First, carefully read examples from poems by different poets.

Under blue skies

Magnificent carpets,

The snow lies shining in the sun.

(A. Pushkin.)

It's sad at night. From the lights

The needles stretch out like rays.

From gardens and alleys

Smells like wet leaves.

(M. Voloshin.)

Let the bird cherry trees dry like laundry in the wind,

Let the lilacs fall like rain -

I'll take you away from here anyway

To the palace where pipes are played.

(V. Vysotsky.)

I erected a different monument for myself!

Turn your back to the shameful century.

Face your lost love.

And the chest is like a bicycle wheel.

(I. Brodsky.)

Find comparisons in each of the four passages. Let us give you a little hint: what is lying snow compared to? lantern lights? cherry blossom? chest of a monument (which, of course, does not exist) to the poet Brodsky? Was it easy for you to complete this task? Try to explain why the comparisons were not immediately visible, why there were difficulties in finding them? Is this related to the form of their expression?

In Pushkin, the fallen snow looks like magnificent carpets. In Voloshin, the rays from the lights are drawn to needles (however, it should be noted that the comparison itself is inverted here: it would be less unexpected to read that “the rays are drawn by needles”). Vysotsky compares blooming trees bird cherry trees with linen drying and fluttering in the wind. In the last example, what is interesting is that Brodsky revives the linguistic comparison chest with a wheel, which has become so worn out that we no longer perceive it as a comparison. Adding cycling makes the comparison come alive again.

All comparisons in these passages are expressed in the instrumental case of the noun. The instrumental case creates difficulties: we cannot recognize the comparison “in person” immediately, because we do not see the clue words as, as if, as if, similar to others.

Exercise. The poet Bella Akhmadulina has a poem that is dedicated to... it’s very difficult to say what and to whom. Formally, at first glance, one day of life, one morning, one of the Arbat lanes - Khlebny Lane, Moscow...

Beginning of the poem:

I went out into the snow of the Arbat courtyard...

1. Of course, you can easily name the time of year. But think about it: is it only in winter that you can go out into the snow? For what purpose is this detail emphasized? What was this snow like? Describe it.

B. Akhmadulina’s poems list the most ordinary, long-familiar objects, in which, it seems, there is no poetry... Excuse me, did we say “listed”? This is wrong:

Here is the snow, here is the janitor, here is the child running -

everything exists and can be sung...

Have you noticed the word chant? Read one line from this poem that “glorifies” the dog:

Irish Setter, as playful as fire...

2. Describe how you imagine this setter. What role does the comparison with fire play? What do the meanings of the words fire and dog have in common?

1. You can, of course, go out into the snow not only in winter, but also in autumn - the main thing is that the snow is unexpected, that there is a lot of it, that it is not dirty, gray, familiar, boring, but, on the contrary, new, white, clean , fluffy. To remember how it was in childhood, when each of us, more than ever, was carefree and kind...

2. Comparison like fire allows you to turn on your imagination and see what the setter was like: firstly, frisky, fast (this is in the text), secondly, bright red, and thirdly, most likely, long-haired: probably While running, his fur fluttered and looked like tongues of flame...

This also confirms encyclopedic Dictionary: “Setters are long-haired pointing dogs used for hunting game birds.” The comparison invented by B. Akhmadulina is remarkable; it includes three meanings that unite the words dog and fire: movement, color and shape. This is a very accurate comparison: we even know people who did not know this breed of dog before, but suddenly they began to recognize setters after reading B. Akhmadulina’s poems.

We present this poem in full.

If we turn to the origins of this word, it comes from the ancient Greek concept meaning literal translation"applied". That is, it is an addition to the main word, the main function of which is to make the main idea clearer and more expressive. Most often, the epithet comes before the main word or expression.

Like all means artistic expression, epithets developed from one literary era to another. So, in folklore, that is, in folk art, the role of epithets in the text is very large. They describe the properties of objects or phenomena. Their key features are highlighted, while extremely rarely addressing the emotional component.

Later, the role of epithets in literature changes. It is expanding significantly. This means of artistic expression is given new properties and filled with functions that were not previously inherent in it. This becomes especially noticeable among the poets of the Silver Age.

Nowadays, especially in postmodern literary works, the structure of the epithet became even more complex. The semantic content of this trope has also increased, leading to surprisingly expressive techniques. For example: the diapers were golden.

