The explication of the notional part of the concept "gardening" in the British detectives of the XIX century

Sidorova Elizaveta Nikolaevna ORCID: 0000-0002-1550-1145 Educator, Department of Foreign and Russian Languages, Russian State Agrarian University - Moscow Timiryazev Agricultural Academy 127422, Russia, Moscow, ul. Timiryazevskaya, 49 elizavetasidorova5@gmail.com Other publications by this author

Currently, most researchers consider the complex concept of "Englishness" under the prism of cultural and literary approaches, ignoring its linguistic component. This article is a contribution to the analysis of the linguistic representation of the hyperconcept by studying the concept of "gardening" included in it.

The concept of "Englishness" is considered under the prism of the territorial division of Great Britain, where England is the largest part of the country in the south-east of the island, where about 80% of the population lives. It can be represented as a "matryoshka identity" of the British, consisting of national, ethno-cultural and regional levels. Researchers define Englishness and Englishness as complementary categories relative to the nation and ethnic culture ^[2].

The concepts of "Britishness" and "Englishness" are distinguished by the fact that the former is used in a political context, while the latter refers to the preservation of one's own closed, insular world, which includes one's hometown, home, garden ^[2].

As D. N. Karavaeva notes, it is difficult to talk about a single English identity, taking into account its deep historical relations with the concept of "Britishness", as well as the acquisition of political overtones by the term Englishness and the regional diversity of its versions ^[2].

According to the researcher, the most appropriate way to describe the modern discourse of Englishness is categorization according to time and place. From a historical point of view, English culture, considered the core of British society, served as a space of interaction and confrontation between locality (land identity) and mainline (sea identity). "Land identity" uses the concept of "island" (country, county), "countryside" as a designation of soil, locality, settlement, orientation to the province, cozy English villages, pastorals, parish churches and local communities ^[2].

M. I. Latynina and N. F. Khrenova note that the mentality of the British is difficult for other peoples, so there are a number of stereotypes that reflect it and have an impact on communicative customs and characteristics. The researchers consider the most common stereotypes to be: conservatism, restraint, politeness, self-control, respect for personal space, English sense of humor, attachment to home, gardening, caring for pets ^[6].

The combination of the above characteristics determines the national uniqueness and the socio-historical basis of this linguistic culture, therefore "Englishness" can be considered a hyperconcept. His verbalization is a complex linguocognitive element of the picture of the world of this people ^[4].

Having studied the representation of the concept of "Englishness" in a number of research papers, where the analysis of its constituent concepts is presented, we noted that in modern Russian linguistics the most studied are the concept of "home", inextricably linked with the concept of "personal space" ^[7]. The concept of "politeness" is considered by researchers together with "conservatism", "restraint" and "tolerance" ^[5]. While the concepts of "gardening", "pets", "English humor" are not given enough attention.

According to V. I. Karasik, the concept includes conceptual, figurative and value components ^[3]. Within the framework of this article, we will analyze from a conceptual point of view the little-studied concept of "gardening", which is part of the hyperconcept "Englishness".

This article presents an analysis of the representation of the concept of "gardening", which is most often found in detective novels of the late XIX century. The following works serve as material: "Moonstone" by W. Collins, "A Study in crimson tones" by A. K. Doyle, "Ignorance of Father Brown" by G. K. Chesterton.

The garden has become the foundation of the English national identity, created over many centuries. It performs the function of an invented tradition, which is a set of practices, usually openly regulated and generally accepted rules, having a ritual or symbolic character, which seek to instill certain values and norms of behavior through repetition, which automatically implies continuity with the past ^[11].

The English love of gardening is reinforced by the climate of Great Britain: mild winters and heavy rains create favorable conditions for the national hobby.

The selected examples can be classified according to the representation of the "garden" frame, which finds its verbal representation through such hyperonyms as "flowers", "trees", as well as through the lexemes "grass", "plants". Special attention in detectives is paid to the lexeme "rose" as a component of the hyperonym "flowers".

In the detective story by W. Collins "Moonstone", the lexeme "rose" occurs 110 times, including the following combinations: rose-garden (4), rosery (4), growing roses (2), growing of roses (5), white moss rose (7), white musk rose (2)

The noun "rose" can be used in texts independently.

