Лингвокультурологический аспект исследования английской загадки

В связи с наличием огромного тематического спектра загадок, очевидна потребность тематической классификации загадок с целью систематизации процесса их изучения.

Классификация загадок представлена Е.А. Тупичкиной. В ней представлены следующие группы:

1. загадки, в которых дается описание предмета или явления путем перечисления различных его признаков.

2. загадки, где описание предполагает краткую характеристику предмета или явления, для решения данной загадки нужно выделить

3. загадки, которые включают отрицательное сравнение:

4. загадки, в описании которых использованы метафоры.

5. загадки, в которых представлено описание не самого предмета (явления), а буквенного (слогового) состава слова, его обозначающего. К данной категории можно отнести:

· шарады (слова-загадки, в которых несколько букв, слогов или частей слова выделено и описано самостоятельно);

· метаграммы (загадки, в которых из загаданного слова путем замены одной из буквы другой получается новое слово);

· анаграммы (слова, получающиеся из других слов при обратном чтении или при перестановке слогов и букв);

логографы (слова-загадки, меняющие свое значение при прибавлении букв) [Тупичкина 1990].

Ниже представлены примеры загадок для каждой из групп классификации Е. А. Тупичкиной:

1. загадки, в которых дается описание предмета или явления путем перечисления различных его признаков:

E.g. I am hot yet cold. I am liquid yet solid. I am flaky but wet (answer: The Wax); I have a golden head, a golden tail, but no body (answer: A gold coin);

I move like the wind. I reflect what you see. I am many colors although I may not be. I see everything around the world without moving. I have been here since before inhabitants on this planet. I can twist and turn without feeling. I can get angry and throw a temper without being ashamed. I am used by every one. No one knows where I came from (answer: water);

I am a white box with a golden treasure inside. I am oval and can only be opened from the inside (answer: Egg);

I have two heads but only one body. The stiller I stand, the faster I run (answer: An hourglass) [URL: http://riddlesbrainteasers.com];

2. загадки, где описание предполагает краткую характеристику предмета или явления, для решения данной загадки нужно выделить отмеченный признак, связать его по ассоциации с другими, по одному или двум признакам восстановить целостный образ:

E.g. I am but three holes. When you come out of me, you are still inside me (answer: The Shirt);

Look in my face I am somebody and look in my back I am nobody (answer: Mirror);

My neighbor makes mistakes. I get rid of them (answer: Eraser)

I'm hiding in the air. I'm hiding everywhere. Under your bed, in your cupboard, I'm hiding everywhere (answer: Oxygen);

What belongs to you but others use it more than you do? (answer: Your name) [URL: http://riddles.com];

3. загадки, которые включают отрицательное сравнение:

E.g. Though it is not an ox, it has horns; though it is not an ass, it has a pack-saddle; and wherever it goes it leaves silver behind. What is it? (answer: A snail) [URL: http://thinks.com];

4. загадки, в описании которых использованы метафоры:

E.g. I have a little house in which I live all alone. It has no doors or windows, and if I want to go out I must break through the wall (answer: A chicken in an egg) [URL: http://www.quizandquestions.com];

5. загадки, в которых представлено описание не самого предмета (явления), а буквенного (слогового) состава слова, его обозначающего. К данной категории можно отнести:

· шарады (слова-загадки, в которых несколько букв, слогов или частей слова выделено и описано самостоятельно):

E.g. What starts with a 'P', ends with an 'E' and has thousands of letters? (answer: The Post Office);

How many letters are in the alphabet? (answer: 11 – THE ALPHABET);

I come one in a minute, twice in a moment, but never in a thousand years (answer: “M”);

Pronounced as one letter, And written with three, Two letters there are, And two only in me. I'm double, I'm single, I'm black, blue, and gray, I'm read from both ends, And the same either way (answer: An eye);

I am the beginning of sorrow, and the end of sickness. You cannot express happiness without me, yet I am in the midst of crosses. I am always in risk, yet never in danger. You may find me in the sun, but I am never out of darkness
(answer: The letter “S”) [URL: http://www.just-riddles.net];

· метаграммы (загадки, в которых из загаданного слова путем замены одной из буквы другой получается новое слово)^

