focuses on establishing the place of the family in the history of  the country in different eras, which correlates with the purpose of our study – to determine the nature of the connection between non-fiction and fiction, past and present, which are presented in the story both in a dialogic unity and in opposition. The article concludes that the complex narrative organization of the work reflects the authorial concept of family history, allowing her not only to introduce the reader to the cultural and historical realities of a particular era, which is facilitated by the popular science commentary inserts by Ivan Privalov, but also to transmit the cultural codes that form the identity of the Russians (family, historical memory, respect for elders, love for one’s country and our homeland). The analysis shows that the dialectical relation between non-fiction and fiction is realized through the motif of “stories”, the conversation with the elder relatives is organized in accordance with the narrative models of Soviet literature, which makes an organic synthesis of non-fiction and fiction possible and does not presuppose a linear unfolding of the narrative. The article analyzes the ways of representation of the documentary in the story. The superpower motif, in the author’s opinion, enables her to reach the level of mythopoetic modelling of the national cultural code, which represents traditional values in the formulas that are topical for modern teenagers.

The article studies the peculiarities of dramatic narration in E. Radzinsky’s plays-parables. Modern theater and dramaturgy strive to reflect the qualitative changes in representative forms and their potential stage possibilities. One of these forms is the reception of dramatic narration, when the event that is being shown is replaced by the event that is being told about. This technique is actively used by the playwright E. Radzinsky in his historical plays-parables “Conversations with Socrates”, “Lunin, or the Death of Jacques”, “Theater of the Times of Nero and Seneca”, “The Executioner, or Conversations on the Way to the Guillotine”. Despite the fact that the plot is based on a documentary (or pseudo-documentary) text: the story of the life and execution of Socrates, described by Plato; “Moral Letters” to Lucilius (procurator of Sicily) by Seneca; “Letters from Siberia” by Mikhail Lunin; “Notes of an Executioner” by Charles Henri Sanson, the famous executioner during the era of the Great French Revolution, the play has a setting for oral speech. The playwright uses various techniques in constructing a plot to introduce this kind of a narrator into the text. The protagonist acts as a narrator, his position, the system of evidence, the testimony that the narrator uses – all these create an attitude of authenticity, the semblance of documentarity.

The article considers the documentary and fictional components of M. Ogneva’s play “Following the White Rabbit”, which raises the theme of the trauma experienced in the past. The play is based on real events related to the violent death of two teenage girls. In this play, the tragic event is taken out of the storyline and the attention is focused on the understanding of the tragedy by a female friend and the mothers of the girls. The article studies the techniques used by the author to create the fictional world of the play: allegory, allusion, a combination of real and fantasy elements, division and montage, work with documentary materials of a judicial practice, the “verbatim” technique, different types of discourse and different “points of view” to describe one and the same event. As a result of the analysis, we  conclude that the strategy used by the author is comparable to a fairy tale therapy (the method of psycho-correctional work): the therapeutic effect is achieved by pronouncing the traumatic experience in the presence of the audience, by the characters’ searches for various options for getting out of the spiritual crisis, by launching the process of continuous moral and ethical self-identification at the viewer’s level, i.e. by correlating the characters’ experience with their own destiny.

The ethno-epic heritage of the Russian and Tatar peoples’ traditional culture is based on epic tales, including the heroic epic of the people, the ethnos. The core of traditional culture is the subject’s ideas about the ideals of wisdom, heroism and beauty, about good and evil, about man’s place in the world, as well as religious and mythological views on man’s relationship with supernatural, higher forces as a kind of life of an ethnic group’s world. Our culturological analysis of the main characters from epic tales, including the comparison with Slavic epic characters, allows us to assert that the epic image of a batyr expresses a single complex of national historical concepts and ideas about the ideal man – a warrior in the best manifestation of all his virtues, the one who realizes and implements the age–old aspirations of the people, that is, an objectified view of the world. The image of a batyr, a hero in Tatar and Slavic folklore is of interest due to its complexity and versatility. He is both a fighter against the enemies of his native land and a hero who destroys evil forces; he is an ideal warrior who can make even the khan feel fear; at the same time, he can resort to cunning and deceit at times. Thus, batyrs win not only owing to their best qualities, but also to those that are usually pushed into the shadows when positive characters are described, as if they were non-existent. Perhaps, this is where lies the excessive love and trust of the people for epic works and their heroes.

