INTRODUCTION
“Motive”, everyone has come across this term in their life, many know its meaning thanks to their studies in music schools, but this term is also widely used in literary criticism. Motive varies in its definition, but what significance does it have in literary works? For people involved in the study and analysis of literary works, it is necessary to know the meaning of motive.
MOTIVE
Motif (French motif, German motiv from Latin moveo - I move) is a term that has passed into literary studies from musicology. It is “the smallest independent unit of musical form.”<…>Development is carried out through various repetitions of the motive, as well as its transformations, the introduction of contrasting motives<…>The motivic structure embodies the logical connection in the structure of the work” 1. The term was first recorded in the “Musical Dictionary” of S. de Brossard (1703). Analogies with music, where this term is key in the analysis compositions works, help to understand the properties of a motif in a literary work: its separability from the whole and repeatability in a variety of variations.
Motive became a term for a series scientific disciplines(psychology, linguistics, etc.), in particular literary studies, where it has a fairly wide range of meanings: there is a whole series theories of motive, which do not always agree with each other 2. Motif as a phenomenon of artistic literature is in close contact and intersects with repetitions and their similarities, but is far from identical to them.
In literary criticism, the concept of “motive” was used to characterize the components of the plot by I.V. Goethe and F. Schiller. In the article “On Epic and Dramatic Poetry” (1797), five types of motives are identified: “rushing forward, which accelerates the action”; “retreating, those that move the action away from its goal”; “slowers that delay the progress of action”; "addressed to the past"; “addressed to the future, anticipating what will happen in subsequent eras” 3.
The initial, leading, main meaning of this literary term is difficult to define. Motive is component of works of increased significance(semantic richness). A.A. Blok wrote: “Every poem is a veil, stretched on the edges of several words. These words shine like stars. Because of them the work exists” 4 . The same can be said about some words and the objects they denote in novels, short stories, and dramas. They are the motives.
Motives are actively involved in the theme and concept (idea) of the work, but they are not exhaustive. Being, according to B.N. Putilov, “stable units,” they are “characterized by an increased, one might say, exceptional degree of semioticity. Each motive has a stable set of meanings” 5. The motif is one way or another localized in the work, but at the same time it is present in a variety of forms. It can be a separate word or phrase, repeated and varied, or appear as something denoted by various lexical units, or appear in the form of a title or epigraph, or remain only guessable, lost in the subtext. Resorting to allegory, let us say that the sphere of motives consists of the links of the work, marked by internal, invisible italics, which should be felt and recognized by a sensitive reader and literary analyst. The most important feature of a motive is its ability to be half-realized in the text, revealed in it incompletely and sometimes remain mysterious.
The concept of motive as the simplest narrative unit was first theoretically substantiated in “The Poetics of Plots” by A.N. Veselovsky. He was mainly interested in the repetition of motifs in the narrative genres of different peoples. The motive acted as the basis of “legend”, “ poetic language", inherited from the past: "Under motive I mean the simplest narrative unit, figuratively responding to various requests of the primitive mind or everyday observation. With the similarity or unity of everyday and psychological conditions in the first stages of human development, such motives could be created independently and at the same time represent similar features” 6. Veselovsky considered motifs to be the simplest formulas that could arise among different tribes independently of each other. “The hallmark of a motive is its figurative, single-member schematism...” (p. 301).
For example, an eclipse (“someone is stealing the sun”), brothers’ struggle for an inheritance, a fight for the bride. The scientist tried to find out what motives could have arisen in the minds of primitive people based on a reflection of their living conditions. He studied the prehistoric life of different tribes, their life based on poetic monuments. Acquaintance with rudimentary formulas led him to the idea that the motives themselves are not an act of creativity, they cannot be borrowed, and borrowed motives are difficult to distinguish from spontaneously generated ones.
Creativity, according to Veselovsky, was manifested primarily in a “combination of motives” that gives one or another individual plot. To analyze the motive, the scientist used the formula: a + b. For example, “the evil old woman does not like the beauty - and sets her a life-threatening task. Each part of the formula can be modified, especially subject to increment b” (p. 301). Thus, the pursuit of the old woman is expressed in the tasks that she asks the beauty. There may be two, three or more of these tasks. Therefore, the formula a + b can become more complicated: a + b + b 1 + b 2. Subsequently, combinations of motifs were transformed into numerous compositions and became the basis of such narrative genres as story, novel, poem.
The motive itself, according to Veselovsky, remained stable and indecomposable; various combinations of motifs make up plot. Unlike motive, plot could borrow move from people to people, become stray. In the plot, each motive plays a certain role: it can be main, secondary, episodic. Often the development of the same motif is repeated in different plots. Many traditional motifs can be developed into entire plots, and traditional plots, on the contrary, are “collapsed” into one motif. Veselovsky noted the tendency of great poets, with the help of a “brilliant poetic instinct,” to use plots and motifs that have already been subjected to poetic treatment. “They are somewhere in the deep dark region of our consciousness, like much that has been tested and experienced, apparently forgotten and suddenly striking us, like an incomprehensible revelation, like novelty and at the same time antiquity, which we do not give ourselves an account of, because we are often unable to determine the essence of that mental act that unexpectedly renewed old memories in us” (p. 70).
Motives can act either as an aspect of individual works and their cycles, as a link in their construction, or as the property of the entire work of the writer and even entire genres, movements, literary epics, world literature as such. In this supra-individual aspect, they constitute one of the most important subjects of historical poetics 5 .
Throughout last decades motives began to be actively correlated with individual creative experience and were considered as the property of individual writers and works. This, in particular, is evidenced by the experience of studying the poetry of M.Yu. Lermontova 7.
According to Veselovsky, creative activity The writer’s fantasies are not an arbitrary play with “living pictures” of real or fictional life. The writer thinks in terms of motives, and each motive has a stable set of meanings, partly inherent in it genetically, partly emerging in the process of a long historical life.
It also has a responsible place in the science of literature. It is rooted in almost all modern European languages, goes back to the Latin verb moveo (I move) and now has a very wide range of meanings.
The initial, leading, main meaning of this literary term is difficult to define. Motive is component of works of increased significance(semantic richness). He is actively involved in the theme and concept (idea) of the work, but is not identical to them. Being, according to B.N. Putilov, “stable semantic units”, motives “are characterized by an increased, one might say exceptional, degree of semioticity. Each motive has a stable set of meanings." The motif is localized in one way or another in the work, but at the same time it is present in a variety of forms. It can be a separate word or phrase, repeated and varied, or appear as something denoted by various lexical units, or appear in the form of a title or epigraph, or remain only guessable, lost in the subtext. Having resorted to allegory, it is legitimate to assert that the sphere of motives consists of the links of the work, marked by internal, invisible italics, which should be felt and recognized by a sensitive reader and literary analyst. The most important feature of a motive is its ability to appear half-realized in the text, revealed in it incompletely, and mysterious.
Motifs can act either as an aspect of individual works and their cycles, as a link in their construction, or as the property of the entire work of the writer and even entire genres, movements, literary eras, world literature as such. In this supra-individual side, they constitute one of the most important subjects of historical poetics (see pp. 372–373).
