Genre Originality and Linguistic Features of Fantasy

Burieva Nargiza Kuchkarovna

Jizzakh State Pedagogical University, Jizzakh, Uzbekistan

Keywords: Society, Fantasy, Fictitious, Linguistic Determinism, Conceptual.

Abstract: The purpose of this study is to comprehensively examine the linguistic means used in the construction of an

anomalous artistic world in works of the fantasy genre. In accordance with the stated goal and the hypothesis

put forward, the following tasks are investigated in the research: systematizing the essential characteristics of

the artistic world; distinguishing the fantasy genre from related genres of fantastic literature; describing the

specifics of the anomalous artistic world in works of the fantasy genre; and identifying the linguistic

characteristics of creating a fantastic world in artistic literature. The relevance of the work is determined by

the growing interest of linguistics in the problems of the fantasy genre as a tool for classification and

typologization of literary texts, as well as the need for a deeper and more comprehensive study of the genre-

forming function of language, namely the role of various linguistic units in the creation of a special type of

artistic reality where uniform laws apply. Turning to fantasy is also important in the context of the

understanding of multi-genres, characteristic of modern humanities, as a manifestation of the fragmented

thinking of modern man. The research is based on the material of works in the fantasy genre, which is the

object of the research. The authors used novels by English writers whose works are most representative for

understanding the fantasy genre: J.R.R. Tolkien, J.K. Rowling, W. Golding, and others.

1 INTRODUCTION

The basis of any work of art is always fiction or

fantasy. According to the philosophical dictionary,

fantasy is “an imagination characterized by the

special strength, brightness, and unusualness of the

created ideas and images”. Its main feature can be

called extreme detachment from the conditions of

surrounding reality. The emergence of fantasy images

in a person’s mind is associated with interest in a

particular object or action manifested for some

reason. In modern philology, there are two terms that

name classes of texts identified on the basis of a set

of formal and meaningful features: text types and

genre.

There are two types of fantasy: passive and active.

The first is characterized by the unconscious creation

of images, when the individual’s “I” appears in the

role of an observer (for example, dreams). With

active fantasy, a person controls the images created in

the imagination, choosing the association necessary

at this stage. These two types of fantasy complement

each other, and passive fantasy can become the basis

https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2864-3078

for active fantasy. While the author is awake, fantasy

is involved in the creation of literary texts. She

provides him with a set of incredible images and their

combinations. At the same time, aesthetic feeling and

artistic design make it possible to combine them into

a single whole. That is, fantasy creates the artistry of

a work and determines the artistic qualities of such a

text.

2 METHODOLOGY

One of the most pressing problems in modern

linguistics is intertextuality. Intertextual analysis, as a

rule, is carried out from the perspectives of literary

criticism, linguistics, psycholinguistics, and

linguoculturology. At the moment, a holistic

linguistic theory of intertextuality does not exist, just

like the very definition of this concept. Most of the

works are still of a literary nature, but at the moment,

much more interesting is the differentiation of the

basic data of the general philological theory of

intertextuality (Aksenova N.S, 2013).

868

Kuchkarovna, B.

Genre Originality and Linguistic Features of Fantasy.

DOI: 10.5220/0012931500003882

Paper published under CC license (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)

In Proceedings of the 2nd Pamir Transboundary Conference for Sustainable Societies (PAMIR-2 2023), pages 868-875

ISBN: 978-989-758-723-8

Literary studies are based on linguistic data.

Within the framework of linguistics, intertext is the

fact of the presence in a text of elements of another

text; its form is determined at the level of varieties. a)

markers of inclusion (quotes, font, author’s surname,

etc.); b) type of inclusion (quote, allusion,

reminiscence, etc.) and types c) relations between the

new text and the source of intertext (pretext)

(intertextuality, paratextuality, metatextuality, etc.)

(Aksenova N.S, 2013).

The fantasy genre involves works depicting

fictional events, the main role of which is the

irrational or mystical principle and the world, the

existence defies logical explanation (Arnold I.V.

Stylistics., 2005). The concept of “anomalous artistic

world” was introduced by linguist S.N. Plotnikova,

which later became the conceptual standard defining

the work in the above-mentioned genre.

