Personification. Use in fiction, scientific style and journalism. What is personification in literature, its functions, examples

Personification

Personification

PERSONIFICATION (or personification) is an expression that gives an idea of ​​a concept or phenomenon by depicting it in the form of a living person endowed with properties this concept(for example, the Greeks and Romans depicted happiness in the form of a capricious goddess of fortune, etc.). Very often O. is used when depicting nature, where it is endowed with certain human traits, “animated”, for example: “the sea laughed” (Gorky) or the description of the flood in “ Bronze Horseman" Pushkin: "... The Neva all night / was rushing to the sea against the storm, / unable to overcome their violent foolishness... / and it became unable to argue... / The weather became even more ferocious, / The Neva swelled and roared... /and suddenly, like a frenzied beast,/the city was rushed.../Siege! Attack! evil waves/like thieves climb through the windows,” etc.
O. was especially in use in precision and false-classical poetry, where it was carried out consistently and extensively; in Russian literature, examples of such O. were given by Tredyakovsky: “Riding to the Island of Love,” (St. Petersburg), 1730.
O. is essentially, therefore, a transference of signs of animation onto a concept or phenomenon and represents it as such. arr. type of metaphor (see). Trails.

Literary encyclopedia. - At 11 t.; M.: Publishing House of the Communist Academy, Soviet encyclopedia, Fiction. Edited by V. M. Fritsche, A. V. Lunacharsky. 1929-1939 .

Personification

Literature and language. Modern illustrated encyclopedia. - M.: Rosman. Edited by prof. Gorkina A.P. 2006 .

Personification

PERSONALIZATION Also personification(lat. persona and facio), prosopopoeia(Greek Προσωποποια), is a stylistic term denoting the depiction of an inanimate or abstract object as animate. The question of how much personification corresponds to the poet’s actual view of things goes beyond stylistics and relates to the field of worldview in general. Where the poet himself believes in the animation of the object he depicts, one should not even talk about personification as a phenomenon of style, for it is then connected not with the techniques of depiction, but with a certain, animistic worldview and attitude. The object is already perceived as animate and is depicted as such. It is in this sense that many personifications in folk poetry, when they relate not to techniques, not to the form of expression, but to the animated object itself, i.e. to the content of the work. This is especially evident in any mythological work. On the contrary, personification, as a phenomenon of style, appears in those cases when it is used as allegory, i.e., as an image of an object that stylistically transforms his. Of course, it is not always possible to establish with accuracy what order of personification we are dealing with, just as in a metaphor it is difficult to find objective signs of the degree of its real imagery. Therefore, stylistic research often cannot do without attracting data from the field of individual poetic worldview. Thus, many personifications of natural phenomena in Goethe, Tyutchev, and the German romantics should not be considered at all as a stylistic device, but as essential features of their general view of the world. These, for example, are Tyutchev’s personifications of the wind - “What are you howling about, night wind, Why are you complaining so madly?”; a thunderstorm that “will suddenly and recklessly run into the oak grove”; lightning, which “like deaf-mute demons, conduct a conversation among themselves”; trees that “joyfully tremble, bathing in the blue sky” - for all this is consistent with the poet’s attitude towards nature, which he himself expressed in a special poem: “Not what you think, nature is not a cast, not a soulless face. It has a soul, it has freedom, it has love, it has language,” etc. On the contrary, in such works as fables, parables, and different types allegories (see), we should talk about personification as an artistic device. Compare, for example, Krylov’s fables about inanimate objects (“Cauldron and Pot”, “Guns and Sails”, etc.)

