a narrative dimension of the concept
The paper deals with a subject matter motif «immortality» regarded as a narrative unit. A subject
matter motif may be schematically presented as a triangular frame including notional, imaginative
and evaluative constituents. Its notional constituents describe eternal life existing contrary
to physical laws of the world. Its images are presented as transfigurations of human beings who
turned to be eternally young, beautiful and invulnerable or alternatively became ugly and repulsive.
Its evaluative features make an ambivalent combination of a dream to obtain an ever-lasting
life and a horror connected with it as it contradicts the very essence of existence.
A narrative dimension of immortality as developed in fiction is manifested in the scripts
of travelling, transformation or staying in the point of inalterability. The idea of immortality is
implemented in a number of plots in folklore and artistic fiction. Immortal gods enjoy their eternal
adventures and interfere in the life of mortals who either share the divine joy of ever-lasting
pleasures or are doomed to endless suffering. Usually mortals who turned inaccessible to death
have a certain vulnerable place on their bodies to be hit and finally they are affected there. Immortal
beings live endlessly because the secret of their existence is situated somewhere outside
their bodies and the main character usually finds it and thus terminates their lives. Immortality
may become a severe punishment inflicted upon people for their sins (the stories of Ahasverus,
Shi Huandi, etc.) and they have to go in circles losing their identity and taste for life. An important
thing about becoming immortal is that no return to natural way of thing after it is possible.
The key-point of immortality in the post-modern world is the idea of endless play of life
aimed at no result as such, which means that genuine immortality is understood as ever-lasing
Here and Now feeling absorbing everything.
Immortality in fiction as depicted in prose and poetry is associated with a lack of genuine sensations
beyond the edges of this world, personality dissolution, and transition to a ludic attitude to
reality. Two aspects of immortality are to be taken into consideration – the eternal life of Creator
and creation.
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a narrative dimension of the concept // Сибирский филологический журнал. 2017. № 4. Pp. 149–162. DOI: 10.17223/18137083/61/14.