Metaphors of Love in English and Russian

Irina Popaditch Department of Humanities Mid Sweden University English Linguistics C-level Supervisor: Mats Deutschmann January 2004

Table of Contents:
1. Introduction ............................................................................................................................ 2 2. Cognitive Linguistics ............................................................................................................. 3 3. Structural metaphors .............................................................................................................. 5 4. Orientational Metaphors....................................................................................................... 13 5. Container Metaphors and Cases of Personification ............................................................. 14 6. Source and Target Domains ................................................................................................. 16 7. Metaphorization as a Culturally-bound Process................................................................... 17 8. Conclusion............................................................................................................................ 19 9. Works Cited.......................................................................................................................... 21

1. Introduction
What do we know about metaphors? They are not something we stop and think about every time we utter a sentence. Perhaps, they are just stylistic devices we use when we write a poem and certainly not our way of cognizing the world, some may argue. They would appear to be wrong metaphors are not purely a subject matter of stylistics, they are an inevitable part of our conscious as well as unconscious thinking and acting, even though we are not aware of their existence. It is through them we get a chance of wording our inner thoughts as well as endowing words with a particular meaning. What do we know about feelings? Love, happiness, exhaustion, disappointment, are they clearly defined in the language? Can we always explain what we feel when we are in control of our feelings, not to mention the situations when we are excited or upset? What mechanisms are involved when we are trying to describe our emotional states? Are these mechanisms personal or rather universal, uniting all human beings, as a result of our ability to use language as a means of communication? Is there any connection between our ways of understanding and expressing emotions and a metaphor? This essay is going to discuss these questions in terms of the cognitive metaphor theory, presented by George Lakoff and Mark Johnson in their book Metaphors We Live by in 1980. The essay will focus on differences and similarities between the Russian and English metaphors of love and it will discuss to what extent metaphorization is a culturally-bound process. Before we start our discussion, it is important to emphasize the fact that we are going to understand metaphor as a cognitive tool, helping us to activate categories of our conceptual system and providing connections between them. Such metaphors most often result in a literal expression in a language. In that way they differ from a metaphor as a stylistic device, the latter belonging to the sphere of the imaginative language.

2. Cognitive Linguistics In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth starts the Bible. The Bible of the
cognitive linguistics would probably start with categories. Without our ability to categorize, we would not function at all, either in the physical world or in our social and intellectual lives (Lakoff 1990:6) explains Lakoff in his Women, Fire and Dangerous Things. We cannot understand a thing without tracing its origin or placing it into some mental storage together with those things which it mostly resembles. In doing so we accumulate a huge amount of entities and characteristics of different concepts (in the form of categories), and constitute our knowledge by pieces during our life time. Later, we lean on this knowledge when learning and classifying unknown concepts. Cognitive linguistics studies the existing correlations between human processes of cognition and images of the external world. In the beginning of the eighteenth century, the British school of philosophers, among them there were John Locke, David Hume, George Berkeley, David Hartley and John Stuart Mill, suggested the following:

thought is governed by two laws. One is contiguity: ideas that are frequently experienced together get associated in the mind. Thereafter, when one is activated, the other is activated too. The other law is resemblance: when two ideas are similar, whatever has been associated with the first idea is automatically associated with the second (Pinker 1997: 113).

However, the philosophers major concern was to trace the origin of reason, thus they believed that the mind is separate from, and independent of, the body (Lakoff 1990:9). Eleanor Rosch ( Rosch & Merris,1975) by her proposing the prototype theory (stating that categories can be presented through best examples, which she called prototypes) emphasized the fact that such matters as human neurophysiology, human body movement, and specific human capacities to perceive, to form mental images (Lakoff

