Symbol - (from the ancient Greek symbolon - sign, omen) - a multi-valued allegorical image based on the similarity, resemblance or commonality of objects and phenomena of life. A symbol can express a system of correspondences between different aspects of reality (the natural world and human life, society and personality, real and unreal, earthly and heavenly, external and internal).
The symbol is closely related in origin and principles of figurative translation of reality with other types of allegories. But, unlike, for example, figurative parallelism or comparison (these allegorical images, as a rule, consist of two parts, that is, two-membered), the image-symbol is single-membered. In a symbol, again in contrast to figurative parallelism and comparison, identity or similarity with another object or phenomenon is not obvious and is not fixed verbally or syntactically.
Unlike a metaphor, an image-symbol has multiple meanings. He admits that the reader may have a wide variety of associations. In addition, the meaning of the symbol most often does not coincide with the meaning of the metaphor word. The understanding and interpretation of a symbol is always broader than the similes or metaphorical allegories from which it is composed.
A symbolic image can arise as a result of the use of a wide variety of figurative means: metaphors, figurative parallelisms, comparisons. In some cases, a symbolic image is created without the use of any other types of allegories.
Unlike an allegory, a symbolic image does not have a straightforward, rational meaning. He always retains lively, emotional associations with a wide range of phenomena.
Symbolic images are widely used in literary works: in lyric poetry, epic and drama. Correct interpretation symbols contributes to a deep and correct reading of literary texts. Failure to understand the symbolic nature of images, on the contrary, can lead to gross errors in the interpretation of the text and to a distortion of the author's intention. Symbols always expand the semantic perspective of a work and allow the reader, based on the author’s “clues,” to build a chain of associations connecting various phenomena of life. Writers use symbolization (the creation of images-symbols) in order to destroy the illusion of life-likeness that often arises among readers, to emphasize the ambiguity and greater semantic depth of the images they create.
In many of Lermontov's works, natural phenomena often become symbols. Symbolization is a favorite technique of the romantic poet, reflecting on the fate of man in the broad context of world, universal life. A lonely pine and a palm tree (“In the wild north it stands alone...”), a lonely old cliff (“The Cliff”), an oak leaf (“The oak leaf tore off from the branch of the darling...”) are symbols of lonely people suffering from their loneliness or alienation. “Golden Cloud” is a symbol of short-lived happiness that makes a person suffer.
A capacious symbol is nature in the poem “Mtsyri”: this is a world in which romantic hero sees a semblance of an ideal world of “anxiety and battles” created by him in his soul. Nature is the goal and meaning of his escape from the monastery, the “homeland” where he dreams of returning. But nature also becomes a formidable rival for Mtsyri: the leopard with whom the hero entered into battle is not just a strong and beautiful animal, it is a symbol of the brute force of nature, its hostility to man. The fight with the leopard is symbolic: it became a duel between the matter of nature, embodied in the leopard, and the unbending, proud human spirit, embodied in Mtsyri.
Symbolization, the creation of symbols based on a wide variety of associations, is a striking feature romantic literature. However, realist writers also use symbols, creating multi-valued generalization images associated with various aspects of people’s lives.
In L.N. Tolstoy’s novel “War and Peace”, at key moments in the heroes’ spiritual quest, the author creates symbolic images that clarify the heroes’ attitude to life, helping to understand their self-knowledge or insight. For example, Prince Andrei, wounded in the battle of Austerlitz, sees a “bottomless blue sky” above him. The symbol of the sky here is both a psychological symbol, clarifying the state of the hero’s soul, and a philosophical symbol, expressing the writer’s attitude to life, understanding of its bottomless depth and the multiplicity of goals that can arise for a person and humanity.
The symbolic image of the cherry orchard is the basis of A.P. Chekhov’s play “The Cherry Orchard.” This symbol reveals the characters’ and the author’s ideas about life, fate, time, and becomes a figurative “echo” of the spiritual world of the heroes. Besides, The Cherry Orchard- a philosophical symbol that emphasizes the connection of times, the interpenetration of various layers of life, the destinies of the former and new owners of the garden, younger generation, looking to the future.
There are two main types of symbols.