E.g. You’ll have me at night and if you remove the first letter I denote the top, such as on a train (answer: Supper. You eat supper at night, and removing the first letter leaves upper) [URL: http://riddles.com];

· анаграммы (слова, получающиеся из других слов при обратном чтении или при перестановке слогов и букв)^

E.g. I have two fruits in my basket. When I rearrange the name of one, I get the other. What are the fruits? (answer: lemon and melon) [URL: http://riddlesbrainteasers.com];

· логографы (слова-загадки, меняющие свое значение при прибавлении букв):

E.g. I’ single now but when you add an “S” I become more. Add another “S” I’m single once more (answer: prince – princes – princess);

How do you make "one" disappear? (answer: Add a "g" to make it "gone" or an "n" to make it "none");

I know a word of letters three. Add two and fewer there will be (answer: few) [URL: http://www.quizandquestions.com] [Тупичкина, 1990, с. 36].

Согласно классификации, составленной Ю.Г. Кругловым, загадки делятся на загадки–иносказания; загадки–описания; загадки–вопросы; загадки–задачи [Круглов, 1990]. Исследователь делает описание каждой группы: в загадках – иносказаниях метафорически представлен какой-либо предмет или явление. Например: “There are four brothers in this world that were all born together. The firstruns and never wearies. The secondeats and is never full. The third drinks and is always thirsty. The fourth sings a song that is never good” (answer: Water, fire, earth, wind) [URL: http://puzzle.dse.nl].

В загадке – описании нет иносказания, а присутствует описание предмета или явления. Например, в загадке “I am a white box with a golden treasure inside. I am oval and can only be opened from the inside ” (answer: egg) [URL: http://thinks.com]. То есть в загадках данной группы, представлены характерные черты загадываемого предмета.

К загадкам – вопросам он относит загадки типа: “What looks like food, tastes like food, smells like food, sounds like food when you cook it, is grown in dirt like food, fills up your stomach like food, but is not food?” (answer: a poisonous mushroom) [URL: http://www.quizandquestions.com].

Загадки – задачи, по мнению Ю.Г. Круглова, требуют от отгадывающего умения считать: “A boy leaves home in the morning to go to school. At the moment that he leaves the house, he looks at the clock in the mirror. The clock has no number indication and for this reason, the boy makes a mistake in interpreting the time (mirror image). Just assuming the clock must be out of order, the boy cycles to school, where he arrives after twenty minutes. At that moment, the clock at school shows a time that is two and a half hours later than the time that the boy saw on the clock at home. At what time did he reach school?” (answer: The boy reaches school at five minutes past seven plus twenty minutes of cycling, which is twenty-five minutes past seven) [URL: http://puzzle.dse.nl].

Некоторые загадки могут быть отнесены одновременно к нескольким категориям, например: “ Three eyes I have, all in a row; when the red one opens, all freeze. What am I?” (answer: A traffic light) [URL: http://www.just-riddles.net]. Данный пример построен в вопросительной форме. Однако в загадке используется метафора (Three eyes I have, all in a row), что свидетельствует об использовании иносказания. Соответственно, данный пример можно отнести как к загадке-иносказанию, так и к загадке-вопросу [Круглов 1990].

все загадки на следующие категории:

Ø Christmas Riddles

Ø Hard Riddles

Ø Long Riddles

Ø Rhyming Riddles

Ø Trivial Riddles

Ø Classic Riddles

Ø Impossible Riddles

Ø Math Riddles

Ø Short Riddles

Ø What Am I Riddles

Ø Easy Riddles

Ø Kids Riddles

Ø Play On Words Riddles

Ø Who Am I Riddles

Ø Funny Riddles

Ø Logic Riddles

Ø Poem Riddles

Ø Trick Riddles

Ø Word Riddles

Данная классификация является смешанной, так как сочетает в себе как тематические особенности загадок (Christmas Riddles), так и структурные, т. е. особенности, относящиеся к определенному языковому уровню, например, Rhyming Riddles. Рассмотрим примеры загадок к каждой из этих категорий:

Christmas Riddles:

I have, in a sense, everlasting life.

My brothers grow old and brittle while I stay ripe.

I am greatly appreciated and adorned with jewels, and my head has a crown, it's beautiful.

