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Dar141.Html
IN SLOVAKIA #141 (196)
Mikhail Epstein's projective lexicon
January 8, 2006
Words about reading and writing: chitky , serovik .
malochitka (cf. malozhka, youngster) - one who reads little.
serovik (cf. draft , belovik ) - an intermediate stage of creative work between the draft and the belovik.
Aphorism
news
Mikhail Epstein's projective lexicon
January 8, 2006
Dear friends!
Happy New Year,
I wish you peace, health, happiness, good luck!
Words about reading and writing: chitky , serovik .
The extremely economical and modest suffix of adjectives “-to-” is capable of much more than the current language allows it. How, for example, can one express in one word the simple thought that a given work is readable and conducive to reading? The word "readable" - a hybrid of a Russian root with an English suffix - is one of the ugliest words to appear in the Russian language in recent decades. The words “respectable” and “fashionable” are borrowed from English entirely and are uniform in style (respectable, fashionable), while “readable” is a morphological grotesque (then “readable” would be better). It could have sounded in the mouth of a vulgar “cultured” lady of Soviet times, who in her reading preferences did not move beyond the “readable” V. Pikul and Yu. Semenov.
And what resource is there in Russian to express this meaning - “easy to read, well read”?
What can be heated, what can be heated well, we call firey . What breaks well is brittle . What sells well is popular . What flows well is loose . That which melts and forges well is fusible and malleable . So what do you call something that reads well? Well, of course, “ readable ”.
This is the meaning of the suffix -k- in all the above verbal adjectives: the subject’s compliance with the action indicated by the verb.
readable - something that reads well is conducive to quick, enjoyable reading.
Quite a readable book! Be sure to read it!See the article by M. Epstein in Nezavisimaya Gazeta (December 8, 2005) Sensitive people, sensitive books. About the merits of readers to literature.Well, how do you like my storyteller? - Very readable . But nothing more.
Another readable product of Mr. P. has come out. But we have the right to expect from a gifted writer not only readability , but some more meaningful insight into the essence of things.
The book turned out to be easy to read , popular, people willingly take it, even snatch it up. We can congratulate the author on his commercial success.
A readable work is not necessarily artistically convincing. It is unlikely that "Faust" can be considered readable . And yet, for most “non-genius” writings, legibility is not only a virtue, but also a necessary requirement. Why write something that can't be read?
Nikitin is very depressed. He wrote his best thing, but he put so much into it that it seems unreadable to him . She didn't even take much notice of her friends.
The Russian reader is the most sensitive in the world! Russian books are the most readable among the people! The languishing fine literature in the 21st century would find a second wind - thanks to the encouragement of readers, and not just writers.
malochitka (cf. malozhka, youngster) - one who reads little.
I'm not a good reader , that is. I read a lot, but I skim quickly,
I plucked a piece from the book and that was enough, I ran on.Aren't you ashamed to be such a little reader ? Others at your age have already read Balzac and Dickens, but you are still hanging around on Belkin's Tales.
serovik (cf. draft , belovik ) - an intermediate stage of creative work between the draft and the belovik.
The language has words only to designate the initial and final stages of writing or artistic work: “draft” and “belovik”. (There is also the word “chistovik” - a synonym for “belovik”). But the most important, complex, painful thing happens in the interval when black gradually gives way to gray until it gives way to white.
Previously, the word “serovik” was used only as a regional word, in a very narrow meaning, which is given by V. Dahl:
" Serovik Sib., a kind of gray, very dark clay; gray savage, sandstone."
Let me read some poetry! or do you only have a draft? - Not a draft, not a white paper, but something gray. - That's it, let's do it. I like to read seroviks until they have been cleaned of the rubbish from which they grow.Each essay has only one belovik, but many seroviks . A real writer knows all the shades of gray.
I don’t want to send you a draft; I won’t get to the white paper soon, but I’ll send the gray draft soon.
As a literary critic, I am interested in the intermediate forms between the draft and the white paper - the serovik , perhaps the richest stage of work in meaning and interpretation... Read Dostoevsky's seroviks - there are some pearls there that were not included in the final version. And drafts are a dark and boring matter, this is only for a specialist.
So, we throw the drafts into the trash, they are no longer needed; the white papers are also printed. But the seroviki should be put in a separate folder, from there you can still extract something that will be useful for other work.
gray (adjective, cf. draft , white ) - relating to serovik, to the intermediate stage of work on a text or work; already processed, but not yet completely ready.
Well, read your masterpiece. What version is this, white? - No, gray , we still need to work a little, but we can already see the light at the end of the tunnel._______________________________________________________________________________________
Aphorism
A new word is not created without harm and damage to the writer: if
the word is accepted by society, the writer is praised moderately, and if rejected, then he is strongly scolded.
Ben Jonson (1572-1637), English playwright and poet.
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Memo (from previous issues)
to make possible (trans. verb) - to make possible, to transfer something actual into a state of possibility, to transfer an object from the realm of being or knowledge to the realm of probability, conjecture, assumption.
You know, Katya, we have reached a dead end. One option is not the answer; at least two options are needed. Let's clear up the situation. You can leave. But you can stay._________________________________________________________________When are we happier: when some possibility is realized - or when reality becomes possible ? When do we get a chance to get a job - or when do we get this very job (and can no longer refuse it)?
Everything in her life is going well: a rich house, a caring fiancé... The future is as clear as the present. And anxiety grows in her soul: how to make this house, this estate possible? It seems that she would exchange this calm happiness for just the possibility of a different life. After all, she is still a bride, but already like a wife. ( issue 35)
news
1. The word “predictionary” (created by M. Epstein in 2000, published in 2003) is registered as a new word in the English language and is included in the American Dictionary of Neologisms.
Predictionary is a proto-dictionary (pre-dictionary) and at the same time
dictionary-predictor of future words (predict-ionary).
2. In the 10th issue of the magazine “Zvezda” (2005), an article by M. Epstein “ Word and Silence in Russian Culture ” was published.
3. In the 6th issue of the journal “Voprosy Literatury” the article “ Little Man in a Case: Bashmachkin-Belikov Syndrome ” was published.
4. The Nezavisimaya Gazeta (Ex Libris) published an article Sensitive people, sensitive books. On the merits of readers to literature (Dec. 8, 2005).
5. The online magazine “Topos” published the articles “ Four Sides of Love ” (desire, inspiration, tenderness and pity) and “ Lyubol ” (love and pain).
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network project Mikhail Epstein's "The Gift of Words" has been published since April 17, 2000. Every week, several new words are sent to subscribers, with definitions and examples of use. These words are not in any dictionary, and yet they denote significant phenomena and concepts for which there has not yet been a place in the language and public consciousness. "Dar" also conducts discussions about the Russian language, discusses letters and suggestions from readers. “The Gift” can serve as a guide to word creation, an introduction to the world of linguistic fantasies and mental technologies. “The word controls the brain, the brain controls the hands, hands control the kingdoms” (Velimir Khlebnikov).
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PreDictionary - a collection of English neologisms by M. Epstein.
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