The first type includes symbols that are based in cultural tradition. They are part of culture; to construct them, writers use the language of culture, which is, in principle, understandable to a more or less informed reader. Of course, each such symbol acquires individual semantic shades that are close to the writer and important to him in a particular work.
Such “cultural-historical” symbols are the image-symbols of “sea”, “ship”, “sail”, “road”, “path”, “garden”, “sky”, “blizzard”, “fire”, “crown” , “shield” and “sword”, “rose”, “cross”, “nightingale” and many others. Images, heroes, and plots previously created by culture can become symbols. For example, the biblical image of a prophet, the image of a sower and the parable of the sower from the Gospel, medieval symbolic images of the Beautiful Lady and her knight, the image of Odysseus and his wanderings (“odyssey”), the image of Arion - the mythical singer saved by a dolphin, etc. These are like ready-made symbolic structures that writers could complement, rethink, creating new variations on their basis symbolic images. In Russian literature, ancient mythology, as well as biblical images and plots, were especially often the source of new symbols.
The second type includes symbols created without reference to cultural tradition. Such symbols arose on the basis of semantic relationships within one literary work or a series of works. These are the symbols of the cherry orchard in A.P. Chekhov’s play, the leopard in M.Yu. Lermontov’s poem “Mtsyri”, the “solitary” oak, the “patriarch of the forests”, in the poems of A.S. Pushkin “Do I wander along the noisy streets... ..” and “When outside the city, thoughtfully, I wander...”, the madly rushing “Rus-troika” in N.V. Gogol’s poem “Dead Souls”.
Especially often, individual symbols were created by Russian symbolist writers, who considered them not just one of the types of allegorical images, but the most important category artistic worldview. For example, in the poetry of A.A. Blok, who widely used traditional symbols(“rose”, “cross”, “shield”, Sophia, Queen, Beautiful lady etc.), the main place is occupied by individual symbols created by the poet.
The Beautiful Lady of Blok’s early poems is replaced by the Stranger and the Snow Maiden, the image-symbol of “a youth lighting candles” is replaced by the image-symbol of a man “nailed to a tavern counter”, escaping in a wine stupor from the horrors and temptations of a “terrible world”. " Scary world" is one of the most capacious and significant symbols in Blok’s late lyrics. This image arises as a result of the poet’s symbolic understanding of everything that he sees in the world around him and in himself. In Blok’s lyrics, from poem to poem, from cycle to cycle, images-symbols of the path, distance, movement, “ring of existence” unfold: they express the poet’s ideas about the eternal and transitory in people’s lives, about his fate and the fate of the world, they create a “myth” about man and time.
Ideas about symbols among Russian symbolist writers late XIX- beginning of the 20th century do not coincide with traditional ones. For them, the symbol was not only artistically, capable of expressing generalized ideas about the world and man. For them, a symbol is the most important “tool” in their special way of comprehending reality. This is a means of cognition and penetration into the world of mystical “entities” through the world of simple and clear, sensually perceived “things”. The symbol was considered by symbolist writers on a par with such aesthetic categories as “beautiful”, “ugly”, “tragic”, “comic”. But also wide aesthetic perception symbol seemed insufficient. Many symbolists considered the symbol to be a “super-aesthetic” category, a category of worldview, an element of the mythological perception of the world.
SYMBOLICS OF SPACE: CENTER
We managed to get acquainted with many of the most influential groups of symbols that came to fiction from the depths of mythology, ritual, religion, folklore. These are symbols of “one’s own” - “foreign” space, and symbolism of another world, and symbolism of border and contact.
The time has come to talk about the most “strong”, significant and powerful of the symbolic groups - about the symbolism of the center.
Let us first ask ourselves the question: what does an oak tree in an open field have in common (from epics and folk songs) and the fairy-tale hut of Baba Yaga? Between the hearth in the ancestral dwellings of the Slavs (and even the predecessors of the Slavs, people of the Trypillian culture) and the “cramped stove” in which “fire beats” (from famous song war years "Dugout" by A. Surkov)? Between the “alatyr stone” of pagan conspiracies, the abode of the owners of diseases and misfortunes (but also happiness, share, and love luck), and the throne in the altar christian church, and the gospel Mount Golgotha in Jerusalem? Between Koshchei the Immortal in his palace and Stalin in his office, all-seeing, all-knowing, all-powerful, according to the neo-mythology of those years?