For most of my life I have braved cold, or heat, but where I am taken it's always warm, but my fame cannot last.

The jewels are taken off, along with my crown,

and I am shunned until my successor arrives in one year.

What am I? (Christmas Tree)

Данная загадка является не просто тематической, она содержит в себе информацию о традициях народа.

Hard Riddles:

The man who invented it doesn't want it. The man who bought it doesn't need it. The man who needs it doesn't know it. What is it? (Coffin). Long Riddles:

A boy was at a carnival and went to a booth where a man said to the boy, "If I write your exact weight on this piece of paper then you have to give me $50, but if I cannot, I will pay you $50." The boy looked around and saw no scale so he agrees, thinking no matter what the carny writes he'll just say he weighs more or less. In the end the boy ended up paying the man $50. How did the man win the bet? (The man did exactly as he said he would and wrote "your exact weight" on the paper).

Rhyming Riddles:

Alive without breath,

As cold as death;

Never thirsty, ever drinking,

All in mail never clinking (Fish).

Trivial Riddles:

How high would you have to count before you would use the letter A in the English language spelling of a whole number? (One Thousand).

Загадка касается непосредственно английского языка. Интересно то, что при переводе на русский язык загадка теряет свой смысл полностью, так как именно в английском языке первым числом, в котором можно найти букву «А» является число Thousand (тысяча), тогда как в русском языке эта буква появляется уже при буквенном написании числа «два».

Classic Riddles:

I 'm as big as an elephant, but lighter than a feather (The wind).

Impossible Riddles:

The king dies and two men, the true heir and an impostor, both claim to be his long-lost son. Both fit the description of the rightful heir: about the right age, height, coloring and general appearance.

Finally, one of the elders proposes a test to identify the true heir. One man agrees to the test while the other flatly re-fuses. The one who agreed is immediately sent on his way, and the one who re-fused is correctly identified as the rightful heir.

Can you figure out why? (The test was a blood test. The elder remembered that the true prince was a hemophiliac).

Math Riddles:

Farmer Brown came to town with some watermelons. He sold half of them plus half a melon, and found that he had one whole melon left.

How many melons did he take to town? (Three melons).

Short Riddles:

What gets wetter and wetter the more it dries? (A towel).

What Am I Riddles:

For some I go fast

for others I'm slow.

To most people, I'm an obsession

relying on me is a well practiced lesson.

What am I? (Time).

Easy Riddles:

What goes around the world but stays in a corner? (A stamp).

Kids Riddles:

They have not flesh, nor feathers, nor scales, nor bone. Yet they have fingers and thumbs of their own.(Gloves).

Play On Words Riddles:

What is it that when you take away the whole, you still have some left over? (Wholesome).

Silly Riddles:

Romeo and Juliet are found dead on the floor in a bedroom. When they were discovered, there were pieces of glass and some water on the floor. The only furniture in the room is a shelf and a bed. The house in is a remote location, away from everything except for the nearby railway track.

What caused the death of Romeo and Juliet? (Romeo and Juliet are fish. The rumble of the train knocked the tank off the shelf).

Who Am I Riddles:

I have married many women but I am not married.

Who am I? (I Am A Priest).

Funny Riddles:

What do you call a witch that lives in the sand? (A sandwitch).

Logic Riddles:

A man was going to buy a $5000 car, but he didn't pay a penny for the car, how is this possible? (He didn't pay a penny, he payed $5000 for the car!).

Poem Riddles:

We are little creatures;

All of us have different features.

One of us in glass is set;

One of us you'll find in jet.

Another you may see in tin,

And the fourth is boxed within.

If the fifth you should pursue,

It can never fly from you. (Vowels).

Trick Riddles:

A blue house is made of blue bricks. A yellow house is made of yellow bricks. A red house is made of red bricks. An orange house is made of orange bricks. What would a green house be made of? (Glass).

Word Riddles:

Can you name three consecutive days without using the words Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, or Sunday? (Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow).

В проведенном выше исследовании тематического разнообразия загадок нами частично затрагивался вопрос о наличии в загадках особенностей, передающих некоторые черты культуры английского народа. Эти особенности являются лингвокультурологическими и присущи не только загадкам, перечисленным нами выше, но и многим другим.

