TEXT-FORMING ROLE OF VOCABULARY IN TRAVEL SKETCHES (ILLUSTRATED WITH TRAVEL SKETCHES BY I. A. GONCHAROV “FRIGATE PALLADA”)

Problem description. Genres change over time, each era expresses itself through its genre forms [Конь­ков 2011]. Travel sketches can be called one of such era-defining genre forms in the 2nd half of the XIX century: many researchers note a growing interest in journeys in the specified period, this period was marked by emergence of a large number of track (or geographical sketches — in this period they are hardy differentiated) in magazines [Про­цен­ко 1984; Пока­ти­ло­ва 1989].

The interest in travel literature in general and in sketches in particular can be explained with a number of factors: the growth of national consciousness, the increasing role of scientific knowledge, the educated society’s interest in scientific discoveries (more on the influence of these factors on language processes in the nineteenth century can be found here: [Вино­гра­дов 1982; Соро­кин 1965]). I. A. Goncharov’s travel sketches “Frigate Pallada” can be considered one of the key texts of this period. At this, the stylistic image of the genre form of this time largely depends on vocabulary, organizing the sketches as a text.

History of the issue. The key property of any test is its integrity [Нико­ла­е­ва 2000: 507], provided by the integrity of language units (“the unity of the whole” [Вино­гра­дов 1959]). For the first time, a thought about the role of vocabulary in the organization of the text structure (in this case we are talking about a fiction text) seemed to appear in the works of V. V. Vinogradov, who spoke about the need to study the verbal composition of the text as a dynamic system seeking to self-unfold. At the same time, he relied on the concept of “word series”: the text composition is understood as a system of “dynamic deployment of word series in the complex unity of the whole” [Вино­гра­дов 1971: 49]. A. I. Gorshkov continued the development of the word series doctrine. He clarifies the definition of word series and defines them as a sequence of “linguistic units of different levels, represented in the text, united by compositional features and their correlation with the particular sphere of language communication or a special means of linguistic expression” [Горш­ков 1984: 18]. Thus, the definition of “word” should be understood in a wider meaning: “it is not only the vocabulary, lexical series, but also the series of all other language units and unities, that is, the series that can fit into words and be made up of words” [Горш­ков 2015: 22].

As L. R. Duskaeva states, objectification of a travel in the text requires some demonstration: a) of what is fixed by the traveler’s view — the space of observations’ properties: geographical objects on the water and on land, natural phenomena, phenomena of cultural heritage, traditions of a particular area, including folklore, culinary — observation as the stage of knowledge; b) of the way in which the traveler learns about the space, how he moves around, how he watches, what results he achieves after observing — the phase of reflection on the experience he obtained at the stage of observation [Дус­ка­е­ва 2014].

This defines the variable nature of lexical groups, organizing the text of travel sketches (or word series as V. V. Vinogradov understands it). Part of them is made up of lexical groups, fairly homogeneous in their semantics, without the internal hierarchy of units that make up the group. 

At this, the verbal material constituting such word series is evenly distributed in the text, forming a kind of pillar for the text of the work. In other word series, the units are heterogeneous in their structure and semantics, one can highlight the keywords with a large number of paradigmatic and syntagmatic relations with other lexical items. In this case, the main conceptual content of the work is concentrated in such word series.

This idea is confirmed by turning to another scientific direction of studying a text as a unity — to the text linguistics. Much attention to lexical material in the classical work was paid by I. R. Gal’perin [Галь­пе­рин 1981]. Y. M. Kalinina, who based her analysis of a fiction text composition on the principles of modern linguistic paradigm, distinguishes two groups of compositional components — structural and that of content and idea: “The first group consists of linguistic phenomena which are of direct relevance to the structural organization of the text, which reproduce the chronology of events and describe the environment surrounding the characters (elements of factual and idio-stylistic types). The second group consists of linguistic phenomena, carrying great meaning, which express the ideological position of the characters and the author (elements of ideological and individualized types)” [Кали­ни­на 2009: 6].

Referring to the lexical composition of a fiction work, one should obviously talk about different ways of implementing the text forming function of lexics. In one case, when word series constitute the lexical core of the work, the text-forming function is realized linearly; in the other case, when word series are directly related to the ideological content of the work, then it is realized nonlinearly.