Function of epithets

The definitions epithet, metaphor, personification, comparison come down to one thing - all of this artistic media, giving prominence and expressiveness to our speech. Both literary and colloquial. The special function of the epithet is also strong emotionality.

These means of artistic expression, and especially epithets, help readers or listeners to visualize what the author is talking or writing about, to understand how he relates to this subject.

Epithets serve to realistically recreate a historical era, a specific social group or people. With their help, we can imagine how these people spoke, what words colored their speech.

What is a metaphor?

Translated from ancient Greek, metaphor is “transfer of meaning.” This characterizes this concept as well as possible.

A metaphor can be either a separate word or a whole expression that is used by the author in a figurative sense. This means of artistic expression is based on a comparison of an object that has not yet been named with some other one based on their common feature.

Unlike most other literary terms, metaphor has a specific author. This is a famous philosopher Ancient Greece- Aristotle. The initial birth of this term is associated with Aristotle’s ideas about art as a method of imitating life.

Moreover, the metaphors that Aristotle used are almost impossible to distinguish from literary exaggeration (hyperbole), ordinary comparison or personification. He understood metaphor much more broadly than modern literary scholars.

Examples of the use of metaphor in literary speech

Epithets, metaphors, personifications, comparisons are actively used in works of art. Moreover, for many authors, metaphors become an aesthetic end in themselves, sometimes completely displacing the original meaning of the word.

As an example, literary researchers cite the famous English poet and playwright William Shakespeare. For him, what is often important is not the everyday original meaning of a particular statement, but the metaphorical meaning it acquires, a new unexpected meaning.

For those readers and researchers who were brought up on the Aristotelian understanding of the principles of literature, this was unusual and even incomprehensible. So, on this basis Leo Tolstoy did not recognize Shakespeare’s poetry. His point of view in Russia in the 19th century was shared by many readers of the English playwright.

At the same time, with the development of literature, metaphor begins not only to reflect, but also to create the life around us. A striking example from classical Russian literature is Nikolai Vasilyevich Gogol's story "The Nose". The nose of the collegiate assessor Kovalev, who went on his own journey around St. Petersburg, is not only a hyperbole, personification and comparison, but also a metaphor that gives this image a new unexpected meaning.

The example of futurist poets who worked in Russia at the beginning of the 20th century is illustrative. Their main goal was to distance the metaphor as far as possible from its original meaning. Vladimir Mayakovsky often used such techniques. An example is the title of his poem “A Cloud in Pants.”

Moreover, after the October Revolution, metaphors began to be used much less frequently. Soviet poets and writers strived for clarity and straightforwardness, so the need to use words and expressions in a figurative sense disappeared.

Although it is impossible to imagine a work of art, even by Soviet authors, without metaphor. Almost everyone uses metaphor words. In Arkady Gaidar's "The Fate of a Drummer" you can find the following phrase - "So we parted ways. The stomping has stopped, and the field is empty."

In Soviet poetry of the 70s, Konstantin Kedrov introduced the concept of “meta-metaphor” or, as it is also called, “metaphor squared”. The metaphor has a new one distinguishing feature- she is constantly involved in development literary language. As well as speech and culture itself as a whole.

For this purpose, metaphors are constantly used when talking about the latest sources of knowledge and information, and they are used to describe modern achievements of mankind in science and technology.

Personification

In order to understand what personification is in literature, let us turn to the origin of this concept. Like most literary terms, it has its roots in ancient greek language. Literally translated it means “face” and “do”. With the help of this literary device, natural forces and phenomena, inanimate objects acquire properties and signs inherent in humans. It’s as if they are animated by the author. For example, they can be given the properties of the human psyche.

Such techniques are often used not only in modern fiction, but also in mythology, and religion, in magic and cults. Personification was a key means of artistic expression in legends and parables, in which ancient man explained how the world works, what is behind natural phenomena. They were animated, endowed with human qualities, and associated with gods or supermen. This made it easier for ancient man to accept and understand the reality around him.

Examples of avatars

Examples of specific texts will help us understand what personification is in literature. Thus, in a Russian folk song, the author claims that "bast is girded with grief".

With the help of personification, a special worldview appears. It is characterized by an unscientific idea of natural phenomena. When, for example, thunder grumbles like an old man, or the sun is perceived not as an inanimate cosmic object, but as a specific god named Helios.

