dialectic of journalistic text

Any text, including journalistic, is, figuratively speaking, a living organism. According to the laws of dialectics, it is born, develops in one direction or another, participates in sociocultural processes, and then it can either literally die, be irretrievably lost, or, as often happens, lose relevance. So, alas, not all incunabula have reached us - the first printed books, those that were released in the 15th century, and most of the media publications buried under a layer of archival dust. True, miraculous transformations happen: a text that was considered archaic almost mummified over the years, for some reason or other, can suddenly be claimed. Mass media sometimes publish materials taken from old newspapers and magazines. They may contain information that is in some way in tune with the current state of affairs. For example, in our days, Ogonyok reprints from the newspapers of the beginning of the century the following reasoning: “The housing problem is the most important for a Muscovite. The rise in price of apartments goes crescendo, soothing speeches that with the advent of large houses the price will fall, hardly substantive. The present time is the time of the hottest building. Houses are built on floors 6–7 with hundreds of apartments, but the tenants do not see any reassuring results. ”

The text never exists outside of time, however, and in time, it should be considered in at least two aspects. First, since its inception, it has taken place on a common axis of historical time, in a common time space, and it should be assessed taking into account the realities of a specific period. Such a development of the phenomenon, taking into account the transformation of values, the actualization at some stage of one or the other signs, called diachronicia (from the Greek. dia - through, through and chronos - time). Secondly, the text can be perceived momentarily, taking into account only at the moment manifested quality features, as if in its instantaneous state, and not in motion. Such a state and study of the text as a semiotic system is called synchrony (from the Greek. Synchronos - simultaneous).

Any written verbal text - both journalistic and literary-artistic - is never completely self-sufficient, confined in the space of exclusively its own semantics, isolated from other developed iconic complexes, not only verbal, but also created on other semiotic basis, in particular iconic . An endless, difficultly organized dialectic process of engaging some textual formations into others is carried out, and the roots of this process are found in ancient times, when the creative imagination of the people gave birth to vivid examples of unwritten texts. The organically inherent property of the text to include third-party elements, as well as the imposition of some associative semantic structures on others with the formation of new additional values ​​is called intertextuality.

Within the framework of the theory of text as a philological discipline, this concept is developed quite deeply, and, of course, it is convenient to use it for a more complete analysis of journalistic texts. But, of course, it must be done in view of their specificity. After all, journalistic texts, compared with literary and artistic, are more multidimensional, primarily in a formal sense.

Intertextuality, being an integral quality feature of any coherent and holistic sign education, is reflected in the concept of intertext. “These are elements of another text that are present in the semantic structure of the text in question as an integral part of it. Intertext is always a compressed paraphrase of a source text, arising not directly from the source text itself, but indirectly through the concept of a source text in the reader’s cultural thesaurus ”[15]. It is not by chance that the notion of a thesaurus (from the Greek. Thesauros is a treasure, a treasury) appears, a kind of vocabulary that accumulates conceptual experience and reflects the semantic relations between its constituent elements. It is precisely because the thesaurus of the person perceiving the message contains ideas about other texts that can be extracted from long-term memory, and the phenomenon of intertextuality turns out to be possible. One of its most specific manifestations is allusions (from Lat. Allusio - a joke, hint), stylistic figures, expressed in the fact that the text correlates with known historical and literary facts, events, characters, and so on. For example, it is enough to cite the words “And you, Brutus”, as a complex semantic structure will immediately be recreated on their basis.

The principle of intertextuality is difficult to implement, the process of reconstruction of the former textual formations is ambiguous, it is possible dialectic denial of "obsolete" concepts, which gives reason to speak, in particular, about "negative intertextuality". Artistic work and journalism differ in this respect, as in many others. “The functional difference between the intertext in a poetic text and the intertext in journal articles is how the intertext is included in the semantic structure of the text. In the poem, intertext contributes to the actualization of a whole layer of meaning, expanding the structure of metaphorical relationships in the text; Intertext in journal articles is an economical way to fulfill pragmatic statements of a statement by including the reader’s consciousness in the generation of reasoning confirming the truth of the transmitted meaning. ” But at the same time, let us emphasize once again, the commonality of many features of artistic and journalistic texts is manifested constantly: even the most logically rigorous and rationalistic publications of newspaper and magazine periodicals are usually not allusions and metaphorical constructions. This is manifested even more clearly in artistic and journalistic genres. “So-called“ lyrical digressions ”can also cause generality, for example, descriptions of a landscape or weather in a newspaper report, when the purpose of a description is not to transmit actual information about a place or natural phenomena at the time of creating the text, but to depict the author’s feelings through them. in those moments "[16].