1. “Ah, you’ve got the right exposure here to the south and sou’-west,” says the Sergeant, with a wag of his grizzled head, and a streak of pleasure in his melancholy voice. “This is the shape for a rosery—nothing like a circle set in a square. Yes, yes; with walks between all the beds. But they oughtn’t to be gravel walks like these. Grass, Mr. Gardener—grass walks between your roses; gravel’s too hard for them. That’s a sweet pretty bed of white roses and blush roses. They always mix well together, don’t they? Here’s the white musk rose, Mr. Betteredge – our old English rose holding up its head along with the best and the newest of them. Pretty dear!” says the Sergeant, fondling the Musk Rose with his lanky fingers, and speaking to it as if he was speaking to a child ^[13].

In this case, the use of the lexeme "rose" in the plural as part of the phrase "your roses" emphasize the love with which the gardener raised them, making them his flowers, putting his whole soul into them. Also in the example we can see the mention of a separate variety of musk rose – "the white musk rose", which the gardener calls "their old English rose", which demonstrates the centuries-old history of this hobby, which the population of England considers to be rightfully their own.

As mentioned above, the noun "rose" can be used as part of the compound word "rose-garden". For example:

2. “I saw him take her away alone into the rose-garden,” says Penelope. “And I waited behind the holly to see how they came back. They had gone out arm-in-arm, both laughing ^[13]. 

According to this context, the word "rose" as part of a complex phrase represents not just flowers, but a rose garden, and the garden plays an important role, as indicated by a certain article, creating favorable conditions for spending time together. The garden makes life more beautiful.

Sometimes, instead of the noun "rose" in the text, the single-root word "rosery" can be used.

3. Asking for my lady, and hearing that she was in one of the conservatories, we went round to the gardens at the back, and sent a servant to seek her. While we were waiting, Sergeant Cuff looked through the evergreen arch on our left, spied out our rosery, and walked straight in, with the first appearance of anything like interest that he had shown yet. To the gardener’s astonishment, and to my disgust, this celebrated policeman proved to be quite a mine of learning on the trumpery subject of rose-gardens ^[13].

In this example, the word "rosery", which is the same root of the lexeme "rose", is used to designate a territory adapted only for the cultivation of roses. Moreover, the special attitude of the British to this plant demonstrates the presence of the possessive pronoun in English "our rosary". Speaking about the rose garden, the author notes its ostentatious side, using the phrase "the trumpery subject of rose-gardens".

In the detective, the author pays special attention to the very process of creating a garden, in particular the cultivation of roses, as evidenced by examples number four and five.

4. “I haven’t much time to be fond of anything,” says Sergeant Cuff. “But when I have a moment’s fondness to bestow, most times, Mr. Betteredge, the roses get it. I began my life among them in my father’s nursery garden, and I shall end my life among them, if I can. Yes. One of these days (please God) I shall retire from catching thieves, and try my hand at growing roses. There will be grass walks, Mr. Gardener, between my beds,” says the Sergeant, on whose mind the gravel paths of our rosery seemed to dwell unpleasantly ^[13].

In the above example, the lexeme "rose" is used with the gerund "growing", which gives a representation of the laborious process of growing roses that the hero of the detective novel cherishes.

In the text, the lexeme "rose" can also be used as part of the compound word "dog-rose", meaning a rosehip growing along with varietal roses in the garden of the English.

5. “There has been an event, sir, in the police-circles, since you went away. The great Cuff has retired from business. He has got a little cottage at Dorking; and he’s up to his eyes in the growing of roses. I have it in his own handwriting, Mr. Franklin. He has grown the white moss rose, without budding it on the dog-rose first. And Mr. Begbie the gardener is to go to Dorking, and own that the Sergeant has beaten him at last ^[13].”

In this context, the word "rose" is part of the substantive phrase "the growing of roses", demonstrating the hero's love for gardening through the cultivation of roses, and especially the English variety of moss white rose. Also, the lexeme "rose" can be used as part of the compound word "dog-rose", which serves to represent the process of cultivating garden roses by grafting them on dog rose hips, which provides them with such qualities as unpretentiousness, winter hardiness and resistance to diseases.

Analyzing the work "Study in crimson tones" by A. K. Doyle, the frame "garden" was identified, the frequency of use of which was 18 times, including the fictional name of the house Lauriston Gardens.

In the text of the detective there is a lexeme "plant", which emphasizes the facelessness of an unkempt garden, without giving the exact names of its plants.