Starting from turn of the XIX century- XX centuries, the term “motive” is widely used in the study of plots, especially historically early folklore ones. So, A.N. Veselovsky, in his unfinished “Poetics of Plots,” spoke of the motif as the simplest, indivisible unit of narration, as a repeating schematic formula that forms the basis of plots (originally myths and fairy tales). These are, the scientist gives examples of motives, the abduction of the sun or a beauty, water drying up in a source, etc. The motifs here are not so much correlated with individual works, but are considered as the common property of verbal art. Motives, according to Veselovsky, are historically stable and endlessly repeatable. In a cautious, conjectural form, the scientist argued: “... is not poetic creativity limited to certain certain formulas, stable motifs that one generation accepted from the previous one, and this from the third?<...>? Doesn’t each new poetic era work on images bequeathed from time immemorial, necessarily revolving within their boundaries, allowing itself only new combinations of old ones and only filling them<...>new understanding of life<...>? Based on the understanding of motive as the primary element of plot, going back to Veselovsky, scientists of the Siberian branch Russian Academy Sciences are now working on compiling a dictionary of plots and motifs in Russian literature.
Over the past decades, motives have begun to be actively correlated with individual creative experience, considered
as the property of individual writers and works. This, in particular, is evidenced by the experience of studying the poetry of M.Yu. Lermontov.
Attention to the motives hidden in literary works allows us to understand them more fully and deeply. Thus, some “peak” moments of the embodiment of the author’s concept in the famous story by I.A. Bunin about a life suddenly cut short charming girl are " easy breathing"(the phrase that became the title), lightness as such, as well as the repeatedly mentioned cold. These deeply interconnected motifs turn out to be perhaps the most important compositional “strings” of Bunin’s masterpiece and, at the same time, an expression of the writer’s philosophical idea of the existence and place of man in it. The cold accompanies Olya Meshcherskaya not only in winter, but also in summer; it also reigns in the episodes framing the plot, depicting a cemetery in early spring. These motifs are combined in the last phrase of the story: “Now this light breath has again dissipated in the world, in this cloudy sky, in this cold spring wind.”
One of the motifs of Tolstoy’s epic novel “War and Peace” is spiritual softness, often associated with feelings of gratitude and submission to fate, with tenderness and tears, most importantly, marking certain higher, illuminating moments in the lives of the heroes. Let us remember the episodes when the old Prince Volkonsky learns about the death of his daughter-in-law; wounded Prince Andrei in Mytishchi. After a conversation with Natasha, who feels irreparably guilty before Prince Andrei, Pierre experiences some special elation. And here it speaks of his, Pierre’s, “blossomed to a new life, softened and encouraged soul.” And after captivity, Bezukhov asks Natasha about the last days of Andrei Bolkonsky: “So has he calmed down? Have you softened up?
Perhaps the central motif of “The Master and Margarita” by M.A. Bulgakov - the light emanating from full moon, disturbing, exciting, painful. This light somehow “affects” a number of characters in the novel. It is associated primarily with the idea of torment of conscience - with the appearance and fate of Pontius Pilate, who was afraid for his “career”.
Lyric poetry is characterized by verbal motives. A.A. Blok wrote: “Every poem is a veil, stretched on the edges of several words. These words shine like stars. Because of them the poem exists." Thus, in Blok’s poem “Worlds Fly” (1912) the supporting (key) words are flight, aimless and mad; the accompanying ringing, intrusive and buzzing; tired, a soul immersed in darkness; and (in contrast to all this) the unattainable, vainly beckoning happiness.
In Blok’s “Carmen” cycle, the word “treason” serves as a motive. This word captures the poetic and at the same time tragic element of the soul. The world of betrayal here is associated with the “storm of gypsy passions” and leaving the homeland, coupled with an inexplicable feeling of sadness, the “black and wild fate” of the poet, and instead with the charm of boundless freedom, free flight “without orbits”: “This is music secret betrayals?/Is this the heart captured by Carmen?”
Note that the term “motive” is also used in a different meaning than the one on which we rely. Thus, themes and problems of a writer’s work are often called motives (for example, the moral rebirth of man; the illogical existence of people). In modern literary criticism, there is also the idea of a motive as an “extrastructural” beginning - as the property not of the text and its creator, but of the unrestricted thought of the interpreter of the work. The properties of the motive, says B.M. Gasparov, “grow anew every time, in the process of analysis itself” - depending on what contexts of the writer’s work the scientist turns to. Thus understood, the motive is conceptualized as the “basic unit of analysis,” an analysis that “fundamentally abandons the concept of fixed blocks of structure that have an objectively specified function in the construction of the text.” A similar approach to literature, as noted by M.L. Gasparov, allowed A.K. Zholkovsky in the book “Wandering Dreams” to offer readers a number of “brilliant and paradoxical interpretations of Pushkin through Brodsky and Gogol through Sokolov.”
But no matter what semantic tones are attached to the word “motive” in literary criticism, the irrevocable significance and genuine relevance of this term, which captures the really (objectively) existing facet of literary works, remains self-evident.
Cm.: Kholopova V. A. Musical theme. M., 1983.
Putilov B.N. Veselovsky and the problems of folklore motive//The legacy of Alexander Veselovsky: Research and materials. St. Petersburg, 1992. P. 84.
Cm.: Veselovsky A.N.. Historical poetics. P. 301.
Veselovsky A.N.. Historical poetics. P. 40.
See: From plot to motive. Novosibirsk, 1996; Plot and motive in the context of tradition. Novosibirsk, 1998; Tyupa V.I.. Abstracts for the project of a dictionary of motives//Discourse. No. 2. Novosibirsk, 1996.
See articles under the heading “Motives” in: Lermontov Encyclopedia. M., 1981.
Blok A.A. Notebooks. 1901–1920. P. 84.
Gasparov B.M.. Literary leitmotifs. M., 1994. P. 301.
Gasparov M.L. Preface// Zholkovsky A.K., Shcheglov Yu.K.. Works on the poetics of expressiveness. S. 5.
V.V. Prozorov “Essays on Life” in literature."
The plot is the entire living and multi-colored fabric of the text that we perceive.
Fabula (optional feature) – patterns and designs on this fabric in relief.
Motifs are threads that make up the fabric of the text, specially colored and skillfully woven, paired with each other.
The plot and plot are more attested to by poetic textual reality. The motif as a unit of plot-plot data, capable of being correctly isolated from it, remains entirely within the limits of the literary text and at the same time, to a large extent, retains a visibly and sonorously designated memory of the theme of the text, of its intertextual relations and connections, of extra-textual reality , about the world outside the text and behind the text.
At the same time, the plot-fable scheme primarily characterizes the world of the text from the position of extra-textual existence. The motif represents, first of all, the textual reality itself, in which it is organically written.
Motif is an invariable component of a verbal and artistic plot, but the component is by no means the simplest, not elementary, from the point of view of the plot itself; This is not the theme of an indivisible part of the work (B.V. Tomashevsky) or “an indivisible component of intrigue” in the drama.
Motifs in the plot can be productive and derivative, collapsed and widespread, dynamic and static, relatively free and absolutely conditioned. In their complex totality, in their interweaving, they form a verbal and artistic plot.
These are “microplots” (E.M. Meletinsky), “scurrying around” in a whole, independently existing plot.
The motive, even in its artificial analytical isolation from the artistic organism, stubbornly and polysemantically reveals the entire text, keeping its secret, hinting at its poetic pathos and helping to carry out the necessary typological comparisons and other methodological operations in literary criticism. Motif is one of the most reliable means of endless philological examination and discernment of plot.
Motive is a certain (in narratively extended plots) developing constancy, relative repetition of movements and gestures, often objectively (objectively) expressed: in the characters and actions of the heroes, in lyrical experiences, in dramatic actions and situations, in symbolically designated, multi-scale artistic details etc.
Of course, the motive can be recreated in all its autonomous completeness only in the process of research, literary criticism, staging and interpretation, directorial (performances and films “based on ...”), and more or less sophisticated reader analysis.
The more concise (in accordance with genre characteristics) and the more aphoristic the text, the more exhaustive the chain of motives found in it may be.