4 1990:7) are highly influential in human processes of categorization. Following in her steps, George Lakoff understands categorization as: a matter of both human experience and imagination of perception, motor activity, and culture on the one hand, and of metaphor, metonymy, and mental imagery on the other (Lakoff 1990:8).Thus, interpreting categories as a mixture of experiential and imaginative, George Lakoff, together with Mark Johnson, propose a theory of a cognitive metaphor, which was meant to clarify the relationships between the experiential and the imaginative in our conceptual system. This theory of the cognitive metaphor is grounded on the assumption that metaphor is not a matter of mere language (Lakoff 1985:159) but that of thought and cognition. The authors abandon the Aristotlian substitutionist view on metaphor where metaphor is defined as the application to one thing of the name belonging to another (www.compapp.dcu.ie). This definition leads to the understanding of metaphor not as an essential feature of human communication, but rather a formula for achieving more colourful expression (www.compapp.dcu.ie). Lakoff and Johnson argue that metaphors are integral part of our knowledge and consequently can not be easily explained in terms of our communicative competence (Finegan 1999:12). How do we conceptualize emotions? In the classical theory of categories the emotions are viewed as having no conceptual content (Lakoff 1990:327). However, there must be some, as we can imagine and express exactly how it felt when we were disappointed, happy, or in love before. Our facial muscles react differently depending on a situation. The vocal cords and intonation can betray the way we are feeling at a particular moment. Besides, there must be some image which is stored in our mind as well, which we can consciously refer to and provide wording for. The subject of this essay being metaphors of love, we are going to argue that it is due to the existence of metaphor we can fully comprehend this feeling.

3. Structural metaphors
Our ordinary conceptual system, in terms of which we both think and act, is fundamentally metaphorical in nature(Lakoff 1980:3) state Lakoff and Johnson in the introduction to their book Metaphors We Live by. How do the authors explain that a concept is metaphorical as well as the fact that it structures our everyday activity? (Lakoff 1980:4). Let us take the LOVE IS WAR metaphor (Lakoff 1980:49), which is an example of structural metaphor, the most productive type of cognitive metaphors: He is known for his many rapid conquests (Rus. On izvesten svoimi chastymi pobedami) She fought for him but his mistress won out (Rus: Ona za nego borolas, no ego ljubovnitsa oderzhala pobedu) He overpowered her (Rus: On slomal ee soprotivlenie) He made an ally of her mother (Rus: On nashel sojuznika v litse ee materi) He is slowly gaining ground with her (Rus: On postepenno ee zavoevyvaet) (All English and Russian expressions given as examples in this essay correspond closely; moreover, they are almost literal translations of one another, which are frequently and commonly used in both languages). These examples clearly show that we not only talk about love in terms of war. We can actually fight for a person in order to save a relationship. Any war presupposes two different sides, between which the fight is going on, we see the same situation in a marriage: either the partners can attack each other (the competition between male and female), or the enemy can come from the outside. Someone gets the trophy in the end. Is there any background to our thinking of love in terms of war? If we go back to the animal world, we can find the same competition there: the male representatives are fighting and competing with each other in order to attract a female. Fortunately, humans have

6 invented more sophisticated techniques for getting our way (Lakoff 1980:62), the war being one of these. As Lakoff points out, the human conflict undergoes exactly the same stages as the fight between animals, those of establishing and defending territory, attacking, retreating and surrendering(Lakoff 1980:62). The way we act is directly expressed in our language, thus the LOVE IS WAR metaphor reflects one side of this feeling, namely that of a fight (Lakoff 1980:61-68). The LOVE IS WAR metaphor is found and widely used in Russian as well, that makes us think that this aspect of love, namely WAR, is present in both English and Russian; furthermore, the languages have developed similar ways of expressing it. If we talk about love as the examples above suggest, either in English or in Russian, we would not be viewed as speaking metaphorically, but as using the normal everyday language appropriate to the situation(Lakoff 1980:51). However, there are some instances of how this metaphor can result in a figurative expression: There came battalions of her admirers (Rus: Bot pribyli bataljony ee poklonnikov). All these examples, the literal expressions and the figurative one, prove that metaphors are not random but instead coherent systems, in terms of which we conceptualize our experience (Lakoff 1980:41). To fight/srazhatjsya, an ally/sojuznik, to overpower/oderzhat verkh, to gain ground/imet uspekh, battalions/bataljony, etc, are instances of the same defining domain, that of WAR (Lakoff 1980:61-68). We coherently use the WAR terminology when talking about a feeling. Keeping in mind that the essence of metaphor is understanding and experiencing one kind of thing in terms of another (Lakoff 1980:5), we can say that LOVE is partially structured, understood, performed and talked about in terms of WAR (Lakoff 1980:5). We say partially because every metaphor has its used and unused parts, we do not transfer all characteristics from the domain of WAR to that of LOVE but only some of them (Lakoff 1980:52) Our conventional ways of talking about love presuppose a metaphor