The modern humanities increasingly tend towards interdisciplinarity, developing various methods and optics of analysis within the framework of the general main topic. Such, for example, is the study of the urban text, begun by academician V. Toporov, which gained popularity only in the 21st century. Rapid changes in the way and pace of life, technologies, science and social structure over the past 150 years require a new understanding of the process of urbanization and modern trends in urban structure and urban life. However, not only the social and applied anthropology of the city itself can be interesting, but also its representation in literary texts. The object of this research is the novel “Open City” by the modern American writer of Nigerian descent Teju Cole, in which New York, as the title itself suggests, becomes the main character and the center of the narrative. The following topics investigated by the author are distinguished in the work: the search for national and cultural identity, the existence of society in multiculturalism, the possibility of building communities that provide the individual with primary, i.e. close connections. The article concludes that the modern state of society within urban locality is best characterized by the term “anomie”, marking the social entropy and disintegration of the axiological system.

The article deals with the author’s strategies, used by E. O’Donnell in his Twenty Years’ Experience as a Ghost Hunter, and compares this peculiar text with ghost stories – a genre of fiction very popular those days. O’Donnell’s book is a part of a long tradition of occult ‘non-fiction’, but it is positioned as the author’s memoirs, a true story of his own life (his other books are basically collections of ‘real’ ghostly appearances in various regions of England), and begins with his (or his alter ego’s) youth and his first traumatic encounter with a ghost that influenced his career choice, but then this traditional life story turns into a set of cases, not necessarily witnessed by the narrator himself. Some stories are structured exactly like fictional ghost stories but their perception is preconditioned by the ‘rules of reading’ established by the author (the book is supposed to be his memoirs) and by the character of information – what the narrator knows about ghosts from various sources. Thus, the text is very uneven – its aesthetic characteristics are regarded as secondary in comparison with the ‘facts’ retold.

This article reviews theoretical conceptions concerning the genre specificity of the literary fairy tale. We refer to two key theories in the field of the genre - the works of M. Lipovetsky, based on M.  Bakhtin’s conception of “genre memory”, and J. Zipes theory of the fairy tale genre as a memeplex. Despite the fact that these conceptions are not traditionally considered in the scientific paradigm as complementary, we attempt to bring them into a single logic. The article identifies the connection between the studies of M. Lipovetsky, J. Zipes and the conception of “metafictionality”, or “self-reflexivity” of the literary fairy tale genre. We argue that metafiction is a key parameter of the genre being in direct connection with the category of intertextuality. Metafictionalism underlies the genre nature of the literary fairy tale; in addition, it can be expressed through particular techniques, including the “the method of breaking the fourth wall” technique, the “mis en abame” technique, the change of focalization, etc. The article concludes that the “metafiction” of the text, manifested in the literary fairy tale at all textual levels, can be a tool of genre differentiation.

The problem of the reception of M. Bakhtin’s personality and ideas seems to be one of the most important in today’s Bakhtin Studies. We focus on the writers’ reception among the various forms of Bakhtin reception. By Bakhtin literary reception they mean the presentation of Bakhtin’s image as a literary character, the participation of Bakhtin himself in the literary and cultural life of Nevel, Vitebsk, Leningrad, Saransk and Moscow, the facts of the thinker’s specific relations with representatives of the Russian literary community in different periods of his life. Special attention is paid to the presentation of M. Bakhtin’s image in the literary works of K. Vaginov (“Satyr Chorus”), A. Losev (“The Woman-Thinker”) and in the letters of B. Pasternak. The letters of K. Fedin (the 1960s and early 1970s), containing assessments of M. Bakhtin’s work and personality, have been introduced into the scientific literature for the  first time. We also analyze A. Beck’s attitude to Bakhtin’s works. The article concludes that the study of the writers’ reception of M. Bakhtin’s personality allows us to abandon a number of biographical myths and determine the real place of Bakhtin in the literary and intellectual life of the country in the 1920s and 1970s.

