Metaphorical realization of the image of music in V. P. Astafyev’s short story “A Fairy Tale Far and Near”

The research aims to determine the specifics of metaphorical image units functioning in a literary text, participating in the modeling of a literary image. The paper examines the functioning of metaphor in literary discourse and provides a typology of image units, based on the dichotomy “the usual/linguistic – the individual authorial”. The study is conducted using V. P. Astafyev’s short story “A Fairy Tale Far and Near”. Particular attention is paid to describing the ways of forming the basic image of music through metaphorical means, taking into account contextual elements: creating an internal rhyme, highlighting key metaphorical models. Scientific novelty lies in examining the functioning of metaphorical image units that act as transmitters of the individual authorial worldview and represent the key image of the plot, analyzed for the first time using V. P. Astafyev’s short story “A Fairy Tale Far and Near” from the perspective of realizing their text-forming and world-modeling potential in context. As a result, it has been determined that metaphorical image units carry key meanings of the work, participating in the construction of the text as a musical composition.