7 we are hardly even conscious of.() We talk about love that way because we conceive of it that way - and we act according to the way we conceive of things (Lakoff 1980:59). Love, as well as other feelings and emotions, is quite an abstraction. It is difficult for us, if not impossible, to comprehend these concepts without a metaphor. According to Lakoff, we conceptualize the more abstract concept in terms of more concrete, the non-physical in terms of the physical (Lakoff 1980:59). The ability to cope with abstract notions is the evidence and the result of the adequate development of an individual. A child starts to understand the mechanisms of metaphorization rather early, since the latter has its origin in our very basic physical experience. Structural metaphors are highly conventional, we must learn them while acquiring or learning a language. They originate, as Lakoff (1990:35-40) argues, from either scientific or folk theories. The scientific theories are based on proved assumptions, such as that fire makes the water boil, that the sun warms the earth, etc. Thus, the LOVE IS HEAT metaphor (the examples will follow) can be scientifically explained as follows: when we are in love, we get excited, the heart strikes more rapidly, we get hot, nervous, sometimes even redden. The body temperature rises, that allows us to see the connection between LOVE and HEAT through the similarity of physical experience. The folk theory would suggest, as for example in Russian, that when we fall in love, we usually become silly and absent-minded. Poterjal golovu ot ljubvi (He has lost his head because of love), this example would perfectly fit under the LOVE IS MADNESS metaphor (the examples will follow). Even though there is no scientific evidence proving that one, when in love, necessarily loses his or her mind, this folk belief has found its expression in the form of proverbs and sayings in the Russian language. Sometimes, the folk theories can directly contradict the facts of the scientific research.

8 LOVE IS WAR is not the only example of structural metaphors of love. There are others as well, viewing different aspects of the feeling, some of them exist in both English and Russian, others do not. LOVE IS MADNESS: I am crazy about her (Rus: Ja ot nee bez uma). She drives me out of my mind (Rus: Ona svodit menja s uma). He constantly raves about her (Rus: On postojanno bredit o nej). He has gone mad over her (Rus: Ona svela ego s uma). I am just wild about Harry (Rus: Garri delaet iz menja dikarku). I am insane about her (Rus: Ja skhozhu po nej s uma)(Lakoff 1980:49). Wild, mad, angry and crazy are well-understood by us, we do not have any difficulties in specifying our feeling or behaviour when we experience any of these emotions or mental states. Furthermore, we are aware of the fact that each of these emotions is slightly different from the others, and that some of them evoke stronger feelings than the others do. Madness with all its implications belongs to our most natural and basic experiences and therefore gives us a clue of how we feel about love. The existence of the same metaphor is predetermined in many languages, because it involves our most basic instincts and reactions, it is an unalienable part of our development. LOVE IS MAGIC: She cast her spell over me (Rus: Ona menja okoldovala). The magic is gone (Rus: Volshebstvo ischezlo). I was spellbound (Rus: Ja byl ocharovan). She had me hypnotized (Rus: Ona menja zagipnotizirovala). He has me in trance (Rus: On vvodit menja v trans). I am charmed by him (Rus: On ocharovan ee sharmom). She is bewitching (Rus: Ona okoldovyvaet) (Lakoff 1980:49). For centuries humans have been fascinated with things connected with magic, as it provided the explanation for the unknown. We are unlikely to find out how the very sensation of love appears, that is why we call it magic. This metaphor is extremely productive in Russian, moreover, the verb ocharovyvat (meaning to hypnotize, to cast spell) is most commonly used when talking about womens ability to charm men, and not vice versa. In the Slavonic mythology women are thought to