Methodology of the study. Analysis of the vocabulary, which performs the text-forming function in I. A. Goncharov’s travel sketches, took place in several stages. At first, we carried out a systematic analysis of the lexical content of the sketches to determine the composition of lexical means, used by the author.

In the second phase, we allocated vocabulary groups, which make up the genre and stylistic originality of the work, we studied their role in the organization of the verbal composition in the work. It was found out that the vocabulary of some groups (word series) is uniformly distributed over the sketches, therefore, it performs the text-forming function linearly. In other cases, the words included in the group (word series), are often used in those passages that reflect the conceptional vision of the author, while the lexemes themselves demonstrate the complexity of the semantics, the plurality of syntagmatic and paradigmatic relations. Such lexemes can be considered key ones, and they realize the text-forming function nonlinearly. At the third stage, we carried out the analysis of the selected groups’ usage and their functioning features. The above — mentioned differences among the selected groups caused the difference in the research approach. The groups of lexics, which fulfill the text-forming function linearly, were analyzed without doing any analysis of specific lexical units’ occurrences. We highlighted common features of the use and operation, typical of the group. In the case of vocabulary, which implements the text-forming function nonlinearly, the main research objective was a detailed description of these words’ semantics, which required a careful study of the usage contexts, the system of paradigmatic and syntagmatic relations.

Material analysis. The groups implementing the text forming function linearly include names of exotic realities, regional language, maritime language, toponyms and ethnonyms. These groups are united in sketches due to the similarities of functioning and peculiarities of their use. The system of author’s interpretations and explanations of lexical units from these groups confirms their special role in the “Frigate” sketches. The vocabulary becomes a kind of core of the sketches’ texts, fulfilling the text-forming function linearly. While analyzing the words associated with the conceptual content of the sketches, it was found that the ethnonyms, toponyms, and toponymically-produced adjectives used in most cases in direct nominative meanings, in some cases, may form word series, in which the composing lexemes demonstrate the changes in semantics, the acquisition of new historical and cultural connotative meanings. The words of these word series form the ideological fabric of the sketches, thus, implementing the text-forming function nonlinearly.

The fact that these groups of toponyms are present on the sketches’ pages devoted to the description of a round-the-world trip, seems quite obvious and predictable. They serve to indicate the position of the ship, the expedition members and the author on the world map at the moment of speech, in the past and in the future. An important role is played by the deictic vocabulary here:

I wrote to you, how I was fascinated with an island of Madeira (and its wine too). Then, when it disappeared from our sight, I got a little disappointed (Я писал вам, как я был оча­ро­ван ост­ро­вом (и вином тоже) Маде­ры. Потом, когда она скры­лась у нас из вида, я немно­го разо­ча­ро­вал­ся) [Гон­ча­ров 1997: 101]; I’m under the equator, under the vertical sun rays, on the border of India and China, in the realm of the eternal, mercilessly-hot summer (Я под эква­то­ром, под отвес­ны­ми луча­ми солн­ца, на меже Индии и Китая, в цар­стве веч­но­го, бес­по­щад­но-зной­но­го лета) [Ibid.: 253]; They were still the most south islands, extreme limits, only the small islands and rocks of the Japanese archipelago, which bore European and their original names. There were Julia, Clara, then Jakunoshima, Nomoshima, Iwoshima, then came ‑saki: Tagasaki, Kossaki, Nagasaki. Shima means an island, Saki — a cape, or vice versa, I can’t remember (Это были еще самые южные ост­ро­ва, край­ние пре­де­лы, толь­ко ост­ров­ки и ска­лы Япон­ско­го архи­пе­ла­га, носив­шие евро­пей­ские и свои име­на. Тут были Юлия, Кла­ра, далее Яку­но­си­ма, Номо­си­ма, Иво­си­ма, потом пошли саки: Тага­са­ки, Кос­са­ки, Нага­са­ки. Сима зна­чит ост­ров, саки — мыс, или наобо­рот, не пом­ню) [Ibid.: 314], etc.