It is also obvious that any description of the inflorescence of motifs that seems to be the most exhaustive does not, of course, provide knowledge about the plot whole, capable of expressing an infinite multiplicity of counter-feelings. The sum or chain of motives is not a plot, but for recognizing the plot, the analysis of motives is one of the most effective philological procedures.
Complex of motives and types of plot schemes.
Compiled by N. D. Tamarchenko
Motive
1) Sierotwiński S.Słownik terminów literackich. S. 161.
“ Motive.The theme is one of the smallest meaningful wholes that stands out when analyzing a work.”
“ The motive is dynamic.The motive that accompanies a change in a situation (part of an action) is the opposite of a static motive.”
“ The motive is free.A motive that is not included in the system of cause-and-effect plot is the opposite of a connected motive.”
2) Wilpert G. von.Sachwörterbuch der Literatur.
“
Motive(lat .
motivus -motivating),<...>3. content-structural unity as a typical, meaningful situation that embraces general thematic ideas (as opposed to something defined and framed through specific featuresmaterial
3) Mö lk U.Motiv, Stoff, Thema // Das Fischer Lexicon. Literatur. B.2.“The name that the interpreter gives to the motif he identifies influences his work, no matter whether he wants to compile an inventory of the motifs of a particular corpus of texts or plans an analytical study of the motifs of a particular text, a comparative or historical study of them. Sometimes the formula motifs common in a certain era hide the fact that they bring together completely different phenomena: “ange-femme“ (female angel) designates, for example, in French romance both a lover stylized as an angel and a female angel; Only if both phenomena are recognized as two different motives do they obtain the prerequisite for further understanding. How significant consequences a proper name can have in identifying a motif is shown by the example of the question whether it is better to speak of “a woman and a parrot” or “a woman and a bird” in relation to Flaubert’s “Simple Heart”; here only a broader designation opens the interpreter’s eyes to certain meanings and their variants, but not a narrower one” (S. 1328).
4) Barnet S., Berman M., Burto W.Dictionary of Literary, Dramatic and Cinematic Terms. Boston, 1971.“ Motive- a repeated word, phrase, situation, object or idea. Most often, the term “motive” is used to designate a situation that is repeated in various literary works, for example, the motive of a poor man getting rich quickly. However, a motif (in the meaning of "leitmotif" from the German "leading motive") can arise within a separate work: it can be any repetition that contributes to integrity of the work, recalling the previous mention of a given element and everything associated with it” (p. 71).
5) Dictionary of World Literary Terms / By J. Shipley.
“ Motive. A word or mental pattern that is repeated in the same situations or to evoke a certain mood within a single work, or across different works of the same genre” (p. 204).
6) The Longman Dictionary of Poetic Terms / By J. Myers, M. Simms.
“ Motive(from Latin “to move”; can also be written as “topos”) - a theme, image, or character that develops through various nuances and repetitions” (p. 198).
7) Dictionary of Literary Terms / By H. Shaw.
“ Leitmotif. German term literally meaning "leading motive". It denotes a theme or motif associated in a musical drama with a specific situation, character or idea. The term is often used to designate a central impression, a central image, or a recurring theme in a work of fiction, such as the “practicalism” of Franklin’s Autobiography or the “revolutionary spirit” of Thomas Pine” (pp. 218-219).
8) Blagoy D.Motive // Dictionary of literary terms. T. 1. Stlb. 466 - 467.
“ M.(from moveo - I move, I set in motion), in the broad sense of the word, is the main psychological or figurative grain that underlies every work of art.” “... the main motive coincides with the theme. So, for example, the theme of Leo Tolstoy’s “War and Peace” is the motif of historical fate, which does not interfere with the parallel development in the novel of a number of other, often only distantly related to the theme, secondary motives (for example, the motif of the truth of collective consciousness - Pierre and Karataev. ..)". “The entire set of motifs that make up a given work of art forms what is calledplot his".
9) Zakharkin A.Motive // Dictionary of literary terms. P.226-227.
“ M. (from the French motif - melody, tune) - an out-of-use term denoting the minimum significant component of the narrative, the simplest component of the plot of a work of art.”
10) Chudakov A.P.Motive. KLE. T. 4. Stlb. 995.
“ M. (French motif, from Latin motivus - movable) - the simplest meaningful (semantic) unit of art. text inmyth And fairy tale; basis, based on the development of one of the members of M. (a+b turns into a+b1+b2+b3) or several combinations. motives growplot (plot), which represents a greater level of generalization.” “As applied to art. literature of modern times M. is most often called abstract from specific details and expressed in the simplest verbal formula, schematic. presentation of the elements of the content of the work involved in the creation of the plot (plot). The content of M. itself, for example, the death of a hero or a walk, buying a pistol or buying a pencil, does not indicate its significance. The scale of M. depends on its role in the plot (main and secondary M.). Basic M. are relatively stable (love triangle, betrayal - revenge), but we can talk about the similarity or borrowing of M. only at the plot level - when the combination of many minor M. and the methods of their development coincide.”
11) Nezvankina L.K., Shchemeleva L.M.Motive // LES. P. 230:
“ M. (German Motive, French motif, from Latin moveo - I move), stable formal-contain. component lit. text; M. can be distinguished within one or several. prod. writer (for example, a certain cycle), and in the complex of his entire work, as well as k.-l. lit. direction or an entire era.”
“A more strict meaning of the term “M.” receives when it contains elements of symbolization (road by N.V. Gogol, garden by Chekhov, desert by M.Yu. Lermontov<...>). The motive, therefore, unlike the theme, has a direct verbal (and objective) fixation in the text of the work itself; in poetry, its criterion in most cases is the presence of a key, supporting word that carries a special semantic load (smoke in Tyutchev, exile in Lermontov). In the lyrics<...>M.'s circle is most clearly expressed and defined, so the study of M. in poetry can be especially fruitful.
For storytelling. and dramatic works that are more action-packed are characterized by plot melodrama; many of them have historical universality and repeatability: recognition and insight, testing and retribution (punishment).”
Introduction
Another provision about motive
Variety of motives
Leading motive
Another meaning of “motive”
Conclusion
References
INTRODUCTION
“Motive”, everyone has come across this term in their life, many know its meaning thanks to their studies in music schools, but this term is also widely used in literary criticism. Motive varies in its definition, but what significance does it have in literary works? For people involved in the study and analysis of literary works, it is necessary to know the meaning of motive.
Motif (French motif, German motiv from Latin moveo - I move) is a term that has passed into literary studies from musicology. It is “the smallest independent unit of musical form.”<…>Development is carried out through various repetitions of the motive, as well as its transformations, the introduction of contrasting motives<…>The motivic structure embodies the logical connection in the structure of the work." 1. The term was first recorded in the “Musical Dictionary” of S. de Brossard (1703). Analogies with music, where this term is key in the analysis compositionsworks, help to understand the properties of a motif in a literary work: its separabilityfrom the whole and repeatabilityin a variety of variations.
Motif has become a term for a number of scientific disciplines (psychology, linguistics, etc.), in particular literary criticism, where it has a fairly wide range of meanings: there are a number of theories of motive, which are not always consistent with each other 2. Motif as a phenomenon of artistic literature is in close contact and intersects with repetitions and their similarities, but is far from identical to them.
In literary criticism, the concept of “motive” was used to characterize the components of the plot by I.V. Goethe and F. Schiller. In the article “On Epic and Dramatic Poetry” (1797), five types of motives are identified: “rushing forward, which accelerates the action”; “retreating, those that move the action away from its goal”; “slowers that delay the progress of action”; "addressed to the past"; “addressed to the future, anticipating what will happen in subsequent eras”3 .