9 have power over forces of evil, darkness and disease (Grushko 2003:97), this explains the Old Russian tradition of matriarchy, where women functioned as intermediaries between their own husbands and the ancient gods. LOVE IS A PATIENT: This is a sick relationship (Rus: Eto slabyj sojyuz). They have a strong, healthy marriage (Rus: U nikh krepkij prochnyj brak). We are getting back on our feet (Rus: My prikhodim v sebja). Their marriage is on its last legs (Rus: Ikh brak dozhivaet poslednie dni). It is a tired affair (Rus: Eto iznurennyj soyuz) (Lakoff 1980:49). It takes time to cure ones heart (Rus:Trebuetsja vremja, chtoby vylechit bolnoe serdtse). It is folly to pretend that one wholly recovers from a disappointed passion. Such wounds always leave a scar (Longfellow). Most of us know what it means to be ill, it is a very basic experience for all human beings, that is why we are able to comprehend this aspect of any relationship. In Russian there is an expression: Ja bolna ne vami,word by word translation I am not sick because of you, meaning I am not interested in you. LOVE IS A JOURNEY: Look how far we have come (Rus: Posmotri, kak mnogo my dostigli). We are at a crossroads (Rus: My na pereputje). We shall just have to go our separate ways (Rus: Nam nuzhno idti kazhdomu svoim putem). I do not think this relationship is going anywhere (Rus: Nashi otnoshenija zashli v tupik). Where are we? (Rus: Gde my?). We are stuck (Rus: My zastrjali). We have gotten off the track (Rus: My soshli s kursa/puti). (Lakoff 1980:44-45). The course of true love never did run smooth (Shakespeare). Love () is looking outward together in the same direction (de SaintExupery). Steven Pinker in his book How the Mind Works points out: We are using space and motion as a metaphor for more abstract ideas (Pinker 1997:352), that explains why the LOVE IS A JOURNEY metaphor is so often used in English and Russian when talking about love. However, in English this metaphor is not homogeneous in nature, as it refers to different

10 kinds of journeys. Car trip: Its been a long, bumpy road; Train trip: Weve gotten off the tracks; Sea voyage: Our marriage is on the rocks, the fact that they are all journey metaphors, makes them coherent (Lakoff 1980:45). This distinction is not as clearly made in Russian. Most probably, due to richness of the English sea-faring tradition, English has many expressions containing the sea voyage element. However, in the history of Russia we find evidence proving the fact that the most important cultural and trade centres of the country were built far from seas. Peter the Great is said to have opened a window to Europe through the development of ship-building industry, which he initiated, and the foundation of Saint Petersburg in the beginning of the eighteenth century. Until this time Russians had no experience of seas, here we clearly see how our immediate environment (close to /distant from sea) can influence linguistic expressions. LOVE IS A PHYSICAL FORCE: I could feel the electricity between us (Rus: Ja mog chuvstvovat rasrjady mezhdu nami). I was magnetically drawn to her (Rus: Menja k nej pritjagivalo). They are uncontrollably attracted to each other (Rus: Ikh nekontroliremo tjanet drug k drugu). His whole life revolves around her (Rus: Vsja ego zhizn vraschaetsja vokrug nee). The atmosphere around them is always charged (Rus: Atmosfera mezhdu nimi vsegda razryazhena). There is incredible energy in their relationship (Rus: V ikh otnoshenijakh neverojatnaya energiya) (Lakoff 1980:49). This metaphor arises naturally from our awareness of the external world. Due to the revolutionary discoveries of such scientists as Newton, Einstein and others we have learned about natural forces, magnetism, electricity, gravitation, etc. Moreover, we can observe, measure and try them, and through them we can define and measure the strength of our emotions. LOVED ONE IS A POSSESSION: My friend stole my love from me (Rus: Moj drug ukral u menja moju ljubov). You are all I have got (Rus: Ty vse, chto u menja est). I

11 am going to get him back (Rus: Ja zapoluchu ego nazad). I am yours - be mine (Rus: Ja tvoj bud moej)(cogsci.berkeley.edu). You are my own (Rus: Ty moj). This metaphor stayed rather passive in Russian during the years of communist ideology, which aimed at demolishing the very concept of possession and owning; but nowadays this metaphor is as common in the Russians vocabulary as its English counterpart is in the vocabulary of English-speaking people. LOVE IS HEAT: I am burning with desire (Rus: Ja gorju zhelaniem). We have discussed the possible origin of this metaphor when talking about scientific theories. LOVE IS A CREATION: We are made for each other (Rus: My sozdany drug dlja druga); to make love (Rus:? Zanimatjsya ljubovjyu) (Thesaurus Roget). It is difficult to translate to make love into Russian, because all expressions concerning sex and the relationships between the sexes were considered to be extremely intimate and thus were taboos for many decades. The language was highly censored, the unsuitable words could never appear in the peoples conversations. Nowadays the situation is changing rapidly, the language starts borrowing words in order to fill in the existing gaps in the vocabulary. This is most often achieved through a primitive translation of an English expression into Russian, without taking into consideration the peculiarities of the countrys development and culture. As a result, many people, especially the old, get frustrated and disappointed, seeing how the moral values they used to live with are being ruined. LOVE IS A FRAGILE OBJECT: They broke up. Her heart was broken (Rus: Ee serdtse razbilos na melkie kusochki). It is as impossible to do something about a broken vase, as about a broken heart. LOVE IS A UNITY: We are one (Rus: My-odno tseloe). She is my other/better half (Rus: Ona - luchshee vo mne).He is a perfect match (Rus: On prekrasnaja para). (cogsci.berkeley.edu)