The author pays much attention to the accuracy of the toponyms’ use, in the case there are several variable and equivalent names of the same geographical object, the author gives them all to the reader. This is especially true in cases when along with the original title, there are one or several names in European languages, which became the result of colonialists’ activities: “First river in English or Erst river (the first river) in Dutch,” — Vandyke replied («Ферст-ривер по-англий­ски или Эршт-ривер (пер­вая река) по-гол­ланд­ски», — отве­чал Ван­дик) [Ibid.: 177].

In this case, the author gives two foreign-language names — English and Dutch — and then Russian translation. Such a use has a historical-cultural background, because the territory of the Cape colony in Africa was originally under the Dutch colonial rule, which was changed into English later. In some cases, when Goncharov presents a unique, exotic name, not the Europeans’ given one, the author provides a kind of “etymological” reference, adds some reflections on the “right” name: Koreans call themselves, or their country, Chaosin or Chausin, and the name of Korea belongs to one of their ancient dynasties (Корей­цы назы­ва­ют себя, или стра­ну свою, Чаосин или Чау­син, а назва­ние Корея при­над­ле­жит одной из их ста­рин­ных дина­стий) [Ibid.: 617].

Ethnonyms play a similar role in the designation of the journey geography. Names of various tribes and peoples are often given in everyday contexts to describe daily life and often appear in the same row with other lexical units, which are the names of the tribes and their representatives: Here is a tall handsome negro, Fingo or Mozambique, dragging bales on his shoulders; this is a “kuli” — a hired servant, a porter, running errands; here is another one, from the tribe of Zulu, and most often a Hottentot, deftly manages a pair of horses, harnessed in a convertible. There the third one, a bitchuan, leads a saddle horse; the fourth sweeps the street, raising the red-yellow dust (Вот строй­ный, кра­си­вый негр, фин­го или мозам­бик, тащит тюк на пле­чах; это «кули» — наем­ный слу­га, носиль­щик, бега­ю­щий на посыл­ках; вот дру­гой, из пле­ме­ни зулу, а чаще гот­тен­тот, на коз­лах лов­ко управ­ля­ет парой лоша­дей, запря­жен­ных в каб­ри­о­лет. Там тре­тий, бичу­ан, ведет вер­хо­вую лошадь; чет­вер­тый метет ули­цу, под­ни­мая стол­бом крас­но-жел­тую пыль) [Ibid.: 140]; We raced along the village, now filled with crowds of people, mostly Tagalog and Chinese, partially mestizos: all these people were going to work or from work; others seemed to be just happy with the coming cool weather and came out of their homes to walk, they were walking along the shops, stood in crowds and talked (Мы про­мча­лись по пред­ме­стью, теперь уже напол­нен­но­му тол­па­ми наро­да, боль­шею частию тага­ла­ми и китай­ца­ми, отча­сти так­же мети­са­ми: весь этот люд шел на рабо­ту или с рабо­ты; дру­гие, каза­лось, про­сто обра­до­ва­лись насту­пав­шей про­хла­де и вышли из домов гулять, ходи­ли по лав­кам, сто­я­ли тол­па­ми и раз­го­ва­ри­ва­ли) [Ibid.: 534].

The exotic realities’ names were grouped along thematic lines basing on the unity of their use and functioning in the sketches minding the author’s position regarding this language. The term “reality” here describes a fairly wide range of objects and phenomena of the local environment, perceived by the author as an integral part of the exotic reality, in which he abides during the journey. These are the names of natural phenomena and objects (plants: kakisy (каки­сы), tangerines (ман­да­ри­ны); animals: babwani (бабу­ан), shrimps (шрим­сы)) and cultural realities proper (norimoni (нори­мо­ны), saki (саки), jonka (джон­ка)). Names of exotic realities are an important part of the narrative about places visited by I. A. Goncharov together with the “Pallada” crew during the voyage, creating the necessary historical and cultural context: I was walking among the European houses and Chinese huts, among the ships and jonkas, between the Christian churches and the pagan temples (Я гулял меж­ду евро­пей­ски­ми дома­ми и китай­ски­ми хижи­на­ми, меж­ду кораб­ля­ми и джон­ка­ми, меж­ду хри­сти­ан­ски­ми церк­ва­ми и кумир­ня­ми) [Idid.: 603]. Contrast is provided by means of enumeration of homogeneous objects pairs: each pair is formed by two nouns with a specific subject value, describing the realities belonging to different cultural codes (a house — a hut, a ship — a jonka, churches — temples).

