Linguistics and literary studies department

Chapter II NATIONAL AND CULTURAL SPECIFICS OF PROVERBS CONTAINING REALIAS
2.1 Proverbs and sayings with anthroponymic realias
Proverbs and sayings, which include an anthroponym, have a vivid national mark for the recipient of a foreign culture. In these texts, the anthroponym acts as a proper name, rich in various associative connections and connotations, but already having a figurative meaning and used for a number of situations. It no longer refers to its specific bearer, but, as it were, "absorbs" all its inherent features and endows them with any other object, characterizes its actions, actions, highlighting not the name itself, but its assessment, the speaker's attitude as to the object bearing the given name and to the new object to which this name is transferred. Conceptually, foreign cultural proverbs and sayings with an anthroponym element are complex, because to isolate their meanings, as well as to compare them with the meanings of equivalents in their native language, the recipient, as a rule, needs additional background linguistic and cultural knowledge.
Of particular interest is a group of proverbs and sayings, one of the components of which is a traditionally English name or surname, such as Betty, Thoth, Jack, Dick, John, Mary, Brown, Jones, Smith, etc.
So, for example, anthroponyms-names Thoth, Dick, Harry were fixed in the saying "Thoth, Dick and Harry", and anthroponyms-surnames - in the saying "Brown, Jones and Robinson". Both sayings are synonymous, tk. realize the same meaning - “average, ordinary, ordinary people; first comer ". In Russian, there is an equivalent to the above English sayings - "Ivanov, Petrov, Sidorov", which in the form of expression coincides with the second English version ("Brown, Jones and Robinson"). The presence of purely English names and surnames in these linguistic units is an indicator for the Russian recipient of the national marking of sayings. It immediately expands the background knowledge of foreign cultural recipients about English names. The fact that the saying “Ivanov, Petrov, Sidorov” exists and is widely used in Russian makes it easier to identify the meaning of English equivalent texts. By analogy with the conclusions drawn from the knowledge of a well-known native proverb, the Russian-speaking recipient notes, firstly, the prevalence of such names and surnames as Thoth, Dick, Harry, Brown, Jones, Robinson among the English population, and, secondly, the usual and the inconspicuousness of the bulk of their carriers. The sayings of the two compared languages ​​completely coincide in their meaning and structure, but differ in examples, having as their prototypes, in one case, specific persons with typically English names, in the other, with common Russian names. Moreover, there is also one significant difference between the considered equivalents and in conceptual terms. It lies in the fact that both peoples put different ideas into the concept of “average, ordinary, ordinary person,” which depends on the way and standard of living of the peoples. And therefore, even equivalent sayings will evoke in the minds of foreign cultural recipients various images corresponding to their national worldviews, i.e. in this case, ordinary, average people in England and in Russia will differ in material status, rights, habits, clothes, etc. and, accordingly, the images of these people in the minds of the representatives of the two compared linguocultural communities will differ.
The most common anthroponym found in English proverbs and sayings is the anthroponym Jack. It can be assumed that the frequent use of this name in English proverbs and sayings is due to its widespread prevalence among the representatives of the English people. Due to its prevalence, it becomes a household name in many cases. In the proverb "Jack-of-all-trades", which later gave rise to a more specific unit - the proverb "Jack of all trades and master of none", this proper name is used to refer to a person who undertakes different types of activity, but does not really know how ... The meaning of an English proverb determines its negative connotation. In Russian there is a saying “Мастер на все руки”. Unlike the English proverb, it has a positive connotation and is applied to people who are good at doing various types of work.
Thus, in the pair of sayings we are considering, there is a different degree of refraction of the same concept of mastery: for the Russian mentality, a jack of all trades is a person who can do a lot; for the British, a master is, first of all, a person who is good at one craft, but not all at once. The prototypes of this pair of sayings were undoubtedly specific individuals. But in English, a proper name has become a component of the proverb; in Russian, it did not enter its structure, thereby giving it a more generalized character. This provision does not in the least deny the fact of the applicability of an English proverb to a person with any name, if he takes up a lot, but does not know how to do anything (as a result of generalization of the lexeme "Jack" in this proverb, meaning "a fellow"). It only indicates, firstly, the ease of identifying the nationality of an English proverb, since it contains an anthroponym reality, and, secondly, it shows that different peoples put both completely different principles and different lexical units in the basis of the expression of the same concept (in the English version - a proper name; in Russian - a name common noun).
Comparison of such a pair of sayings as the English "Before one can say Jack Robinson" and its Russian-language functional and semantic equivalent " Не успеть и глазом моргнуть " is a clear example of the fact that the same concept of speed and instant action can be different implemented in figurative and, therefore, linguistic expression. The description of the same concept is based on completely different prototype scenes. In Russian, the figurative expression “Не успеть и глазом моргнуть” (ie, as the first picture of the world) is based on the observation of a physical action that is easily verified in practice - blinking. The genetic prototype of the English proverb was the real historical character Jack Robinson, who made short visits to his acquaintances and left before he was announced. The presence of an anthroponym in an English proverb significantly complicates the identification of the meaning of this text: it indicates the national marking of the text and requires additional background knowledge of linguistic and cultural studies. Moreover, the above couple of sayings also indicate different degrees of refraction of the same concept in two languages. So, for example, in English, speed is conveyed using an image that expresses an action, the duration of which is much longer than the action used as a prototypical image in a Russian proverb (it takes only a fraction of a second to blink an eye, to announce the arrival - several minutes).
The proverb "The vicar of Bray" refers to a semi-legendary vicar from Bray, who lived in the 16th century, who changed his religion four times: twice Protestant and twice Catholic. “The vicar of Bray” is a characteristic name that was created not just to name a person, but to characterize an object. The name-characteristic in this case especially emphasizes such a condemned human property as lack of principle. According to this proverb, unscrupulousness for the British is an inconsistency in faith. The symbol of unprincipledness is a concrete historical person, which has its own realization in the language. In the Russian language there are no proverbs and sayings equivalent to the English proverb “The vicar of Bray”, which greatly complicates the isolation of the concept and, accordingly, the understanding of this linguistic unit by Russian-speaking recipients. To calculate the concept of such proverbs and sayings, the foreign cultural recipient needs background linguistic and cultural knowledge as the main condition for understanding those fragments of the picture of the world that are conveyed by proverbs and sayings that contain anthroponyms-characteristics, including the features of the attitude of the whole people to certain traits of behavior, the nature of that or another person, including their national assessment.