Point of view and assessment in Russian publicistic texts of the early seventeenth century

Problem statement. The article is devoted to the problem of historical figures evaluative nominations functioning. These persons became personages of late-Old Russian Tales of Dark Times. The purpose of the article is to consider the interrelations of different types of viewpoints on historical characters present in the narrative of Russian publicistic texts in the early XVIIth century on the basis of evaluative nominations analysis. The review of scientific literature on the problem. The analysis of scientific literature on the problem shows that the researchers of the forms of representation of the authors’ images and characters are based on the works of the Russian “formalistic school” representatives. It turns out that the narrative publicistic text is characterized by evaluation, expressed through the point of view. The nature of the assessment, in the author’s opinion, depends on the point of view expressed in the narrative. This article describes three points of view that affect the type of nomination. In the examined texts there are all types of points of view, but more frequently narratorial non-diegetic and personal non-diegetic viewpoints are used. And personal diegetic point of view occurs only in in “impostor contexts”. The research methods are based on the analysis of the contexts in which the approaches to personage-evaluation are disclosed. As a rule these personages are political figures of the epoch. The results of the study consist in the description of various points of view presented in the texts of the Tales of Dark Times. The conclusions which the author of the article makes are as follows: the system of evaluative nominations presented in the Tales of Dark Times depends on the type of the viewpoint used in each concrete text. The author’s contribution to the study of the problem of historical figures of late-Old Russian epoch evaluative nominations consists in precise and detailed definition of the means of nomination used to characterize individuals and groups of personages in the texts. It also consists in characterizing the means of revealing the ties between ideologies of the scribes and those of their personages. The scribes’ means of expressing their evaluation are also highlighted in the article.