Syntax phrase models with a modal component in the discursive space of A.P. Chekhov

Abstract

The article is dedicated to the research of syntax phrase models with a modal component in the context of Chekhov’s artistic and epistolary prose. Actuality of the undertaken research is attributable to the fact that sentences with idiomatic structure are insufficiently researched: in particular, the issue of their function in discursive space is not resolved. Due to this fact, phrase models with a modal component that possess syntactic bivalency, which are common for Chekhov’s idiomatic style, are considered in this article; they are analyzed by their variety by “intensity” and “confirmation/denial” scales, as well as a “many/few” opposition. The specificity and objectives of the studied material required the usage of complex of research methods: descriptive, component, structural-semantic and statistical methods; text and distributional analysis of phrase models that express modality. The author’s modality is a very important text category, the studying of which is the most productive in terms of text fragments of bigger and shorter extent. In the Chekhov’s discursive space, the paragraph often either starts with the studied phrase models, which are unraveled in the following sentences, or ends with them, creating a summarizing judgement. The studied phrase models are also followed by the explicative and argumentative component, and are established by emotional and expressive units and question marks. The mental space of Chekhov’s works is filled with both relevant vocabulary and grammar structures (e.g., phrase models with modal components), which are oriented to relational meanings in the field of semantic of dependency. Meanwhile, the conditionality category includes not only typical units with meanings of target, cause and effect, but also similar meanings that are followed by the modal and evaluative component.