The common thing is that all of these are symbols of the center.
Formed in the depths of primitive mythological consciousness (even at the “dawn of myth”), the symbolism of the center passed through the era of paganism. It was embodied in a new capacity in subsequent world religions (for Europe - in Christianity, for other regions - in Islam or Buddhism). She survived the rationalistic age of Enlightenment. It did not perish under the pressure of the pragmatic and “anti-symbolic” positivism of the 19th century. And, as if avenging itself, it unexpectedly flared up violently in the 20th century: in the neomyths and neosymbols of revolutions, civil and world wars, totalitarian regimes, but also liberation movements. Ethereal and fragile, it would seem, the symbol turned out (almost according to Horace) stronger than copper monuments and stone pyramids, more durable than political regimes and economic formations.
Where did this powerful symbolism of the center begin?
As archaeologists and paleoanthropologists (specialists in ancient human history) have proven, there was a “centerless” era in this history. A time when people could neither define nor depict - in cave paintings, in “infinite” chain, so-called. cumulative spells, lullabies, fairy tales (such as "Turnips", "Teremka", "Koloboka") - the central event or central character. And the symbolism of the center did not yet mature in literature (which did not exist), not in folklore, not even in “specialized mythology and religion. All these are forms of consciousness, much later. It matured in the symbolization of itself environment, "living life".
There is a hypothesis that such a “proto-symbol”, a proto-symbol of the center could be an animal’s hole or a bird’s nest. They are located approximately in the middle of “their” natural zone, which means they are equally distant from the borders, from “foreign” space and therefore the safest. However, this is also the beginning of the symbolism of the middle, and the middle is not yet the center. To become the center, the focus magical properties and sacred powers, the middle had to contain some unusually important, especially “marked” object.
Most likely, it became fire: the sacred one that man learned to first maintain and then kindle. Fire “gathered” ritual actions around itself, became the giver of life, but also death (sacrifice), and its guardians through it became familiar with the most important quality for the ancients - magical power.
The second of the probable prototypes of the center is a tree: a symbol of growth and the universal connection of all things (sky - earth - underworld), the breadwinner and support of “one’s” space, from the home (support pillar) to the entire “land of people” (World Tree in myths different nations). Rituals are also grouped around the tree; sacrifices are made on it or under it.
Accordingly, the center became the place of leaders and princes, kings and kings. The place of elders - sages of the family, magicians and soothsayers, shamans and priests. And in parallel there was a reverse symbolic process. Every thing, every animal, bird, person, every plant or luminary, revered as the eldest, the most powerful, the most fertile, the most valuable and influential, had to be in the center. There was their rightful place, for it was fit only for them.
Having comprehended this symbolic logic, it is not difficult to translate the symbolism of the center, for example, into the language of astral symbolism. The heavenly center of myths, legends, tales will be the sun, month or polar Star. Let us translate the symbolism of the center onto the earthly landscape and get (in addition to the “main” tree) the “main” mountain or river of a given people, if we move into a “tamed”, “humanized” space, the supreme functions will be assumed by the stove in the house (initially the hearth) and the table that later replaced it. The central altar and altar, around which a pagan temple was built first, then a temple. And around it is the central square of the village (later - the city), with its statue of a deity, which evolved into a statue of a king, emperor, commander, and even later - a politician.
And it was enough for the red or gold color to absorb the symbolism of vital power, light, beauty, so that these colors - in accordance with the steady laws of mythological and symbolic thinking - immediately moved to the center. They became the golden horn of the “prince”-month in conspiracies, golden rejuvenating apples in fairy tales, golden hair of Perun, but also the golden halo of Christian saints, the royal crown and golden domes of churches (remember the “golden-domed” Moscow), the golden spire of the Admiralty Needle of St. Petersburg.
And the togas of the Roman emperors, the boots of the Byzantine rulers, but also the robe and shoes of the “heavenly Queen,” the Mother of God, will turn red. Red - festive shirts, sundresses, scarlet embroidered ribbon - the “red beauty” of the bride in Russian folklore - and Red Square of the same Moscow, where “the earth is roundest” (O. Mandelstam), i.e. where the center and peak are located, as it were the entire “own” Universe. That is why banners, banners, banners, standards, and coats of arms are painted in red and gold.