12 LOVE IS WINE: This metaphor is very often used in Russian: Pyan ot lyubvi drunk with love; Ee vzglyad menja pyanil She gave me a fuddling/exhilarating look; durmanyaschij zapakh; fuddling smell,etc. Here we can see the Eastern influence, where the same metaphor is very productive: Ya pyan bez vina ot ulits, po kotorym proshla ona I am drunk without wine, with the streets where she has been... runs an Azerbaijanian song. The same metaphor is found in Omar Khayams poems (a Tadjik poet). Russians seem to have further developed the Latin expression In vino veritas(The truth is in wine) under the Eastern influence; as a result of this development the LOVE IS WINE metaphor appeared. LOVE IS A CULT: Raba lyubvi the slave of love; Ya preklonyayus pred toboj I worship you; Ya u tvoikh nog I am at your feet, etc. In Russian this metaphor is productive due to the image of a woman-guardian called bereginya guardian from the Slavonic mythology. She took care of the sick and those who were in love, she is the symbol of a happy marriage. The main purpose of all structural metaphors is to present how we conceptualize the more complicated concepts, such as feelings, in terms of more concrete, physically experienced concepts. The source domain LOVE- is

a superordinate concept, a concept which is fairly abstract. By contrast, our principle metaphors WAR, MADNESS, FIRE, FRAGILE OBJECT, etc can be called basic-level concepts, concepts that are information-rich and rich in conventional mental imagery. Let us call the metaphors based on such concepts basic-level metaphors(Lakoff 1990: 406).

We have discussed that there is a system according to which we structure our conceptual sphere, the metaphors are coherent, even if not homogeneous in nature. Different structural metaphors of love present different aspects of this feeling, it would be impossible to become aware of all shades of such an abstraction as love without these metaphors.

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4. Orientational Metaphors
Another kind of the cognitive metaphor Lakoff and Johnson have called orientational metaphor, one that does not structure one concept in terms of another but instead organizes a whole system of concepts with respect to one another (Lakoff 1980:14). They give us a clue about how the reality of a definite culture is structured. Such metaphorical orientations are not arbitrary as they have their origin and basis in our physical and cultural experience (Lakoff 1980:14). Knowing that the sun brings about light and life, we can on analogy assume that the light itself is UP (as it comes from above), the darkness, on the contrary, alongside danger, uncertainty (most often associated with it) is DOWN. Consequently, happiness, wealth, health, stability will be UP, whereas misfortunes, poverty, disease, instability will be DOWN in the Western society (Lakoff 1980:14-21). Getting back to our metaphors of love, we can analyze the expression to fall in love in terms of the orientational metaphor. Thousands of English-speaking people do it every day without actually falling anywhere, if we neglect Aerosmiths literal interpretation falling in love is hard on your knees. How has the expression to fall in love become possible in the language? If we try to explain the fact in terms of William Nagys (1974) polar oppositions up-down, in-out, frontback; where, according to Nagy, RATIONAL IS UP; EMOTIONAL IS DOWN (in the Western society intellect is superior, the feelings are inferior and therefore suppressed), we can interpret falling in love as losing our common sense, being influenced by the feelings, that is falling from the intellectual domain to the emotional one. Beyond rational free willed values are emotive feelings. To be emotive is to lose rational, free-willed self-control (http://hometown.aol.com) This loss of self-control is clearly expressed in the Russian language: Poterjal golovu ot ljubvi, meaning He has lost his ability to think because of love; or Durakam

