CONCEPTION OF ARTISTIC WORD AS A SIGN IN MODERN LITERARY STUDY

INTRODUCTION In the history of literature study the specifics of word was comprehended ranging from the Word that “was in the beginning” and to a set of symbols between two spaces. Word being basically a сompletelly concrete phenomenon, the essence of which is presumably crystal clear (each schoolboy knows literature is an art of word), in the real practical study of literature disintegrates into multicity of categories that cannot be summarized in one and that simultaneously is something united “literary work”, “text”, “artistic word”, “poetic langiage”, “poetic speaking” etc. All this multiciplity, obviously, is the row od hypostasiss of single essence, that appears so universal and all-embracing that becomes hard to define. In such situation not even of the logo-centrism per say, but of expansion of the word phenomenon to complete boundlessness it is very difficult, but at the same time highly necessary to comprehend the specifics of the word. In a comprehension of the word phenomenon in a study of literature there are two opposite tendencies: comprehension of word as sign and comprehension of it as an ontological meaningfulness. Polarity of these tendencies shows up very clearly. If a word is a sign, then it defines a certain meaning. A word than becomes a conditional construct. Thus, the word is an instrument, a mean, something inferior. If on the contrary a word is a special particular reality of existence, then it is a direct embodiment of a meaning. In this case word is not a mean, but a self-valuable spiritual essence. This essence is of an active and creative character. The aim of this work is to analyse concepts of word belonging to the first of the above mentioned tendencies.