Comparison

In order to understand the main modern means artistic expression, it is important to understand what comparison is in literature. Examples will help us with this. At Zabolotsky we meet: "He used to be loud, like a bird"or Pushkin: "He ran faster than a horse".

Very often comparisons are used in Russian folk art. So we clearly see that this is a trope in which one object or phenomenon is likened to another on the basis of some characteristic common to them. The purpose of comparison is to find new and important properties for the subject of artistic expression.

Metaphor, epithets, comparisons, personifications serve a similar purpose. The table, which presents all these concepts, helps to clearly understand how they differ from each other.

Types of comparisons

For a detailed understanding, let us consider what comparison is in literature, examples and varieties of this trope.

It can be used in the form of a comparative phrase: the man is as stupid as a pig.

There are non-union comparisons: My home is my castle.

Comparisons are often formed by using a noun in the instrumental case. Classic example: he walks like a nog.

We can talk endlessly about the beauty and richness of the Russian language. These arguments are just another reason to join such a conversation. So, comparisons.

What is comparison

In fact, this term is ambiguous. This fact is confirmed by the endless examples of comparison that we observe in everyday life. IN colloquial speech it is rather a likening of different objects, a statement that they are equal or similar.

In mathematics, the term “comparison” is intertwined with the similar concept of “relation.” By comparing numbers for equality or inequality, we find the difference between them.

Comparison is also the process of comparing the similarities and differences, disadvantages and advantages of several objects. As examples show, comparisons in sciences such as philosophy, psychology, sociology are a kind of cognitive operations that underlie reasoning about the similarities and differences of the objects being studied. With the help of comparisons, various characteristics of these objects or phenomena are revealed.

Comparison in the literature: definition and examples

Stylistic and literary comparisons have a slightly different meaning. These are figures of speech, stylistic devices in which some phenomena or objects are likened to others according to some common characteristic. The comparison method can be simple, then certain words are usually present in circulation. Among them are: “as”, “as if”, “as if”, “exactly”. But there is also an indirect method of comparison: in this case, the comparison is made using a noun in the instrumental case without a preposition. Example: “Onegin lived as an anchorite” (“Eugene Onegin” by A. S. Pushkin).

Video on the topic

Similes and metaphors

Comparisons are inextricably linked literary concept, metaphor - an expression used in a figurative sense. Actually, the basis of the metaphor is a comparison that is not directly expressed. For example, A. Blok’s line “The streams of my poems run” is a typical metaphor (the word “streams” is used in a figurative sense). But this same line is also a comparison: poems flow like streams.

It is interesting to use metaphorical devices in the case of the so-called negative comparison. Examples of comparison can be easily found in epics. “Not two clouds converged in the sky, but two daring knights converged” - in this example of the Old Russian epic, the similarity of formidable warriors with dark terrible clouds is simultaneously emphasized, and their identity is denied, and an absolutely amazing overall picture is drawn.

Negative comparisons, more typical of works of folk art and their folklore stylizations, play a special role in the perception of the artistic image. Here is a line from A. Nekrasov’s work: “It’s not the huntsman who trumpets the oak wood, it’s the wild head who cackles—after crying, the young widow chops and chops wood.” The second part of the expression (After crying...) is self-sufficient in itself and fully conveys the required meaning. But only the combination of both parts of the sentence allows you to feel all the bitterness, all the tragedy of what happened.

Means of expressive language

Comparisons help explain concepts or phenomena by comparing them with other objects - sweet like honey, sour like vinegar. But the main goal is not to emphasize the characteristic properties of the object. The main thing is the figurative, most accurate expression of the author’s thought, because one of the most powerful means expressiveness is a comparison. Examples from literature brilliantly illustrate its role in the formation of the image desired by the author. Here is a line of creation from M.Yu. Lermontov: “Harun ran faster than a deer, faster than a hare from an eagle.” One could simply say: “Harun ran very fast” or “Harun ran at great speed.” But, being absolutely true in their essence, such phrases would not achieve even a small degree of the effect that is inherent in Lermontov’s lines.

