The content of the concepts theme and motive. Motif of a literary work
The term “motive” (from the Latin “moving”) moved into the science of literature from musicology. It was first recorded in " Musical dictionary"S. De Brossard (1703). Analogies with music, where this term is key when analyzing the composition of a work, help to understand typical properties motive in a literary text: its isolation from the whole and repetition in a variety of variations.
The term “motive” was introduced into literary use by I.V. Goethe and I.F. Schiller, using it to characterize the components of the plot. 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.”
In Russian literary criticism, the motif has been studied since the beginning of the 20th century. This term was first used by A.N. Veselovsky, applying it during benchmarking folklore texts. According to the scientist, the motives are distinguished by historical stability and repetition in fiction. Philologist considering motive as a basis folklore plot, defined it as an indecomposable unit of narrative.
A.N. Veselovsky also noted the ability of writers, with the help of a “brilliant poetic instinct,” to use plots and motifs that had already been processed poetically. Speaking about the semantic significance of the motive, the literary critic raises the issue of the deep mental connection of the creative act with a stable set of its (motive) meanings: “They are somewhere in the deep dark region of our consciousness<...>like an incomprehensible revelation, like newness and at the same time antiquity, which we are not aware of, because we are often unable to determine the essence of that mental act that unexpectedly renewed old memories in us.”
A significant contribution to the development of the semantic theory of motive was made by O.M. Freudenberg. In her opinion, the concept of motive is not abstract, but is inextricably linked with the concept of character: “In essence, speaking about the character, we thereby had to talk about the motives that received stabilization in him; the entire morphology of the character is the morphology of plot motifs (...) The significance expressed in the name of the character and, therefore, in his metaphorical essence, unfolds into the action that constitutes the motive: the hero does only what he himself semantically means.”
Ancient medieval literature also reveals stable connections between the hero and his motivic repertoire, and these connections are already made within the framework of a certain genre-thematic tradition. D.S. Likhachev, describing in the light of the concept literary etiquette the motive complex of the hero of medieval literature speaks of the regularity of the predetermined structure of literary themes set by tradition.
Lines of conceptual searches of A.N. Veselovsky and O.M. Freudenberg come together in the development of the idea of the aesthetics of the motif. This idea takes the concept of motive beyond its narrowly disciplinary interpretation and connects the problems of motive with general questions of the genesis of the aesthetic principle in literature, including explaining the very phenomenon of the stability of the motive in the narrative tradition. Both researchers interpret the idea of the aesthetics of a motif through the related concept of imagery. Thus, in the definitions of motive by A.N. Veselovsky, one can see that the word “figurative” itself is key, terminological meaning: a motive is “a formula that figuratively answered, in the early days of the public, the questions that nature posed to man everywhere”; “a feature of a motive is its figurative monomial schematism,” etc.
We see the same thing with O.M. Freudenberg: “The dissemination and concretization of the plot scheme is reflected in the motif’s emphasis on imagery, which conveys this scheme in a number of isolated similarities identified with the phenomena of life”; “A motif is a figurative interpretation of a plot scheme.”
Thus, the motif as a figurative narrative formula, enshrined in tradition, has the property of aesthetic significance, which ultimately determines its stability in the literary tradition.
The works of A.N. Veselovsky are fundamental in the study of the functioning of motive in Russian literary criticism, but many of them were later criticized. Thus, the position of the literary critic about the motive as a single-member unit of the plot was revised by V.Ya. Propp. The scientist, arguing that the motives identified by A.N. Veselovsky can be split, demonstrates this split on some of them. According to V.Ya. Propp, the primary elements of the plot are the “functions” (actions) of the characters, “historically repeated in fiction.” Based on the analysis of one hundred fairy tales from the collection of A.N. Afanasyev, V.Ya. Propp created a classification of these functions. Having provided a detailed analysis of fairy tales with different plots, the scientist comes to the conclusion that “the sequence of functions is always the same” and that “all fairy tales are of the same type in their structure.”