14 vezet v ljubvi, meaning Love favours fools, and there are some others. If we look at the Russian folk tales, the most typical hero of which is a fool, having neither fortune nor capable of doing a thing, nonetheless, it is this very personage, who wins the love of the beautiful princess and lives happily ever after. Besides, the process of falling in love is an unconscious one (one can not force him/herself into loving somebody else), thus, proceeding from the metaphor: CONSCIOUS IS UP; UNCONSCIOUS IS DOWN (Nagys explanation for these metaphors is based on the fact that humans sleep lying down and stand up when they awaken), we can conclude that the falling has actually taken place to the level of the unconscious. If we look at another example the fallen woman, understanding the latter as the one who sells love, and keeping in mind Nagys scheme VIRTUE IS UP; DEPRAVITY IS DOWN, we can clearly see what moral standards exist in the Western world. Thanks to Einsteins law of gravitation we know that falling is easier than climbing, thus complying with the existing moral values which is achieved through hard work of self-perfection cements your respected position in the society; the opposite will ruin your situation and place you at the bottom of the social ladder, or you will simply fall from grace. (Nagys metaphors were taken from Lakoff 1980:14-21).

5. Container Metaphors and Cases of Personification

Another kind of the cognitive metaphor, viewed in Lakoff and Johnsons Metaphors We Live by is the container metaphor. The authors define the latter as follows: Each of us is a container, with a bounding surface and an in-out orientation. We project our own in-out orientation onto other physical objects that are bounded by surfaces(Lakoff 1980:29). The assumption that our world is organized as a certain container presupposes the existence of a boarder between the outer environment and the inner content of the container. This is quite

15 obvious with the example of rooms, houses and other objects having artificial or natural boundaries, but the matter gets more complicated when it comes to our personal conditions, states or feelings. He is in love, he entered a state of euphoria, we are out of trouble now, etc (Lakoff 1980:32) clearly show that we conceptualize our emotions and states as a container and conceptualize what we feel and experience as being inside it (Lakoff 1980:30). Rus vlyubitsya means to fall in love, where the prefix v-(which can be translated as in-) denotes direction and is usually used on entering a limited territory, such as a room. When attracted to somebody, the Russians put their feelings into that person, the latter is a container; whereas the feeling itself is experienced as being inside this container. The final suffix sya- marks reflexivity of verbs, thus the verb vlyubitsya literally would mean that one places his/her affection into somebody else, treating that other persons body as a CONTAINER FOR THE EMOTIONS (Lakoff 1990:383). The cases of personification (Lakoff) are especially interesting. Lakoff defines them as metaphors where the physical object is further specified as being a person (Lakoff 1980:33). This means that we endow non-living objects, events, experiences, etc with human characteristics, activities and motivations (Lakoff 1980:33-34). If we look at the metaphor of love, we can see that love is personified in the following verbs: love can eat you up and go (Rus: Lyubov sedaet cheloveka i ukhodit), it can give you hope (Rus: lyubov daet nadezhdu) and expect you to handle (Rus: zhdet vashikh dejstvij) - love acts just as humans do. It needs nurturing and care (Rus: ljubvi nuzhna zabota i ukhod) as a pampered child. Love can be blind (Rus: ljubov slepa). It can hurt (Rus: ranit) us and we blame (Rus: vinim) it for that. Furthermore, love goes through exactly the same stages as individuals do in the course of their lives: it comes to life (Rus: poyavlyaetsya), it can age (Rus: vzrosleet): (young (Rus: molodaya) love versus mature (Rus: zrelaya) love); it lasts, becomes mature and can even die (Rus:mozhet umeret). Love even has the features of

16 a human character: it can be tender (Rus: nezhnaya), heartless (Rus: besserderchnaya), strong (Rus: silnaya), unreasonable (Rus: bezrassudnaya), unreliable (Rus: nenadezhnaya), etc.

6. Source and Target Domains

If we look at the endearments found in English, why is it quite popular to address your loved one by honey, sweetheart and chicken; whereas little donkeyand my sausage are not so common? There must be some pattern of choosing as well as understanding the terms of endearment, they are rather conventional and the associations between the qualities or appearances are not that random as they can seem at the first sight. If we look at the endearments containing the animalistic element, the most common ones would be: sugar lamb, sweet chicken, teddy/ huggy bear, turtledove, tiger, etc. Why do we choose these animals? The answer is fairly obvious: we find some of their features attractive and readily borrow these appealing, most often psychological characteristics and apply them to the person we love. Lakoff and Johnson argue that this kind of imprecation of conceptual spheres is not accidental or occasional but rather regular and conventional (Lakoff 1980:67). Using Lakoffs terminology, we refer to the already nominated object, the animal, as the SOURCE domain and the person to be nominated the TARGET domain. Thus, if from a lamb (SOURCE) we borrow tenderness and need for protection, with a tiger it is strength and power which appeal to us. What about the endearments containing the word sweet or referring to the sweet things, such as candy man, honey/honey pie, sweetheart/sweetie, sugar babe/lips? Do we associate food with love? Probably, Steven Pinkers explanation is the most suitable: Children learn to associate sweets with pleasure because parents use sweets as a reward for eating spinach(Pinker 1997:57).