The initial, leading, main meaning of this literary term is difficult to define. Motive is component of works of increased significance(semantic richness). A.A. Blok wrote: “Every poem is a veil, stretched on the edges of several words. These words shine like stars. Because of them the work exists." 4. The same can be said about some words and the objects they denote in novels, short stories, and dramas. They are the motives.
Motives are actively involved in the theme and concept (idea) of the work, but they are not exhaustive. Being, according to B.N. Putilov, “stable units,” they are “characterized by an increased, one might say, exceptional degree of semioticity. Each motive has a stable set of meanings" 5. The motif is one way or another localized in the work, but at the same time it is present in a variety of forms. It can be a separate word or phrase, repeated and varied, or appear as something denoted by various lexical units, or appear in the form of a title or epigraph, or remain only guessable, lost in the subtext. Resorting to allegory, let us say that the sphere of motives consists of the links of the work, marked by internal, invisible italics, which should be felt and recognized by a sensitive reader and literary analyst. The most important feature of a motive is its ability to be half-realized in the text, revealed in it incompletely and sometimes remain mysterious.
The concept of motive as the simplest narrative unit was first theoretically substantiated in “The Poetics of Plots” by A.N. Veselovsky. He was mainly interested in the repetition of motifs in the narrative genres of different peoples. The motif acted as the basis of “legend”, “poetic language” inherited from the past: “Under motiveI mean the simplest narrative unit, figuratively responding to various requests of the primitive mind or everyday observation. With the similarity or unity of everyday and psychological conditionsin the first stages of human development, such motives could be created independently and at the same time represent similar features" 6. Veselovsky considered motifs to be the simplest formulas that could arise among different tribes independently of each other. “The hallmark of a motive is its figurative, single-member schematism...” (p. 301).
For example, an eclipse (“someone is stealing the sun”), brothers’ struggle for an inheritance, a fight for the bride. The scientist tried to find out what motives could have arisen in the minds of primitive people based on a reflection of their living conditions. He studied the prehistoric life of different tribes, their life based on poetic monuments. Acquaintance with rudimentary formulas led him to the idea that the motives themselves are not an act of creativity, they cannot be borrowed, and borrowed motives are difficult to distinguish from spontaneously generated ones.
Creativity, according to Veselovsky, was manifested primarily in a “combination of motives” that gives one or another individual plot. To analyze the motive, the scientist used the formula: a + b. For example, “the evil old woman does not like the beauty - and sets her a life-threatening task. Each part of the formula can be modified, especially subject to increment b” (p. 301). Thus, the pursuit of the old woman is expressed in the tasks that she asks the beauty. There may be two, three or more of these tasks. Therefore, the formula a + b can become more complicated: a + b + b 1 + b 2. Subsequently, combinations of motifs were transformed into numerous compositions and became the basis of such narrative genres as story, novel, poem.
The motive itself, according to Veselovsky, remained stable and indecomposable; various combinations of motifs make up plot.Unlike motive, plot could borrowmove from people to people, become stray.In the plot, each motive plays a certain role: it can be main, secondary, episodic. Often the development of the same motif is repeated in different plots. Many traditional motifs can be developed into entire plots, and traditional plots, on the contrary, are “collapsed” into one motif. Veselovsky noted the tendency of great poets, with the help of a “brilliant poetic instinct,” to use plots and motifs that have already been subjected to poetic treatment. “They are somewhere in the deep dark region of our consciousness, like much that has been tested and experienced, apparently forgotten and suddenly striking us, like an incomprehensible revelation, like novelty and at the same time antiquity, which we do not give ourselves an account of, because we are often unable to determine the essence of that mental act that unexpectedly renewed old memories in us” (p. 70).
Motifs can act either as an aspect of individual works and their cycles, as a link in their construction, or as the property of the entire work of the writer and even entire genres, movements, literary epics, and world literature as such. In this supra-individual aspect, they constitute one of the most important subjects of historical poetics5 .
Over the past decades, motifs have begun to be actively correlated with individual creative experience and are considered as the property of individual writers and works. This, in particular, is evidenced by the experience of studying the poetry of M.Yu. Lermontova7 .
In Veselovsky’s understanding, the creative activity of the writer’s imagination is not an arbitrary game with “living pictures” of real or fictional life. The writer thinks in terms of motives, and each motive has a stable set of meanings, partly inherent in it genetically, partly emerging in the process of a long historical life.
OTHER PROVISION OF MOTIVE
Veselovsky's position on the motive as an indecomposable and stable unit of narrative was revised in the 1920s. “Veselovsky’s specific interpretation of the term “motive” can no longer be applied at present,” wrote V. Propp. - According to Veselovsky, a motive is an indecomposable unit of narration.<…>However, the motives that he cites as examples are decomposed.” 8. Propp demonstrates the decomposition of the “serpent kidnaps the king’s daughter” motif. “This motive is decomposed into 4 elements, each of which can be varied individually. The snake can be replaced by Koshchei, whirlwind, devil, falcon, sorcerer. Abduction can be replaced by vampirism and various actions by which disappearance is achieved in the fairy tale. A daughter can be replaced by a sister, fiancee, wife, mother. The king can be replaced by a king's son, a peasant, or a priest. Thus, contrary to Veselovsky, we must assert that the motive is not single-membered, not indecomposable. The last decomposable unit as such does not represent a logical whole (and according to Veselovsky, the motive is more primary in origin than the plot); we will subsequently have to solve the problem of isolating some primary elements differently than Veselovsky does” (p. 22).
Propp considers these “primary elements” functions of the actors. “By function we mean an action actor, defined in terms of its significance for the course of action"(pp. 30-31). Functions are repeated and can be counted; all functions are distributed among the characters so that seven “circles of action” and, accordingly, seven types of characters can be distinguished: saboteur, donor, helper, sought-after character, sender, hero, false hero(pp. 88-89).
Based on the analysis of 100 fairy tales from the collection of A.N. Afanasyev “Russian folk tales” V. Propp identified 31 functions within which the action develops. These are, in particular: absence(“One of the family members leaves home”), locked(“The hero is approached with a ban”), his violationetc. A detailed analysis of one hundred fairy tales with different plots shows that “the sequence of functions is always the same” and that “all fairy tales are of the same type in their structure” (pp. 31, 33) despite their apparent diversity.
Veselovsky's point of view was also disputed by other scientists. After all, motives arose not only in the primitive era, but also later. “It is important to find such a definition of this term,” wrote A. Bem, “that would make it possible to highlight it in any work, both ancient and modern.” According to A. Bem, “a motif is the ultimate level of artistic abstraction from the specific content of a work, enshrined in the simplest verbal formula” 9. As an example, the scientist cites a motif that unites three works: the poems “Prisoner of the Caucasus” by Pushkin, “Prisoner of the Caucasus” by Lermontov and the story “Atala” by Chateaubriand - this is the love of a foreign woman for a captive; incoming motive: the release of a captive by a foreigner, either successful or unsuccessful. And as a development of the original motive - the death of the heroine.
It is particularly difficult to identify motives in the literature last centuries. The variety of motives and complex functional load require special scrupulousness in their study.
Motif is often considered as a category comparative historical literary criticism.Motives are identified that have very ancient origins, leading to primitive consciousness and at the same time developed in the conditions of high civilization in different countries. These are the motives prodigal son, a proud king, a pact with the devil, etc.
VARIETY OF MOTIVES
motive narrative literature work
In literature different eras there are many that occur and function effectively mythologicalmotives. Constantly being updated in different historical and literary contexts, they at the same time retain their semantic essence. For example, the motive of the hero’s deliberate death because of a woman runs through many works XIX-XX centuries Werther's suicide in Goethe's novel "The Sorrows of Young Werther", the death of Vladimir Lensky in Pushkin's novel "Eugene Onegin", the death of Romashov in Kuprin's novel "The Duel". Apparently, this motif can be considered as a transformation of the motif identified by Veselovsky in the poetic work of deep antiquity: “the fight for the bride.”