Peculiarities

Paying tribute to comparisons as powerful exponents of the peculiarities of Russian speech, many researchers were amazed at the rationality of these comparisons. It would seem, what does rationality have to do with it? After all, no one demands special accuracy or literalness from comparisons! But here are dissimilar comparison examples, strings belonging to different people. “There were fire-faced elands here, like glasses of bloody wine” (N. Zabolotsky) and “Fate, you look like a market butcher, whose knife is bloody from tip to handle” (Khakani). Despite all the dissimilarity of these expressions, what distinguishes them is general feature. Both phrases tell about completely ordinary things (about red flowers, about the difficult human fate) and, written in a slightly different form, could easily be lost in any text. But the use of comparisons (“glasses of bloody wine”, “butcher’s knife”) turned out to be exactly the touch that deliberately added in simple words special expressiveness and emotionality. This is probably why in songs and romantic poems, where one is already strong emotional mood, comparisons are even less common than in realistic narratives.

Examples of comparisons in Russian

Russian language is considered one of the most difficult. And at the same time, the creations of domestic classics are recognized throughout the world as the most brilliant, original, and talented. It seems that between these facts there is unbreakable bond. The difficulty of learning a language lies in the considerable number of features, possibilities, and rules present in it. But this also opens up enormous scope for a talented writer who has managed to master cunning techniques. The Russian language is indeed very rich: it contains truly limitless possibilities that allow you to turn an ordinary word into a vivid visual image, make it sound in a new way, so that it remains forever in memory. Poetic works are especially conducive to this. “Our life in old age is like a worn-out robe: it’s both a shame to wear it and a pity to leave it.” This line by P. Vyazemsky is an excellent example of the use of comparisons in literary work.

About the work of A.S. Pushkin

The great poet was a recognized genius in mastering the most complex literary devices. The comparisons used in his poems and poems are striking in their unexpectedness and at the same time accuracy and precision.

“His beaver collar is silvered with frosty dust” - this is a line from the poem “Eugene Onegin”. Only a few words, but the capital’s boulevard, covered with snow, and a young dandy heading to the ball emerge before my eyes. And then there’s the episode at the ball: “He walked in: and the cork hit the ceiling, the current flowed out from the comet.” If Pushkin had written that a footman had opened a bottle of champagne, he would not have deviated from the truth. But would this picture of extraordinary, festive, sparkling fun have emerged so clearly then?

And this is from the poem “The Bronze Horseman”: “And before the younger capital, old Moscow faded, like a porphyry-bearing widow before the new queen.” Is it possible to more accurately convey the atmosphere of a certain patriarchy and even abandonment that reigned in Moscow after the city of Petra was named the capital of Russia? “Let the Finnish waves forget their ancient enmity and captivity!” - this is about how the waters of the Neva were encased in granite. Yes, probably, this could be stated without comparisons, but would the pictures drawn by the author appear so clearly before the eyes?

And more about Russian poetic creativity

Great use cases comparative images There is also plenty of it in the works of other Russian poets. Amazing comparisons in Bunin's poem "Childhood" accurately convey the atmosphere of the roast summer day, the sensations of a child enjoying the sun and aromas of the forest. The author’s sand is silk, the tree trunk is a giant, and the sun-drenched summer forest itself is sunny chambers.

No less remarkable, although completely different examples are present in the works of other Russian wordsmiths. Comparisons in Yesenin’s poem “With Good morning!” reveal to the reader a summer dawn. Golden stars are dozing, instead of river water there is a mirror of the backwater, there are green catkins on the birch trees, silver dews are burning, and the nettles are dressed in bright mother-of-pearl. In fact, the entire poem is one big comparison. And how beautiful it is!

We can talk about comparisons in S. Yesenin’s works for a long time - they are all so bright, imaginative and at the same time different. If in the work “Good Morning” the atmosphere is light, joyful, pleasant, then when reading the poem “Black Man” there is a feeling of heaviness, even disaster (it is not for nothing that it is considered a kind of requiem by the author). And this atmosphere of hopelessness is also formed thanks to unusually accurate comparisons!

“The Black Man” is a tragically unique poem. A certain black man who appeared either in a dream or in the author’s feverish delirium. Yesenin is trying to understand what kind of vision this is. And then a whole series of brilliant comparisons: “Just like a grove in September, the brain is showered with alcohol,” “My head flaps its ears like the wings of a bird, its legs can no longer loom on its neck,” “In December in that country the snow is pure as hell, and snowstorms make merry spinning wheels.” You read these lines and see everything: the bright frosty winter, and enormous human despair.

Conclusion

You can express your thoughts in different ways. But for some it is faded and dull phrases, or even completely incoherent babble, while for others it is luxurious, flowery paintings. Comparisons and other artistic techniques allow us to achieve figurative speech, both written and oral. And you should not neglect this wealth.

