Paul Donets
Assistant Lecturer at the Department of Translation and Theoretical and Applied Linguistics,
State Institution “South Ukrainian National Pedagogical University named after K. D. Ushynsky”,
Odesa, Ukraine
E-mail: dp85@ukr.net
ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6759-0920
DOI: https://doi.org/10.24195/2616-5317-2019-29-8
Key words: immortalism, cosmism, posthuman, science fiction, transhumanism.
The article examines stylistic devices in which distinguished Ukrainian writer Oles Berdnyk expresses transhumanist ideas. The author is famous for being one of the brightest representatives of native science fiction. His early novels “Paths of Titans”, “The Arrow of Time” and “Children of Infinity”, which depict a utopian future, have been chosen as an object to be studied. It is found out that the message translated by the author in a given period of his creative activity reproduces primarily the techno-optimistic discourse that prevailed in the middle of the twentieth century and has some obvious transhumanist and immortalist indications, which can be observed both at substantive (the evolution of a man into an omnipotent immortal being is being depicted) and stylistic level. In its simplest form, this is manifested in the active use of positively colored epithets, hyperbolized metaphors, metonymic embodiments and other stylistic means which shape central features of the author's idiostyle. The tropes and figures of speech used by the author are in most cases emotionally expressive, that is, they contain elements of value (mostly positive, in this case). One common characteristic of Berdnyk’s prose is its high expressiveness, that is, solemn and pompous style, contrast and bright images. Building on the ideas of cosmism philosophy, he follows the scientistic trends of the Golden Age of western science fiction on the one hand and introduces some distinctive elements of national Ukrainian conceptosphere into the established genre on the other. His late works, however, underwent drastic philosophical changes, resulting in a gradual departure from his previous views.
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