The article is devoted to the history of a creative dialogue between the poet and translator B. Ber and his literary patron A. Sheller-Mikhailov. The correspondence between the two writers, which began in 1895, continued until 1900 when the latter died. The surviving part of the epistolary genre (letters from A. Sheller-Mikhailov to B. Ber) contains about twenty documents; B. Ber’s response letters have not been found yet. Based on the analysis of their correspondence, the history of their acquaintance, the literary ties and cooperation between the two artists of the realistic and pre-modernist trends is restored, the main motives of their correspondence are revealed, which, on the one hand, is the evidence of the acquaintance and communication of representatives of different literary generations; on the other hand, it is a curious epistolary text that actualizes such meanings as “old” and “young”, “capital” and “province”, “craft” and “inspiration”. Particular attention is paid to literary masks and game strategies used by the addressee and the sender of the letters, framing the epistolary dialogue as an aesthetic phenomenon and an artistic act. The study of the creative dialogue between B. Ber and A. Sheller-Mikhailov is interesting as it enables to characterize each of the participants in the correspondence and to understand the nature of pre-modernist aesthetics, which was formed in the conditions of simultaneous assimilation and rejection of classical traditions.

Written at the turn of the 19^th– 20^th centuries, Evgeny Chirikov’s novel “Strangers”, reflecting the realities of provincial life, received an impressive number of critical reviews from the author’s contemporaries. However, decades later, critics took a different look at the work of E. Chirikov. The article examines the historical context of the novel created by the writer, searches for real prototypes of the characters depicted by the author, authentic events that served as a source of inspiration for Chirikov; as a result, the position of the writer’s contemporary critics is questioned. We have established that several episodes of the Samara “newspaper battles” of the 1880s – 1890s were taken as the basis for the plot development in the story “Strangers” by E. Chirikov, the main episode was the short “Marxist” period of “The Samara Vestnik”. We suggest that, while depicting Samara and Samara Messenger on the pages of the story, the author of “Strangers” did not copy the reality, recreating it in the way required by the laws of creating an artistic image. Finally, we prove that when creating the images of individual characters in “Strangers”, the writer acted in at least three different ways: “copying” the characters from real prototypes, “splitting” the prototypes into different characters, and finally, combining several real figures into one character.

Romantic historicism is defined by the combination of two basic ideas: the closedness of the historical past and the infinity of being. “The spirit of times” is a category characteristic of Romanticism, which determines the nature of text historicity. For N. Polevoy, it is significant to depict not only the material world, but also the ideological, mental level of comprehension of this world by the perceiving subject - the protagonist of the work (in the dialogues of the characters), as well as the “local flavor” of the characters’ images, largely based on the thinking forms characteristic of a certain time and society. The mental image of the world, formed by the man of the Middle Ages, presupposed the correlation of what was happening with biblical truths. Realizing the limitations of the characters’ idea of the true meaning of the events, the author makes them seek it in disputes. To create a “local flavor”, he also uses the forms of the characters’ names, which acquire a symbolic meaning in the context of the depicted events. All forms of representation of “the spirit of times”, used in the story, allow us to show the ambiguity, the incompleteness of the participants’ knowledge of the events happening around them. To this end, the narrator connects events belonging to the history of different peoples, showing that their participants cannot always even predict how they will interact over time. The “goal-setting” form of “the spirit of times” representation is an appeal to a chronicle source or a direct word of the narrator.

Based on the authorial notes to the “Letters of a Russian Traveler” by N. Karamzin, who separated “poetry” from “truth”, the article considers the following questions: how to determine the aesthetic nature of the notes; how they are connected with the change of literary trends, genres and styles, with the communicative function of verbal art, how the artistry of notes is formed; whether they are an integral part of the work; whether the author of the notes and the author of the main text are identical. We emphasize that Karamzin’s notes should be analyzed, first of all, in terms of his attitude to the problem of “literature and reality”, since for him authenticity was more important than artistry. The writer enters not into an artistically mediated, but into a direct dialogue with the reader, in order to gain his understanding and trust, to convince him of the veracity of what is described, while revealing a new level of understanding of what happened earlier. The article investigates the dynamics of the relationship between the notes and the main text. The special arrangement of the notes, the temporal and spatial distance separating them from the main text is interpreted as the evidence of their heterogeneity. We note the differences in their status: the main text, in principle, can exist and be perceived by the reader without the notes, albeit in a flawed form, while the publication of the notes in isolation from the main text is meaningless. The article highlights that it is in the literature of sentimentalism and, in particular, in Karamzin’s works, that a specific artistic quality of notes is developed in the form of a dialogue with an imaginary reader. The conclusion is made about the referential function of the authorial notes: in the “Letters of a Russian Traveler” they link literature and reality, the world of images and the real world, which is characterized by “its selective affinity” with the world of fiction.