Changing the semantic criterion to a logical one in the criticism of V.Ya. Proppa led to the destruction of the motif as a whole. Taken only as a logical construction, the motive fell apart into trivial components of the logical-grammatical structure of the utterance - into a set of subjects, objects and predicates, expressed in certain plot variations. Opposite A.N. Veselovsky’s point of view on the essence of the motive is observed in B.I. Yarho. 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 a semantic status: “The real scope of the motive cannot be established.” As a result, the author rejected the existence of a real literary motive, and the motive itself was interpreted by him as a conceptual construct that helps a literary critic establish the degree of similarity of different plots: “It is clear that the motive is not a real part of the plot, but a working term that serves to compare plots with each other.”
A.I. Beletsky, in his monograph “In the Word Artist’s Workshop” (1964), 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 and does not reject the very concept of motive, but makes an attempt to resolve the problem of motive variability in a constructive manner.
He 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 compiled according to A.I. Beletsky, “relationships-actions”. It is important to emphasize that the scientist, starting from the observations of A.L. Bema, tied in unified system two polar principles in the structure of the motive, that is, the semantic invariant of the motive was associated with its plot variants. Thus, a fundamental step forward was made, which served as the basis for the development of a dichotomous theory of motive.
Note that the dichotomous concept of the motif received its final form in the second half of the 20th century. At the same time, it was the idea of the generalized meaning of the motive, and primarily the concept of function, interpreted as an invariant form of the motive, in combination with the dichotomous ideas of structural linguistics, that allowed literary scholars to come to a strict distinction between the invariant motive and its plot variants.
Simultaneously with dichotomous ideas in national science In the 1920s, the thematic concept of the motif developed. In the works of B.V. Tomashevsky and V.B. Shklovsky's thematic ideas about the motive were developed to the level of strict definitions.
B.V. Tomashevsky in a monographic textbook on poetics develops two interpretations of the motive - the original interpretation and the interpretation of the motive according to A.N. Veselovsky. At the same time, the author does not enter into a contradiction, since he correlates these interpretations with various methodological foundations of theoretical and historical poetics.
The researcher defines the motive exclusively through the category of theme: “The concept of theme is a summative concept that unites the verbal material of the work. The whole work can have a theme, and at the same time, each part of the work has its own theme. (...) Through this decomposition of the work into thematic parts, we finally reach the non-decomposable parts, the smallest divisions of the thematic material. “Evening has come,” “Raskolnikov killed the old woman,” “The hero died,” “A letter was received,” etc. The theme of the indecomposable part of the work is called a motive. In essence, every sentence has its own motive."
Thus, the concept of motive is derivative for B.V. Tomashevsky from the concept of narrative theme and has a predominantly working function. The scientist points out the “auxiliary” nature of this concept. It is necessary for the researcher to correctly determine the relationship between the plot and the plot, because it connects these concepts: “the plot is a set of motives in their logical cause-time relationship, the plot is a set of the same motives in the sequence and connection in which they are given in the work.” .
Further, it should be noted that there are significant differences in V.B.’s understanding of motive as a theme. Shklovsky and B.V. Tomashevsky. United by the common idea of the thematic nature of the motive, the concepts of these authors are at the same time directly opposite in terms of the relationship of the motive with the beginnings of the plot and plot. For V.B. Shklovsky's motive is the thematic result of the plot or its integral part, and in this regard, the motive becomes already above the plot - as a semantic “atom” of the plot of the work. That is, for V.B. Shklovsky’s motive is important not in itself, not as the initial “brick” for constructing plots, but is important as a unit of typological analysis of the plots of the literary era as a whole.
So, the considered ideas about motive can be combined into four conceptual series: semantic, morphological, dichotomous (at the stage of its inception) and thematic. The main difference between these approaches is how the most important criterion of the indecomposability of a motive is interpreted and how the relationship between the moments of integrity and elementaryness is understood in the very status of a motive.
For A.N. Veselovsky and O.M. Freudenberg - the main representatives of the semantic approach - the constitutive beginning of the motive is semantic integrity, which sets the limit to the elementarity of the motive. At the same time, the semantics of the motive is figurative in nature. The image itself underlying the motif is essentially aesthetic, which explains the phenomenon of spontaneous generation of motifs from “life itself” - but seen and experienced from an aesthetic perspective.
The morphological approach, most deeply developed by V.Ya. Proppom, sent to reverse side: not from semantic integrity to the elementaryity of the motive, but bypassing the integrity - to the establishment of a formal measure of the elementaryity of the motive.