At the heart of the fantasy world, the authors lay

legends and myths, as well as elements of ancient

cultures of various peoples. Thus, the works of the

English writer J.R.R. Tolkien tend to mention

elements of Scandinavian and Germanic cultures,

while the writer J. Rowling takes Greco-Roman as a

basis. The novels of the American writer Dan Brown

are based on the myths of the Middle Ages.

These references can be traced in the names of the

characters, the location of events, symbolism, and

works of art. Most of the characters in J.R.R.

Tolkien's novels trace their origins to ancient

Germanic roots, incorporating elements from the

Beowulf epics, the Scandinavian Eddas, and English

folklore through intersubjective intertextuality. The

most notable is the name of the main character of the

novel "The Lord of the Rings," Frodo Baggins. It

comes from the name of the Germanic king Frodo,

who was mentioned in the epic Beowulf. Thus, this

example characterizes the hero as a supporter of the

royal family, which is typical for the creation of the

image of a king in ancient epics (Dan Brown, 2015).

If we talk about personal intertext in J. Rowling’s

novels, then their borrowing goes back to Roman and

Latin. For example, one of the heroes of the novel

“Harry Potter,” Lucius Malfoy, is a supporter of the

forces of evil. On the one hand, his name is consonant

with the family name of many famous representatives

of the Roman aristocracy and nobility, and on the

other hand, with the name of the fallen angel Lucifer,

meaning “bringer of light” (Vitokhina, O.A, 2018).

First appearing in the Latin version of the Vulgate

Bible as translated by Jerome in the book of the

prophet Isaiah in chapter 14, verse 12, the name

Lucifer became a common noun in relation to the

image of the devil.

Using the same principle, one can consider

borrowings in D. Brown’s novel “Angels and

Demons.” Repeated mentions of the Illuminati lead

readers to think about a secret society that existed in

reality. Often, the use of this term indicates the

presence of a sinister organization of conspirators

seeking to secretly rule world affairs with the goal of

destroying the existing order and building a

completely opposite one.

Eiges differentiates the concepts of artistic fantasy

and imagination as the ability to “clearly imagine

events, persons, and settings”. Imagination is

associated with rational activity, while fantasy is

separate from it. In art, the latter begins to dominate

the “mind”. To the same extent, fantasy is separated

from feelings. According to the researcher, a work

can be emotionally filled, but without imagination, it

will not become artistic. Joseph Eiges recognizes the

essence of artistic fantasy as a “waking dream.”

Dreams provide artists with images for poetic

comparisons and often become the poetic centre of a

work. The most important property of sleep and

artistic fantasy is “the experience of identifying one

image with another." Therefore, a work of art

expresses the author’s subconscious perception of the

era and the time in which he lives.

Anthropomorphism in fantasy texts is highlighted

as an important criterion since heroes and their

actions are placed in the foreground. All heroes are

described in the image of a person while having their

own additional set of attributes. It should be noted

that the “anomalous worlds” are inhabited by gods

and various mystical creatures (elves, gnomes,

hobbits, and orcs). However, the fact remains

unchanged: in any work of fantasy, there is a race of

people, which closes the cycle of evolution of living

beings in the “anomalous world”. The human race is

represented by people; that is, a person in fantasy

texts always remains himself. the obligatory presence

of folklore characters and magic in the text. At the

same time, magic is secretly opposed to technology

and emerges victorious in this confrontation. The

authors of fantasy texts themselves speak about the

use of folklore characters. For example, the Polish

writer A. Sapkowski wrote that "the archetype and

prototype of all works in the fantasy genre is the

legend of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round

Table. This approach, however, seems to us to be very

conditional and generalized. We consider a fantasy

picture of the world as “a holistic image of the artistic

world of a work, which is the result of the spiritual

activity of the writer”. It is represented by elements

that reflect a fictional, non-existent reality. These

include fantastic, fabulous, miraculous, and

Genre Originality and Linguistic Features of Fantasy

869

mythological components, which are integral

attributes of works of fantasy and science fiction.