Motives can be not only plot, but also descriptive, lyrical,not only intertextual(Veselovsky means exactly these), but also intratextual.We can talk about iconicitymotive - both in its repetition from text to text, and within one text. In modern literary criticism, the term “motive” is used in different methodological contexts and for different purposes, which largely explains the discrepancies in the interpretation of the concept and its most important properties.
A generally accepted indicator of a motive is its repeatability.“...The role of a motive in a work can be,” believes B. Gasparov, “any phenomenon, any semantic “spot” - an event, character trait, landscape element, any object, spoken word, paint, sound, etc.; the only thing that defines a motif is its reproduction in the text, so that unlike a traditional plot narrative, where it is more or less predetermined what can be considered discrete components ("characters" or "events"), there is no set "alphabet" “- it is formed directly in the deployment of the structure and through the structure”10 .
For example, in V. Nabokov’s novel “Feat” one can highlight motifs of the sea, flickering lights, and paths leading into the forest.
In the same novel, another motive - the hero’s alienation to the world around him - largely determines the development of the plot and helps clarify the main idea. And if in “Feat” the motive of foreignness is limited to exile (“his choice is not free<…>there is one thing he must do, he is an exile, doomed to live outside his home"), then in other works of Nabokov he finds more broad meaning and can be defined as the motive of the hero’s foreignness to the vulgarity and mediocrity of the surrounding world (“The Gift”, “The Defense of Luzhin”, “The True Life of Sebastian Knight”, etc.).
One of the motifs of Tolstoy’s epic novel “War and Peace” is spiritual softness, often associated with feelings of gratitude and submission to fate, with tenderness and tears, most importantly, marking certain higher, illuminating moments in the lives of the heroes. Let us remember the episodes when the old Prince Bolkonsky learns about the death of his daughter-in-law; wounded Prince Andrei in Mytishchi. Pierre, after a conversation with Natasha, who feels irreparably guilty before Prince Andrei, experiences some kind of special elation: he speaks of his, Pierre’s, “blooming to a new life, softened and encouraged soul.” And after captivity, Bezukhov asks Natasha about the last days of Andrei Bolkonsky: “So has he calmed down? Have you softened up?
Perhaps the central motif of “The Master and Margarita” by M.A. Bulgakov - the light emanating from the full moon, disturbing, exciting, painful. This light somehow “affects” a number of characters in the novel. It is associated primarily with the idea of torment of conscience - with the appearance and fate of Pontius Pilate, who was once afraid for his “career”.
In Blok’s cycle “Carmen” the word “treason” performs the function of motive. It captures the poetic and at the same time tragic element of the soul. The world of betrayal here is associated with the “storm of gypsy passions” and leaving the homeland, coupled with an inexplicable feeling of sadness, with the “black and wild fate” of the poet, and at the same time with the charm of boundless freedom, free flight “without orbits”: “This is - music of secret betrayals?/Is this the heart captured by Carmen?”
One of the most important motives of B.L. Pasternak - face,which the poet saw not only in people who remained faithful to themselves, but also in nature and higher power being 11. This motive became the poet's leading theme and an expression of his moral credo. Let's remember the last stanza of the poem “Being famous is ugly...”:
And should not a single slice
Don't give up on your face
But to be alive, alive and only,
Alive and only until the end.
LEADING MOTIVE
The leading motive in one or many works of a writer can be defined as leitmotif.Sometimes they talk about the leitmotif of a creative movement (German: Leitmotiv; the term was introduced into use by musicologists and researchers of the work of R. Wagner). Usually it becomes the expressive and emotional basis for the embodiment of the idea of the work. The leitmotif can be considered at the level of theme, figurative structure and intonation and sound design of the work. For example, throughout the entire play A.P. Chekhov " Cherry Orchard"The motif of the cherry orchard is used as a symbol of Home, beauty, and sustainability of life. This leitmotif sounds in the dialogues, in the memories of the characters, and in the author’s remarks: “It’s already May, the cherry trees are blooming, but it’s cold in the garden, matinee” (no. 1): “Look, the late mother is walking through the garden... in a white dress ! (house 1, Ranevskaya); “Come everyone and watch how Yermolai Lopakhin takes an ax to the cherry orchard and how the trees fall to the ground!” (no. 3, Lopakhin).
We can talk about the special role of both the leitmotif and the motive in organizing the second, secret meaning of the work, in other words - subtext, undercurrent.The leitmotif of many of Chekhov's dramatic and epic works is the phrase: “Life is lost!” (“Uncle Vanya”, no. 3, Voinitsky).
A special “relationship” connects the motive and leitmotif with topicworks. In the 1920s, a thematic approach to the study of motive was established. “Episodes are broken down into even smaller parts, describing individual actions, events or things. The themes of such small parts of a work that can no longer be divided are called motives"- wrote B. Tomashevsky 12. A motif can be considered as a development, expansion and deepening of the main theme. For example, the theme of the story by F.M. Dostoevsky's "Double" is the split personality of the poor official Golyadkin, who is trying to establish himself in a society that has rejected him with the help of his confident and arrogant "double". As the main theme unfolds, motifs of loneliness, restlessness, hopeless love, and the “discrepancy” of the hero with the life around him arise. The leitmotif of the entire story can be considered the motive of the hero’s fatal doom, despite his desperate resistance to circumstances.
In modern literary criticism there is a tendency to consider artistic system works from the point of view leitmotif construction: “The main device that determines the entire semantic structure of “The Master and Margarita” and at the same time has a broader general meaning, it seems to us the principle leitmotif constructionnarratives. This means a principle in which a certain motif, once arising, is then repeated many times, each time appearing in a new version, new outlines and in ever new combinations with other motives”13 .
IN lyricalIn a work, a motive is, first of all, a repeating complex of feelings and ideas. But individual motives in lyric poetry are much more independent than in epic and drama, where they are subordinated to the development of action. “The task of a lyrical work is to compare individual motives and verbal images, giving the impression of an artistic construction of thought” 14. What is most clearly highlighted in the motif is the repetition of psychological experiences:
I will forget the year, day, date.
I'll lock myself in alone with a piece of paper,
Be created, words enlightened by suffering
Inhuman magic!
The one who stole my heart,
Having deprived him of everything,
Tormenting my soul in delirium,
Accept my gift, darling,
I may not be able to think of anything else.
(V. Mayakovsky. “Flute-spine”)
This is how the motive of hopeless suffering due to unrequited love, which is resolved in creativity, develops.
Sometimes the poet’s work as a whole can be considered as an interaction, a correlation of motives. For example, in Lermontov’s poetry there are motifs of freedom, will, action and feat, exile, memory and oblivion, time and eternity, love, death, fate, etc. “Loneliness is a motif that permeates almost all creativity and expresses the poet’s state of mind. This is both a motive and a cross-cutting, central theme of his poetry, starting with his youthful poems and ending with subsequent ones.<…>None of the Russian poets developed this motif into such a comprehensive image as Lermontov’s”15 .
Same motive to get different symbolicmeanings in lyrical works of different eras, emphasizing the closeness and at the same time the originality of the poets: cf. the motive of the road in Gogol’s lyrical digressions in the poem “ Dead souls"and in the poem “Demons” by Pushkin, “Motherland” by Lermontov and “Troika” by Nekrasov, “Rus” by Yesenin and “Russia” by Blok, etc.