6. Number 3, Lauriston Gardens wore an ill-omened and minatory look. It was one of four which stood back some little way from the street, two being occupied and two empty. The latter looked out with three tiers of vacant melancholy windows, which were blank and dreary, save that here and there a “To Let” card had developed like a cataract upon the bleared panes. A small garden sprinkled over with a scattered eruption of sickly plants separated each of these houses from the street, and was traversed by a narrow pathway, yellowish in colour, and consisting apparently of a mixture of clay and of gravel. The whole place was very sloppy from the rain which had fallen through the night. The garden was bounded by a three-foot brick wall with a fringe of wood rails upon the top, and against this wall was leaning a stalwart police constable, surrounded by a small knot of loafers, who craned their necks and strained their eyes in the vain hope of catching some glimpse of the proceedings within ^[10].

In this example, the author uses the lexeme "plant" in the plural in the phrase with the adjective "sickly" in order to represent an unkempt garden, to demonstrate its scarcity and withering. The noun "garden" is used as part of an attributive phrase designed to show the small size of the garden, which, despite its deplorable condition, is an integral part of English culture.

In the work of G. K. Chesterton "Ignorance of Father Brown", a number of hyperonyms are used that make up the "garden" frame: "flowers", "trees", lexemes "grass", "shrubs", "flowerbeds", "rose bush".

Let us turn to the analysis of an example in which the verbalization of the above hyperonyms occurs.

7. They had moored their boat one night under a bank veiled in high grasses and short pollarded trees. Sleep, after heavy sculling, had come to them early, and by a corresponding accident they awoke before it was light. To speak more strictly, they awoke before it was daylight; for a large lemon moon was only just setting in the forest of high grass above their heads, and the sky was of a vivid violet-blue, nocturnal but bright. Both men had simultaneously a reminiscence of childhood, of the elfin and adventurous time when tall weeds close over us like woods. Standing up thus against the large low moon, the daisies really seemed to be giant daisies, the dandelions to be giant dandelions. Somehow it reminded them of the dado of a nursery wall-paper. The drop of the river-bed sufficed to sink them under the roots of all shrubs and flowers and make them gaze upwards at the grass. “By Jove!” said Flambeau, “it’s like being in fairyland ^[12].”

In this example, the lexeme "grass" is used in a phrase with the adjective "high" to create an atmosphere of a magical garden, where all its contents seem to be magnified under a magnifying glass. The hyperonym "flowers" finds its representation through the names of individual flowers – daisies and dandelions, which also seem huge to the heroes, which is expressed in the attributive phrases "giant daisies" and "giant dandelions".

The following passage demonstrates the representation of the hyperconcept "Englishness" through the insular mentality of the English.

8. He gave his name and address as a witness, but declined their offer of a boat to the shore, and remained alone in the island garden, gazing at the broken rose bush and the whole green theatre of that swift and inexplicable tragedy ^[12].

In the above example, the lexeme "garden" is used as part of the complex phrase "the island garden", in order to demonstrate an isolated garden located on a separate island. The phrase "rose bush" is defined by the adjective "broken", creating a sad, purely English background for the unfolding tragedy.

Consider the verbalization of the hyperonym "tree" in the last example.

9. The winter afternoon was reddening towards evening, and already a ruby light was rolled over the bloomless beds, filling them, as it were, with the ghosts of the dead roses. On one side of the house stood the stable, on the other an alley or cloister of laurels led to the larger garden behind. The young lady, having scattered bread for the birds (for the fourth or fifth time that day, because the dog ate it), passed unobtrusively down the lane of laurels and into a glimmering plantation of evergreens behind ^[12].

In this example, the hyperonym "tree" is represented by the lexemes "evergreens" and "laurels", which serves as a representation of popular varieties of evergreen trees planted by the British to create a hedge.

Thus, the studied examples demonstrate the special attitude of the British to roses, since the lexeme "rose" is often found in detectives as a component of the hyperonym "flowers". Also in the texts there are lexemes "grass", "plants", and the hyperonym "trees", which cause the verbalization of the "garden" frame. "Gardening" is verbalized in English-language literary texts in the form of the following lexemes: "the growing of roses", "the island garden". Consequently, gardening as a favorite pastime of the English in their spare time in the detectives of the XIX century is understood as caring for and caring for plants, most often roses growing in close proximity to the house, decorating the space and pleasing the eyes of the English people.