We can talk endlessly about the beauty and richness of the Russian language. These arguments are just another reason to join such a conversation. So, comparisons.

What is comparison

In fact, this term is ambiguous. This fact is confirmed by the endless examples of comparison that we observe in everyday life. In colloquial speech, it is rather a likening of different objects, a statement that they are equal or similar.

In mathematics, the term “comparison” is intertwined with the similar concept of “relation.” By comparing numbers for equality or inequality, we find the difference between them.

Comparison is also the process of comparing the similarities and differences, disadvantages and advantages of several objects. As examples show, comparisons in sciences such as philosophy, psychology, sociology are a kind of cognitive operations that underlie reasoning about the similarities and differences of the objects being studied. With the help of comparisons, various characteristics of these objects or phenomena are revealed.

Comparison in the literature: definition and examples

Stylistic and literary comparisons have a slightly different meaning. These are figures of speech, stylistic devices in which some phenomena or objects are likened to others according to some common characteristic. The comparison method can be simple, then certain words are usually present in circulation. Among them are: “as”, “as if”, “as if”, “exactly”. But there is also an indirect method of comparison: in this case, the comparison is made using a noun in the instrumental case without a preposition. Example: “Onegin lived as an anchorite” (“Eugene Onegin” by A. S. Pushkin).

Similes and metaphors

Comparisons are inextricably linked with another literary concept, metaphor - an expression used in a figurative sense. Actually, the basis of the metaphor is a comparison that is not directly expressed. For example, A. Blok’s line “The streams of my poems run” is a typical metaphor (the word “streams” is used in a figurative sense). But this same line is also a comparison: poems flow like streams.

It is interesting to use metaphorical devices in the case of the so-called negative comparison. Examples of comparison can be easily found in epics. “Not two clouds converged in the sky, but two daring knights converged” - in this example of the Old Russian epic, the similarity of formidable warriors with dark terrible clouds is simultaneously emphasized, and their identity is denied, and an absolutely amazing overall picture is drawn.

Negative comparisons, more typical of works of folk art and their folklore stylizations, play a special role in the perception of the artistic image. Here is a line from A. Nekrasov’s work: “It’s not the huntsman who trumpets the oak wood, it’s the wild head who cackles—after crying, the young widow chops and chops wood.” The second part of the expression (After crying...) is self-sufficient in itself and fully conveys the required meaning. But only the combination of both parts of the sentence allows you to feel all the bitterness, all the tragedy of what happened.

Means of expressive language

Comparisons help explain concepts or phenomena by comparing them with other objects - sweet like honey, sour like vinegar. But the main goal is not to emphasize the characteristic properties of the object. The main thing is the figurative, most accurate expression of the author's thoughts, because one of the most powerful means of expressiveness is comparison. Examples from literature brilliantly illustrate its role in the formation of the image desired by the author. Here is a line of creation from M.Yu. Lermontov: “Harun ran faster than a deer, faster than a hare from an eagle.” One could simply say: “Harun ran very fast” or “Harun ran at great speed.” But, being absolutely true in their essence, such phrases would not achieve even a small degree of the effect that is inherent in Lermontov’s lines.

Peculiarities

Paying tribute to comparisons as powerful exponents of the peculiarities of Russian speech, many researchers were amazed at the rationality of these comparisons. It would seem, what does rationality have to do with it? After all, no one demands special accuracy or literalness from comparisons! But here are dissimilar comparison examples, strings belonging to different people. “There were fire-faced elands here, like glasses of bloody wine” (N. Zabolotsky) and “Fate, you look like a market butcher, whose knife is bloody from tip to handle” (Khakani). Despite all the dissimilarity of these expressions, they are distinguished by a common feature. Both phrases tell about completely ordinary things (about red flowers, about the difficult human fate) and, written in a slightly different form, could easily be lost in any text. But the use of comparisons (“glasses of bloody wine,” “butcher’s knife”) turned out to be exactly the touch that deliberately added special expressiveness and emotionality to simple words. This is probably why in songs and romantic poems, where the emotional mood is already strong, comparisons are even less common than in realistic narratives.