So historically, sociologically, a huge difference lies between Pavel Vlasov with a red banner at a demonstration ("Mother" by M. Gorky), the Young Guards hoisting the same banner over occupied Krasnodon (novel by A. Fadeev) and the youngest daughter of a merchant from a folk tale (processed by S . Aksakov): the one who seeks and protects The Scarlet Flower. But in the depths of the symbolic logic of behavior there is no impassable gap between these characters. They all seek and affirm their sacred center.
The change of center for any culture was a huge event, the whole later life determining importance. This change meant the emergence of new peoples, a change in government structure, the birth of a new religion, the promotion of a new class to the role of the dominant one, a radical shift in spiritual, moral, and ideological attitudes.
Literary works, as part of culture, also build their plot and philosophical space based on the center (or centers). The center can be designated explicitly or hidden. It can be set immediately or revealed gradually. But in any case literary text the center necessarily exists and is certainly associated with the highest values and deepest meanings this work as a model of the world. If it is not there, the absence of a center is also always significant (see below).
Therefore, to answer the question: what is the “world” of this or that work, what forces, values, imperatives, authorities govern this world? - it’s impossible until we determine how its space is built relative to the center.
There may be several options here. Monocentric space: the text has one universally significant symbolic center. Then before us is a world of indestructible spiritual, ethnic, political, national foundations. This world can be attacked from the outside - it cannot be destroyed from the inside. The center in it will always be “its” center: a shrine that is protected by “its” heroes, hero-protagonists. The “alien” world will be perceived and depicted as centerless: chaos, be it natural, social or spiritual chaos.
Such is the world of heroic sagas or epics Kievan Rus, where Kyiv is not just the capital, but the center of the world, and Prince Vladimir (“who owns the world”) is the “red sun” of this earthly cosmos. On the other hand, these are the lives of the saints, where in the center is God and his “earthly abodes”: the temple, a monastery, a monastery are outposts of the spirit, enlightening and ordering the chaos of anger, temptations and passions.
However, “one’s” center is not something easily accessible. Because he is the place in highest degree“sacred”, you can’t easily get into it. Admission to it requires - even for - enormous efforts: the feat of a hero, the dedication of a ruler, the asceticism of a sage. For Christianity, merging with such a center on this side of life is generally achievable only “in the spirit.” This is how a single super-plot arises and varies in hundreds of plots in world literature: the search for the center.
Both hero-protagonists ("good" characters) and hero-antagonists ("bad" characters) can search for it, the latter - in order to forcibly seize, appropriate, and destroy this center. Reaching the center by the protagonists brings them access to mystery or wisdom, the acquisition of well-deserved power, success in love and happy marriage, in general, physical and spiritual maturation and transformation. Therefore, it means a happy and final ending to the plot.
But if the antagonistic heroes reach the center, it means something exactly the opposite. Firstly, this event is as dramatic and blasphemous as possible: profane people, strangers, defilers, and enemies penetrate into the center. Secondly, such an event cannot fundamentally become the final denouement, otherwise the world of the work would fall into chaos. Therefore, the breakthrough of the antagonists into the center is a false denouement, followed by a true denouement: their expulsion (flight, etc.) from the sacred Center, or at least a hint of the inevitability of this in the future.
The climax and finale of Pushkin’s “The Bronze Horseman” are amazingly subtle and complex in this regard. The owner of the culmination space, “Petrova Square”, seems to be alone - Bronze Horseman. It is here, in front of him, that Eugene unravels the mystery of his tragedy and the tragedy of the flooded city: it is here that he, a living person, is defeated by a copper idol. But the plot doesn’t end there. The last space of the poem is the “small island”, where there are no idols, but only the eternal land and sea; Eugene’s last refuge is the threshold of his beloved’s house and a return to eternity, when the hero was “buried for God’s sake” ( final words poems)...
Dualistic space: the text reveals not one, but two influential centers. These can be centers of two magical powers, divine and demonic, centers of the human and non-human (wonderful, natural) worlds, centers of good and, conversely, evil, centers of two different peoples, states, classes, a city center and a village center, etc. n. One thing is essential: that they oppose each other as center to center, and not as centric, organized space to “wild” chaos.
