Тhe article deals with the distribution of monosyllabic and two-syllabic endings of Instrumental singular case -ой(-ей) // -ою (-ею) and -ью // -ию in the language of different Pushkin’s prose genres: fiction (“Dubrovsky”, “Captain’s Daughter”), historical and journalistic works (“The History of Pugachev”, the papers on literature and theater), Pushkin’s letters to his wife. It finds out that the distribution of these endings in Pushkin’s prose of different genres is not similar (except for the forms of personal pronouns, where archaic two-syllable endings are used in all texts). In historical and journalistic prose two-syllable endings with sporadic penetration of monosyllabic as facultative variants are dominated. On the contrary, in Pushkin’s letters to his wife monosyllabic endings are preferred. At the same time monosyllabic and two-syllabic forms are no less common in attributive combination. In Pushkin’s fiction, however, there is a clear tendency to introduce at least one monosyllabic ending (most often in preposition attributive phrases) in constructions with several forms of Instrumental case for syntagmatic “facilitation” to create a certain quantitative balance.

The article presents the history of the manuscript tradition and the study of one of the most ancient canon law text of Slavic writing – the psedoepigraphic Commandment of John Chrysostom on church law. It is widely distributed as part of the Slavonic Trebniks of the 14th century, preserved in library collections of the Chilandar Monastery, the Pechsky Patriarchate, and Dečan Monastery. The editions of the text in East Slavic writing are indicated for the first time. Particular attention is paid to the Commandments as part of the Myasnikovskaya Kormčaja, whose compiler introduced significant changes in the text, expanding in every possible way the rights of the “spiritual fathers”. The Commandment is presented in short and abbreviated form in miscellaneas in the monastery libraries of the Russian north and the Chudovsky monastery. Based on the vocabulary of the Commandment comparison with the vocabulary of Svyatosavskaya Kormčaja, the author makes an assumption on the possible belonging of the text to the earlier, Ohrid period of the history of Slavic writing.

The author of the present reflection on Raisa Kuznetsova’s (1920–2001) creative work describes a wider context of the mutual relations between domestic and foreign philology, above all, on the contacts between Czech and Russian literatures appreciating the views of foreign specialists in Czech studies of Czech literature which contributed to a more profound penetration into the undercurrents, half-hidden (for the domestic research) qualities of the given national literature. In case of Raisa Kuznetsova he expresses his respect for her orientation on the novel in general, the epic novel /epopee /epopeia (German: Roman-Epopöe) in particular and on the interwar literature which represents the miraculous Golden Age of Czech literature.

The article discusses the place and the role of the antithesis in the structure of the poetic image of the most prominent representatives of the Russian, Czech and Slovak poetry of the romantic period. Based on the analysis of the peculiarities and functions of the contrast, antithesis, paradox and oxymoron in the system of images of V.A. Zhukovsky, K.F. Ryleyev, A.S. Pushkin, M.Yu. Lermontov, Y. Kral, K.H. Macha, the author of the article attempts at revealing the epistemological aspects of the relationship of the lyrical subject to the world (openness of the cognitive process – the demonstration of cognition in the “finished form”) and at showing the specifics of the art model of the world in the works of the poets.

The article explores the traditions of grotesque realism in the novel by M. Kundera “Immortality”. Attention is paid to the concept of the grotesque body in the novel, the motives of the carnival and the theme of death and immortality.

The full version of the letter of N.N. Lanskaya (Pushkina) addressed to Pyotr Vyazemsky is proposed. The missing part of this letter deals with the future son-in-law of N.N. Lanskaya (Pushkina) – Mikhail Dubelt, son of Leonty Dubelt having headed the III Department of His Majesty’s own Chancery during the reign of Nicholas I. The letters of Mikhail Dubelt to his wife concerning the divorce proceedings are also published, that elluminated his personality in a new way.

