The article studies how the spatial and temporal characteristics of the world in a literary work are determined by the specific updating of artistic meaning. The specifics of the artistic meaning in the article are described using the concept of incarnation (embodiment). Using the example of the analysis of texts by A.E. Kruchenykh and M.Y. Lermontov, the author of the article shows how space and time are comprehended in the horizons of the heroes (in the internal semantic dimension of the work) and in the horizons of the author and recipients (in the external – aesthetic – semantic dimension of the text). The author of the article points out a number of significant differences between the semantics of space and time in the life and artistic contexts of comprehension. Characteristics of the vital understanding of space and time: 1) space and time are comprehended teleologically; 2) space and time semantically articulate a private life situation; 3) space and time are the coordinates of the comprehending relationship to the world. Characteristics of artistic understanding of space and time: 1) space and time are conceptualized ontologically; 2) space and time semantically articulate the whole of the characters’ lives; 3) space and time are the coordinates of the location of the heroes’ being as an incarnation of their (being) meaning.

The article deals with such type of intertextual relations as narrative palimpsest. Its role in the poetics of non-classical artistry, where it has a special status – the status of the cultural code, is studied.
On the example of two works (F. Sologub’s “The Petty Devil” and S. Sokolov’s “School for Fools”), which represent the narrative of abnormal consciousness, the author tries to show that F. Sologub’s text became a palimpsest pretext for the work of S. Sokolov.

The article deals with the specifics of a Russian literary landscape’s construction as a system of values organized in a particular way. It allows answering the question what is good and what is beauty in the life context relevant to a human being. In this regard, special attention is paid to various descriptions. They allow not only to describe and individualize the contemplated natural forms like meadows, fields, lakes and forests, but also to understand, realize and evaluate those familiar marks of the central Russia’s landscape in connection with some axiological concepts significant for a human being, such as God, life, freedom, liberty, art, happiness, or virtue, as a historically dynamic system of values. In that sense, a literary landscape is more than a recognizable image of a place; it is also a “focus of the world-like-history”.

The article considers and describes the marks on the pages of the Bible, preserved in the home library of A. Blok. The greatest number of marginalia is found in the Pentateuch, Ecclesiastes, the Book of Wisdom of Solomon, the Gospel of John, the 1st Epistle of John, and the Revelation of John the Theologian. A number of quotations are reflected in Blok’s poems, dramas, and articles. The influence of the text of the Apocalypse is particularly evident in the early lyrics of 1901–1904, and then, in the period of “antithesis” (1905–1908), not only in poetry, but also in drama. The analysis of markings in the Gospel makes it clear that the Other, about whom Blok spoke in connection with the figure of Christ in the poem “The Twelve”, is the Holy Spirit, the Comforter. As a source of biblical reminiscences the author considers the text of the “Service of the Church of St. John”, created by D.S. Merezhkovsky and Z.N. Gippius and used by them in home services. Quotations from that source in Blok’s poems allow the author to question the extent of Blok’s knowledge with the practice preached by D.S. Merezhkovsky “The Church of the Third Testament”.

The focus of our attention is Chekhov’s attitude to the institute of psychiatry as a part of Russian social system at the end of the 19th century. “Ward No. 6” is an invaluable material on the history of social medicine, comparable with the few documentary evidence of zemstvo (the county) doctors about the state of psychiatry in the Russian province of the late nineteenth century. The story “The Black Monk” draws increasing attention to the discussion around the topic of genius and madness, which received a new impetus in the fin de siècle era.

The article deals with Andrei Platonov’s play “Sharmanka”. Its analysis shows how the author’s original and hidden language relates to the meaning of the text and to the author’s life. The play is also considered in the context of the poetics of the writer’s works close in time: the general tendency of thought, invariance of details and themes; different combinations of motifs and development of some leitmotifs are revealed. The method used is hermeneutics, as it is defined by Friedrich Schleiermacher – the art of understanding and interpreting the text. The “grammatical” and the “psychological” sides in such analysis remain identical – they are not separated, but constantly touching and mutually percepting, like part and parcel in a hermeneutic circle. First of all, that allows to approach the interpretation of difficult parts through the prism of the author’s life, thereby giving them a reasonable and convincing explanation; and secondly, to call “Sharmanka” partly an autobiographical work. Thus, the article studies the originality of Platonov’s language, its connection with the realities of Soviet times in the 20s and 30s; the intersection of the plot with important events in the writer’s life, such as the repudiation of the literary community, in particular his patron and comrade Alexander Fadeev; as well as the place of “Sharmanka” in the creative legacy of Andrei Platonov.

The article deals with the reference to the song by Vladimir Vysotsky “Hunting for wolves” in the text of Boris Belokurov (Usov) “Hunting for sheep”. The conclusion is made about the specific role of someone else’s word in the strong positions of the text – in the title, refrain, final verse, on the basis of which the author’s attitude is also characterized.