If the centers complement each other (that is, they are different qualitatively, but not evaluatively), then moving the character from center to center brings good results. The hero discovers a “different” world, brings valuable knowledge, properties, gifts from there, and brings a bride. This is what happens with Sadko at the sea king, with Afanasy Nikitin “beyond the three seas”, with the heroes of F. Cooper in the world of the Indians, with the prince-husband fabulous Vasilisa The Wise One or with the inhabitants of two earthly civilizations of the future in A. Clark’s novel “The City and the Stars.”
However, if the centers are conceptualized as antagonistic, the heroes' journey to the anticenter will always be mortally dangerous (physically or spiritually) and most often stolen. The protagonists are kidnapped, or given an assignment, or they have to find, free and return a character from “their” world who has been captured by the “alien” world. Many genres of mass literature are built on this model: detective stories, “spy” novels, horror novels, etc. However, in Dostoevsky’s “The Brothers Karamazov”, the cell of Elder Zosima and the house of Karamazov the father will become two epicenters of spiritual confrontation (and the plot battle) .
Centerless space: There is no center in any space within the work. Then you should check: is the center absent temporarily or permanently?
The temporary absence of a center creates a special “carnival” space: a territory where - again temporarily - chaos has invaded, where the norms and forms of “correct” existence have been abolished. Usually this is the space of borderline “times and terms”, when the “old” existence, its hierarchy of forces and values have ended, and the new one has not yet established itself. It is in this crevice of being that the centerless, extra-normative world reigns. The plot of such works is the stabilization of the world order, the search for a new or resurrection of the old center, which ends the successful fight against chaos and evil.
It was precisely this kind of space that was symbolized by New Year's and Maslenitsa mummers, Kupala games (the turning point of summer), and the Western European All Hallows' Eve (the turning point of autumn). In general, here lie the ritual origins of comedy: all comedy is an imitation of chaos and a laughter victory over it.
However, the absence of a center and the non-centered nature of the universe can be taken as the usual state of affairs. Then we find ourselves in a "mad, mad, mad world." It can take on the appearance of a mad world literally: spaces of illness, delirium, nightmare, madness. It can become a world of “quiet madness”: meaningless service, everyday routine, self-absorbed consumerism.
Since in the millennial cultural traditions a person has learned to combine the concept of higher values and goals (and not even an abstract concept, but their passionate experience) with the symbolism of the center, then such a stably centerless world becomes the artistic embodiment of life in which to live - in the authentic, in the highest sense- it is forbidden.
In this imaginary life, the protagonists and antagonists lose their certain Functions. Good and evil are confused or "cancelled". The conflict weakens proportionally and “disintegrates.” The plot boils down to the characters' attempts to escape from this amorphous space, which is impossible. The composition is built on the model of “bad infinity”: like meaningless, aimless tossing and wandering or an apathetic stay in place. The climax weakens or disappears completely, and events turn into viscous circumstances that slow down every path of the heroes, internal or external.
Examples of centerless space are the dramas and prose of modernism and postmodernism (“theater of the absurd,” “novels of the absurd”): S. Beckett, E. Ionesco, etc. But this space arose long before modernism. "Uncentered" is one of Pushkin's most formidable poems - "Demons". "Uncentered" space of Gogol's landowners and officials Dead souls": it’s not for nothing that Chichikov’s chaise “will not reach Moscow”; neither he nor the other “dead men” have access to the sacred center; the provincial city is a fictitious, ghostly center, no one’s fate is decided in it. Many of Chekhov’s plays are “non-centered.” “Turgenevskaya” "The noble estate, this indisputable symbol, the spiritual center for Russian literature of the first third of the 19th century, here no longer unites or saves anything ("The Cherry Orchard").
The difference is that in the works of Pushkin and Gogol, the loss of the center is a sign of the demonic or “dead” world, that in all three writers it causes melancholy and pain, “breaks the heart.” In the world of the absurd, centerlessness is no longer an anomaly, but the norm.
But with any variants of the symbolic organization of space, one thing remains unchanged. Philosophy work of art it is always accurately and honestly revealed whether its space has a symbolic center and what it is.