Especially in cases of the so-called. incomplete personification, it is common stylistic device, which is used not only by poetry, but also by everyday speech. Here we are dealing, strictly speaking, only with individual elements of personification, which have often become so commonplace in speech that their direct meaning is no longer felt. Wed, for example, such expressions as: “The sun rises, sets”, “the train is coming”, “streams are running”, “the moan of the wind”, “the howling of the motel”, etc. Most of these expressions are one of the types of metaphor , and the same should be said about their meaning in poetic style as about metaphor (see). Examples of stylistic personifications: “The air does not want to overcome its drowsiness... The stars of the night, Like accusatory eyes, look at him mockingly. And the poplars, cramped in a row, shaking their heads low, like judges whispering among themselves” (Pushkin); “Nozdryov had stopped playing a long time ago, but there was one pipe in the barrel organ, very lively, which did not want to calm down, and for a long time afterwards it whistled alone” (Gogol); “A bird will fly out - my longing, sit on a branch and begin to sing” (Akhmatova). The depiction of plants and animals in the image of people, as found in fairy tales, fables, and animal epics, can also be considered a type of personification.

A. Petrovsky. Literary Encyclopedia: Dictionary literary terms: In 2 volumes / Edited by N. Brodsky, A. Lavretsky, E. Lunin, V. Lvov-Rogachevsky, M. Rozanov, V. Cheshikhin-Vetrinsky. - M.; L.: Publishing house L. D. Frenkel, 1925

See what “Impersonation” is in other dictionaries:

Churches. Statue of Strasbourg Cathedral Personification (personification, prosopopoeia) of the trope ... Wikipedia

Prosopopoeia, embodiment, personification, anthropomorphism, animation, humanization, metaphor, representation, epitome, expression Dictionary of Russian synonyms. personification 1. humanization, animation, personification 2. see embodiment ... Dictionary of synonyms

PERSONIFICATION, personification, cf. (book). 1. units only Action under Ch. personify personify. The personification of the forces of nature among primitive peoples. 2. what. The embodiment of some elemental force, a natural phenomenon in the form of a living creature. God… … Dictionary Ushakova

Personification- PERSONIFICATION is also personification (Latin: Persona and facio), prosopopoeia (Greek: Προσωποποια), a stylistic term denoting the depiction of an inanimate or abstract object as animate. The question is how much personification... ... Dictionary of literary terms

Personification, the property inherent in mythopoetic consciousness of transferring to inanimate things and phenomena the traits of living beings: human (anthropomorphism, anthropopathism) or animals (zoomorphism), as well as endowing animals with human qualities. IN … Encyclopedia of Mythology

- (prosopopoeia) a type of metaphor, transferring the properties of animate objects to inanimate ones (Her nurse is silence..., A. A. Blok) ... Big Encyclopedic Dictionary

PERSONIFICATION, I, cf. 1. see personify. 2. what. About a living being: the embodiment of what n. features, properties. Plyushkin O. stinginess. O. kindness. Ozhegov's explanatory dictionary. S.I. Ozhegov, N.Yu. Shvedova. 1949 1992 … Ozhegov's Explanatory Dictionary

personification- PERSONIFY1, embodiment PERSONIFIED, embodied PERSONIFY / PERSONIFY, embody / embody PERSONIFY2, spiritualization, animation, humanization, personification, book. anthropomorphism ANIMATION,... ... Dictionary-thesaurus of synonyms of Russian speech

personification- impersonation Occurs when an object pretends to be someone or something. [Cryptographic Dictionary by Karen Isaguliev www.racal.ru ] Topics information Technology in general Synonyms impersonation EN impersonation ... Technical Translator's Guide

I; Wed 1. to Personify (1 character). and Personify. O. forces of nature. 2. Image of which letter. elemental force, a natural phenomenon in the form of a living being. Dove o. peace. 3. what. The embodiment of an idea, concept, etc. properties, qualities in human... ... Encyclopedic Dictionary

Books

• The personification of history. Issue 2. Rich people, Daria Prikhodko. In the collection “Personification of History. Rich Men" included twelve biographical essays, the heroes of which were: one of the richest residents of the United States...

In the lesson we will look at such a concept as personification - an artistic means with the help of which poetry and prose become brighter and more beautiful - we will see how inanimate objects are endowed with human qualities.

Personification- this is giving a phenomenon or object some individual, more precisely, personal characteristics.

Translated from Greek, personification is personification, that is, endowing an inanimate object or phenomenon with human qualities.