17 The endearments in Russian are of a different kind. The process of borrowing some characteristics from the SOURCE domain and applying them to the TARGET one is essentially the same. The difference is found in the make-up of the SOURCE domain. The tradition of the folk-lore is very rich and still influential in the Russian culture, thus many terms of endearment are connected with nature and symbols of the Slavonic mythology. It is fairly common to address your loved one by rechenka moya(fem.)/ moj rucheek (masc.) my river; yablonka moya (fem.) my apple tree; moya lebedushka (fem.) my swan; moj zajchik (masc.) my hare; moje solnyshko (used with both genders) my sun. All the nouns are most commonly used with a diminutive suffix to express tenderness. In addition, there are two expressions which are taken from a folk tale in their original form: golub moj sizokrylyj (masc.) my rock dove and sokol moj yasnyj (masc.) my pure falcon. Although the language of love is extremely creative, we have to use the limited thematic vocabulary in order to be understood and taken seriously. Furthermore, we have to create within a definite cultural frame.

7. Metaphorization as a Culturally-bound Process

All human beings are unique due to our different ways of getting accustomed to the environment we are raised in. However, nature has created us alike, this can be proved by: neuro-genetic similarity of human beings: our minds are organized in the same complicated way the world over. We cognize the world with the same mental processes, common operations of deduction, induction, analysis,etc; physical and physiological similarity: we all inhale oxygen; we have the same upright posture, our bodies function alike; the universality of our socio-cultural structure: we are all communal animals, we perform similar social functions (to some extent) (Pinker 1997: 260-267).

18 These similarities suggest that we should normally have equal ability to cognize the external world. Thus, we can understand metaphors as well as see the connections between different linguistic expressions. However, humans do not develop in isolation, we are closely connected with each other by our culture and environment. We exist within physical environments, some of them radically different jungles, deserts, islands, tundra, mountains,cities, etc.(Lakoff 1980:146). Besides, we are raised in a system of wellestablished standards and taboos, which our society and epoch have imposed on us. The same processes of cognition are not enough for us to understand each other properly, we must as well have the same cultural and historical base. While discussing the metaphors of love we have noticed many parallels between the structural metaphors of English and Russian. We can see that different aspects of love are structured in terms of the same concrete concepts in both languages. Such concepts as WAR, MADNESS, FRAGILE OBJECT, PATIENT, HEAT, etc are a part of the European/Western history, that is why they are equally understood by the speakers of English and Russian. What cultural and historical events could have preconditioned these similarities? We have all been influenced by the Greek and Roman philosophers and have inherited our todays values from these ancient cultures. We have been raised with the Greek myths and legends, which have, no doubt, left a trace in our imagination. Besides, the fact that we have been brought up in the Christian world with the ideas and morality associated with the latter, has, to varying degrees, depending on an individual, affected our way of thinking. Moreover, we are bound to tackle the results of Darwins and Freuds ideas in order to find the identity of our own. What about the similarities between the orientational metaphors, such as HEALTH IS UP, DARKNESS IS DOWN, etc.? We all lie down when we are asleep and ill,

19 we have upright posture; and Einsteins law of gravitation has influenced all of us. This kind of metaphor is directly linked to our physical experience. As to the differences, we have found in the course of the research, they are preconditioned by the cultural peculiarities of the speakers of Russian and English. No culture can be identical with another. Furthermore, within one culture there can appear subcultures, which invent the values of their own. When it comes to two different languages, it is usually very difficult to translate a word from one language into the other without taking into consideration the cultural aspect of our metaphorical thinking. Even though that newly translated word follows the same metaphor in both languages without disturbing the inner coherence of the metaphor itself, such a word can not completely fit into the system of values and norms coded in the languages. We have seen such attempts of translating the English expression to make love into Russian. There are more unsuccessful examples, such as the translation of the English pumpkin, with its meaning of endearment, into a corresponding Russian word which refers to the vegetable only and does not have any positive connotation. All experience is cultural through and through, we experience our world in such a way that our culture is already present in the very experience itself(Lakoff 1980:57).

