SEMANTICS OF VERSE AND ITS APPREHENSION

A series of experiments on the apprehension of verse is described. Each experiment with three texts (“V goluboy dalekoy spalenke” by A. Blok, “Ya na dne, ya pechalnyj oblomok” by I. Annensky, “Neznakomka” by A. Blok) included 40 native speakers from hension of prose. When apprehending verse a reader does not attempt at fi nding one most logical and well-grounded understanding of the text, but rests on a number of rather arbitrarily pulled out images, which are combined into a picture, individual for this particular reader.The set of images pulled out by particular reader depends on his mood, memory and personal experience. A set of images pulled out by a particular reader and the overall picture constructed of them may diff er with diff erent informants and may contradict understanding of other readers and the intention of the author. Still such way of apprehension is not a mistake but the normal mechanism of imaginative processing of the text An experiment by V G. Timofeev on understanding of a Peter Blume’s picture shows, that the same mechanism of processing is typical of apprehension of paintings as well.