As a result of such a “deconstruction of the whole,” V.Ya. Propp reduces the motive to a set of elementary logical-grammatical components, but at the same time faces the problem of variability of the motive components in specific plots. The researcher solves the problem of motive variability by finding its semantic invariant, which he gives the name of the function of the actor.
This fundamental step returns V.Ya. Propp in line with the semantic interpretation of motive, but at a significantly different level - at the level of development of dichotomous ideas about motive as a unit of dual status - linguistic and speech at the same time.
For representatives of the thematic approach, the criterion for the integrity of a motive is its ability to express a holistic theme, understood as a semantic result, or a summary of the semantic development of the plot. In the interpretation of B.V. Tomashevsky's motive acts as an exponent of the micro-theme as the theme of the plot statement; in the interpretations of B.V. Shklovsky - the exponent of the macro-theme as the theme of the episode or plot as a whole.
Due to well-known historical and cultural reasons, in the 1930s, domestic theoretical and historical traditions were interrupted for a long time. The theory of motive was no exception in this series. Even in the 1960s, the category of motive in literary criticism was either not accepted in its essence or was interpreted rather formally.
An example is the definition of motive in the Brief literary encyclopedia: this is “the simplest content (semantic) unit literary text in myth and fairy tale." At the same time, the author of the encyclopedic article is forced to refer only to the works of scientists of the beginning and first quarter of the 20th century - A.N. Veselovsky, A.L. Bem and some others.
We will talk about the new period of study of the motif and its modern interpretation in paragraph 1.2.
motive
MOTIVE (from the Latin moveo “I move”) is a term transferred from music, where it denotes a group of several notes, rhythmically designed. analogies with this in literary criticism the term “M.” begins to be used to denote the minimal component work of art element of content that cannot be further decomposable (Scherer). In this sense, the concept of M. plays a particularly large, perhaps central role in the comparative study of plots mainly oral literature(see, Folklore); here is a comparison of similar M.Used both as a method of reconstructing the original form of the plot and as a way of tracing its migration, it becomes almost the only method of research in all pre-Marxist schools from the Aryan Grimms and the comparative mythological M. Muller to the anthropological, eastern and comparative historical inclusive.
The depravity of the concept of M. beyond the boundaries of folklore, especially popularized by the formalists in their polemics with the cultural-historical school in the mechanistic concept of the artistic method as a technique for combining a certain number of qualitatively unchanged elements; This concept presupposes the separation of the technique (techniques) of artistic mastery from its content, i.e.
E. ultimately the separation of form from content. Therefore, in a specific historical analysis literary work the concept of M. as a formalistic concept is subject to significant criticism (see, Plot, Topics). Another meaning of the term “M.” has among representatives of Western European subjective-idealistic literary criticism, who define it as “the experience of the poet, taken in its significance” (Dilthey).
M. in this sense the starting point artistic creativity, the totality of the poet’s ideas and feelings, seeking a visually accessible design that determines the choice of the material itself poetic work, and thanks to the unity of the individual or national spirit expressed in them, repeated in the works of one poet, one era, one nation and thereby accessible to isolation and analysis.
Contrasting the creative consciousness with the matter it shapes, this understanding of motive is built on the opposition of subject to object, so typical of subjective-idealistic systems, and is subject to exposure in Marxist literary criticism. Bibliography:
The concept of motive in comparative literature Veselovsky A.
N., plots, Collection. sochin., vol. II, issue. I, St. Petersburg, 1913; Leyen G. D., Das Marchen, ; R. M., Fairy tale. Plot-based investigations folk tale. T. I. Great Russian, Ukrainian and Belarusian fairy tale, State University of Culture, Odessa, 1924; Arne A.
Vergleichende Marchenforschung (Russian translation by A. Andreeva, 1930); Krohn K., Die folkloristische Arbeitsmethode. See also “Fairy tale”, “Folklore”. The concept of motive among the formalists Shklovsky V., On the theory of prose, ed. "Circle", M., 1925; Fleschenberg, Rhetorische Forschungen, Dibelius-Englische Romankunst (preface). See also “Methods of Pre-Marxist Literary Studies.” The concept of motive in Dilthey’s school Dilthey W., Die Einbildungskraft des Dichters, “Ges.
Schriften", VI, 1924; His, Das Erlebnis und die Dichtung, 1922; Korner J., Motiv; "Reallexikon der deutschen Literaturgeschichte", hrsg. v. Merker u. Stammler. .