Marina NOVIKOVA
Topic of my research : Symbolism of numbers in works of Russian literature.Numbers are all around us. Date of birth, phone number, school grade, zip code, price of an item, quantity - everything is expressed in numbers.Numbers, like symbols, have always attracted people with their hidden meaning and significance for a person. Numbers are also widely used in literature.
Relevance of our research is that the language of children's literature still remains poorly understood in primary school, and the analysis of numbers in it has not yet been performed by third graders.
All this determined the goal of our work- find out exactly what numbers are found in literary works, what meaning they have, how often they are used.
To achieve this goal, we set tasks:
1) Find examples of the use of numbers in the literature.
2) Analyze the frequency of use of numbers in works.
3) Collect information about the symbolism of the most frequent numbers, analyzing various sources.
The object of this study became proverbs and fairy tales.
Subject of research are numbers in proverbs and fairy tales.
Base for research steel collections:The magical world of fairy tales. – Moscow: Bustard-Plus Publishing House, 2011. – 320 pages;Vladimir Ivanovich Dal. Proverbs of the Russian people. - Electronic version.
Practical value The work is due to the possibility of using the material of this study in literary reading lessons.
Let's formulate hypothesis:
2) each number in the product is symbolic.
We began our research by finding numbers in proverbs and fairy tales. It turned out that the most frequent numbers are 3, 7, 4.
Re-reading proverbs and fairy tales, we were convinced that their choice was not accidental.
Studying symbolic meanings numbers we used different sources: encyclopedias, textbooks, Internet resources. Their analysis showed that each number is assigned a special symbolic meaning.
Number 3.
Most often in fairy tales and proverbs we come across the number 3. And this is not accidental, but symbolic, because three is:
man, with his body, soul, spirit;
birth, life, death;
three periods of any entity: beginning, middle and end;
past, present and future.
The Encyclopedia of Symbolism and Heraldry says that 3 is an image of absolute perfection.
In literary works, heroes usually have 3 wishes, and they are performed on third time: must pass 3 tests or 3 attempts to achieve results. Found in fairy tales 3 princes, 3 witches, 3 fairies(two good, one evil). Everyone knows 3 pigs, 3 bears, 3 fat men. At Pushkin's 3 girls, V folk tales - Ivan rode for 3 days and 3 nights.
In proverbs “To learn hard work, it takes three years, to learn laziness - only three days”, “The price of a braggart is three kopecks”, “If you don’t recognize a friend in three days, recognize him in three years” and others, the symbol of three contains the wisdom of life.
Number 7.
In ancient times, people observed 7 planets that revolve around the Earth. The origin of the seven-day week is apparently connected with the number of these celestial bodies. lunar month. The Bible talks about "seven spirits of God", "seven lamps". Among the Greeks "7 Wonders of the World", "7 Wise Men", in our proverbs “Seven nannies have a child without an eye”, “Measure 7 times, cut once”, in the fairy tales of the Brothers Grimm Snow White and the 7 Dwarfs, the Seven Brave Men, the Wolf and the Seven Little Goats, at Pushkin "The Tale of dead princess and seven heroes", in Charles Perrault's fairy tale "The Boy with Thumb" the forester had 7 sons, and the Ogre 7 daughters.
Number 4.
The number four is a symbol of maximum stability. The Greeks believed that earth, water, air and fire came first. To navigate in space, people used knowledge four sides light (north, south, east and west), and the calendar year was divided into four seasons: winter, spring, summer and autumn. The number 4 symbolizes universal stability, order, reliability, stability and strength. Human life is divided into 4 periods: childhood, adolescence, maturity and old age.
So, in the fairy tale “Kolobok” 4 characters met main character(hare, wolf, bear and fox), in the fairy tale “Seven-year-old daughter” 4 riddles the Tsar wished, and in the fairy tale “The Fox, the Hare and the Rooster” 4 times the animals came to the hare's aid.
In proverbs « A hut cannot be cut without four corners,” “A horse has four legs, and even then it stumbles.”», « Four corners of a house for construction, four seasons for execution" the same stability is observed.
To summarize, literature is riddled with numbers. The presence of numbers is observed everywhere and almost always they appear as sacred.