The purpose of the article is to analyze the influence of Buddhism on the ideological component and poetics of A. Makushinsky’s novel “Max” and poetry books “The Light Behind the Trees” and “The Sea, Today”. In the novel “Max” the protagonist follows the path of spiritual transformation. The goal of this path is a state in which reality will be seen as it is – genuine, that is, empty, and not illusory, hidden behind matter and various forms. The image of the illusory reality generated by the affected human mind in the novel is associated with the motives of fuzziness, confusion, absence. Characters and items in “Max” have a phantom status. The hero approaches the desired state through the desire for a “fixed point”, for presence in the present time, for complete objectivity, for pure consciousness. The chronotope of the novel is conventional: the spatial loci of “Max” do not have clear boundaries and are similar to each other; the past, present and future are mixed and tend to a single point – here-and-now. In poetry books, as well as in the novel, there is, in the words of the author, «an intuition of the radiant emptiness». A. Makushinsky’s poems are meditative and are tuned to capture the emptiness and silence hidden behind the words and phenomena of reality.

The article considers the transformation of the motif of violating the ban in the medieval versions of the “plot of the Swan Knight” in the French and German traditions. While in the French sources the heroine’s violation implies the theme of the struggle between God and the devil, in the Germanlanguage versions the individual motivations of the characters’ behavior are emphasised. The article suggests a possible borrowing by the creators of German poems of the plot-forming motif of a folklore anecdote or urban schwank about Clever Elsa – the motif of the heroine’s thoughts about the future of children. The article concludes that due to appealing to turning to folk genres, German poets managed to create more plausible and convincing motivations related to reasoning about the inconsistency of human nature rather than to the theme of supernatural intervention.

The article deals with an analysis of the image of I.S. Turgenev in the story “The Revival” by Julian Barnes. The aim of the work is to reveal the characteristics and the role of Turgenev’s image in the story “The Revival”. The chosen topic of the study is relevant due to the undying interest to the English writer‘s work in Russian literary studies. The personality and the work of Turgenev made an important impact on the Barnes’s wordview and his texts. In “The Revival” the author is focused on the artistic image of the Turgenev’s last love with the theatre actress Mariya Savina. Drawing on a real event from the life of Turgenev, Barnes creates his own perception of what was happening by using the literary techniques of fabulation, fragmentation and irony. British writer involves a reader into a specific game. A reader can hardly decide which facts are truth, about the Russian writer’s last love, when it is additionally complicated with the fragmentary images of what was happening between Turgenev and the actress, and illustrated by the letters of Russian writer filled in with frequent shifts between the episodes, showing the unreliability of the memory. The comprehension of the personality and the work of Russian writer is connected with the leading themes in the work of Barnes such as ageing, death and love.

The article presents the specifics in the development of modern Chinese female prose, presents views on the concept of “narcissism” and a person’s perception of himself in the mirror, describes the cultural meaning of the image of mirrors, considers the narration of the episode “appreciating one’s own beauty in front of the mirror” in the works of Lin Bai. The author interprets the role of the image of a mirror in female prose from a feminist point of view, gives a generalized description of the works of Lin Bai – to build a dialogue between women and the world.

The article identifies and analyzes the formation of images of the past in popular music on the example of the tracks from the album “Heroes” by the band “Sabaton”. The work studies the representations of the war images in popular music in the context of the original works of the musical group “Sabaton”, interviews of musicians, reviews of fans and critics, as well as videos of the popular science YouTube channel of the group. The author develops studies of representations of the military history images in the context of culture and the arts, using popular music, which is unpopular in research, but a large-scale and ubiquitous phenomenon. Through the involvement of audiovisual sources (video clips and performances at concerts), as well as interviews and video materials of the popular science channel, the author reveals an issue of narrativization and glorification of the historical past and its participants, the creation of completely new images and plots by the Swedish group in the context of representations of the past. The involvement and analysis of the works from the popular science channel “Sabaton History” allows to identify the background for the creation of songs by the Swedish band, to find out the opinions of musicians and a professional historian responsible for maintaining the channel. The example considered in the article demonstrates how popular music works with images of the past, and how the techniques of representation may vary depending on different cultural and linguistic contexts.

Translation studies is a vast discipline inextricably linked to linguistics (including applied linguistics, psycho- and neurolinguistics), textual studies, literary criticism, semiotics, history, and philosophy. In her book, Professor Laura Salmon applies an interdisciplinary approach to research a wide range of topical issues in translation theory, discovering their origins and exposing the inconsistency of binary oppositions that have always accompanied it. The author’s main objective is to create a holistic scientific model of translation, which includes theoretically grounded and effective strategies and techniques of translation activities.