СПЕЦИФІКА ХУДОЖНЬОГО СВІТУ РОМАНІВ ДОРІС ЛЕССІНГ (НА МАТЕРІАЛІ РОМАНІВ «МААРА І ДАНН», «ПОВІСТЬ ПРО ГЕНЕРАЛА ДАННА, ДОЧКУ МААРИ, ГРІОТА ТА СНІЖНОГО ПСА»)

Abstract

The article is devoted to the study of special features of artistic world of the novels of contemporary English writer D. Lessing “Mara and Dann”, “The Story of General Dann and Mara’s Daughter, Griot and the Snow Dog”. The purpose of the article is to discover the mythological dominants of the artistic world in D. Lesing’s novels. The methodology of the study involves an integrated approach based on the synthesis of methods and approaches: an appeal to the integral analysis of the text, the usage of elements of the myth-critical and structural- semiotic approaches, as well as the motive analysis. Under the concept of “artistic world” the integral interaction of all elements of content and form is understood, each of which has a semantic load in general. The artistic world of Lessing’s works appears as a complex and multi-level phenomenon, which is conditioned by the specificity of the plot-compositional structure, the peculiarity of artistic time and space, the concept of the hero, dominant motifs, symbolism and “personal context” of the author. The artistic world of mentioned novels reveals features which are typical for neomythological texts, which are determined in the interaction of two planes (the real and the mythological one) in the plot composition of the work. The dilogy time-spatial organization has mythological features and is determined by time (day and night), spatial (the north – the south), high-quality (“live-dead”) oppositions. The mythological character of time in the dilogy is actualized in cyclicity and heterogeneity (extension/compression) of the roman time course. The seasonality is the main unit of time measurement; in the text there is no specific correlation of events with days of the week, months, time is determined only by the weather and long seasons of the rains, it creates a feeling of a “frozen” of time. The roman space is characterized by heterogeneous features which are actualized through binary oppositions (“the north – the south”, “living – dead”, “sacred – profane”). The component part of the artistic world of mentioned D. Lessing’s novels is also a system of characters, represented by three types of images: firstly, these are the main characters – brother and sister, Mara and Dann (in the first part of the dilogy) and Mara’s daughter Tamar (in the second part) that reveal mythological features. Secondly, these are the characters who “test” the main characters (Kulik, Kira). Thirdly, it is the category of allies of the main characters (Griot, Ali, dog Ruff). The main characters reveal mythological features, representing the divine pair of male and female deities. The artistic world of D. Lessing’s novels is characterized by the functioning of mythological markers and symbols. Ambivalent solar symbols and their coloristic correlates reproduce the state of the heroes: red – black (life – death), pale yellow – white (contrast of the south and the north), yellow – green – blue (drought – flood, infernality – vitality). The prospect of research is seen in the further study of contemporary works of Anglo-American writers, whose texts reveal neomythological features.