We have proven our hypothesis:
1) the choice of numbers in the literature is not accidental;
sacred symbol novel literature
Symbol - from Greek. symbolon - conventional sign. In Ancient Greece, this was the name given to the halves of a stick cut in two, which helped their owners recognize each other in a distant place. A symbol is an object or word that conventionally expresses the essence of a phenomenon (Lekhin). An artistic symbol is a universal category of aesthetics that can best be revealed through comparison with adjacent categories of image, on the one hand, and sign, on the other. Taking the words broadly, we can say that a symbol is an image taken in the aspect of its signification, and that it is a sign endowed with all the organicity of myth and the inexhaustible ambiguity of the image. Every symbol is an image (and every image is, at least to some extent, a symbol); but if the category of image presupposes objective identity with itself, then the category of symbol places emphasis on the other side of the same essence - on the image going beyond its own limits, on the presence of a certain meaning, intimately fused with the image, but not identical to it. The objective image and the deep meaning appear in the structure of the symbol as two poles, inconceivable one without the other (for the meaning loses its manifestation outside the image, and the image without the meaning crumbles into its components), but also separated from each other and generating tension between themselves, in which is the essence of the symbol. Transitioning into a symbol, the image becomes “transparent”; the meaning “shines through” through it, being given precisely as semantic depth, a semantic perspective that requires a difficult “entry” into oneself.
The meaning of a symbol cannot be deciphered by a simple effort of reason; one must “get used to” it. This is precisely the fundamental difference between a symbol and an allegory: the meaning of a symbol does not exist as some kind of rational formula that can be “embedded” in an image and then extracted from the image. The relationship between the signifier and the signified in a symbol is a dialectical relationship of identity in non-identity: “... each image must be understood as what it is, and only thanks to this is it taken as what it designates” (Schelling). Here we have to look for the specifics of the symbol in relation to the category of the sign. If for a purely utilitarian sign system polysemy is only a meaningless hindrance that harms the rational functioning of the sign, then the more polysemantic it is, the more meaningful the symbol is: ultimately, the content of a genuine symbol, through mediating semantic connections, is each time correlated with the “most important thing” - with the idea of the world integrity, with the completeness of the cosmic and human “universe”. The very fact that any symbol generally has “meaning” itself symbolizes the presence of “meaning” in the world and life. “The image of the world, revealed in the word,” these words of B. Pasternak can be attributed to the symbolism of every great poet. The very structure of the symbol is aimed at immersing each particular phenomenon in the element of the “first principles” of existence and through this phenomenon giving a holistic image of the world. Here lies the affinity between symbol and myth; a symbol is a myth, “sublated” (in the Hegelian sense) by cultural development, derived from identity with itself and realized in its discrepancy with its own meaning.
From myth, the symbol inherited its social and communicative functions, which are indicated by the etymology of the term: the ancient Greeks called symbols suitable friend fragments of one plate to each other along the break line, adding which, people connected by a union of hereditary friendship identified each other. By the symbol, “friends” recognize and understand each other. Unlike an allegory, which can be deciphered by a “stranger,” there is a warmth of unifying mystery in the consciousness.
Yu.V. Shatin suggests that every natural language begins with a symbol, which is the first significant point of separation of language from myth. According to C. Pierce, symbols are conventional (i.e. established by agreement) relations of sign and meaning. The symbol, in the words of S.S. Averintsev, points to the image going beyond its own limits, to the presence of a certain meaning, inseparably fused with the image, but not identical to it. Such a symbol cannot be deciphered by a simple effort of reason. It requires not simple recognition as a cultural sign, but active adaptation to its internal structure on the part of the perceiver.
A symbol is a more difficult object to identify compared to metaphor and metonymic transfer. Apparently, the essence of any poetic symbol is that the word as a whole and its meaning, being unconnected by specific conceptual and figurative bonds with classes of homogeneous objects and phenomena, still designate them. A symbol can denote many such classes; its conceptual, that is, generalizing, range is very wide.
A typical symbol, firstly, “grows” from a specific detail of the text, which has a clear verbal designation. When the text is expanded, this detail ceases to be perceived as a detail in the direct nominative function. In other cases, its functionality acquires duality: what is designated by the word “detail” can be perceived both as a detail and as a symbol.
