Achieving the effect of relativity through the reconstruction of an old tradition in Vanessa Dieffenbaugh's novel The Language of Flowers

The article, using historical-comparative and semiotic methods of text research, analyzes the novel by the American writer Vanessa Dieffenbaugh The Language of Flowers (2011), translated into Russian in 2019 by Yu. Zmeeva. The novel is written in line with the most modern literary trends: metamodernism, neoromanticism, and "new sincerity". It is concluded that the novel is a unique synthesis of the most acute topics raised in the literature of the "new sincerity": the achievement of contact with another, the return of affect and empathy. It also fits into the framework of the so-called "scientific postmodernism" (John Wood's term), although in this article it is referred to as "scientific metamodernism" because the writer resorts to studying the issue raised in the novel, referring to a variety of fields of science: botany, gardening, floriculture, orticultura, as well as phytocooking and much more. The most important perspective of the novel is the combination of the plant theme and the achievement of relativity by modern man. As an example of an extremely non-contact person, the writer chooses Victoria, a graduate of a boarding school for orphans, who becomes homeless and experiences difficulties in communicating with people. The contact and expression of emotions in this work is achieved thanks to the "language of flowers", which Dieffenbaugh gleaned from Henrietta Dumont's old collection of floral mail The Language of Flowers. The Floral Offering: A Token of Affection and Esteem (1851). The writer turned to specialists in the field of "flower mail", "flirting of flowers", as well as flower sonnets and madrigals (collections What Flowers Say), which were used in secret love correspondence during the Victorian era. In addition, Dieffenbaugh studied the poetry of the era of romanticism, in which plant images play the most important semantic role. The book also contains many references to floral themes in the works of William Shakespeare and Gertrude Stein. Thus, the language of the past, which was very fashionable in the 19th century, in the novel of the American writer, as it were, unites with our modernity and helps the person of our time to overcome the problem of non-contact. The author declares no conflicts of interests.

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