The Coding Function of Proper Names in Literary Text (Based on the Example of Lev Kassil’s Novel “Get ready, Your Highness!”)

Abstract

The language captures the historical and cultural picture of the world, because without words it is impossible either to describe an object, or to preserve the memory of it. Language as a keeper and translator of cultural and historical values operates with a vast baggage of various means for the nomination of new objects, their description and representation. A proper name acts as one of the means of verbalizing new knowledge, and a form of representation of knowledge accumulated in the language as a whole. Onyms have encyclopedic meaning, which makes it possible to incorporate a large amount of information, but an adequate understanding of the information conveyed by the name depends on the background knowledge of the recipient. A proper name can be considered as a code with the help of which the author’s communicative message is verbalized; it realizes the cognitive, communicative, expressive, axiological and password functions in the text. For a comprehensive study of the functioning of the onomastic code of culture in the literary text, the work of Lev Kassil “Get ready, Your Highness!” was analyzed. This work is saturated with the realities of the corresponding era, and proper names in it sometimes represent social practices characteristic of that time. Onyms are used to represent one’s social status, indicate a political situation, not only identify a person, but also draw patterns of behavior typical of a given era. For an adequate perception of the work, it is necessary to decode the encyclopedic and socio-cultural information presented in proper names. The implementation of the coding function by the name is aimed at the semantic disclosure of the potential of the semantic development of a proper name, its use as a universal linguistic unit capable of simultaneously activating the function of linguistic economy and the function of multilevel interpretation.

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