Les critiques littéraires contemporains s’étonnent de la popularité du roman parmi ses jeunes lecteurs, surtout de 12 à 17 ans. Une telle renommée est d’autant plus surprenante vu sa publication intégrale plus de 50 ans après sa première édition. La critique russe contemporaine n’est pas en mesure d’expliquer la valeur esthétique du roman créé à l’époque du règne absolu du réalisme socialiste dont les consignes devaient être strictement respectées par les écrivains. La satire boulgakovienne est incompatible avec la terreur stalinienne et doit être examinée sous l’angle transdisciplinaire, notamment dans l’optique de la théorie du jeu qui par la valeur de la corrélation sémantique du fait et de la fiction sous-tend les intensions pragmatiques de l’écrivain. La narration du roman se déploie conformément aux deux principales catégories ludiques: fiction et liberté d’expression qui se manifestent généralement par l’énigme et la mystification.

The concept “Republic” is analyzed in French and Russian linguoculture for the first time. The article deals with comparison of Russian and French concepts “Republic” in terms of their content, structure and importance in respective linguoculture. The author pays much attention to the concept’s representation in both languages. The research applies concepts’ comparative method. The study is based on materials of explanatory, associative and linguistic-cultural dictionaries as well as of French thesaurus, data of the National Corpus of Russian language and of a psycholinguistic experiment. The analysis shows that the concept has different structures, way of representation and connotation in these languages. Its degree of national culture’s reflection also differs. The author explains the discovered differences of concepts by peculiarities of political and historical development of France and Russia.

The article is devoted to the analysis of the fictional animal images’ semantics in the works of Julio Cortázar. Mythological creatures, extinct animals and the ones created by the writer’s imagination can be reader’s guides to the reality of fantasy as well as means of a more complex character portraying or elements of the author’s self-reflection. Cortázar follows a bestiary tradition revived in Latin America in the 20th century; while creating his images he refers to different myths and legends of the New World or of European origin, thus making his bestiary a part of the context of the world culture; in the same time he transforms them and includes in his own artistic code. Its decoding opens new perspective for study of the prose of Julio Cortázar.

The article is devoted to verbs and adjectives of Celsus’ “De medicina” and main features in their usage in the context of Latin medical terminological system. These features include polysemy and wide usage of synonymous words and phrases. These facts point to the early stage of formation of the terminological system. Moreover, the article discusses which words can be considered as elements of Latin medical terminology.

The story “At Maslenitsa” (“W Zapusty”) in “The Book for Tadek and Zosia” written by the famous Polish writer of the second half of the 19th and early 20th centuries, Maria Konopnicka, is largely based on the use of Polish folk elements transferred in the literary context. This is most clearly seen in the detailed descriptions of folk costumes in it that are characteristic of various ethnographic regions of Poland. Including detailed descriptions of costumes in the narrative became possible because of szlachta’s Maslenitsa week tradition of dressing in peasants which is presented in the text. This article attempts to answer the questions to what extent the images of different costumes in Konopnicka’s story correspond to the costumes of these ethnographic regions in reality, on what basis they are sampled, what elements are included in the description, and what in this case is understood as a folk costume.

In the article the musical texture of “The Northern Symphony” by Andrey Bely, which was created under the influence of Edvard Grieg, is studied with regards possible lines of its research. The connection between “The Symphony” and the works of the Norwegian composer is found not only on the level of images, but also on the levels of intonation and rhythm. The rhythmical pattern is emphasized with alliteration, which in some cases helps to identify sporadically appearing metre. In the paper the attempt has been made to prove that the major influence on the symphony had been produced by two works by Grieg: “Ballade in the Form of Variations on a Norwegian Folk Song in G-moll, Op. 24”, and the romance “The Princess”. While creating the Symphony Andrey Bely thought in musical terms, seeking for the analogues to musical devices, such as ritenuto (slowing of pace), rubato (pace variation while performing a classical musical composition, which deviates from composer’s pace «instruction»). Shifting the focus from the meaningful element of a word to its musical form, Bely tries to overcome the resistance of the “matter” and thus reduce the distance between literature and music.