The study of the writer’s artistic creativity is

possible through the category of fantasy, which

allows us to gain a deeper understanding of the

author’s works. According to N.N. Menshakova, the

category of fantasy reflects the ability of thinking and

language to express the features of the real world by

referring to the internal, nonobjective world of the

individual. N. N. Menshakova points out the

relationship between the category of fantasy and

artistic fiction and cites a “fantastic work” as an

example of a literary genre (Menshakova N.N, 2008).

Fantasy, indeed, is quite clearly manifested in science

fiction literature. As K. G. Frumkin notes, a science

fiction writer deliberately “deceives” the reader by

presenting him with a non-existent reality and

“balances” on the border between existing and

fictional reality (Frumkin K.G. Filosofia, 2004).

3 RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Fantasy in general and science fiction in particular is

an extremely rich layer of literature, including an

enormous number of different subgenres such as

space opera, cyberpunk, utopia, dystopia, and others.

Science fiction is inspired by many real-life ideas,

images, and theories in science. Thus, space opera or

cyberpunk are primarily based on the authors’

development of ideas related to physics and

technology, while utopia and dystopia are based on

certain social studies and theories. This study

examines science fiction works that are based on

fictional languages, which are a central,

ontologically, and axiologically important fantasy

assumption. Taking into account the fact that such

works are most often based on real-life linguistic

theories, implemented in the work in the form of

fictional languages, it seems legitimate to identify a

separate subgenre of science fiction literature:

linguistic fiction, identifying the inherent features of

this subgenre.

French linguist Marina Jagello, analysing the

novel by the English writer E. Bulwer-Lytton “The

Coming Race”, classifies it as science fiction.

However, M. Jagiello further emphasizes that in this

case, the author’s attention is focused primarily on

describing the linguistic problems that the characters

in the book are trying to solve when they first

encounter creatures speaking a language unknown to

them (Vance J, 2004). It is worth noting that the

problem of mutual understanding between

conditional aliens and earthlings at First Contact does

not at all require the author to introduce fictitious

language into the text. For example, G. Wells, in his

novel “The First Men in the Moon” (1901), describes

a situation where it is aliens who learn English and

not vice versa. H. Wells, as one of the pioneers of the

science fiction genre, according to the observation of

the French researcher Sandrine Sorlin, refuses to

follow the literary tradition (the foundations of which

were laid in “Utopia” by Thomas More and then

continued in the works of Francis Godwin, Cyrano de

Bergerac, Jonathan Swift, and others) descriptions of

a fictitious language that a conventional traveller

becomes familiar with when meeting another

civilization (Ogden, C. K., 1994). The lack of interest

in fictional languages in fiction of the late 19th and

early 20th centuries, according to S. Sorlen, is all the

more surprising since the close attention of many

scientists of that time was directed to studying the

problems of artificial languages and, one way or

another, contributed to the emergence of Volapuk

(1879) and Esperanto (1887) (Ogden, C. K., 1994).

M. Jagiello tries to explain the decline in interest in

the topic of fictional language in science fiction

literature at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries as

follows: Man has already explored almost the entire

globe, and there is simply no place left in the world

for a “utopian” journey. Science was supposed to

offer people new horizons and open up new areas for

them to explore. One of these areas was fictional

languages, whose return to fantastic literature can be

attributed to the emergence of various linguistic

theories in the mid-20th century. It is the study of this

phenomenon that will help us answer the question of

what brings together and what distinguishes linguistic

and scientific fiction from each other.

First, it is important to note that in works of the

genre of scientific and linguistic fiction, the action

often takes place in a fictional (author's) world, which

is based on one or another fantastic assumption.

However, if in works of science fiction this

assumption to some extent continues or develops a

real scientific theory or idea (for example, the

existence of a time machine in the work of the same

name by H. Wells), then linguistic fiction takes

linguistic theories as its starting point, even though

works of this subgenre may also contain fantastic

assumptions based on scientific theories. In other

words, any work of the linguistic fiction subgenre is

also a work of the science fiction genre. The inverse

relationship, for obvious reasons, is not observed.

Therefore, returning to the text by E. Bulwer-Lytton,

we can say that the author creates a fictional language

based on linguistic theories existing in the 19th

century. The writer dedicated his book to the

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outstanding contemporary philologist M. Muller,

who studied the connections between race, language,

and evolution and, undoubtedly, influenced the genre

of the work of E. Bulwer-Lytton.