8. Conclusion
In this essay we have discussed metaphors of love in English and Russian in order to find some similarities and differences between them. From the beginning of the essay we assumed that feelings and emotions,LOVE being one of them, are extremely difficult to comprehend. In the course of our analysis we have proved that the cognitive metaphor is influential in our lives as a universal means of understanding complex matters. Through studying and analyzing literal expressions of a given language we become aware of various aspects of complicated concepts they refer to. Through studying and analyzing cognitive metaphors we become

20 aware of the processes of analogy, association and analysis which take place in the course of our development. It is through metaphor we get an adequate picture of the complexity of the external world. The most productive type of the cognitive metaphor in both Russian and English proved to be the structural metaphor. Moreover, the two languages share almost all structural metaphors of love with only small deviations within each of them. These deviations can be explained by the peculiarities of the cultural and historical development of the languages; as well as the speakers different ways of treating reality. Here we should take into consideration the ambitions of each of us, our social backgrounds, age, sex, health, economic situation, etc. The cognitive metaphor is culturally-bound. It can be both motivated (non-arbitrary) in the cases of orientational metaphors as well as conventional (arbitrary) the cases of structural metaphors. Metaphor organizes our external reality and structures our every day activity. The literal expressions we use in order to express our emotions are dictated by metaphor which is systematic in character. That is why we do not find any expression, which would not follow the pattern given by a general metaphor. If HEALTH had been DOWN (with all linguistic expressions fitting under it), then in the Western world it would have contradicted a more basic metaphor GOOD IS UP. Even the figurative expressions are the products of the same general metaphors and are meant to fit into the metaphorical system of a language. In structuring the abstract emotion of LOVE, metaphor provides us with many sides of the same concept we were not aware of before. The primary function of metaphor is to provide a partial understanding of one kind of experience in terms of another kind of experience stated Lakoff and Johnson in Metaphors We Live by. Metaphors are not something really existing in the external world, but they become real to us because it is through them we create our subjective meaning of the objective events and things.

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9. Works Cited
Primary sources: Finegan, Edward. 1999. Language:Its Structure and Use. 3rd ed. Heinle & Heinle. Gorbachevich, K.S.; E.P. Khablo. 1979. Slovar Epitetov Russkogo Literaturnogo Yazyka (The Descriptive Adjectives of Russian Dictionary) Moscow:Nauka. Grushko, E.A.; Y.M Medvedev. 2003. Mify i Legendy Drevnej Rusi (Myths and Legends of Old Russia). Moscow:Eksmo. Lakoff, George, Mark Johnson. 1980. Metaphors We Live by. Chicago:University of Chicago Press. Lakoff, George. 1990. Women, Fire and Dangerous Things. Chicago:University of Chicago Press. Pinker, Steven. 1997. How the Mind Works. New York:Norton. Rogets Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases. 1988. ed. Susan M.Lloyd.London:Penguin.

Secondary sources: AOL Hometown. 12 December 2003. Trinitarian Nature of Man. http://hometown.aol.com/trinitine/essay2.htm 1-5. Aristotle 11 December 2003. www.compapp.dcu.ie/~~tonyv/trinity/aristotle.html Kvecses, Zoltn. 1986. Metaphors of Anger, Pride and Love: a Lexical Approach to the Structure of Concepts. Amsterdam & Philadelphia:John Benjamins Publishing Company. Kvecses, Zoltn. 1990. Emotion Concepts. New York, Berlin, Heidelberg, London:SpringerVerlag. Love Is Heat, Love Is Magic, Love Is A Unity, Loved One Is A Possession 22 October 2003. http://cogsci.berkeley.edu/metaphors/

22 Pinker, Steven. 1995. The Language Instinct: the New Science of Language and Mind. London:Penguin. Varela, Francisco J.;Evan Thompson; Eleanor Rosch. 1991. The Embodied Mind:Cognitive Science and Human Experience. Cambridge:MIT Press.