BLACK HUMOUR IN A FAIRY TALE: VERBALIZATION OF THE CONCEPT DEATH

Abstract

The paper deals with the study of the influence of black humour elements on R. Dahl’s story “Pig”, qualified by us as a fairy tale genre. The purpose of the research is to describe the verbalization of the author’s individual concept DEATH as a key component for revealing the black-humorous tonality of the story. The model of fairy tale discourse has been specified, which presupposes the use of the initial formula, verbal elements, and patterned compositional structure. The peculiarities of R. Dahl’s creative method (reflected in the fairy tale), whose poetics is characterized by a vivid black-humorous component, have been considered. An interpretation of the lexeme ‘death’ in modern lexicographic sources of the English and Ukrainian languages has been provided. A conceptual model based on the arrangement of frames and slots has been introduced. The functioning of the concept DEATH in the author’s individual worldview has been analysed.
 In the short story “Pig” the writer draws the reader’s attention to the black-humorous macabre element, i. e. death, which is described tragicomically in the author’s and character’s speech with the help of linguistic means to indicate the hero’s enthusiastic and exciting mood and the entertaining tone of the story. Metaphors, contrast, irony, hyperbolization, and allusion occupy the leading place among them. The lexeme ‘death’ belongs to the author’s favourite word that appears as a literary concept. The expansion of the content potential of the specified word occurs due to numerous repetitions and its use in different contexts.
 The linguistic representation of the concept is given in the form of building a lexical and semantic field consisting of four frames (‘cessation of existence, the life of the organism, the end’, ‘reflection of a person’s value’, ‘eating habits of meat-eaters’, ‘a process that equalizes people and animals’) and corresponding slots. Contextual analysis and a figurative approach give reasons to claim that the literary text organizes a system of meanings of the lexeme ‘death’ in a different way. Its figurative meanings as of a symbol of transition to another world and eternal spiritual life, as well as of the personification of evil, generated by people, occupy the first (main) position in the hierarchy of dictionary definitions, thereby expanding its metaphorical meaning.