Like the ethnonyms and toponyms, names of exotic realities reflect the geography of the journey because their composition changes with the change of the place of stay. A characteristic feature of their use is the presence of metalinguistic elements that serve to explain to the reader what the object or phenomenon is hidden behind the unknown or the little-known name: curry served every day everywhere from the Cape of Good Hope to China, especially in India; it is beef or other meat, sometimes chicken, paltry, finally, even crayfish and especially shrimps cut in small pieces and cooked with a pungent sauce that is made up of ten or more Indian peppers. Moreover, this is served with some special, almost poisonous soy, after which the dish got its name. Specially cooked in the same water rice is served as a necessary belonging to it (кар­ри, пода­ва­е­мое еже­днев­но вез­де, начи­ная с мыса Доб­рой Надеж­ды до Китая, осо­бен­но в Индии; это говя­ди­на или дру­гое мясо, ино­гда кури­ца, дичь, нако­нец, даже раки и осо­бен­но шрим­сы, изре­зан­ные мел­ки­ми кусоч­ка­ми и сва­рен­ные с едким соусом, кото­рый состав­ля­ет­ся из деся­ти или более индий­ских пер­цев. Мало того, к это­му пода­ют еще какую-то осо­бую, чуть не ядо­ви­тую сою, от кото­рой блю­до и полу­чи­ло свое назва­ние. Как необ­хо­ди­мая при­над­леж­ность к нему пода­ет­ся осо­бо варен­ный в одной воде рис) [Ibid.: 143]. As can be seen from the above-given example, such meta-text inserts are of a purely personal nature and are usually full of speech means expressing the author’s assessment of the object or reality phenomenon he saw. The author often compares the unknown with the known, which is an appeal to the reader’s cultural memory: there were also the so-called in English custard-apples, the fruit, looking like both pears and apples, with white flesh with black seeds (еще были тут назы­ва­е­мые по-англий­ски кастард-эппльз (custard apples) пло­ды, похо­жие видом и на гру­шу, и на ябло­ко, с белым мясом, с чер­ны­ми семе­на­ми) [Ibid.: 98].

Regional vocabulary is present in the final “Siberian” sketches of “Frigate Pallada”. Its functioning and usage specifics are in many ways similar to the vocabulary related to the names of exotic realities. Goncharov pays extraordinary attention to regional words, which he learnt directly from his lively conversations with the locals, thus giving the readers a wealth of material. For example, a description of the povarnya (повар­ня, ‘an empty hut, designed for relaxation and travellers’ overnight stay’) full of irony: Hence it is a quasi-povarnya. If you want to make it a real povarnya, bring your own cook, some provision as well, and sometimes some wood to the place where there is no forest; don’t forget to bring some fire too (Сле­до­ва­тель­но, это quasi-повар­ня. Если хоти­те сде­лать ее насто­я­щей повар­ней, то при­ве­зи­те с собой пова­ра, да кста­ти уж и про­ви­зии, а ино­гда и дров, где лесу нет; не забудь­те взять и огня) [Ibid.: 686] and the imagery of the verb curzhevet’ (кур­же­веть): only eyebrows, eyelashes, mustache, and others have a beard, can curzhevet’, that is cover with ice, so strongly that eyebrows grow together with lashes, the mustache — with the beard and they form an ice visor on the face (толь­ко бро­ви, рес­ни­цы, усы, а у кого есть и боро­да, кур­же­ве­ют, то есть покры­ва­ют­ся льдом, так что бро­ви срас­та­ют­ся с рес­ни­ца­ми, усы с боро­дой и обра­зу­ют на лице ледя­ное забра­ло) [Ibid.: 698], etc.

