Mythonyms in Metaphors and Similes of Modern Russian Prose

This article analyzes mythonyms of various origins that are included in metaphors and similes in modern Russian prose texts, traces some of their evolutionary trends compared to those of the previous period of Russian literature, and identifies their main functions in the context of literary works. The material for the analysis consists of the prose texts of contemporary authors (A. Ivanov, G. Yakhina, D. Rubina, E. Chizhov, A. Grigoryan, L. Eltang, L. Yuzefovich, O. Slavnikova, S. Filipenko, A. Rubanov, etc.), including contexts extracted from the Russian National Corpus. The analysis of metaphors and similes with mythonyms associated with different cultures shows that they are distributed unevenly in the texts of modern prose. Ancient Greek and Roman, Slavic, and biblical mythonyms dominate these tropes. Metaphors and similes in contemporary Russian prose include the following groups of mythonyms: theonyms, names of mythological characters, names of lower-level anthropomorphic creatures, names of mythical animals, names of mythological objects and substances, and names of mythological spaces, cities, and rivers. In the vast majority of contexts, metaphors and similes containing mythonyms characterize a person – their appearance, gestures, movements, actions, personality, behavioral traits, sounds, speech, and voice. Often, the characters’ situations are compared to the plot elements of the corresponding myth or fairy tale. A distinctive feature of comparative tropes with mythonyms in modern prose is the presence of attributes associated with their vehicles, which modernize the image and often lower it. Mythonyms in comparative tropes perform various functions in contemporary prose texts: the creation of national-historical color, a characterological function, and evaluative and intertextual functions. Compared to the previous period of Russian literature, the composition of mythonyms in comparative tropes has partially changed, and the range of entities they characterize has expanded.