There are several criteria by which linguistic

fiction can be defined. The first criterion can be

considered the presence in the plot of lines that

illustrate one or another truly existing linguistic

theory. Let us give a few examples.

One of the most significant for the genre is the

Sapir-Whorf theory of linguistic relativity. According

to this hypothesis, which arose within the framework

of the American concept of cognitive linguistics, “the

structure of a language determines the thinking and

way of knowing the reality of its speakers”.

(Languages in Tolkien's world) E. Sapir wrote in his

main work, the book “Language” (1921): “The

internal content of all languages is the same—

intuitive knowledge of experience. Only their

external form is infinitely varied."(Sapir E., 1993). A

researcher of the works of E. Sapir and B.L. Whorf,

British linguist D. Chandler, notes in one of his

articles that all their ideas about language can be

reduced to two main points (Daniel Chandler, The

Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis.):

Linguistic determinism: a person’s thinking is

determined by the language in which he thinks;

Linguistic relativity: speakers of different languages

perceive the reality around them differently.

According to the theory of B.L. Whorf, each

utterance is a kind of translation of a thought into

language; that is, a person needs to “fit” his thought

into the framework of his language in order to voice

it. In the process of reading, a reverse translation of

language into thought occurs, and this thought is not

contained in the text itself, not in words and

sentences, but is only generated in the process of their

perception. According to B.L. Whorf, the thought that

a person wants to express is limited by the form of the

word, which partly distorts the original idea. Thus,

any translation deliberately destroys part of the

meaning that the author wanted to convey with his

text.

Modern linguists, however, argue that language

does not shape or limit thoughts but only has a minor

influence on some operations of thinking, such as the

use of certain vocabulary in a certain situation (Daniel

Chandler, The Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis.). Despite

this, in a large number of works by different authors,

one and the same idea can be traced: that a language

determines the thinking of its speaker and is a direct

reflection of the worldview of its people. This

approach is often considered by researchers as an

extreme case of the Sapir-Whorf theory of linguistic

relativity (Danilenko V.P).

Sapir-Whorf theory provides writers with a tool

for creating different kinds of fictional languages that

tend to shape the thinking and behaviour of their

speakers. It is this fantastic assumption—the

recognition of the complete validity of the theory of

linguistic relativity—that allows writers to

experiment with languages (fictional and natural) in

works of linguistic fiction.

Thus, we can say with confidence that the basis of

S. Deleni’s work “Babylon-17” (Babel-17, 1966) is

precisely the theory of linguistic relativity. The book

describes a fictional language used for military

purposes by one of the parties to an intergalactic

conflict. The creators of the Babylonian language

artificially removed the concepts of “I” and “we”

from it, which resulted in people trained in this sign

system being easily suggestible and controlled, and

the complication of the grammatical structure of the

language resulted in multiple increases in the mental

abilities of its carriers.

The use of fictitious language for the purpose of

manipulating consciousness is also found in George

Orwell’s "1984", where the fictitious language

“Newspeak”, devoid of concepts such as “freedom”,

"democracy,” and others, is used by a totalitarian

government to directly control the thinking of people.

Newspeak, in turn, refers us to the tradition of

creating universal languages, in particular to the

works of Ch.K. Ogden, dedicated to his proposed

artificial language, Basic English, a version of the

natural English language limited to 850 words. Ogden

believed that the cause of all conflicts is

misunderstanding between people and that only a

universal language can put an end to wars. “The so-

called state borders are, in essence, linguistic borders.

The lack of a common means of communication for

all is the main obstacle to international understanding

and the main cause of wars,” writes Ch.K. Ogden

(Ogden C.K, 1994).

American writer Jack Vance, in his book The

Languages of Pao, directly developed the Sapir-

Whorf theory. The behaviour and thinking of all

inhabitants of the worlds described by the author are

directly determined by the fictional languages used by

J. Vance. For example, in the Paonite language, there

are no verbs, and all actions are described as

sequences of certain states. The Pao language seemed

passive to the inhabitants of other planets since it

considered only the state but not the action; therefore,

the speakers of this language themselves were

passive, submissive, and did not have any desire for

self-development.