Frequent use of a particular word or phrase helps highlight characters. In this case, it is necessary to replace the named elements with other elements that directly “go out” to the object of designation. The phenomenon of a symbol is the unconditional replacement of any other element with this element.
Symbols quite often and naturally have an intertextual nature: for one writer or poet, stable symbols function in various works.
Unfortunately, symbols are quite often confused, even by experienced linguists, with so-called “keywords.” “Key words” are semantically very close to symbols: both are very rich in meaning; they are indeed very important reference points in the texts; both tend to attract the attention of readers; " keywords” and symbols are the primary features of specific writing styles.
A symbol is a conventional sign that reveals the meaning of a concept, idea, phenomenon or event. The origin of the symbols is related to Ancient Greece, where for the first time symbols began to be used to denote secret things that were understandable only to a group of specific individuals. A striking example is a cross that stands for Christianity. Muslims designate their faith with a crescent moon symbol. A little later, symbols began to be used to distinguish the manufacture of one owner from that of another. What is the symbol for modern man? For us, the symbol of justice is the scales, and the symbol of power is the state, the symbol of brotherhood is the handshake, and the symbol of the god of the seas, Neptune, is the trident.
A symbol is often confused with a sign, but the differences between a symbol and a sign are very significant. If we consider what a symbol and a sign are, then it should be noted that a symbol characterizes a certain phenomenon, and a sign is a distinctive feature of something. For example, a trademark indicates that a particular product is produced by a particular brand or brand.
Symbols in literature
In poetry, poets used many symbolic images. For example, in Yesenin’s poems, the word “window” is very often mentioned, which is an image-symbol. In some poems, the window separates the external and internal world of the poet, and in some it acts as an image-symbol separating two periods of the poet’s life - his childhood and young years with in recent years his life. Quite a lot of similar examples can be found in the works of poets and prose writers, answering the question related to what an image-symbol is. Moreover, each author has his own image-symbol, which he uses not in one work, but at least in several.
At the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, a movement called “Symbolism” emerged in literature. But actually, literary symbols were used much earlier. For each of us, the character of the Wolf from the fairy tale “Little Red Riding Hood” is symbolized with evil, and the main characters of the epics - Dobrynya Nikitich or Ilya Muromets - symbolize strength. All literary symbols contain a figurative meaning, therefore, it is necessary to distinguish between what a symbol is in literature and what a metaphor is. The symbol is more complex in its structure and meaning. Metaphor is a directly described likening of one phenomenon or object to another. The reader is not always able to fully reveal the image-symbol, because the author contains in it his vision of an object or phenomenon.
Symbols in computer science and mathematics
In computer science, most actions are represented by symbols. What is a symbol in computer science? The Pascal language, which is known both to computer users and programmers, will help answer this question. The Pascal language consists of main and auxiliary symbols. The main characters are 26 Latin capital letters and the same number of lowercase letters. In addition, the Pascal language uses specific symbols and numbers.
TO special characters This includes “_” - the underscore and all operator signs (+ – x / = = := @), as well as delimiters and specifiers (^ # $). Delimiters are the following designations (. , " () (. .) ( ) (* *) ... :). The Pascal language uses a number of special words and a space that cannot be used inside special (reserved) words and double characters. In computer science A number of graphic symbols are also used, which are necessary for drawing up block diagrams.
The symbols that are used for mathematics are well known to us from school. These include arithmetic signs, Latin letters and signs denoting “set”, “infinity” and so on.
State symbols
If you do not know what state symbols are, then you should open the Constitution of the Russian Federation and familiarize yourself with the information regarding the state flag, anthem and coat of arms, which are the main symbols of the state. Russian flag is a canvas of three stripes - white, blue and red. Each color is a symbol of something. For example, white color indicates peace and purity, blue indicates faith and fidelity, red indicates energy and strength.
The anthem is performed at all ceremonial events of national significance, at parades and public holidays, and the broadcasting of state television channels on public holidays begins with the anthem. Russian coat of arms is an image of a three-headed eagle. The coat of arms identifies the centuries-old history of Russia, since its image is new, but it uses traditional symbols.