It is clear that in relation to the text on which they act, all intertextual formations take a defining position, because they precede its appearance. But to emphasize the causal relationships, to clearly identify the chronological and logical determination of intertext, use the concept of pretext (from the Latin. Rgay - in front, before and textus - fabric, plexus, connection). It is convenient for purely practical use, as it allows to establish the origins of third-party inclusions in the text, including, of course, journalistic. Pretexts are very actively involved in the process of creating material. The author necessarily accumulates the experience of someone else’s verbal text-building, interprets it, systematizes it, and, as I.P. Smirnov, the perception of "someone else's literary material necessarily includes the moment of pretext reduction to their simplest semantic components." These components are not always easily recognizable in the new composition, but sometimes it happens that the pretexts are embedded in it as almost holistic structures. Such a technique was “embodied, in particular, in futuristic collages, which imply that posttext is unmarked (that is, text already reproduced created using pretext - auth. ) Mounted entirely from pretext fragments” [17].

Some journalistic texts are also fully or almost completely formed based on the use of existing pretext - for example, compiled materials. True, the question arises of the ethical justification of such a professional move. Another thing is if pretext is involved in the creative process in order to strengthen the original author's material, make it more vivid, increase the intensity and depth of its impact on the reader's consciousness. Such techniques are possible in any journalistic genre. This is what is being said when it is stated that “many feuilletonists turn to the reception of traditional (classical) plot testing, putting new content into the ready form” [18]. In satirical materials, pretexts in general can manifest themselves in a particularly impressive way, take shape in an eloquent manner, and the almost obligatory requirement imposed on them is their recognizability.

Consider published in 1860, feuilleton VS Kurochkina "Critic, romantic and lyricist", directed against the representatives of aesthetics, which was alien to him and clearly abhorred. The writer very caustically makes fun of, in particular, a certain Ivan Ivanovich - a fictional person who was sheltered in the pages of the literary weekly “Son of the Fatherland”:

Ivan Ivanovich is “the eternal and last romantic” and at the same time the “man of life”, meaning by the word “ life is not a blind spirit of the moment, but a great, never-ending, always one secret”. Ivan Ivanovich is generally "a strange and original subject, original, however, as chaos , and not as a harmonious phenomenon." Owing to this originality, Ivan Ivanovich calls morality indrarality , remorse for conscience, he lives in evil-doomed numbers, somewhere in Goncharnaya Street, because, due to all the same originality, it seems that Potter is closer to Moscow than Znamenskaya or Nevsky Prospect; - in these numbers, he plays the guitar and indulges in constant and tireless boosters , and in his spare time free from boosters he writes poems, but what poems! .. Ivan Ivanovich, - the author remarks further, - can say with the same right: “I love disgrace, gentlemen ! ”, As Taras Skotinin said:“ I love pigs, sister! ”.

Introduced by Kurochkin into the fabric of the narration, the character, namely, the hero of the comedy Fonvizin “The Undefeated” Taras Skotinin, is a face easily recognizable and appears as an intertext. This character acts as a transmission element: through it the meaning of the pretext penetrates into the material created by the author. The efficacy of the skillful use of pretext can be very great, because they, introducing additional semantics, allow the author not only more rationally to spend creative resources, but also to stylistically diversify the narration, to introduce into it subtle additional nuances. Pretext is not a quote. It is important that he, in turn, also depends on the context of the new material, on its semantic and psycho-aesthetic characteristics. Pretextual constructions can be subjectively interpreted to some extent, painted in accordance with the will of the author of a new material (posttext) in certain expressive tones. So, the pretextual material of even a serious work, immersed in feuilleton elements, is perceived, at least in part, in its light. Consider a fragment of feuilleton M. Koltsov "Obsolete wife":

A guest from the Military Academy is bitterly distressed. Frowning his gloomy face. His strong jaws are tight. His red, weathered cheekbones reddened. He is outraged by outrageous acts.

