Abstract: The purpose of the article is to reveal the cultural meanings that for the poet were associated with the concept of "will". To achieve this goal, we trace the evolution of the poet's work, in which the cultural meaning of the concept of "will" is revealed through a chain of interrelated and complementary meanings: the boundless desire of the symbolist poet, a rush into the distance and upward, gaining freedom, admiration for the free world and the discovery of the supreme Divine - creative principle in nature. It is shown that the concept of "will" embodies in Balmont's poetry the essence of God's world, turns to the foundations of the Russian cultural mentality, reveals the convergence of Divine and human, free and creative principles as the dominant cultural worldview of the poet of the Silver Age. It is necessary to reveal the many cultural meanings that for the poet were associated with the concept of "will". The methodology of the research is based on synchronic, structural-functional, biographical, historical and cultural methods. Thus, the concept of "will" in Balmont's poetry combines the aspiration to space, breadth and height – to infinity, freedom, the poet's kinship with the Divinely free and eternally changeable elements of God's world and the creative principle as comprehension of the soul of the world and his own "free-spirited" soul. The cultural meaning of the concept "will" embodies the essence of God's world and the poet's soul. The concept of "will" in its versatility is one of the key ones in Balmont's poetry and turns to the basics of the Russian mentality, as well as reveals the convergence of the Divine and human, free and creative principles as the dominant worldview of the poet of the Silver Age. The thirst for will and freedom is inseparable from the formation of the Balmont symbolist with his aspiration from external reality to internal realities and is also connected with the rush into the distance "thirst for will and space".

Keywords: The Silver Age, Konstantin Dmitrievich Balmont, The eternal will, The creative will, The free world, Our spirit is free, space, freedom, Volition, conceptual sphere

Abstract: The subject of the research is the creative writing of Yunna Morits defined by the author as the antiglamorous lyrics that presents the opposition between the glamour ideology and glamour myth-making in a critical form. The results of the author's analysis demonstrate the relationship between poetics and metaphysical intellectual-ethical-aesthetical triad that highlights the Here-Existence of the poet and her life position. This proves that the poet had a gift allowing to transform the visibly invisible/invisibly visible into an actual contemporary symbol which was created by the word but acquired the visual aspect. As a result of her creative writing, the poet's Here-Existence attains harmony where the Becoming is born out of creative rethinking and word play of the ar-riving. Yakovleva views the problem in a form of a narrative description using dialectical, interpretative and phenomenological research methods as well as the principle of the intentional analysis which reveals specific features of the poetical phenomenon of Yunna Morits. The novelty of the research is caused by the fact that Yakovleva analyzes Yunna Morits' creative writing in term sof the glamour ideology that prevails in our society now. Conclusions and results of the given research can be used for further studies of Yunna Morits' writings as well as interpretation of literary texts and critical research of today's socio-cultural environment influenced by the glamour ideology and myth-making processes. 

Keywords: simulacrum, inclusion, glamour ideology, myth, absurdity, exclusive inclusivity, esthetic, ethic, intellectual, poetic

Abstract: Many collisions of Fedor Dostoevsky’s novel ‘Idiot’ (1868–1869) still remain a mystery despite them being studied and interpreted quite widely. It was not by accident when V. Burenin said that Dostoevsky’s ‘Idiot’ touches the very ‘sphere of pathology’. Based on the analysis of Fedor Dostoesky’s ‘Idiot’, the author of the article demonstrates heuristic potential of structural method for analyzing characters. The author of the article also hypothetically reconstructs a mysterious ‘meeting of the two female antagonists’ (Nastasia Phillipovna and Aglaya Epanchina). In that scene (Part IV, Chapter VIII) Nastasia Phillipovna wins morally all of the sudden. Duke Myshkin who is in love with Aglaya plays a role of a moral ‘judge’ here. In order to understand all these contradictions, it is necessary to describe typical patters and causes of opposition between the main female characters as well as Nastasia Phillipovna’s ‘internal duality’ as M. Bakhtin called it.