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871

Linguistic fiction can be considered a kind of

“testing ground” where authors test linguistic theories

that, for certain reasons, would be difficult or

impossible to test in reality. Just as science fiction

exposes the hidden dangers facing science in the

future, linguistic fiction exposes the reader to various

aspects of language theories.

In the middle of the 20th century, the theory of

linguistic relativity was criticized by cognitive

scientists who postulated that thinking is determined

neurophysiologically. American linguist N.

Chomsky, in his work “Syntactic Structures”,

established a connection between linguistics and

psychology and proposed the theory of universal

grammar. N. Chomsky tried to prove the existence of

linguistic universals—basic elements of grammar—

inherent in every person, regardless of the language

he speaks, and all the linguistic diversity of

grammars, in essence, contains conceptual structures

of the same order (Chomsky N, 1965).

Again, linguistic fiction comes to the aid of

scientists where linguistic experiments are not

possible. In his book The Embedding, English writer

Ian Watson explores Chomsky's theory. The work

develops several narrative lines in parallel, one of

which tells about the experiment of linguist scientists

observing three children, cut off from the rest of the

world and not knowing any language.

Communication between experimental subjects and

scientists occurs with the help of computers, which

translate all the latter’s statements into the language

of N. Chomsky’s deep structures. The goal of the

study is to discover exactly those grammatical

structures that will be understood and accepted by

children as “natural.”

The second genre-forming criterion of linguistic

fiction can undoubtedly be considered the presence of

a fictional language in the author’s world. In this

sense, the trilogy of the English writer J.R.R.

Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings can also be classified

as a subgenre of linguistic fiction. Here, however, it

is important to clarify that the work belongs to the

fantasy genre, the main difference from the science

fiction genre being the presence in the fictional world

of forces that are inexplicable from the point of view

of science (for example, the existence of magic).

J.R.R. Tolkien was a philologist well acquainted

with many European languages, which undoubtedly

was reflected in his work. However, the reason why

The Lord of the Rings can be classified as a subgenre

of linguistic fiction is not only the fact that there are

many fictional languages in the text. Much more

important is that the author created these languages

not to describe in more detail the world of Middle

Earth he created, but on the contrary, this entire world

was built “around” the fictional J.R.R. Tolkien of

languages (Tolkien J.R.R. Tolkien, 2000). First, the

author came up with the language of the elves, and

only after that did he create and describe a world in

which these languages could be used (Carpenter, H.,

2002).

Linguistic fantasy by J.R.R. Tolkien revives the

tradition begun by T. More, who created a fictional

language for the inhabitants of Utopia, taking Persian

and Greek as a basis. J.R.R. Tolkien also used natural

languages as a basis for creating fictional languages.

For example, the language of the Quenya elves was

based on the Finnish language, with the addition of

some features of (Latin and Greek Languages in

Tolkien's world. (n.d.)).

Oxford professor of Old English and poetry Tom

Shippey, in his work “The Road to Middle-earth,”

called Tolkien’s entire multi-volume work a

“philosophical-linguistic epic,” pointing out that

“philology is the only suitable guide to Middle-

earth”. Deliberate simplification and etymological

multidimensionality in the creation of new words

existed in parallel to each other, which is most evident

in the analysis of toponyms of the world of Middle-

earth, when names such as Hill or Long Lake are

adjacent to large human settlements of Gondor or

Ristania, which have their own translations in other

languages in Tolkien's world, thereby revealing the

nominative function of language. Ristania, also

known as Rohan, is the name of the Land of the

Riders in Westron (the common language), while the

Ristanians themselves called their lands Marka.

