Pecularities of translation into Ukrainian of English phraseological units in the texts of literary discourse

Style is fundamental for analysis of phraseological units in discourse. Indeed, style is part of the meaning of phraseological units (see Ch. 2.2); it is one of the elements of the semantic structure of phraseological meaning (Melerovich 1982; Dobrovol’skij 1996, 1998, 2003). Literary style is the language of literary works. It is important to chose the right linguistic means, the genre the theme, the period in which the story is set, the characters, the author’s viewpoint and linguistic capacity etc. The stylistic potential of phraseological units is richer and more versatile in literary and everyday genre. “The language of literary works is distinguished by the use of selected words , which are “vibrant” and “sound beautifully”, words and phraseological phrases which express the writer’s attitude and feelings”. To artistically reflect life and the world that sorrounds us, a literary author has recourse to the whole wealth of the national standard language with its expressive means on different stylistic level. In fiction we distinguish two main divisions: that of the prose and poetry. Poetry lexicon includes the word of the folk poetry of the recent and the previous generation. According to the theme that the writer decides to write about we find words which belong to different fields of life. So in a lengthy narrative, poetry, or in a poem for a technical achievement about someone or an historical event etc. we will find phrases or phraseological units.

In prose it is difficult to find a literary work without the use of the phraseolgical units which are considered a wealth for this genre. In prose fiction we see that every field of life is depicted and there we find a wide lexicon. Due to its spread and due to the lack of the organization according to a single norm, there are some authors that they do not consider the fiction language as a simple functional style, but as a set of different discourse style. However the author’s works should follow the rules of the standard and the characteristics of the characters ‘discourse should adopt to the stylistics needs. In general the lexicon of the fiction works is distinguished for its double function: the word can have its literal meaning and figurative meaning. On the whole, the use of stylistic devices depends on the individual author’s intention and personal taste and thus cannot be added to the linguistic features of a particular genre or subgenre.

Literary discourse contains the words of common words employed in all language styles, as well as in spoken and written speech. These words are characterized with rich meanings and semantic shades, as a result of which their stylistic functions in literary discourse are very miscellaneous. In addition, if we take into account that writers tend to enrich and develop semantics of words, search for new ways and means of their literary use, the very principles of studying content and the role of common words in a writer’s language, must appreciably differ from their study and classification principles in standard language. History shows that the creative practice of writers normally was successful in case when author developed meaning of words according to the rules of internal language development. Development of meanings of words can be vividly traced in the phraseological innovations of writers, in which words put into new and unusual contacts assume quite different meanings. According to V. Vinogradov, “It is necessary to dwell on the very nature of enriching and complicating meanings of the words belonging to the lexicon of language, as the semantic development of the lexicon words is related to enriching standard language phraseology. Formation and extension of figurative meanings in the words belonging to the lexicon result in creating phraseological units included into the lexicon of language”[6].

While studying literary use of various sayings of writers we have opportunity to observe how they are developed into aphorisms used in figurative- allegorical meaning. Let us refer to the examples as below:

The expression “a blot on one`s escutcheon” is created by G. Draiden (1631-1700) in the translations from Vergilium: The banishment of Ovid was a blot in his escutcheon. Later R.Browning used it in his tragedy’s name. Probably after that it was spread in the English literature. “Surely crudity is only to be expected from a mere blot on the family escutcheon” (R.Aldington. Rejected Guest).

W. Shakespeare created the expression the course of true love never did run smooth in his “Dream at Summer Night” and used it in direct meaning:

Lysander: Ah me! For aught that ever I could read. 

Could ever hear by tale or history. 

The course of true love never did run smooth…

According to I.R. Galperin, this is