ANOTHER MEANING OF “MOTIVE”
Note that the term “motive” is also used in a slightly different meaning than the one on which we rely. Thus, themes and problems of a writer’s work are often called motives (for example, the moral rebirth of man; the illogical existence of people). In modern literary criticism, there is also the idea of a motive as an “extrastructural” beginning - as the property not of the text and its creator, but of the unrestricted thought of the interpreter of the work. The properties of the motive, says B.M. Gasparov, “grow anew every time, in the process of analysis itself” - depending on what contexts of the writer’s work the scientist turns to. Thus understood, the motive is conceptualized as the “basic unit of analysis,” an analysis that “fundamentally abandons the concepts of fixed blocks of structure that have an objectively specified function in the construction of the text”16 .
CONCLUSION
But no matter what semantic tones are attached to the word “motive” in literary studies, the irrevocable significance and genuine relevance of this term, which first of all captures the really existing facet of literary works, remains self-evident.
bibliography
1.Musical encyclopedic dictionary. M., 1990. P. 357.
2.See: Silantiev I.V. The theory of motive in Russian literary criticism and folkloristics. Essay on historiography. Novosibirsk, 1999; It's him. Motif in the system of artistic storytelling. Problems of theory and analysis. Novosibirsk, 2001.
.Goethe I.V. About art. M., 1957. P. 351.
.Blok A.A. Notebooks. 1901-1920. P. 84.
.Putilov B.N. Veselovsky and the problems of folklore motive//The legacy of Alexander Veselovsky: Research and materials. St. Petersburg, 1992. P. 84, 382-383.
.Veselovsky A.N. Historical poetics. M., 1989. P. 305. (Further, when citing this publication, pages are indicated in the text.)
.See articles under the heading “Motives” in: Lermontov Encyclopedia. M., 1981. Note that the motives and themes embodied in them were given considerable attention in the lectures of M.M. Bakhtin (1922-1927), especially when turning to poetry Silver Age. See: Recordings of lectures by M.M. Bakhtin on the history of Russian literature. Notes by R.M. Mirkina // Bakhtin M.M. Collection cit.: In 7 volumes. M., 2000. T. 2. P. 213-427.
.Propp V.Ya. Morphology of a fairy tale. L., 1928. S. 21-22. (Further, when citing this publication, pages are indicated in the text.)
.Bem A. Towards an understanding of historical and literary concepts//Izvestia/ORYAS AN. 1918. T. 23. Book. 1. P. 231.
10.Gasparov B.M. Literary leitmotifs: Essays on Russian literature of the twentieth century. M., 1994. pp. 30-31.
11.See: Prouillard J. “Face” and “personality” in the works of Boris Pasternak (translated from French) // Pasternak readings. Vol. 2. M., 1998.
.Tomashevsky B. Poetics: A Short Course. M., 1996. P. 71.
.Gasparov B.M. Literary leitmotifs. P. 30.
.Tomashevsky B. Poetics. P. 108.
.Shchemeleva L.M., Korovin V.I., Peskov A.M., Turbin V.N. Motives of Lermontov’s poetry//Lermontov Encyclopedia. M., 1981. (P. 290-312.)
.Gasparov B.M. Literary leitmotifs. M., 1994. P. 301.
.Introduction to literary criticism. Literary work: basic concepts and terms: Textbook. Manual/ed. L.V. Chernets. - M.: graduate School; "Academy", 1999. - 556 p.
.Khalizev V.E. Theory of literature. M., 2007. - 405 p.
Tutoring
Need help studying a topic?
Our specialists will advise or provide tutoring services on topics that interest you.
Submit your application indicating the topic right now to find out about the possibility of obtaining a consultation.
THE CONCEPT OF “MOTIVE” AND ITS INTERPRETATION IN THE THEORY OF LITERATURE AND MUSIC
S. G. SHALYGINA
The article is devoted to the consideration of the concept of motive and its interpretation in the theory of literature in comparison with the art of music. The main approaches to the study of this concept in the context of research by leading literary theorists are considered, and the path of understanding this concept in the practice of scientific theoretical thought is traced.
Keywords: motive, theory of motive, structure of motive, level of realization of motive.
Music and literature are perhaps the most mutually enriching and complementary fields of art. Literature and music are song, opera, theater, cinema. A musical work can be roughly compared to a literary work. Each work has a specific design, idea and content, which become clear with gradual presentation. In a piece of music, the content is presented in a continuous stream of sounds. Work musical art attributes such concepts as syntax, period, sentence, caesura, drama, lyricism, epic. Just as in fiction, thoughts are expressed in sentences consisting of individual words, so in melody, sentences are divided into smaller structures - phrases and motives.
A motive in music is the smallest part of a melody that has a specific expressive meaning and that can be recognized when it appears. A motive usually has one accent (like one stress in a word), so the most typical length of a motive is one measure. Depending on the tempo and rhythm, indivisible two-beat motifs can be formed.
By analogy with the name of the poetic feet, the motives have names - iambic and trochee. Iambic is a motive that begins on a weak beat. A characteristic feature of iambic is the desire for the subsequent strong beat. Iambic motives have a strong ending and sound active and energetic.
A trochee is a motif that begins with a strong beat. A characteristic sign of chorea is the transition from a strong beat to a weak beat. Choreic motifs have a weak ending and sound more soft and lyrical.
This concept, one of the pillars in musicology, also has a responsible place in the science of literature. It is present in almost everyone
modern European languages, goes back to the Latin verb “moveo” (I move) and in modern science has a very wide range of meanings.
The leading meaning of this literary term is difficult to define. In the works of V. E. Khalizev one can find the following definition of the concept we are analyzing: “A motif is a component of works that has increased significance (semantic richness). He is actively involved in the theme and concept (idea) of the work, but is not identical to them.” According to the scientist, the motive is one way or another localized in the work, but at the same time it is present in a wide variety of forms. It can denote a single word or phrase, repeated and varied, or appear as something denoted by various lexical units; act as a title or epigraph or remain only guessable, lost in the subtext. Focusing on the above, the researcher summarizes: “It is right to assert that the sphere of motives consists of the links of the work, marked by internal, invisible italics, which should be felt and recognized by a sensitive reader and literary analyst. The most important feature of a motive is its ability to be half-realized in the text, revealed in it incompletely, mysterious.”
Since the turn of the 19th - 20th centuries, the term “motive” has been widely used in the study of plots, especially historically early folklore ones. So
A. N. Veselovsky in his unfinished “Poetics of Plots” wrote about the motive as the simplest, indivisible unit of narration: “By motive I mean a formula that at first answered the questions of the public that nature posed to man everywhere, or fixed especially bright ones that seemed important or repeated impressions
reality." Veselovsky presents the main feature of motives as “figurative single-term schematism.” These are, the scientist gives examples of motives, the abduction of the sun or a beauty, water drying up in a source, the persecution of a beautiful woman by an evil old woman, etc. Such motives, according to the scientist, could arise independently in diverse environments; their homogeneity or their similarity cannot be explained by borrowing; it is explained by the homogeneity of living conditions and the mental processes deposited in them. The motif in Veselovsky’s works grows into a plot, thereby being the fundamental basis of the narrative. Motives, according to Veselovsky, are historically stable and endlessly repeatable. In the form of an assumption, the scientist argued: “... is not poetic creativity limited to certain certain formulas, stable motives, which one generation accepted from the previous one, and this from the third?<...>? Doesn’t each new poetic era work on images bequeathed from time immemorial, necessarily revolving within their boundaries, allowing itself only new combinations of old ones and only filling them<.>new understanding of life<...>?» .