J. Fowles’s diaries illustrate the emergence of the creative career of the prominent 20th-century English writer. In Russian science, there is an opinion that Fowles’s oeuvre belongs to postmodernism. However, Fowles persistently separated himself from postmodernism. A thorough study of his diaries testifies that with all the variety of themes and images and the abundance of the techniques of artistic representation of reality, the key issue of his works was the theme of the individual gaining self-awareness as a necessary condition for achieving freedom. His diaries can be considered as a compact documentary and fictional work, as a presentation of the principles of literary development and its continuity. Fowles’s diary is a peculiar confession of a young man, his creative pursuits and doubts of self–determination in society and life. In his aesthetic principles Fowles focuses on the classical tradition of literature in the 18th–19th centuries. Continuing the tradition of Rousseau, Fowles creates a model of a man who is characterized by the cult of emotions and nature. For Fowles, the world of art is the world of spirituality. Fowles’s diaries allow us to consider the attitude of the autobiographical protagonist to important phenomena of public life. In his diaries, special attention is paid to the topics of time, memory and nature. The diary of John Fowles describes the process of the person’s psychological formation with a real chronotope, with an analytical, informative and aesthetically rich word.

Twice Pulitzer Prize winner Colson Whitehead bases the plot of his novels on various facts of American reality found in documents and newspaper publications. By juxtaposing fact and fiction, he transforms them to create a new reality, rooted in the events of real life but acquiring a universal or metaphorical character that could be seen even in his early works. In “John Henry Days” (2001) the writer makes use of the legend of the famous black laborer John Henry, its reflection in the folklore and everyday life of the American South and attempts to up-sell it in today’s USA with the help of social networks. In the novel “The Underground Railroad”, written after Whitehead’s archival research and his study of slave narratives of the mid-19^th century, the document is woven into the artistic structure of the text by using authentic announcements about runaway slaves. The novel “The Nickel Boys” was written under the influence of the information about the horrible findings discovered on the grounds of the so-called Arthur Dozier School, established in early 20^th century for juvenile delinquents, telling the story of two black boys who got there in the 1960s. The writer incessantly explores the impact of racism on American society and social injustice making use of a historical novel elements, of alternative history, neo-slave narratives and satire in his descriptions of the contemporary US media.

The article systematizes information from the history of Tatar translations of Leo Tolstoy’s dramaturgical works and their existence in the Tatar environment. We have two Tatar translations of the drama “The Power of Darkness”. The analysis is based on Rafkat Shageev’s translation, made a century after the creation of the work. The belated appeal of the Tatar theater to this work is due to the specifics of the Tatars’ mentality and their way of life. In the course of our comparative analysis of the “Dөm” (“The Power of Darkness”) script against the original of the work, we found that the scriptwriters Elizaveta Bondar and Evgenia Augustenyak significantly abridged the work, intensifying the metaphorical and symbolic aspect of its dramatic images. The duration of the performance at the Almetyevsk Theater is 1.5 hours. During the comparative analysis, we proved that the scriptwriters sought to demonstrate the imagery potential of the Tatar language and its rhythmic capabilities, which is why the stage canvas has acquired the operatic sound. The translator managed to convey not only the message and the general idea, but also the structure of the script. R. Shageev used literary techniques in such a way as to make the pronounced text produce on the reader an emotional effect which would be close to the original. This article is the first step forward on the way to understand the phenomenon of Rafkat Shageev’s translation strategy.

The article analyzes the cover version of Shakespeare’s “The Winter’s Tale”, the focus is on the psychological aspect including psychological theories the reader faces in the novel. The origin of the trauma and the necessity of working through it are easily perceived through the perspective of the psychological aspect in the text. The trauma is in the direct proportion to new role behavior models. According to J. Winterson’s work, temporal and spatial characteristics are inextricably bound up with the trauma issue. The main part of the novel is concentrated on the most important problem of working through grief. Beyond that, there are more questions of significance, for instance, Leo’s ambivalence which affects his personhood and adult life. The novel includes the case of addictive love, which is commonly observed nowadays. Much of the plot involves the analysis of the feelings of guilt and an obsessive-compulsive disorder. There is an allusion to the Oedipus complex: both in the literary work and in the psychological theory. J. Winterson uses A. Aron’s Quiz to describe the characters’ relationships. The “separation” process is analyzed throughout the story of the novel.

