ILLUSTRATION AS A PARATEXTUAL ELEMENT OF LITERARY ANALYSIS

Abstract

The article explores methods of creating an epic and lyrical illustrative style based on illustrations by G. Dore and S. Botticelli for Dante’s “Divine Comedy”, illustrations by M. Miturich for Homer’s poem “The Odyssey” and S. Ostrov for S. Kozlov’s fairy tale “Will we really always exist?”. The study of literature in the metamorphological, paratextual aspect is stated as an actual and promising direction in modern literary criticism. In the epic type of illustrations, the antinomy of the volumes of the world and man, characteristic of epic works, spatial monumentality, stability, mythologization of the cosmogonic elements of earth, water, sky, heavenly bodies prevails. Poetic or lyrical illustrations are characterized by an emotional dominant, a special harmony and muted color, elegance and lightness of linear movement, weightlessness of figures, and the “airy” space of the sheet.