THE CONCEPT MENSCH IN THE GRIMM BROTHERS’ FAIRY TALES

Abstract

The article deals with considering the concept MENSCH on the example of the Grimm brothers’ fairy tales. The given work presents the investigation of possibility of this concept verbalization as well as the analysis of fairy-tale and real characters’ interaction. Hence, one can speak about the wide range of representants. The studies of many linguists are devoted to fairy tales. According to numerous researches two peculiarities of fairy tales are traditionally distinguished: the genre of any fairy tale is a narrative and any fairy tale is certain to be the flight of imagination. Fairy tales are often divided into two large groups: folklore and literary. The creation of a literary tale is based on some repetition of a folk tale but they differ from each other. Literary tale has a written variant which reflects some specific features of the author’s style. Speaking about the Grimm brothers’ tales one can mention the original symbiosis of author’s and folklore tales. The representation of the concept MENSCH in the Grimm brothers’ fairy tales is quite varied. The main characters are mostly kings, princes, princesses. Sometimes the attention is focused on the representatives of different specialities: shepherds, woodcutters, foresters, peasants. It is connected with the description of all aspects of human life in fairy tales. It is interesting that in many tales the representatives of older generation are mainly positive characters: they are clever, kind, honest while younger people often have negative features. The text analysis shows that the concept MENSCH is represented by such nouns as Mann, Frau, Kind, Mädchen. The usage of these nouns is conditioned by their neutral connotation that makes generalization possible. The analysis also reveals the binary nature of a human through the distinctive opposition of positive and negative characters, kindness and evil. The cognitive analysis allows us to claim that all ages, gender peculiarities, family and social relationships are included in fairy tales texts.