This article examines Tatar and Russian modern prose characterized by transitional features. The main attention is paid to the works by the Tatar writer Aigul Akhmetgalieva whose work most vividly embodies transitional phenomena in Tatar literature at the beginning of the 21st century. In particular, the authors of the article focus on her stories “Kapka” (“The Gate”), “Tan chyklaryn җil ubu” (“The Wind Kisses the Morning Dew”) and the novel “Tutash”. The purpose of the article is to review new trends in Tatar prose and identify the common features in modern Tatar and Russian literature. The motif of search in Tatar prose correlates with the existential component of consciousness in Russian culture as a whole. Both Russian and Tatar prose follow the trend of profound philosophical subtext and the introduction of new writing techniques. The analysis of Akhmetgalieva’s works has led to the conclusion that in modern Tatar prose, classical realism and avant-garde discourse, when interacting, form new methods of personal relationship with the outside world. The characters of modern writers are most often at a crossroads, in a borderline state, the latest prose reflecting the problem of the total ill-being of modern society.

The article is devoted to the work of the notable contemporary writer A. Gelasimov. Over the past two decades, domestic literature has reflected a steady interest in the category of documentaries, resorting to various genre forms of nonfiction, style dominants, narrative strategies, etc. A. Gelasimov’s novel “Pure High” is largely organized based on the documentary principle, which manifests itself in the text at different levels of the whole: in the genre form of a biography, narrative, method of collecting information, adventurousness of the plot, stylized documents, language manner, etc. The document is used in the design of the publication, the section “Acknowledgements” correlates the names of the people from the environment of rapper Basta with the details of the novel, direct quotes from his songs are given, the biography is based on real facts. This use of documentary elements allows the author to actualize the tragic nineties of Russian history in the reader’s mind, to raise the issue of “the lost generations”, the forms and the causes of their destructive behavior and to show a possible experience of overcoming “the historical trauma”. Touching upon important social problems of our time, A. Gelasimov rediscovers the value of such categories as home, family, love, loyalty and friendship in the present.

Foreign language communication skills are crucial for today’s business professionals, as they provide opportunities for advancing their career and conducting efficient communication with partners world-wide. The present article and the underlying research explore the implementation of andragogical principles in an online course for Business English. One of the most important principles entails providing conditions for comfortable learning, including, above all, the format of interaction, which ultimately affects its efficiency and organization. The relevance of distance learning is confirmed by current national laws, as well as by social studies that indicate a demand for online classes in Russia. The use of digital technology for the development of adult learners’ foreign language communication allows them to be educated in a setting that simulates their working environment. This would suggest that when organizing adult education, it is recommended to rely on the learners’ professional experience, offer practice-oriented tasks, encourage autonomy and offer authentic, problem-oriented materials in order to facilitate interaction and set off discussions. With all the advantages of the distance learning format, adult learners may, however, encounter difficulties which are to be taken into account. This article presents an online course for Business English, taking into consideration the identified principles of andragogy, specific properties of workplace interaction and particular features of the distance learning format. The research findings may be of practical value for designing and organizing a course in Business English with its methodology based on adult learning theory principles.