Examples of comparisons in Russian

Russian language is considered one of the most difficult. And at the same time, the creations of domestic classics are recognized throughout the world as the most brilliant, original, and talented. It seems that there is an inextricable connection between these facts. The difficulty of learning a language lies in the considerable number of features, possibilities, and rules present in it. But this also opens up enormous scope for a talented writer who has managed to master cunning techniques. The Russian language is indeed very rich: it contains truly limitless possibilities that allow you to turn an ordinary word into a vivid visual image, make it sound in a new way, so that it remains forever in memory. Poetic works are especially conducive to this. “Our life in old age is like a worn-out robe: it’s both a shame to wear it and a pity to leave it.” This line by P. Vyazemsky is an excellent example of the use of comparisons in literary work.

About the work of A.S. Pushkin

The great poet was a recognized genius in mastering the most complex literary techniques. The comparisons used in his poems and poems are striking in their unexpectedness and at the same time accuracy and precision.

“His beaver collar is silvered with frosty dust” - this is a line from the poem “Eugene Onegin”. Only a few words, but the capital’s boulevard, covered with snow, and a young dandy heading to the ball emerge before my eyes. And then there’s the episode at the ball: “He walked in: and the cork hit the ceiling, the current flowed out from the comet.” If Pushkin had written that a footman had opened a bottle of champagne, he would not have deviated from the truth. But would this picture of extraordinary, festive, sparkling fun have emerged so clearly then?

And this is from the poem “The Bronze Horseman”: “And before the younger capital, old Moscow faded, like a porphyry-bearing widow before the new queen.” Is it possible to more accurately convey the atmosphere of a certain patriarchy and even abandonment that reigned in Moscow after the city of Petra was named the capital of Russia? “Let the Finnish waves forget their ancient enmity and captivity!” - this is about how the waters of the Neva were encased in granite. Yes, probably, this could be stated without comparisons, but would the pictures drawn by the author appear so clearly before the eyes?

And more about Russian poetic creativity

There are plenty of wonderful examples of the use of comparative images in the works of other Russian poets. Amazing comparisons in Bunin's poem “Childhood” accurately convey the atmosphere of a hot summer day, the sensations of a child who enjoys the sun and the aromas of the forest. The author’s sand is silk, the tree trunk is a giant, and the sun-drenched summer forest itself is sunny chambers.

No less remarkable, although completely different examples are present in the works of other Russian wordsmiths. Comparisons in Yesenin’s poem “Good morning!” reveal to the reader a summer dawn. Golden stars are dozing, instead of river water there is a mirror of the backwater, there are green catkins on the birch trees, silver dews are burning, and the nettles are dressed in bright mother-of-pearl. In fact, the entire poem is one big comparison. And how beautiful it is!

We can talk about comparisons in S. Yesenin’s works for a long time - they are all so bright, imaginative and at the same time different. If in the work “Good Morning” the atmosphere is light, joyful, pleasant, then when reading the poem “Black Man” there is a feeling of heaviness, even disaster (it is not for nothing that it is considered a kind of requiem by the author). And this atmosphere of hopelessness is also formed thanks to unusually accurate comparisons!

“The Black Man” is a tragically unique poem. A certain black man who appeared either in a dream or in the author’s feverish delirium. Yesenin is trying to understand what kind of vision this is. And then a whole series of brilliant comparisons: “Just like a grove in September, the brain is showered with alcohol,” “My head flaps its ears like the wings of a bird, its legs can no longer loom on its neck,” “In December in that country the snow is pure as hell, and snowstorms make merry spinning wheels.” You read these lines and see everything: the bright frosty winter, and enormous human despair.

Conclusion

You can express your thoughts in different ways. But for some it is faded and dull phrases, or even completely incoherent babble, while for others it is luxurious, flowery paintings. Comparisons and other artistic techniques allow us to achieve figurative speech, both written and oral. And you should not neglect this wealth.

TROPE

Trope is a word or expression used figuratively to create artistic image and achieving greater expressiveness. Paths include techniques such as epithet, comparison, personification, metaphor, metonymy, sometimes they include hyperboles and litotes. No work of art is complete without tropes. The artistic word is ambiguous; the writer creates images, playing with meanings and combinations of words, using the environment of the word in the text and its sound - all this constitutes the artistic possibilities of the word, which is the only tool of the writer or poet.
Note! When creating a trope, the word is always used in a figurative sense.