Так, например, существует множество детских загадок, в которых есть названия животных, например:

I live in the woods.

I’m very big and furry.

I have a big nose, a little tail and four legs.

I like to eat fish and berries.

I am a…

(answer: bear) [URL: http://zagadkinder.org].

As red as fire,

With a fuzzy tale.

He likes long walks.

It is … (answer: a fox) [URL: http://zagadkinder.org].

Подтверждением того, что данные животные обитают в лесах Великобритании, являются данные учебника по страноведению

О. А. Леоновича: “The animal life of the UK is much like the rest of northwestern Europe. Many larger animals like bear and wolf are rare, but there are many foxes and red deer [Леонович, 2004, с. 121].

Lives in seas and rivers.

His hands are like two pincers.

As round as a cab. Who is it? -

It is … (answer: a crab) [URL: http://kenglish].

Согласно данным М. А. Васильевой и Е. А. Пугачевой, данное наименование относится к разделу «fishing»: Fishing: The greatest quantities of fish are taken from the Gulf of Mexico (shrimp, oysters). The Pacific Ocean supplies Alaska Pollock, cod, crabs, herring, salmon, tuna. The Atlantic yields cod, flounder, herring and other fish [Васильева, Пугачева, 2012, с. 97].

Кроме названий животных, к лингвокультурологическим особенностям относятся названия растений, овощей, фруктов и т.д. Примеры таких названий также встречаются в некоторых английских загадках:

I can be red and yellow.
I also can be green.
I may be the home

Of a hungry worm,
So make sure I am clean. (answer: apple) [URL: http://zagadkinder.org].

Name a red sweet fruit who wears its seeds on the outside. It is small, but so tasty! Kids like to eat it and drink shakes with it. (answer: strawberry)

When you cut me up
I will make you cry.
I smell really strong
But I don’t know why.
On the white page I can be found
In your garden I’ll be underground.

What am I? (answer: onion) With all my eyes
I still can’t see.
I grow down underneath the ground.
You eat me whole or cut me thin
and fry me till I’m golden brown.

What am I? (answer: potato) I have a white and heavy flower,
And it is packed with vitamin power.
My name is long and
Rhymes with tower.

What am I? (answer: cauliflower)

Подтверждением того, что данные растения, овощи и фрукты являются типичными агрикультурами англоязычных стран, являются данные учебника по страноведению М. А. Васильевой и Е. А. Пугачевой:

Agriculture – is a major industry in the United States and the country is a net exporter of food. The country is a top producer of corn, soy beans, rice, and wheat. Beef cattle rank as most valuable product of American farms. Other leading farm products, in order of value, include milk, chickens and eggs, cotton. UK farms also produce large amounts of hay, tobacco, turkeys, potatoes, tomatoes, apples,cauliflower, onion, strawberry, and peanuts [Васильева, Пугачева, 2012, с. 97].

К лингвокультурологическим явлениям так же относятся названия различных мер веса, названия денежных единиц, имена собственные и др. Они встречаются реже, чем названия животных и растений, но нами были найдены некоторые примеры употребления в загадках этих наименований:

What’s the smallest number of coins you can use to make up exactly sixty-five cents? (answer: four coins – two quarters, a dime and a nickel) – названия денежных единиц. [URL: http://zagadkinder.org].

В словаре G. Fox и M. Rundell приведены следующие дефиниции этих слов: Quarter is a coin that is worth one quarter of an American or Canadian dollar, or 25 cents [Fox, Rundell, Macmillan, 2006, c. 1097]; Dime is a coin worth ten cents in the US and Canada [Fox, Rundell, Macmillan, 2006, c. 257]; Nickel is a coin in the US and Canada worth five cents [Fox, Rundell, Macmillan, 2006, c. 302].

Together, Tom and his father weigh 280 pounds. Tom’s father weighs three times as much as Tom does. How much does Tom weigh? (answer: 70 pounds) [URL: http://zagadkinder.org]

В этой загадке мы обнаружили название меры веса – Pound is a unit of measuring weight, used in several countries including the US and UK, containing 16 ounces and equal to 0.454 kilograms [Fox, Rundell, Macmillan, 2006].