The concept of motive, developed by A. N. Veselovsky in “The Poetics of Plots,” was categorically criticized by V. Ya. Propp in “The Morphology of a Fairy Tale.” However, at the same time, the researcher replaced the criterion of the indecomposability of the motive, so he criticized the concept of motive in an interpretation that had never been in the works of A. N. Veselovsky.
If for A. N. Veselovsky the criterion for the indecomposability of a motif is its “figurative single-term schematism” (the motif is indivisible from the point of view of its “imagery” as a holistic and aesthetically significant semantics), then for V. Ya. Propp such a criterion is a logical relation.
The author himself reasoned: “The motives that he (A. N. Veselovsky) gives as examples are laid out. If a motive is something logically whole, then every phrase of a fairy tale gives a motive. This wouldn't be so bad if the motives really didn't decay. This would make it possible to compile an index of motives. But let’s take the motif “the snake kidnaps the king’s daughter” (not Veselovsky’s example). This motive is decomposed into 4 elements, each of which can be varied individually.<... >Thus, contrary to Veselovsky, we must assert that the motive is not single-membered, not indecomposable. The last decomposable unit, as such, does not represent a logical whole."
Thus, the change from a semantic criterion to a logical one in the criticism of V. Ya. Propp led to the destruction of the motive as a whole.
However, having subjected the concept of motive to criticism from the position of the logical criterion of indecomposability,
V. Ya. Propp in “Morphology of a Fairy Tale” completely abandoned this concept and introduced into circulation a fundamentally different, in his opinion, unit of narrative - the “function of the character”: “The very way of performing functions can change: it represents a variable quantity.<...>But a function, as such, is a constant quantity.<...>The functions of the characters represent those components that can replace Veselovsky’s “motives.”
The concept of the function of the actor introduced by the scientist not only did not replace, but significantly deepened the concept of motive, and precisely in the semantic interpretation of the latter. From the point of view of the semantics of the motive and the plot as a whole, the function is nothing more than one of the semantic components of the motive. Essentially, the function of the character is the generalized meaning of the motive, taken in abstraction from the multitude of its plot options. In this regard, V. Ya. Propp theoretically consistently carried out the operation of generalizing motives.
I.V. Silantyev noted in this regard that “a function is a general seme, or a set of general semes that occupy a central and invariant position in the structure of the variable meaning of a motive. Therefore, a function as a key component of a motive, as its semantic invariant, cannot replace the motive, just as a part cannot replace the whole.”
That is why the opinions of modern scientists on the issue of the relationship between motive and function are not in favor of the categorical view of V. Ya. Propp.
B.I. Yarkho in “Methodology of Precise Literary Studies,” written in the 1930s, defines motive as “an image in action (or in a state),” which, at first glance, gives some reason to see in the scientist’s thoughts following the interpretation of motive as a “figurative unit” according to A. N. Veselovsky. However, the remarks following this definition differentiate the views of B. I. Yarkho and A. N. Veselovsky.
First, the researcher denies the motive the status of a narrative unit. “Motive,” writes B.I. Yarkho, - ... there is a certain division of the plot, the boundaries of which are determined arbitrarily by the researcher.” Secondly, the scientist denies the motive semantic status.
The result of B.I. Yarkho’s statements is the denial of the real literary existence of the motif. The researcher talks about motive within the framework of the concept
tional construct that helps a literary critic establish the degree of similarity of different plots.
It should be noted that A. L. Bem comes to a similar conclusion, albeit from the semantic approach. Having discovered an invariant principle in the structure of the motive, the scientist reduces the semantic whole of the motive to this invariant, and relates the variant semantics of the motive to the specific content of the work and on this basis denies the motive the reality of literary existence: “motifs are fictions obtained as a result of abstraction from the specific content ".
Thus, B.I. Yarkho and A.L. Bem, each from his own position, do not accept the principle of the dual nature of the motif, which is becoming clear in other works, as a unit of artistic language endowed with a generalized meaning, and as a unit of artistic speech endowed with specific semantics.
A. I. Beletsky in his monograph “In the Workshop of the Word Artist” (1923) also comes to the problem of the relationship between the invariant meaning of the motif and the multiplicity of its specific plot variants. At the same time, the scientist does not deny the motive its own literary status (as A. L. Bem and B. I. Yarkho do) and does not reject the very concept of motive (as V. Ya. Propp does), but makes an attempt to resolve the problem of motive variability in a constructive manner.
The scientist distinguishes two levels of realization of a motive in a plot narrative - “schematic motive” and “real motive”. “Real motive” is an element of the plot-event composition of the plot of a particular work. The “schematic motif” no longer correlates with the plot itself in its specific plot form, but with the invariant “plot scheme.” This scheme is made up, according to A.I. Beletsky, of “relationships-actions”.
Illustrating his idea, A. I. Beletsky obviously relies on the observations of A. L. Bem and cites the following pair of real and schematic motives: “Plot “ Caucasian prisoner“, for example, is divided into several motives, of which the main one will be: “A Circassian woman loves a Russian prisoner”; in schematic form: “a foreigner loves a captive.”
The above suggests that the ideas of A. L. Bem, despite his negative position regarding the literary status of the motive, objectively contributed to the development of precisely dichotomous ideas, because the scientist was the first to identify the motive invariant - that very “schematic motive”, the concept of which was introduced somewhat later formulated by A.I. Beletsky.
The need to differentiate the concept of motive in the structural and plot-classification plans was emphasized in his works by A. Dundes. Acting as a direct successor to Propp in the study of fairy tales, A. Dundes addresses the problem of motive and proposes to solve it on the basis of two fundamentally different approaches - emic and etic. He presents the first approach as uniquely contextual, structural. “Emic units” - “points of the system” - do not exist in isolation, but as parts of a “functioning component system”. They are not invented by the researcher, but exist in objective reality. Dundes proposes two emic levels: motifeme and allomotive. The concept of motifeme corresponds to the function of J. Propp, but it is terminologically associated with the lower level. An allomotiv is a specific textual implementation of a motifeme.
The concept of “motive,” according to Dundes, has no emic meaning; it is a purely classification category that allows the researcher to operate with classes and units of material and is convenient for comparative analysis.
Dundes' ideas are partly developed by L. Parpulova, but with the difference that both emic and etic approaches are equally important for her. Following Dundes, she leaves behind the terms “motifeme” and “allomotif” structural meanings, and at the ethical level proposes the following gradation: 1) the theme of the motive, corresponding to the motifeme; 2) the motive itself, expressed in predicative form; 3) a variant of the motive corresponding to the allomotiv, i.e., the presentation of a specific implementation of the motive in a given text; 4) episode, i.e. the actual fragment of the text in its real form.
B. N. Putilov, continuing the theory of motive, in his work “Motive as a Plot-Forming Element,” defines motive as “one of the components of an epic plot, an element of an epic plot system.” “The motive,” the scientist writes, “functions as part of the system, here it finds its specific place, here its specific content is fully revealed. Together with other motives, this motive creates a system. Any motive in a certain way correlates with the whole (plot) and at the same time with other motives, i.e. with parts of this whole.”
However, B. N. Putilov puts his reasoning in opposition to Dundes’s statements about the role of motive as a purely classification category. According to the first, a motive as an invariant scheme that generalizes the essence of a number of allomotives can only partially be considered as an “invention” of the researcher. The motive acts as an element that objectively existed and was “discovered” by the researcher, which
is proven both by the presence of its own stable semantics in the motives, and by the existence of undoubted connections between the motives and the facts of ethnographic reality. In this regard, Putilov writes about the possibility of asserting that it is the motives that are directly related to archaic ideas and institutions, while allomotivs appear in the form of their later transformations.