The Olympiad movement in domestic pedagogy is perceived simultaneously as a driver of the development of students’ creative abilities and an alternative system for assessing their educational results. The problem of our research is associated with the implementation of Olympiad practices, in particular, with the results of the regional stage of the All-Russian Olympiad for Schoolchildren. The relevance of the study is due to the constantly increasing schoolchildren’s participation and popularity of Olympiads in different subjects. For example, in the 2022-23 academic year, more than 20 million cases of participation were recorded. There is no doubt that the Olympiad movement is important for the development of students’ creativity, however, schoolchildren tend to avoid intellectual competitions. Thus, the aim of the study is to examine additional external motivational factors that may improve the situation. As a theoretical framework of the study, the cultural approach was used along with the cultural theory of the education content. The main research methods are theoretical, including the analysis of scientific and methodological literature, regulatory documentation and tasks of the past years, categorization, induction and deduction. As a result, conclusions were made about the need to reform the Olympiad movement in the area of recognition of the significance of the regional stage results of the All-Russian Olympiad for Schoolchildren. We propose to take into account the effective participation in the Olympiads in the system of state final certification and equate the diploma of the winner and prize-winner of the regional stage with 85 and 75 points of the Unified State Exam, respectively. The article reveals prerequisites for such a reform, indicating a high level of competitions, with the transparency of the procedure for assessing and holding competitions under the direct control of the Ministry of Education. The theoretical significance of the study is refracted in the enrichment of pedagogical science in the field of the implementation of Subject Olympiads for Schoolchildren, its practical significance is the possibility of using the obtained results both to reform the procedure at the federal level and to recognize the significance of the regional stage results by universities when working with applicants.

The article deals with innovative methods of working with text in the process of studying Russian literature by international students. We present an integrative structure of working with text in Russian as a foreign language, which includes not only a special type of its analysis, but also the use of extra-text components. The article describes the technology of conducting a primary analysis of the text of fiction using questions on all spheres of readers’ perception. Such an innovative method of teaching the Russian language and culture to international students makes it possible to pay special attention to the methodological invariant of the implementation of literary works in various types of art as a linguodidactic technology focused on the cultural paradigm. The article shows the sequence of work with metaphor as the image-symbol of the whole literary work. It is this technique that allows you to find in the text an object that reflects the main concepts of the work. Thus, a multifaceted understanding of the complex works of Russian classical literature, necessary for a good literary education of international students, is carried  out. We pay close attention to working with texts of large formats with a multi-vector distribution of meanings. We thoroughly describe the technology of working with poetic texts of classical Russian literature, which are both difficult to perceive and necessary to understand the peculiarities of Russian literature and the Russian soul.

The article puts insight into current issues of teaching the Russian literary language to foreign under-graduates and postgraduates, specializing in “Linguistics and Intercultural Communication”, in the course of studying “Modern Russian Literature”. We use a broad historical and cultural context to substantiate the fundamental role of Russian literature in the formation of world culture and the global literary canon, and highlight the great influence that such Russian classical writers as Pushkin, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, Turgenev and Chekhov had on the development of foreign literature in the East and West. We observe and trace continuity in classical and modern literary eras and the best long-lasting spiritual, moral and linguistic traditions of the Russian people. We assume that the key problems the teacher should focus on are: Russian literature as a significant phenomenon of world culture, the development of classical traditions in the history of Russian literature at present, the dialogue among cultures and the translation of modern writers’ works into foreign languages, historical and philosophical problems in literature, and historical heritage of the Russian language. The article comprehensively studies the Russian language value dimensions and linguistic axiological directions. The data show the presence, stability and preservation of the fundamental values (life, love, truth, good, beauty, hope, grace, honour, etc.) in the Russian literary language. These values form the spiritual conceptual sphere in Russian culture and constitute its main moral foundations. Serious attention is paid to the aesthetics of the language. We show the aesthetic potential, artistic expressiveness and stylistic richness of the modern Russian literary language, based on the works of E. Vodolazkin, L. Ulitskaya, M. Shishkin, M. Kucherskaya, M. Stepnova, D. Rubina and others. We focus on the problem of preserving the Russian literary language and the high status of Russian in general, revealing complex realities of modern multinational and multicultural world. We recommend such modern masterpieces as “Laurel” by E. Vodolazkin, “The God of Rain” by M. Kucherskaya, “The Garden” by M. Stepnova, “The Writer” by M. Shishkin, “Yakov’s Staircase” by L. Ulitskaya as sources to improve literacy and general cultural competence of foreign students.

The promotion of the Russian language in the world is one of the main goals of the modern Russian education strategy. An important part of this problem is teaching Russian to foreigners in Russian universities. The current problem of modern Russian studies is the search for the most effective forms, methods and means of Russian language learning. Teaching Russian to foreigners should be built on an interdisciplinary basis. The most important component of teaching Russian to foreign students is literature. Turning to it, foreigners get acquainted with the history, culture and traditions of Russia from different eras. Russian literature is very popular in different countries. The works of Russian writers are studied in schools and universities in China.