Along with this in literary dictionaries personification is interpreted as animation, which is a distortion of the literary term. For example, the participants in the fable by I.A. Krylov “Quartet” (Fig. 2):

Rice. 2. The personification of arrogance and ignorance in I.A.’s fable. Krylov “Quartet” ()

Naughty Monkey,

Donkey,

Goat

Yes, clubfooted Mishka

We decided to play a quartet.

None of them needs animation, because they are all animate nouns, but each of them and all of them together for the company are the personification of arrogant and good-for-nothing people.

Absolutely wonderful use of personification by A.A. Fet in the poem “Evening Lights”:

Everything around is tired, the color of the sky is tired,

And the wind, and the river, and the month that was born,

And the night, and in the greenery of the dim sleeping forest,

And the yellow leaf that finally fell off.

In this picture, which captures the night on the threshold of autumn, everything is truly personified, even the color of the sky, and at the words “and that yellow leaf” a lump rises to the throat.

Personification - artistic technique, based on endowing inanimate objects with human qualities and feelings.

Find personification in the text:

And so they begin whisper among themselves trees: birch white on the other birch white from afar echo; aspen young came out into the clearing, like a green candle, and calling bring the same green aspen candle to you, waving a twig; bird cherry bird cherry serves branch with open buds.

Personifications: trees whisper, birches call to each other, aspen comes out and calls, waving, bird cherry gives.

Very beautifully, the author endowed inanimate objects with human qualities, that is, he personified them. Writers and poets use this artistic technique to make the text bright, beautiful, so that we can clearly imagine what the author is talking about, evoking in us the emotions that he tells us about, endowing objects with positive and negative qualities.

We met artistic medium images - personification, we learned that it is used to make the texts bright, beautiful, so that we can clearly imagine the picture of what the author is telling us about.

“Everything in a person should be beautiful: face, clothes, soul, and thoughts.”

A.P. Chekhov

References

1. Kalenchuk M.L., Churakova N.A., Baykova T.A. Russian language 4: Academic book/Textbook, 2013

2. Buneev R.N., Buneeva E.V., Pronina O.V. Russian language.4. - M.: Balass, 2012

3. Lomakovich S.V., Timchenko L.I. Russian language 4: VITA_PRESS, 2015

1. Internet portal “To the literature lesson” ()

2. Internet portal “Tolkslovar.ru” ()

3. Internet portal “Pycckoeslovo.ru” ()

Homework

1. What is personification?

2. Where is personification most often used?

3. What parts of speech are used as personification?

The role of metaphors in the text

Metaphor is one of the most striking and powerful means of creating expressiveness and imagery in a text.

Through the metaphorical meaning of words and phrases, the author of the text not only enhances the visibility and clarity of what is depicted, but also conveys the uniqueness, individuality of objects or phenomena, while demonstrating the depth and character of his own associative-figurative thinking, vision of the world, the measure of talent (“The most important thing is to be skillful in metaphors. Only this cannot be learned from another - this is a sign of talent” (Aristotle).

Metaphors serve as an important means of expressing the author's assessments and emotions, the author's characteristics of objects and phenomena.

For example: I feel stuffy in this atmosphere! Kites! Owl's nest! Crocodiles!(A.P. Chekhov)

In addition to artistic and journalistic styles, metaphors are characteristic of colloquial and even scientific styles (“ ozone hole», « electron cloud", etc.).

Personification- this is a type of metaphor based on the transfer of signs of a living being to natural phenomena, objects and concepts.

Most often, personifications are used to describe nature.

For example:
Rolling through sleepy valleys,
The sleepy mists have settled down,
And only the clatter of horses,
Sounding, it gets lost in the distance.
The autumn day has gone out, turning pale,
Rolling up the fragrant leaves,
Taste dreamless sleep
Half-withered flowers.
(M. Yu. Lermontov)

Less often, personifications are associated with the objective world.

