HYPERTEXT AS A COMMON SEMANTIC STRUCTURE OF IRIS MURDOCH’S NOVELS AND ITS SEMANTIC AND LINGUISTIC CROSS-LINKS

The article is devoted to studying the semantic structure of a literary text. It is referred to the sphere of cognitive stylistics and focuses on the notion of hypertext. The latter is understood as a model of the semantic structure that binds together Iris Murdoch’s texts. The main principle of hypertext modeling is connected with the author’s mind style represented in the cognitive strategies that find their systematic manifestation in her novels. The research presents an attempt to construct Iris Murdoch’s hypertext with the help of metaphor which serves as a semantic and linguistic cross-link that helps to define the main concepts of the author’s conceptual system and integrate them into a single semantic structure. The main concepts that unite Iris Murdoch’s novels are revealed through the recurrent metaphors featuring the main schemes of conceptual integration. The analysis undertaken illustrates the potential of metaphor in representing cognitive schemes behind the author’s texts and bracing the author’s hypertext. It confirms the main thesis of the research stating that Iris Murdoch’s novels translate a unique world view that is revealed through metaphor which is one of the most outstanding features of her mind style.