Shippey considered two possible options for

borrowing the toponym: the Anglo-Saxon kingdom

of Mercia, on whose territory Tolkien’s native

Birmingham was located; and the common name for

all Anglo-Saxon lands “Mierce”, given to them by

their neighbours the West Saxons, which should have

been read as “Mark” or “Mark”. “But one should not

think that philologists, chasing after particulars,

neglect the author’s intention, and this differs from

literary critics. It’s just that they have such a

profession—to pay attention not only to the behaviour

of a word in its immediate environment but also to the

roots of this word, to its analogues in other languages,

to its relatives and offspring, as well as to the

metamorphoses of culture, which, perhaps, will tell

the story of this word." wrote Shippey, pointing out

that in order to understand the characters’ images, it

is necessary to pay attention to their speech. The

development of the image of the main character of the

story “The Hobbit, or There and Back Again” (Bilbo)

Throughout the entire story, Bilbo’s speech pattern

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does not change, thereby describing him as a simple

and unsophisticated character: “You see, a

completely unbearable situation has arisen.

Personally, I was tired of it. I would like to be at home

in the west, where the people are not so stubborn”

(Tolkien J. R. R. The Hobbit, 2000). However, it

cannot be said that his image remains static. One can

cite his monologue in connection with the death of the

leader of their squad, the dwarf Thorin Oakenshield:

“Farewell, King-under-the-Mountain. Sad indeed is

the adventure that must end thus, and no mountains

of gold are worth it. And yet I am glad that I shared

his hardships with you—this is more than any

Baggins deserved" [Ibid., p. 49]. Thus, passing

through a series of certain obstacles, the little hobbit

undergoes initiation and becomes a real hero. The

story begins and ends with a tea party scene. But if at

the very beginning Bilbo was not at all happy about

the unexpected guests, then at the end of his journey

he is sincerely glad to see his friends. Despite the

internal changes that have occurred in the hero,

Tolkien’s favourite character remains just as simple-

minded, exclaiming when guests arrive, “That’s

nice!” [Ibid., p. 53]. In the image of the main

character, as in the entire story, Tolkien’s main

stylistic innovation as a writer was revealed.

Subsequently, it will become the basis for all his

work. C.S. Lewis called this technique a “tone shift”

(Bee, R. (n.d.). Linguistics), which is explained by the

transition from an ordinary, everyday narrative to an

epic one and a return to the original beginning, as if

“There and Back”. Another example of the use of

“deformed” language is the novel by W. Golding,

“The Inheritors” (1955), which describes a meeting

between Neanderthals and Homo sapiens that

occurred in the distant past. The author uses a slightly

different version of the English language from the

modern one, which gradually changes as the plot

moves from depicting a Neanderthal tribe to

describing the society of Homo sapiens. This work

can be classified as a subgenre of linguistic fiction,

largely because the plot develops precisely because of

the changes occurring in language.

Linguistic fiction gives the reader the opportunity

to hear the languages of our distant ancestors (as in

Golding’s novel) or, conversely, our distant

descendants, as, for example, in the novel by the

American science fiction writer R. Hoban, “Riddley

Walker” (Riddley Walker, 1980), which tells a post-

apocalyptic story. This work differs significantly

from other works of the post-apocalyptic genre in that

it is one (if not the only) of the few works written in

the “evolved English of our descendants” from the

perspective of a person who survived the end of the

world [9]. “Ridley Walker” was followed by the post-

apocalyptic part of the story of “Cloud Atlas” by D.

Mitchell (Cloud Atlas, 2004), “The Book of Dave” by

W. Self (The Book of Dave, 2006), and other works

describing deformed versions of real languages

(Sorlin S. Linguistic fiction).

Undoubtedly, individual works can satisfy all

three of the above criteria, the boundaries of which

are very blurred. A Clockwork Orange (1962) by E.

Burgess, for example, is just such a work. The author

explores the theory of radical behaviourism by B.F.

Skinner (Alex’s reaction to certain concepts) and

describes a russified version of the English

language—the language “nadsat”, fictionalized by

the author.

Reachability between worlds is possible thanks to

means of identification and recognition of a possible

world. Such means are various types of operators

(narrative, intentional, and world-generating). They

separate a given artistic world from other possible

worlds and fiction from reality. The more fantastic the

artistic world depicted, the less motivated it is.

Fantasy worlds require more departure from reality.

Science fiction is a form of representing the world in

which, based on real ideas, a picture of the world that

is logically incompatible with it is created. The

concept of fantasy is culturally and historically

conditioned. Fantastic literature includes myth, fairy

tales, science fiction, horror literature, and fantasy.