For example:
Isn't it true, never again
Will we not part? Enough?..
And the violin answered yes,
But the violin's heart was hurting.
The bow understood everything, he fell silent,
And in the violin the echo was still there...
And it was torment for them,
What people thought was music.
(I. F. Annensky);

There was something good-natured and at the same time cozy in the physiognomy of this house.(D. N. Mamin-Sibiryak)

Personifications- the paths are very old, their roots go back to pagan antiquity and therefore occupy such an important place in mythology and folklore. The Fox and the Wolf, the Hare and the Bear, the epic Serpent Gorynych and the Foul Idol - all these and other fantastic and zoological characters from fairy tales and epics are familiar to us from early childhood.

One of the literary genres closest to folklore, the fable, is based on personification.

Even today it is unthinkable to imagine works of art without personification; our everyday speech is unthinkable without them.

Figurative speech not only visually represents an idea. Its advantage is that it is shorter. Instead of describing an object in detail, we can compare it with an already known object.

It is impossible to imagine poetic speech without using this technique:
"The storm covers the sky with darkness
Whirling snow whirlwinds,
Then, like a beast, she will howl,
She will cry like a child."(A.S. Pushkin)

The role of personifications in the text

Personifications serve to create bright, expressive and imaginative pictures of something, enhancing conveyed thoughts and feelings.

Personification as means of expression used not only in artistic style, but also in journalistic and scientific.

For example: X-rays show, the device says, the air heals, something is stirring in the economy.

The most common metaphors are formed according to the principle of personification, when an inanimate object receives the properties of an animate one, as if acquiring a face.

1. Typically, the two components of a personification metaphor are a subject and a predicate: " the blizzard was angry», « the golden cloud spent the night», « the waves are playing».

« Get angry", that is, only a person can experience irritation, but " blizzard", a blizzard, plunging the world into cold and darkness, also brings " evil". « Spend the night"Only living beings are capable of sleeping peacefully at night, " cloud" represents a young woman who has found an unexpected shelter. Marine « waves"in the poet's imagination" play", like children.

We often find examples of metaphors of this type in the poetry of A.S. Pushkin:
Not suddenly delights will abandon us...
A mortal dream flies over him...
My days have flown by...
The spirit of life awakened in him...
The Fatherland caressed you...
Poetry awakens in me...

2. Many personification metaphors are built according to the method of control: “ lyre singing», « the talk of the waves», « fashion darling», « happiness darling"etc.

Musical instrument is like a human voice, and he too " sings", and the splashing of the waves resembles a quiet conversation. " Favorite», « darling"happens not only to people, but also to wayward ones" fashion"or the fickle one" happiness».

For example: “winter threat”, “the voice of the abyss”, “the joy of sadness”, “the day of despondency”, “the son of laziness”, “threads ... of fun”, “brother by muse, by fate”, “victim of slander”, “cathedrals wax faces ”, “language of joy”, “burden of sorrow”, “hope of young days”, “pages of malice and vice”, “sacred voice”, “by the will of passions”.

But there are metaphors formed differently. The criterion of difference here is the principle of animateness and inanimateness. An inanimate object does NOT receive the properties of an animate object.

1). Subject and predicate: “desire is boiling,” “eyes are burning,” “heart is empty.”

Desire in a person can manifest itself to a strong degree, seethe and “ boil" The eyes, showing excitement, shine and “ are burning" A heart and soul that are not warmed by feeling can become “ empty».

For example: “I learned grief early, I was overcome by persecution”, “our youth will not suddenly fade”, “noon... was burning”, “the moon is floating”, “conversations flow”, “stories spread out”, “love... faded”, “I am calling the shadow ", "life has fallen."

2). Phrases constructed according to the method of control can also, being metaphors, NOT be personification: “ dagger of treason», « tomb of glory», « chain of clouds"etc.

Cold steel - " dagger" - kills a person, but " treason“is like a dagger and can also destroy and break life. " Tomb“This is a crypt, a grave, but not only people can be buried, but also glory, worldly love. " Chain"consists of metal links, but " clouds", intricately intertwined, forming a kind of chain in the sky.