Let's consider different types tropes:

EPITHET(Greek Epitheton, attached) is one of the tropes, which is an artistic, figurative definition. An epithet can be:
adjectives: gentle face (S. Yesenin); these poor villages, this meager nature...(F. Tyutchev); transparent maiden (A. Blok);
participles: edge abandoned(S. Yesenin); frenzied dragon (A. Blok); takeoff illuminated(M. Tsvetaeva);
nouns, sometimes together with their surrounding context: Here he is, leader without squads(M. Tsvetaeva); My youth! My little dove is dark!(M. Tsvetaeva).

Any epithet reflects the uniqueness of the author’s perception of the world, therefore it necessarily expresses some kind of assessment and has a subjective meaning: a wooden shelf is not an epithet, so there is no artistic definition here, a wooden face is an epithet expressing the speaker’s impression of the interlocutor’s facial expression, that is, creating an image.
There are stable (permanent) folklore epithets: remote burly kind Well done, It's clear sun, as well as tautological, that is, repetition epithets, the same root with the defined word: Eh, bitter grief, boring boredom, mortal! (A. Blok).

In a work of art an epithet can perform various functions:

• describe the subject figuratively: shining eyes, eyes- diamonds;
• create an atmosphere, mood: gloomy morning;
• convey the attitude of the author (storyteller, lyrical hero) to the subject being characterized: “Where will our prankster?" (A. Pushkin);
• combine all previous functions in equal shares (in most cases of using the epithet).

Note! All color terms in a literary text they are epithets.

COMPARISON is an artistic technique (trope) in which an image is created by comparing one object with another. Comparison differs from other artistic comparisons, for example, likenings, in that it always has a strict formal sign: a comparative construction or a turnover with comparative conjunctions as if, as if, exactly, as if and the like. Expressions like he looked like... cannot be considered a comparison as a trope.

Examples of comparisons:

Comparison also plays certain roles in the text: sometimes authors use the so-called detailed comparison, revealing various signs phenomena or conveying your attitude to several phenomena. Often a work is entirely based on comparison, such as, for example, V. Bryusov’s poem “Sonnet to Form”:

PERSONALIZATION- an artistic technique (trope) in which an inanimate object, phenomenon or concept is given human properties (do not be confused, exactly human!). Personification can be used narrowly, in one line, in a small fragment, but it can be a technique on which the entire work is built (“You are my abandoned land” by S. Yesenin, “Mother and the evening killed by the Germans”, “The violin and a little nervously” by V. Mayakovsky, etc.). Personification is considered one of the types of metaphor (see below).

Impersonation task- to correlate the depicted object with a person, to make it closer to the reader, to figuratively comprehend the inner essence of the object, hidden from everyday life. Personification is one of the oldest figurative means of art.

HYPERBOLA(Greek: Hyperbole, exaggeration) is a technique in which an image is created through artistic exaggeration. Hyperbole is not always included in the set of tropes, but by the nature of the use of the word in a figurative meaning to create an image, hyperbole is very close to tropes. A technique opposite in content to hyperbole is LITOTES(Greek Litotes, simplicity) is an artistic understatement.

Hyperbole allows the author to show the reader in an exaggerated form the most character traits depicted object. Often, hyperbole and litotes are used by the author in an ironic way, revealing not just characteristic, but negative, from the author’s point of view, aspects of the subject.

METAPHOR(Greek Metaphora, transfer) - a type of so-called complex trope, a speech turn in which the properties of one phenomenon (object, concept) are transferred to another. A metaphor contains a hidden comparison, a figurative likening of phenomena using the figurative meaning of words; what the object is compared to is only implied by the author. No wonder Aristotle said that “to compose good metaphors means to notice similarities.”

Examples of metaphor:

METONYMY(Greek Metonomadzo, rename) - type of trope: figurative designation of an object according to one of its characteristics.

Examples of metonymy:

When studying the topic “Means of Artistic Expression” and completing assignments, pay special attention to the definitions of the concepts given. You must not only understand their meaning, but also know the terminology by heart. This will protect you from practical mistakes: knowing firmly that the comparison technique has strict formal characteristics (see theory on topic 1), you will not confuse this technique with a number of others artistic techniques, also based on the comparison of several objects, but not a comparison.

Please note that you must begin your answer either with the suggested words (by rewriting them) or with your own version of the beginning of the complete answer. This applies to all such tasks.

• Literary criticism: Reference materials. - M., 1988.
• Polyakov M. Rhetoric and literature. Theoretical aspects. - In the book: Questions of poetics and artistic semantics. - M.: Sov. writer, 1978.
• Dictionary of literary terms. - M., 1974.