He is looking at me. But what can I do?

What can I do - it's a common story!

What usually does not shake. The story of how Yevgeny Onegin didn’t like Tatiana Larina, but later he fell in love, but it was too late - she, taken separately, was turned into a classic novel by a brilliant poet. And hundreds of thousands of brutal domestic dramas, unhappy marriages, filthy lives fall as a fertilizer for centuries, splashing out small lines in the chronicle of incidents of jealousy murders, infants thrown into wells, crookedly cut off by their own lives.

An alien from the Military Academy is excited by the mean act of a comrade. Just think, surprised!

Here, the text of Pushkin’s work serves as a pretext for newspaper feuilleton, and it undergoes a certain influence of context: the author of “Outdated Wife” skillfully balances on the verge of an almost mannered feuilleton jerk and marked the true depth of the human drama.

The range of engagement in the text and creative interpretation of pretext can be extremely wide and diverse: it is not only their implantation into the sensitive fabric of new works, but also frequent use in heading complexes, sometimes without formally returning to them in the course of the narration, even without mentioning, because , according to the author, the pretext should relate as if to the entire narrative as a whole. So, M. Zoshchenko sometimes gave his stories names, guided by this method. In “The Suffering of Young Werther,” it is not at all about any Werther and does not contain any analogies or mediated associative links with a specific Goethe hero. We see the same thing in the story “Poor Lisa”, whose character (also, however, Lisa) has nothing to do with the romantic and tragic heroine of the famous work of N.M. Karamzin. The pretexts here are, in fact, completely parodied, and this is due to the intense influence of Zoshchenko's prose contexts. Such a technique is by no means a rarity for publicism, where it allows us to give additional expressive shades to figurative structures.

As a pretext, any semiotic formation endowed with appropriate logic and expression can be taken. This is, for example, an iconic text — either dynamic, represented in motion (theater, cinema), or static (painting, sculpture, architecture). For one of his satirical stories, Zoshchenko chooses the name of the famous film “The Fires of the Big City”, and the verbal element, the name itself, serves only as a link with the iconic text, in this case with the film text. But in the travel essays "Letters from Spain" V.P. Botkin pretext function performed by other iconic complexes - paintings by B.E. Murillo: a publicist, developing his direct observations, gives a direct and very detailed description of the painter's works, in which there is “nature with all its flesh and blood, and together inspected with some kind of inexpressible ideality”. The involvement of the pretext in the newly created work is a peculiar indication of the connection of the new text with another, referring to it. And another text can be presented and recorded using any existing natural or conventional signs.

The participation of the pretext in the creative process attracts particularly close attention of researchers, and attempts are made, in particular, to classify it. So, in the pretext the thematic aspect, the degree and depth of inclusion in the created material, the role in connection with the meaning of the content are distinguished. The following conclusion seems essential: “In identifying the importance or, on the contrary, the complementarity of the pretext, first of all it is necessary to take into account three circumstances: firstly, what proportion does it have in the artistic consciousness of the author, secondly, its place in the cultural chronotope (i.e. in time and space. —and W. ), to which the writer belongs, thirdly, the degree of support that is provided by the in-text methods of sense-generation to the semantic charge introduced to them in the semantic overtones of the work "[nineteen].

Here we are talking about an artistic and literary text, but even without reservations about the proximity of works of artistic and journalistic genres in the media, it is worth pointing out the fundamental similarity of the basic methods of constructing all verbal texts in general, including, of course, journalistic ones. With a significant substantive difference, technological methods remain identical, and almost every newspaper or magazine issue in materials of all genres can find examples of attracting pretext and other intertextual inclusions.

