Specific features of the use of somatic vocabulary in the poetry of O. Mandelstam

The article discusses the features of the use of basic somatisms in O. Mandelstam’s poems, determines their significance for the poet’s world. The importance of this group of vocabulary is explained by the fact that it largely determines the linguistic world image of the writer and the characteristic features of his perception. The study was based on the contexts extracted by the method of continuous sampling from the publication: Mandelstam O.E. Works: in 2 vols. Vol. 1. Poems. Moscow, Khudozhestvennaya Literatura Publ., 1990. In the course of the analysis, the composition of the semantic field of somatic vocabulary in the poems of O. Mandelstam was outlined, the most frequent words were identified: hand, eyes, lips, head, heart, blood. Along with these lexemes, not so much high-frequency names that are dominant in the poet’s idiostyle were also studied. This is a group of words associated with the skeletal system: vertebrae, spine (ridge), cartilage, rib. The contexts of the use of somatisms were classified into metaphorical and non-metaphorical ones (along with metaphorical uses, we also considered uses in comparative constructions). The use of somatisms in comparative constructions as both images and objects of comparison has been considered. It is noted that in non-metaphorical contexts, somatic vocabulary is often used in portrait descriptions, in descriptions of bodily contact, situations related to love relationships. Particular attention was paid to the use of somatisms in contexts related to reflection on poetic creativity, the poet’s place in the world, and the psychophysiological states of the lyrical subject. As a result of the study, the connection of key somatisms with the worldview constants of the poet’s idiostyle was proved.