He, like A. N. Veselovsky, talks about motive primarily in the context of the plot, developing the idea of the driving, dynamic role motive. Of no small importance are Putilov’s statements regarding the method of implementing the motif in the work (in some way consonant with the thoughts of Khalizev), which present the concept we are considering as an element of three levels: lexical, syntactic and the level associated with the forms of “consciousness of the collective that creates and preserves the epic.” In other words, a motive can be a single word or a combination of words, it can manifest itself in a sentence, or it can be realized in the spiritual and moral sphere, which serves as a kind of cultural code of a nation. However, semantic richness is revealed only when considering the motive at all of the above levels.
To clarify the concept of plot and plot, B.V. Tomashevsky introduces several auxiliary concepts, among which he singles out theme and motive. Moreover, in the final definition he somewhat synthesizes the last two concepts. He writes: “The theme of an indecomposable part of a work is called a motive. In essence, every sentence has its own motive." Making a reservation, the scientist draws attention to the fact that the term “motive”, used in historical poetics - in the comparative study of wandering plots (for example, in the study of fairy tales), differs significantly from the one he introduced, although it is usually defined in the same way. These motives move entirely from one plot structure to another. In comparative poetics it does not matter whether they can be broken down into smaller motifs. “The only important thing,” the researcher emphasizes, “is that within the genre being studied, these “motifs” are always found in their entirety. Consequently, instead of the word “indecomposable” in comparative study, one can speak of something that is historically indecomposable, which preserves its unity in wandering from work to work. However, many motives of comparative poetics retain their significance precisely as motives in theoretical poetics.”
According to Tomashevsky, motives, combining with each other, form a thematic connection of the work.
Denia. From this point of view, the plot is a set of motives in their logical cause-time relationship, the plot is a set of the same motives in the same sequence and connection in which they are given in the work. For the plot, it does not matter in which part of the work the reader learns about the event. In the plot, it is the introduction of motives into the reader’s field of attention that plays a role. According to Tomashevsky’s statements, only related motives matter for the plot. In the plot, sometimes it is free motives that play a dominant role that determines the structure of the work. These “side” motifs are introduced for the purpose of artistic construction of the story and carry a wide variety of functions. The introduction of such motifs is largely determined by literary tradition, and each school has its own list of motifs, while related motifs are found in the same form in a wide variety of schools.
In the article by A.P. Skaftymov “Thematic composition of the novel “The Idiot” (first published in 1924; republished in 1972), a system of figurative and psychological analysis of the narrative work is deployed. This analysis is based on the author’s model of the composition of the work, which is built along the lines of character - episode - motive.
A.P. Skaftymov writes: “In the question of the analytical division of the whole [literary work] under study, we were guided by those natural nodes around which its constituent thematic complexes were united.<...>The characters in the novel seem to us to be the main, largest links of the whole. Internal division holistic images occurred according to the categories of the most isolated and highlighted episodes in the novel, then going back to smaller indivisible thematic units, which we denoted in the presentation by the term “thematic motif”.
The model of A.P. Skaftymov implicitly includes, along with the system of heroes, another “upper” level that interacts with the level of “characters” - the plot of the work. The hero as a whole for the researcher is revealed not in this or that episode, but in the plot as a semantic generalization of the system of episodes. We consider it necessary to give several examples of motives that A.P. Skaftmov identifies when analyzing the novel. In relation to Nastasya Filippovna, the motive of consciousness of guilt and insufficiency, the motive of thirst for the ideal and forgiveness, the motive of pride and the motive of self-justification are highlighted. In relation to Hippolytus - the motive of envious pride, the motive of attractive love. In relation to Rogozhin - the motive of selfishness in love. In relation to
to Aglaya - “the motif of childishness imparts to Aglaya freshness, spontaneity and a peculiar innocence even in angry outbursts.” In relation to Gana Ivolgin: “the motive of “inability to surrender to impulse.”
The motive of A.P. Skaftymov is thematic and at the same time holistic and indivisible as a fundamental moment of the psychological whole in the theme of the work - the actual “character” in the scientist’s terminology. Thus, the motives of pride and self-justification form in the image of Nastasya Filippovna “the theme of the combination of pride and a tendency to self-justification.” Elsewhere, “the construction of the image of Nastasya Fillipovna is entirely determined by the themes of pride and moral purity and sensitivity.”
However, the interpretation of the concept of motive that Skaftymov positions seems to us not completely understandable and logically vague.
In our opinion, the synthesis of such basic concepts in literary criticism as the theme of a work and the motive of a work requires a fairly strong argument. The scientist, presenting various types of motives that he discovered in the novel of one of the classics of world literature, nominates pride both as a theme of the work and as a motive, without outlining the circle of differences between these concepts. The rather frequent use of the word “motive” in Skaftymov’s works not only does not provide practical confirmation of its definition due to the load on the word “semantic,” but also raises the question of the relevance and persuasiveness of the concept introduced by the scientist.
One of the most important characteristics of the motif L. E. Khvorova calls its properties of mobility (remember Latin translation term). In her opinion, it is important as a “moving, transitional (from plot to plot throughout a single artistic whole literary space) formal-semantic core (a certain macrostructure), which is a cluster of properties of various orders, including spiritual and axiological properties. A motive can carry object-subjective information, and may have the meaning of a sign or action."
Over the past decades, motifs have begun to be actively correlated with individual creative experience and are considered as the property of individual writers and works.
I would like to note that the term “motive” is also used in a different meaning. Thus, themes and problems of a writer’s work are often called motives (for example, the moral rebirth of man, the illogical existence of people).
In modern literary criticism there is also the idea of motive as an extra-structural element.
chale - as the property not of the text and its creator, but of the unrestricted thought of the person perceiving the work.
However, no matter what semantic tones are attached to the word “motive” in literary criticism, the unconditional significance and genuine relevance of this term, which captures the really (objectively) existing facet of literary works, remains self-evident.
Literature
1. Beletsky A.I. In the workshop of the artist of the word // Beletsky A.I. Selected works on the theory of literature. M., 1964.
2. Bem A. Towards an understanding of historical and literary concepts // News of the Department of Russian Language and Literature. AN. 1918. T. 23. Book. 1. St. Petersburg, 1919.
3. Veselovsky A. N. Poetics of plots. Introduction and chap. I. // Veselovsky A. N. Historical poetics. L., 1940.
4. Popova I. M., Khvorova L. E. Problems of modern literature. Tambov, 2004.
5. Propp V. Ya. Morphology of a fairy tale. M., 1969.
6. Putilov B. N. Motif as a plot-forming element // Typological studies on folklore: collection. Art. in memory of V. Ya. Propp. M., 1975.
7. Silantyev I.V. The theory of motive in domestic literary criticism and folklore: an essay on historiography. M., 1999.
8. Skaftymov A.P. Thematic composition of the novel “The Idiot” // Skaftymov A.P. Articles on Russian literature. Saratov, 1958.
9. Tomashevsky B.V. Theory of Literature. Poetics. M., 1927.
10. Khalizev V. E. Theory of Literature. M., 2002.
11. Yarkho B.I. Methodology of accurate literary criticism (outline plan) // Context. M., 1983.
12. Dandes A. From etic to emic untis in the structural study of Folktales // Journal of American Folklore. 1962. Vol. 75.
THE CONCEPT “MOTIVE” AND ITS INTERPRETATION IN THE THEORY OF LITERATURE AND MUSIC
The article is devoted to the concept of motive and its interpretation in the theory of the literature in relation to musical art. The basic approaches to the study of this concept in the context of the research of the leading theorists of literature, traced the path of understanding of the concepts in the practice of scientific theoretical thought are considered.
Key words: motive, theory of motive, structure of motive, level of implementation of the motive.