Infinitive Techniques in the Poetry by Joseph Brodsky (On the Example of the Analysis of the Poem "Zofia")

The aim of the following article is to prove that the infinitive as a non-conjugated form lacking major grammatical categories of verb expressed at the morphological level (modality, temporality, person), has a potential to express all mentioned categories syntactically. The focus of this article is to review infinitive techniques applied in the poetic texts by Joseph Brodsky. The research is devoted to the identification and analysis of the features of expression of the category of modality and temporality in the infinitive constructions drawing on the example of the fragments of the poem "Zofia". Existential modal and time models of the poem are analyzed. The special semantic effect of internal speech, which allows reflecting the distinctive author's worldview taking into account the applied infinitive techniques, is revealed. The authors managed to demonstrate that the semantic potential of the infinitive is at its highest in the poetic text. This confirms the position of A.K. Zholkovsky who investigated groups of infinitives in poetic texts and revealed a peculiar poetic function of infinitive constructions which he metaphorically described as "infinitive writing". Infinitive writing aims to promote a special "meditative modality" in the poetic context, which creates a particular mood of a poetic persona. In one of his articles, Zholkovsky focuses on a group of infinitives found in the poem "Zofia" by Joseph Brodsky. Further, the article provides an insight into two fragments of Brodsky's "Zofia"; special attention is paid to the semantics, modal and temporal meanings of the infinitive constructions. Analyzing the fragments of the poem, the authors have determined the influence of the change of the poetic text's syntactic structure on the general modal and temporal meaning of infinitive groups. In the analyzed stanzas, the predicative center of the sentence is represented by groups of infinitives of imperfective and perfective aspects dependent on the repeating modal verb with a negative particle "ne sledovalo" and collocation "s toy raznitsey". At the same time, the modality of advice and the modal meaning of impossibility are expressed, and dependent infinitives refer to the past forms of the modal verb. However the syntactic construction changes. It is supported by the full stop at the end of the stanza of the second fragment and the conjunction "no" at the beginning of the next stanza. There is a contextual change of temporal and modal perspectives: the past shifts to the syntactic present with the meaning of future and the modality of obligation with a hint of advice is transformed to the modality of obligation with a hint of necessity. Consequently, the authors of the article come to the conclusion that the infinitive techniques presented in Brodsky's poems allow reflecting the specific author's worldview by means of creating distinctive modal and time models and a particular semantic effect of internal speech (stream of consciousness).

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