Any intertext options have in one way or another an impact on the formation of the subtext - an additional semantic formation that occurs within the textual material and to some extent hidden in it, always implicit, requiring speculation. In one work there can be one subtext, and maybe several. It depends on how the text-building process is carried out, whether the subtexts are relevant at all, whether they contribute to the solution of the main task that the author faces. Of course, subtexts can occur accidentally, due to professional negligence, in addition to the author’s will, and this will be a very serious error - alas, the writer said something that he wouldn’t intend to say. However, the real master of the word skillfully uses this most important means of text-making, which is indispensable, first of all, when creating artistic and publicistic works. For example, S.P.Zalygin in the essay "On Tvardovsky" precisely forms a complex subtextual space: in it the details, it would seem, prosaic, irrelevant are filled with a huge additional meaning. Here is an excerpt from this essay (the author comes to say goodbye to Tvardovsky, but no one is allowed into the mourning hall, an exception is made for Zalygin):

The hall is red, the chairs along the walls are red, the red coffin is on a red pedestal.

So it ended, the life of a boy from the farm Zagorje Pochinkovsky district of the Smolensk region. Four hours I thought next to the dead Tvardovsky - the face of a poet, thinker, a resident of the XX century, a citizen of the USSR.

Beautiful with all that was the face.

And what I thought about - this can not be repeated. There are moments that can not be mentally and at least approximately repeated, impossible.

Хоронили Твардовского на Новодевичьем кладбище, могила его – поблизости от могилы Никиты Хрущева.

Здесь представлена сложно и многоступенчато сконструированная система подтекстов, будто вязь, вплетающаяся в ткань основного повествования. Мы домысливаем феноменологию предметов (красный – сильнейшее и символическое цветообозначение), домысливаем судьбу «поэта, мыслителя, жителя XX века, гражданина СССР» и, конечно, пытаемся осознать почти мистическое значение символического погребения «поблизости от могилы Никиты Хрущева».

В подтексте автору удается о многом рассказать, используя ограниченный объем лексического материала. Умение профессионально распорядиться теми возможностями, которые имеются в подтекстуальных конструкциях, свидетельствует о высоком творческом потенциале литератора. Не случайно В.В. Овечкин с похвалой отозвался о сочинителе, которому в отношении сюжетопостроения и развития характеров персонажей многое «удалось сказать, не вынося из подтекста в прямой текст»[20].

Очень важным в творческом плане показателем можно считать многослойность текста, обусловленную существованием подтекста. Подтекстуальные структуры коренятся в самых жизнеобеспечивающих, базовых семантических уровнях произведения. Они, эти структуры, могут быть представлены в концентрированном варианте –воздействовать в каком-то одном месте повествования, порой внезапно, взрывным образом. Но это вовсе не будет означать, что воздействие подтекста скажется лишь на данном фрагменте, поскольку в силу своей яркости и эффектности оно может распространиться на все произведение. Другой вариант – относительно равномерное распределение подтекстуальных структур на протяжении всего повествования. Это может быть очень уместно при создании произведений высокого публицистического звучания – статей, очерков, обзоров. Что касается сатирических жанров, и в частности фельетона, то именно подтекст дает возможность живо и нестандартно организовать весь текстообразующий материал, тонко акцентировать внимание на его ведущих идеях. Нельзя не признать справедливым следующее суждение: «Постепенное, логически обоснованное и композиционно выдержанное развитие подтекста от “ситуации-основы” до публицистических выводов способствует глубокому пониманию фельетона»[21].

Владение законами текстообразования необходимо журналисту, прежде всего для успешной практической работы. Разумеется, автор произведения не стремится лишь на сугубо дискурсивной, то есть рассудочной, основе разрабатывать творческие ходы, просчитывать наиболее рациональные варианты интертекстуальных включений, формировать пространство подтекста. Безусловно, большую роль играет также интуиция, поскольку творчество немыслимо без смелого выхода за границы стереотипов, поворота «против течения» и в ряде случаев парадоксального отрицания жестких логических схем. Однако без понимания природы строго выверенного закона текстообразования творческий процесс будет развиваться хаотично, с высокой энтропией – рассогласованностью структурных элементов. Даже одаренный журналист, не знакомый с научными основами текстообразования, не сможет в полной мере использовать те возможности, которые таятся в текстовом материале, пройдет мимо интересных творческих ходов и, скорее всего, упрощенно и одномерно отразит события в своем произведении.