D. Ushakov believes that personification is a type of metaphor. In essence, this is how it is. Personification is the transfer of properties of living things to inanimate objects.. That is, inanimate objects (objects, natural phenomena, physical manifestations, etc.) are identified with the living, “revived.” For example, it is raining. Physically he cannot walk, but there is such a turn of phrase. Other examples from our everyday life: the sun is shining, the frost has struck, the dew has fallen, the wind is blowing, the outbuilding is rotating, the tree is waving its leaves, the aspen is trembling... Yes, there are many of them!

Where did this come from? It is believed that the progenitor of personification - animism. The ancient ancestors of man tended to endow inanimate objects with “living” properties - this is how they sought to explain the world around them. From the belief in mystical creatures and gods such a wonderful thing grew visual medium, as a personification.

We are not particularly interested in the details of what personification is and what its varieties are. Let professional literary scholars sort this out. It’s much more interesting for poets how can personification be used in work of art and, among other things, in poetry.

If you open any poem describing nature, you will find many personifications in it. For example, try to find all the personifications in S. Yesenin’s poem “Birch”:

White birch

Below my window

Covered with snow

Exactly silver.

On fluffy branches

Snow border

The brushes have blossomed

White fringe.

And the birch tree stands

In sleepy silence,

And the snowflakes are burning

In golden fire.

And the dawn is lazy

Walking around

sprinkles branches

New silver.

You see: there are no simple, philistine, primitive personifications here that we are accustomed to using in everyday life. Every personification is an image. This is the meaning of using personification. The poet does not use it as a “thing in itself”; in his poetry, personification rises above the “worldly level” and moves to the level of imagery. With the help of personifications, Yesenin creates a special picture. Nature in the poem is alive - but not just alive, but endowed with character and emotions. Nature is the main character of his poem.

How sad look against this background the attempts of many poets to create a beautiful poem about nature, where “the wind blows”, “the moon shines”, “the stars shine”, etc. forever. All these personifications are hackneyed and worn out, they do not generate any imagery and, therefore, are boring.

But this does not mean that they cannot be used. And the erased personification can be raised to the level of an image. For example, in the poem “It’s Snowing” by Boris Pasternak:

It's snowing, it's snowing.

To the white stars in a snowstorm

Geranium flowers stretch

For the window frame.

It's snowing and everything is in turmoil,

Everything starts to fly -

Black staircase steps,

Crossroads turn.

It's snowing, it's snowing,

As if it weren't flakes falling,

And in a patched coat

The firmament descends to the ground.

As if looking like an eccentric,

From the top landing,

Sneaking around, playing hide and seek,

The sky is coming down from the attic.

Because life doesn't wait.

Before you look back, it’s Christmas time.

Only a short period,

Look, there's a new year there.

The snow is falling, thick and thick.

In step with him, in those feet,

At the same pace, with that laziness

Or at the same speed

Maybe time is passing?

Maybe year after year

Follow as the snow falls

Or like the words in a poem?

It's snowing, it's snowing,

It's snowing and everything is in turmoil:

White pedestrian

Surprised plants

Crossroads turn.

Notice how many personifications there are here. “The sky is coming down from the attic,” steps and an intersection that take flight! The “surprised plants” alone are worth it! And the refrain (constant repetition) “it’s snowing” takes simple personification to the level of semantic repetition - and this is already a symbol. The personification “It’s snowing” is a symbol of the passing of time.

Therefore, in your poems you should try use personification not just on its own, but so that it plays a certain role. For example, there is an excellent example of impersonation. The prologue describes the wind circling over St. Petersburg, and the entire city is shown from the point of view of this wind. Wind - main character prologue. No less remarkable is the image of the title character of Nikolai Gogol’s story “The Nose”. The nose is not only personified and personified (i.e. endowed with features human personality), but also becomes a symbol of the duality of the protagonist. Another excellent example of personification is in the lyrical poem by Mikhail Lermontov “A golden cloud spent the night...”.

But personification should not be confused with allegory or anthropomorphism. For example, endowing an animal with human traits, as in Krylov’s fables, will not be personification. Of course, allegory is impossible without personification, but this is a completely different means of representation.