Like the names of exotic realities in “exotic” sketches of “Frigate” cycle, the “Siberian” ones (a return to Petersburg is described) have the regional lexicon accompanied by the author’s explanations. In this case, they are often formally recognized as part of the dialogue with local residents. So, it is possible to detect the whole series of interpretations of the words in the dialogue, with one explanation leading to another: “You’d better buy kukhlyanka, especially a double one…” — said the other, who had been listening to our conversation. “What is kukhlyanka?” — I asked. “This is a sort of a shirt made of reindeer skins, fur up. And if you buy a double one, than you’ll get the same wool underneath, so you won’t need any coats”. “No, it’s hard to put on, — somebody interrupted, — you won’t be able to move in this double kukhlyanka. You’d better buy a reindeer-fur coat to wear under one side kukhlyanka — that’s all”. — “What is a reindeer-fur coat?” — “This is a coat made of young deer skins”. “You’d better buy a borovaya dokha, — said the fourth, — then you’ll have all you need”. — “What is it — a borlovaya dokha?” — I asked. “This is the skin of a wild goat, it’s fluffy, warm and soft: there is no chance frost will reach you” («Луч­ше все­го вам кух­лян­ку купить, осо­бен­но двой­ную…» — ска­зал дру­гой, вслу­шав­ший­ся в наш раз­го­вор. «Что это такое кух­лян­ка?» — спро­сил я. «Это такая рубаш­ка из оле­ньей шку­ры, шер­стью вверх. А если купи­те двой­ную, то есть и сни­зу такая же шерсть, так ника­кой шубы не надо». «Нет, это тяже­ло наде­вать, — пере­бил кто-то, — в двой­ной кух­лян­ке не пово­ро­тишь­ся. А вы луч­ше под оди­на­кую кух­лян­ку купи­те пыжи­ко­вое паль­то, — вот и всё». — «Что это такое пыжи­ко­вое паль­то?” — “Это паль­то из шкур моло­дых оле­ней». «Все­го луч­ше купить вам бор­ло­вую доху, — заго­во­рил чет­вер­тый, — тогда вам ров­но ниче­го не надо». — «Что это такое бор­ло­вая доха?» — спро­сил я. «Это шку­ра с дико­го коз­ла, пуши­стая, теп­лая, мяг­кая: в ней ника­кой мороз не про­бе­рет») [Ibid.: 674]. Further, such words as torbasy (тор­ба­сы), tchizhy (чижи), naled’ (наледь), khius (хиус), otemnet’ (отем­неть) are similarly clarified — overall, there are 8 lexical units interpreted in this dialogue. The author explains the words dokha (доха) and naled’ (наледь) in subsequent occurrences too. Lesser-known nominations hide the objects, familiar to the reader (ushkan — ‘a hare’, morda — ‘nets’), and unknown to the reader (tschyoki (щёки) — ‘a steep bank on the Lena river’, hius (хиус) — ‘Northern wind’).

Marine vocabulary not just creates the colouring of marine life (in this case, such a degree of sketches’ being saturated with nautical words would not be required), but also fulfils an educational function (like in the case of exotic realities and regional vocabulary examples). The author introduces the reader to the peculiarities of marine life and the language that these features reflect. It should be noted that the author provides the following as proper naval terms: mizzen-mast (бизань-мач­та), topsail (мар­се­ля), sailing system (парус­ная систе­ма),mainsheet (шкот), etc. He also gives some professional jargon: whaler (кито­лов, ‘a whale hunting ship’), merchant (купец, a ship, carrying trade items), etc. The author also gives the lexical units, which he heard in simple sailors’ speech: aseyi (асеи, ‘English people’), bratishka (бра­тиш­ка, a word they address each other with), fordak (фор­дак, ‘a jibe’).

I. A. Goncharov illustrates the words related to marine vocabulary with explanations designed to bring the incomprehensible phenomenon closer to the usual reader whose life is far from sea: Squalls came: squalls are when you sit in the country house, suspecting nothing, with the windows open. The suddenly your balcony is attacked by wind, it bursts inside with dust through the window, shatters glass, knocks the pots, slams the shutters, when people are usually late to hurry to shut the windows, to remove flowers, meanwhile, the rain had enough time to pour onto the furniture, onto the floor. Now this situation is repeated here every half an hour (Нача­лись шква­лы: шква­лы — это когда вы сиди­те на даче, ниче­го не подо­зре­вая, с откры­ты­ми окна­ми, вдруг на бал­кон ваш нале­та­ет вихрь, вры­ва­ет­ся с пылью в окна, бьет стек­ла, валит горш­ки с цве­та­ми, хло­па­ет став­ня­ми, когда бро­са­ют­ся, по обык­но­ве­нию позд­но, затво­рять окна, уби­рать цве­ты, а меж­ду тем дождь успел хлы­нуть на мебель, на пар­кет. Теперь это повто­ря­ет­ся здесь каж­дые пол­ча­са) [Ibid.: 67]. The reality of marine life, unusual for the reader, ignorant in naval matters, is placed into a situation familiar to everybody; the “approaching effect” is also supported by I. A. Goncharov’s direct addressing his reader (you sit in the country house), which is another characteristic feature of the sketches.

