Altai Hydropoetics: Rivers

Abstract

The article explores the water sphere of the Altai text (with the exception of lakes). The research methodology is based on works on local supertexts by representatives of the Tartu-Moscow school, as well as adherents of the geocultural and geopoetic approach. A range of motifs and images based on the real qualities of the object under study, on cultural tradition, and on archetypal foundations is revealed. The Katun and the Biya differ in their origin, color of water, specific flow, and sound. In a work of fiction, all the real characteristics of these and other Altai rivers often underlie the metaphor of personification. The formation of one of the main rivers of Siberia, the Ob, by the confluence of the Katun and the Biya, is reflected in literature through a visual image - the color difference between two rivers in the channel of the third, and an anthropomorphic image - the union / conflict of a man and a woman, two women. Chuyskiy Trakt is an analogue of the Chuya and the Katun. The white color of the mountain rivers is identified with milk and gray hair, giving rise to zoomorphic and anthropomorphic metaphors. The noise of the mountain rivers is interpreted as the cry of the beast, crying and speech, including artistic and human ones. The flow of water is associated with the passage of time, a turbulent current with a difficult historical moment, the immutability of the flow with eternity. Especially frequent is the chronotope of a river crossing associated with a crisis moment in the life of a person and/or society. Metonymic substitutions of a river and a crossing according to the pars pro toto principle, and vice versa, are based on a borderline - a feature common for them. The border concentrates around itself plots related to the implementation/impossibility of contact, changes. Therefore, not only the crossing of the river, but also the path along the river is accompanied by corresponding events. Swimming in the river is endowed with adventurous, epistemological, aesthetic functions. Rivers allow differentiating space and navigating in it. Small rivers are usually associated with the concepts of homeland and childhood. The noted semantics are universal for the most part. The territorial attachment of these meanings arises due to toponymic markers. The author declares no conflicts of interests.