GESTURE IN POETIC DISCOURSE

The word gesture in the Russian poetic language does not belong to high-frequency ones, but examples of its use allow us to make interesting observations. Cases of the use of the word gesture in poetic texts are considered through the prism of reputable linguistic studies on Russian gesticulation, as well as works of literary, linguopoetic orientation, in which gestures are understood as signs, images, part of a system of symbols, including for individual authors. The multivolume “Dictionary of the language of Russian poetry (20th сentury)” (Moscow, 2001, 2003, 2008, 2010, 2013, 2015, 2017, 2019, 2021, 2022) is based on works of ten outstanding poets of the Silver Age: I. Annensky, A. Akhmatova, A. Blok, S. Yesenin, M. Kuzmin, O. Mandelstam, V. Mayakovsky, B. Pasternak, V. Khleb nikov, M. Tsvetaeva. This dictionary contains about forty contexts with this word (the largest number is noted in Tsvetaeva). There are more than 450 occurrences in the Poetry corpus of the Russian National Corpus. The article analyzes diff erent types of poetic use of the word gesture. In some cases, it is used without specifi ers (to denote a gesture as such, an indefi nite gesture), and often — in a number of names of other non-verbal manifestations; often the word gesture is clarifi ed by indicating the way in which the body movement is performed. In poetic discourse, attributive refi nements are frequent, which characterize a gesture from one side or another. The cases of fi gurative interpretation of the word gesture are of particular interest.