Observing life in different parts of the world, its conceptual comprehension is the ideological content of the sketches — words that have become crucial for these fragments of sketches, form the group of vocabulary, which implements the text-forming function nonlinearly. A word series with the English ethnonym the English and the adjective English turned out to be the most demonstrative in this respect concerning a number of extralinguistic reasons. It is associated with such key words as comfort (ком­форт), convenience (удоб­ство), civilization (циви­ли­за­ция), trade (тор­гов­ля), practicality (прак­тич­ность) etc. One should mind the fact that the keywords, forming a word series, are associated with the image of the British in the Russian culture, which is illustrated by the analysis of texts used as comparative material.

Cultural and historical component of the meaning is of a particular importance in the semantics of these words. Thus, the meaning of the word comfort actualized in various contexts of the work contains a seme ‘novelty’, for example: It is easy to guess that the owners (of the hotel in the Cape colony in Africa. — E. S.) were English: the furniture is new, everything is fresh and full of signs of comfort (Нетруд­но дога­дать­ся, что хозя­е­ва были англи­чане: мебель новая, всё све­жо и вез­де при­зна­ки ком­фор­та) [Ibid.: 177].

This was due to the English dominance of the time in the world economy — it is this country, which owned the most advanced production technologies of consumption goods (as they would be called now). That is why a comfortable way of life meant using all these inventions in daily life: After that, reserved and confident, that he (the Englishman. — E. S.) lived this day with all conveniences, that he saw a lot wonderful, that he’s got a duke (Wellington. — E. S.) and steamed chickens, that he sold a party of paper blankets on the stock exchange, and his voice — in the Parliament, he sits down to eat and leaving the table not quite steadily, hangs non-opening locks to the closet and the bureau, removes his boots with a machine, sets the alarm clock and goes to bed (После того, покой­ный созна­ни­ем, что он про­жил день по всем удоб­ствам, что видел мно­го заме­ча­тель­но­го, что у него есть дюк и паро­вые цып­ля­та, что он выгод­но про­дал на бир­же пар­тию бумаж­ных оде­ял, а в пар­ла­мен­те ― свой голос, он садит­ся обе­дать и, встав из-за сто­ла не совсем твер­до, веша­ет к шка­фу и бюро неот­пи­ра­е­мые зам­ки, сни­ма­ет с себя машин­кой сапо­ги, заво­дит будиль­ник и ложит­ся спать) [Ibid.: 61].

With the change in the position of Great Britain on the world stage, the nature of the word comfort (ком­форт) usage has changed when used addressing the Albion residents. It can be seen in cultural descriptions of England of the XX and XXI centuries, in which English comfort is described as the addiction of the English to the old, familiar things, sometimes passing from generation to generation (close to the concepts “patriarchy”, “patriarchal” according to Goncharov) [Овчин­ни­ков 1987; Пак­с­ман 2009].

Another interesting example is the ratio of the volume of the terms “trade” and “life”, which are expressed by the corresponding lexical units in the following contexts, creating the image of the English capital: Meanwhile, the overall impression produced by London exterior view, with its circulation of population, is strange: there are up to two million inhabitants, it is the world trade center, –but why do you think life, its rapid fermentation, is so unnoticeable. Trade is visible, but there is no life: or you should conclude that the trade is life here, as it is, in fact (Меж­ду тем общее впе­чат­ле­ние, какое про­из­во­дит наруж­ный вид Лон­до­на, с цир­ку­ля­ци­ею наро­до­на­се­ле­ния, стран­но: там до двух мил­ли­о­нов жите­лей, центр все­мир­ной тор­гов­ли, а чего бы вы дума­ли не замет­но? — жиз­ни, то есть ее бур­но­го бро­же­ния. Тор­гов­ля вид­на, а жиз­ни нет: или вы долж­ны заклю­чить, что здесь тор­гов­ля есть жизнь, как оно и есть в самом деле) [Гон­ча­ров 1997: 48].

