Образ ветра (Çил) в чувашской национальной картине мира и в художественной прозе

Abstract

The research aims to study the literary meaning of the mystical worldview by analysing the image of a certain phenomenon - the Air element (Çil) in a literary work. The paper carried out a comprehensive study of a mystical-religious, literary interpretation of the image of the Wind in the work of a mystical-philosophical style. Special attention is paid to the traditional customs and rituals of the Chuvash people. The research is novel in that it is the first in Chuvash literary studies to identify the connection between the anthropomorphic image of the Wind in folklore and literary fiction, to clarify features peculiar to the personification of this character in literature. For this purpose, various texts of magical rituals and incantations used to propitiate the Air element were analysed. The research findings have shown that the folklore image of the Wind is the primary basis for characters in Chuvash literary works, and the mystical-philosophical style of literature becomes the author’s interpretation of folk belief.