FOLK REALITY IN THE NOVEL OF L. A. BUNIN "LIFE OF ARSENYEV"

The article deals with folklorism in the prose by I. A. Bunin. The object of study is the novel "Life of Arseniev", Book One. Scholars have already addressed the functioning of the folklore traditions in the writer's poetry, but they paid more attention to the external forms of folklorism. However, it has seemingly become imminent to consider the internal manifestations of the folklore traditions, which are expressed at the level of interaction of various space models, including mundane and ideal. The latter is seen by Arseniev through various elements of the environment and books, Russian fairy tales, and world literature. Parallels with Pushkin's works are indicative, including Ruslan and Ludmila, a fairy-tale poem that is also mentioned in the novel, and M. Lermontov. Much attention is paid to the highly intense semiotics of the moon and starry sky symbols. The folkloric comments to the text allow identifying the peculiar features of the national axiology in the novel and gaining insights into the mystery of Arseniev's "Russian soul." The methodology of this study is connected with a holistic analysis of a literary text using structural, typological and comparative methods of research. These methods enable us to move to describe deeper layers of literature, the intertwinement of the folklore tradition and art, and with it the insertion of thanatological complex. Instead of narrower consideration of the concept of "folklore" the author goes beyond verbal forms of creativity, taking into account myth, ritual, and ritual.