Keywords: cultural studies, M. Bakhtin, dialogue, Fedor Dostoevsky, literary studies, reconstruction, structuralism, structural method, character analysis, characters.

Abstract: The article formalizes poet and philosopher Konstantin Kedrov’s theoretical concepts related to the meta metaphor conception. The author of the article summarizes the cognitive metaphor theory and introduces the concept of metaphor hierarchy similar to Tarsky’s metaphor hierarchy. The author also provides cognitive deÞ nitions of the terms ‘fora’ (O-metaphor), meta metaphor and N-metaphor and gives examples of different N-metaphors in Egor Radov’s creative works.

Keywords: cultural studies, metaphor hierarchy, Tarski’s language hierarchy, metaphor, meta language, metaphor theory, semiotics, Konstantin Kedrov’s school.

Abstract: Intellectual prose by Doctor of Philosophy Vladimir Kantor stands out of modern literature and deserves special attention of literature experts. This article is an attemp to define peculiarities of Vladimir Kantor’s prose. The author of the article analyzes Kantor’s new edition of selecive works called ‘Juicy Apple’. As a result, the author makes a conclusion that oen of the main peculiarities of Kantor’s prose is intertextuality of his works. The article describes stories which hadn’t been published before such as a story ‘Death of a Retired Man’. Special attention is paied at the structure of the book which plays a certain role, too: previously published works are combined with new ones and altogether they acquire a new meaning.

Keywords: cultural studies, history of literature, intertex tuality, narrative, selective works, prose, intelligen tsia, story, philosophy, Vladimir Kantor.

Abstract: The article describes one of the most promising direction in psychological literary studies – literary characterology. The author of the article approbates the method of hypothetic reconstruction of literary heroes by means of a text structural analysis. The object of the research is the roman ‘Venus in Fur’ (1869) written by an Austrian writer Leopold von Sacher-Mazoch. The main heroes there are identified as accentuated personalities standing very close to pathology. It is well shown that the structural analysis allows to take a new look at the plot and conflict of the novel and better understand a very complex phenomenon of masochism. The author introduces such terms as ‘aglo charaters’ and ‘micro schisis’ and defines a number of certain patterns which were not noticed by researchers before.

Keywords: accentuated personality, Venus in Furs, Leopold von Sacher-Mazoch, cultural studies, psychological literary studies, structural analysis, psychosemiotics, characterology.

Abstract: In most cases literary criticism activities are confined to the pattern when the initial text (T1) is compared with the secon dary text (T2). The article describes the fundamental and conventional limitations imposed by T1 to T2. Literary criticism method is vie wed as a succession of basic intension operators applied to the initial text.

Keywords: cultural studies, nonsense, intension, intension operator, communication failure, convention, literary critics, narrative operator, reduction, semiotics.

Abstract: It is the fi rst Russian publication of James Joyce’s essay ‘James Clarence Mangan’ (1920), one of the fundamental works which expresses early Joyce’s esthetic attitudes. The main hero of his essay, James K. Mangan (1803-1849), a ‘Celtic Nerval’, was a poet, translator, essay writer and one of the brightest fi gures of Irish and European late Romanticism. This essay became an important part of early Joyce’s creative works; many of the thoughts, formulas and stylistic expressions were then repeated and transformed in other Joyce’s works.

Keywords: cultural studies, esthetics, James Joyce, Ireland, romanticism, poetry, fi ction, art, artist, style.

Abstract: The article is devoted to a unique genre in music during the 20th century, -instrumental word composition, the phenomenon which hasn’t been fully studied in art history yet. Even though composers use a variety of concepts within the framework of this genre, all of them render a tragic content of their music pieces. The purpose of this article is both to view peculiarities of using literary texts in tragic instrumental compositions and to defi ne the constant of their relationship with the music material.

Keywords: art history, genre, advance guard, 20th century, word, music, interpretation, tragedy, drama, synthesis.