The lexemes expressing the concept of “life” and “trade” are largely presented as contextual antonyms (opposed as a part and the whole). Moreover, they are concepts, which are mutually exclusive. Contrasting between these two concepts is expressed in this context by contrasting attributes of life in London and life in a general sense: population circulation (цир­ку­ля­ция наро­до­на­се­ле­ния) — rapid fermentation of life (бур­ное бро­же­ние жиз­ни). The word circulation (цир­ку­ля­ция) has the following definition in Dahl’s dictionary: ‘turning, rotation’; compatibility presented in the glossary is important — blood circulation (цир­ку­ля­ция кро­ви) [Даль, IV]. Thus, terminology is important; regular, mechanistic nature of the movement means much. The word fermentation (бро­же­ние) is explained in the dictionary of 1847 in its general meaning: ‘the same as moving”, i. e. ‘walking there and back’ in its special meaning: ‘In chemistry: inside movement that occur in organic solids and in liquids containing organic parts by means of ferment: wine, spirit movement’ [Сло­варь… 1847, I].

Y. S. Sorokin notes that such combinations as mind fermentation (бро­же­ние ума) are usual in the 30-ies of the XIX century. Here, associations with chemical ideas are obvious and often accentuated in these contexts [Соро­кин 1965: 410]. In this context, it is important to emphasize spontaneity, randomness of this kind of movement. The final part of I. A. Goncharov’s argumentation is to convince the reader that the concepts are of equal volume. The word trade (тор­гов­ля) takes on the meaning ‘a comprehensive activity, leveling all other aspects of life’.

The results of the study. Analysis of the lexical material of travel sketches by I. A. Goncharov in “Frigate Pallada” has demonstrated a special role of lexical means in their textual organization. We discovered the groups (word series), the component units of which form the verbal composition of sketches, thereby fulfilling the text-forming function.

The implementation nature of the text-forming functions of different word series’ vocabulary is different. Some of them are formed by units, which are evenly distributed all over the text, seal it and make it the whole. Thus, the units of these groups become a kind of lexical axis around which the work is created. These are the names for exotic realities, regional language, maritime language, toponyms and ethnonyms. Among these groups’ lexical units’ usage features, especially noteworthy is a network of metalinguistic elements (author’s interpretations and explanations), with which I. A. Goncharov supplies a significant part of lexical units belonging to those groups (on specifics of little-known and unknown nominations’ explanations in I. A. Goncharov’s works — [Щег­ло­ва 2014]).

Another characteristic feature of these groups’ lexical units’ use is introducing several names or equivalent names. The fact of the author’s attention to this language speaks of its role in the sketches. The pattern of this vocabulary use shows the stage of observation in the process of understanding the world. Such lexical units are implementing the text-forming function linearly.

Other word series are formed by the units, which are key ones for those fragments of sketches in which the author presents his vision of the world. Hence the extraordinary semantic load of these words, is expressed in the presence of diverse shades of meaning, but also of historical, cultural and evaluative connotative meanings.

They reflect the next step in the process of learning — understanding. The words of this lexical series form the ideological fabric of the sketches, that is, implement the text-forming function nonlinearly.

Conclusion. Thus, I. A. Goncharov’s travel sketches being definitely some of the best examples of travel sketches of his time — reflect all the contradiction in the human perception of the world and of person’s self in this world, typical of this period, with its rapid processes in all spheres of society. This is what the need to study words as a carrier of historical and cultural memory is explained with.

The results of this study show the necessity of studying journalistic texts of different periods from different linguistic and stylistic perspectives: scientific prospects of such a diachronic approach also aiming at comprehension of modern media texts are proven by T. Y. Red’kina’s works in the sphere of modern travel texts studying [Редь­ки­на 2011; 2015].