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- Word usage in the story “Youth” (1857) in the context of Leo Tolstoyʼs idiostyle and the literary language of the era
- Romanov D.A. Word usage in the story “Youth” (1857) in the context of Leo Tolstoyʼs idiostyle and the literary language of the era. Vestnik of Kostroma State University, 2026, vol. 32, no. 3, pp. 98–107. (In Russ.) https://doi.org/10.34216/1998- 0817-2026-32-3-98-107.
- DOI: https://doi.org/10.34216/1998-0817-2026-32-3-98-107
- УДК: 821.161.1«19»
- EDN: TOEMOE
- Publish date: 2026-09-10
- Annotation: Even in the creation of his early oeuvre (including “Youth”), Leo Tolstoy developed a very specific approach to the selection of vocabulary and its functional use in the text. The imbuing of adjectives with the moral semantics of categorical meanings, the expansion of the literary lexicon by incorporating “chamber” units used in the writerʼs family circle, and the active introduction of new formations (potential words, compound adjectives and adverbs, Russified loanwords, and original foreign-language inclusions) are all indicative of Tolstoyʼs idiostyle. Based on data from the National Corpus of the Russian Language, it can be argued that Tolstoy significantly updated the vocabulary of the literary language of his era. Tolstoyʼs semantic imprint is evident in many words to this day. The writerʼs manipulation of the expressive resources of language, elevating some of them to the rank of artistic details, shaped the poetics of the outward restraint of the story “Youth” while deepening the psychological impact of non-tropical linguistic devices (diminutives, repetitions, compositional conjunctions). “Images of direct speech” (according to Lidiya Ginzburg) occupy a prominent place in the story, serving as one of the means of embodying the protagonist’s spiritual crisis and transformation.
- Keywords: literary text, Leo Tolstoy, idiostyle, vocabulary, new formations, borrowings, detail, tropes, direct speech
- Funding and acknowledgments: This study was supported by grant no. 25-28-20226 from the Russian Science Foundation, “Contexts of Leo Tolstoyʼs biographical trilogy: the 21st century”, https://rscf.ru/project/25-28-20226.
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