The article presents the authorial method of teaching the Russian language to Chinese bachelors and masters based on a graphical and symbolic analysis of Russian literature. Our methodology uses the practice-oriented traditions of semiotics, mnemonics and ergonomics. When studying Ivan Turgenev’s story “Bezhin Meadow”, we focus on the features of its analysis in the Chinese audience. This lesson is preceded by a historical-literary and cultural commentary of the teacher who uses various multimedia tools. An integral part of our methodology is the creation of an adapted educational text with marked stresses, vocabulary work and various types of retelling, grammar tasks and a graphic drawing of the analyzed text. With this approach to the educational process, foreign students develop visual memory, better understand Russian grammar and improve oral coherent speech, which contributes to a deeper and more meaningful interest in the Russian language. The use of modern technologies, while working on a literary text, helps foreign students to better understand the national flavor of Russian literature. The study has led to the need to implement new approaches to teaching the Russian language to Chinese students at the North-Eastern Federal University named after M.K. Ammosov.

The article highlights the methodological techniques and technologies that are relevant to the methodology of teaching Russian as a foreign language and allow teaching the language of a specialty from any level to the required one. The methodological basis of the Russian language, which has gained a foothold in the Russian Federation in the status of a native, second native, non-native, second, and foreign Russian language, motivates RFL teachers to develop and implement modern technological methods that make it possible to build the system of education for this contingent in a Russian university as efficiently as possible.

Elements of hybrid learning, actively implemented in universities of all profiles, make it possible to flexibly use methodological developments to form individual strategies for achieving the main educational goal and personal results. Nevertheless, the lack of uniform departmental recommendations and the documented final level of proficiency in Russian at the university and postgraduate levels of education complicates the process of creating unified textbooks and teaching aids for foreign students of each individual profile.

The experience of working with educational materials, created in universities, shows the need for their wide dissemination through the implementation of the idea of common departmental libraries. We offer a model of a modern contextual manual, using up-to-date pedagogical and technological solutions for joint testing in universities of different profiles.

The article discusses the possibilities of using an ethno-oriented approach in teaching Russian pronunciation to younger foreign students. We attempt to solve the problem of overcoming phonetic interference in the speech of Tajik children studying in Russian schools. The purpose of the study presented in the article is to substantiate and develop an effective ethnic-oriented set of exercises to overcome the Tajik-Russian phonetic interference and the formation of pronunciation skills in children with Tajik as their native language. In the course of a comparative analysis of the Russian and Tajik phonetic systems, we reveal their differences, which are potential interferemes – points of a possible negative transfer of the native language sounds on the articulation of Russian ones. Taking into account the results of a comparative analysis, we have developed special sets of exercises that practice all stages of the formation of pronunciation skills in Tajik children. The article proves the expediency of using these educational complexes with schoolchildren in a video format where the work on sounds is supervised by an experienced teacher of Russian as a foreign language with a speech therapy education, which allows him to use special techniques for improving pronunciation skills, allowing foreign children to overcome the existing articulatory stereotypes of their native language. Particular attention is paid to articulatory warm-ups, which prepare the organs of speech for productive work on a certain sound. The research materials can be used directly in the educational process, as well as in the development of recommendations for school teachers working with foreign children and textbooks on phonetics, including educational aids in innovative formats, which determines the practical and theoretical value of the presented conception of ethno-oriented phonetics teaching.

The article deals with the significance of using jokes while teaching Russian as a foreign language in a military institute. We analyze text selection criteria, identify and describe work steps. We note that carefully selected jokes, accompanied by a set of tasks, let international students take a look at everyday future officers’ life from a different perspective. It is important to take into account the characteristics of an educational institute, the age of students and their language level. We believe it is possible to introduce jokes at the basic level. The material is selected in accordance with the studied topic. We suggest different methods of work aimed to develop different types of speech activity and country-specific competence. Examples of jokes are provided. We have come to the conclusion that humorous texts have considerable linguodidactic potential for teaching Russian as a foreign language course. They promote the development of all types of speech activity, form cross-cultural competence, help to understand the mechanisms of language games as well as increase motivation to study language and culture. The materials of the presented research could be useful for teachers of Russian as a foreign language who work at military institutions.