We consider the fantasy genre from the perspective

of cognitive linguistics. The cognitive basis of this

genre is the anomalous artistic world, a world that is

organized on the basis of other general structural

principles than the ordinary world. “Anomalous

artistic world” is the conceptual standard of the

fantasy genre. The conceptual standard of modern

fantasy was formed by a number of authors, the most

prominent who is J.R.R. Tolkien. The structure of the

world determines its existence, the characteristics of

the creatures inhabiting it, and its spatiotemporal

characteristics.

The descriptive space of the fantasy world is

represented in the text by mythological signs, which

are divided into objective (fantastic creatures,

magical objects), spatial, and event mythological

signs. These mythological signs, relating to the sphere

of culture, exist in the consciousness of a native

speaker in the form of concepts. In the works of

specific authors, these mythological signs are

presented in the author’s interpretation. In addition,

authors of works in the fantasy genre are expanding

the list of fantastic creatures and objects recorded in

dictionaries. The description of fantastic creatures,

objects, places, and events is carried out using

Genre Originality and Linguistic Features of Fantasy

873

epithets, colour terms, comparisons, metaphors, and

syntactic and graphic stylistic means. From the point

of view of the narrator, the anomalous artistic world

is presented through the prism of subjective

evaluative modalities: “strangeness”,

“unexpectedness”, and “appearance”. Contact with

an anomaly is accompanied by the subject’s

confusion, fear, loss of spatiotemporal orientation,

and a sense of danger, which leads to cognitive

dissonance. A way out of an anomalous situation is

possible provided the subject changes either his

behaviour or thoughts and beliefs, that is, when he

restores harmony between his actions and way of

thinking. The boundaries of worlds are marked by the

modal operators “strange” (strange, queer),

“surprise” (suddenly), and “seem” (seem, appear).

Works of the fantasy genre belonging to a single

author are often organized in the form of cycles. They

are interconnected by relations of continuity, which

are ensured through prospection and retrospection,

contrast and analogy, and internal and external

intertextuality. The works of different authors form a

single discursive space in the fantasy world. The

worlds of different authors, differing in individuality,

interact and interpenetrate each other, revealing a

living commonality of conceptual standards. The

anomalous fantasy world is considered a

simultaneous implementation of the concepts of

“good” (the world of good) and "evil" (the world of

evil).

The linguistic features of the anomalous artistic

world are as follows:

1) The purely linguistic nature of its essences, which

have no analogues in the real world and therefore

have their existence only in the form of denotations

of special linguistic means—mythological signs;

2) The use of fictitious language as a means of

communication between anomalous entities Pasha's

research is open-ended. It seems promising to further

study the genre from the perspective of cognitive

linguistics, develop such a concept as a conceptual

standard of the genre, and study the features of the

anomalous artistic world based on the material of

works of other genres, perhaps at the intersection of

genres such as fantasy and horror literature and

fantasy and science fiction. It seems necessary to us

to study the interaction and interconnection of the

possible worlds of works of art and the real world, as

well as the deep mechanisms of this process and the

features of its linguistic implementation.

4 CONCLUSION

The author's lexical new formations, introduced by

the author into the fantasy text as a linguocultural

component, are one of the main parts of the created

imaginary world. The last, but no less important,

criterion that determines the type of fantasy text is the

presence of the author's language, through which

writers endow their characters with representatives of

different races inhabiting “anomalous worlds.” This

technique helps to endow the created “anomalous

world” with phonetic and graphic fullness while

creating a complete picture in the reader’s

imagination. Thus, an analysis of the works of leading

domestic and foreign linguists on the problem of

determining criteria that allow us to distinguish

fantasy as a separate type of text allows us to identify

and systematize seven main substantive and formal

criteria. Thus, fantasy determines the artistic

properties of a work, and the study of the author’s

fantasy picture of the world allows us to reveal many

aspects of the writer’s artistic world. The genre

uniqueness of linguistic fiction is primarily

determined by the following factors:

the presence of a humanitarian and scientific fantasy

assumption in the work;

linguistic theory underlying the work;

presence of fictitious language in the text. It is

extremely common for some works to meet several

criteria simultaneously

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