A motif in a literary work is most often understood as a part, an element of the plot. Any plot is an interweaving of motifs, closely related to each other, growing into one another. The same motive can underlie a wide variety of plots and thus have very different meanings.
The strength and significance of a motive changes depending on what other motives it is adjacent to. The motive is sometimes very deeply hidden, but the deeper it lies, the more content it can carry within itself. It shades or complements the main, main theme of the work. The motif of enrichment unites such otherwise diverse works as “Père Goriot” by O. de Balzac, “ Queen of Spades" And " Stingy Knight"A. S. Pushkin and " Dead Souls"N.V. Gogol. The motive of imposture unites “Boris Godunov”, “The Peasant Young Lady” and “The Stone Guest” by A. S. Pushkin with Gogol’s “The Inspector General”... And yet the motive is not indifferent to the environment of its existence: for example, those beloved by the romantics (although not created by them ) motives for escape from captivity, death in a foreign land, loneliness in the crowd, appearing in realistic work, retain the sheen and taste of romanticism for a long time, giving additional depth to their new home, creating, as it were, niches in which one can hear the echo of the previous sound of these motifs. It is not without reason that for most people the word “motive” means a tune, a melody - it retains something of this meaning as a literary term. In poetry, almost any word can become a motif; in lyric poetry, a word-motive is always shrouded in a cloud of former meanings and uses; a halo of former meanings “shines” around it.
Motif, according to A. N. Veselovsky’s definition, is the “nervous knot” of the narrative (including lyrical). Touching such a node causes an explosion of aesthetic emotions, necessary for the artist, and sets in motion a chain of associations that help the correct perception of the work, enriching it. Having discovered, for example, that the motif of escape from captivity permeates all Russian literature (from “The Tale of Igor’s Campaign” to “Mtsyri” by M. Yu. Lermontov, from “ Caucasian prisoner"A. S. Pushkin to "Walking in Torment" by A. N. Tolstoy and "The Fate of Man" by M. A. Sholokhov), filling with different content, acquiring various details, appearing either in the center or on the outskirts of the narrative, we will be able to go deeper understand and feel this motive if we meet it again and again in modern prose. The motive of wish fulfillment, which entered the literature from a fairy tale, underlies almost all science fiction, but its significance is not limited to this. It can be found in works as distant from each other as “Little Tsakhes” by E. T. A. Hoffmann, “The Overcoat” by N. V. Gogol, “The Twelve Chairs” by I. A. Ilf and E. P. Petrov, “The Master and Margarita” by M. A. Bulgakov - the list is almost endless, right up to the novel by V. A. Kaverin, called “The Fulfillment of Desires.”
A motive, as a rule, exists with two signs at once, in two guises, and presupposes the existence of an antonym motive: the motive of impatience (for example, the novel by Yu. V. Trifonov “The House on the Embankment”) will certainly bring to life the motive of patience, and this does not mean at all that the motifs will coexist in one work. What is important for the development of literature is precisely that the motifs seem to echo each other not only within one plot (and not even so much), one work, but also across the boundaries of books and even literatures. Therefore, by the way, it is possible and fruitful to study not only the system of motifs belonging to one artist, but also the general network of motifs used in the literature of a certain time, certain direction, in one or another national literature.
Understood as a plot element, motif borders on the concept of theme.
The understanding of a motive as a plot unit in literary criticism is adjacent to and contradicts the understanding of it as a kind of cluster of feelings, ideas, ideas, even methods of expression. Understood in this way, the motive is already approaching the image and can develop in this direction and develop into an image. This process can occur in one, sometimes completely small work, as, for example, in Lermontov’s “Sail”. The motif of a lonely sail (borrowed by M. Yu. Lermontov from A. A. Bestuzhev-Marlinsky and having long tradition), combined with the motifs of storm, space, escape, gives rise to a complete and organic image of a rebellious lonely soul, an image so rich in the possibilities of artistic influence that its development and enrichment allowed Lermontov not only to base all his lyrics on it, but also to transform it into images Demon, Arbenin and Pechorin. Pushkin treated motifs differently: he knew how to combine the most prosaic, dispassionate, almost meaningless and empty motifs from long use to give them a fresh and universal meaning and create living and eternal images. In Pushkin, all motives remember their former existence. With them, a new work enters not just a tradition, but also a genre, beginning to live a new life. This is how the ballad, elegy, epigram, ode, idyll, letter, song, fairy tale, fable, short story, epitaph, madrigal and many other half-forgotten and forgotten genres and genre formations, introduced through motifs, live in “Eugene Onegin”.
The motif is two-faced; it is both a representative of tradition and a sign of novelty. But the motive is equally dual within itself: it is not an indecomposable unit, it is, as a rule, formed by two opposing forces, it within itself presupposes a conflict that is transformed into action. The life of a motive is not endless (motives fizzle out); straightforward and primitive exploitation of a motive can devalue it. This happened, for example, with the motif of the struggle between old and new in the so-called “industrial” prose of the 50s. XX century After many novels and stories appeared that used this motif, for a long time any manifestation of it served as a sign of literary inferiority. It took time and extraordinary efforts of talented writers for this motif to regain its citizenship rights in our literature. Motives sometimes come back to life completely unexpectedly. For example, the romantic motif of loneliness in a crowd, the motif of a stranger, were successfully resurrected in the story “Scarecrow” by V. K. Zheleznikov, which became especially famous after its film adaptation by R. A. Bykov. Motif is a category that allows us to consider literature as single book, as a whole - through the particular, as an organism - through a cell. The history of motifs - their origin, development, extinction and new flourishing - can be the subject of a fascinating literary study.
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 the visibly and sonorously designated memory of the theme of the text, its intertextual relations and connections, and 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 motive 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 laconic (in accordance with genre characteristics) and 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.
2) A motive that is not included in the system of cause-and-effect plot is the opposite of a connected motive.”Wilpert G. von.
“
Motive Sachwörterbuch der Literatur. .
(latmotivus -<...>motivating),3. content-structural unity as a typical, meaningful situation that embraces general thematic ideas (as opposed to something defined and framed through specific features
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 motive is shown by the example of the question whether it is better about “ Simple heart
4) Flaubert speaks of “woman and parrot” or “woman and bird”; here only a broader designation opens the interpreter’s eyes to certain meanings and their variants, but not a narrower one” (S. 1328).Barnet S., Berman M., Burto W.“ MotiveDictionary of Literary, Dramatic and Cinematic Terms. Boston, 1971.
- 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 (meaning “leitmotif” from the German “leading motive”) can arise within a single work: it can be any repetition that contributes to the integrity of the work by recalling a previous mention of a given element and everything associated with it” (p .71).
“ 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 motive associated in a musical drama with a specific situation, actor or an 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 literary terms. T. 1. Stlb. 466 - 467.
“ M.(from moveo - I move, set in motion), in in a broad sense this 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, side motifs (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 called plot
9) his".Zakharkin A.
“ Motive // Dictionary of literary terms.P.226-227. M. (from the French motif - melody, tune) - an obsolete term denoting the minimum significant component of the narrative, the simplest
10) componentthe plot of a work of art."
“ Motive // Dictionary of literary terms.Chudakov A.P.Motive. KLE. T. 4. Stlb. 995.. (French motif, from Latin motivus - movable) - the simplest meaningful (semantic) unit of art. text in mythAndfairy tale, 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
11) , betrayal - revenge), but we can only talk about the similarity or borrowing of M.plot level
“ Motive // Dictionary of literary terms.- when the combination of many minor M. and methods of their development coincide.”
Nezvankina L.K., Shchemeleva L.M. Motive // LES. P. 230:. (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.”<...>"More strict meaning 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,
reference word
, carrying 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 narration. 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).”(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 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. 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).
Since the turn of the 19th and 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,” 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 motives here are not so much related to individual works, how many are considered as common property verbal art. Motives, according to Veselovsky, are historically stable and endlessly repeatable. In a cautious, speculative form, the scientist argued: “... is it not limited poetic creativity known definite 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<...>? 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.
For last decades motives began to be actively correlated with individual creative experience, considered
as a property 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 famous story I.A. Bunin about a life suddenly cut short charming girl are “light 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's remember the episodes when 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 last days Andrei Bolkonsky: “So he calmed down? Have you softened?"
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 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 cycle “Carmen” the word “treason” performs the function of 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, moral rebirth person; 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.
