Grammar Deviations Creating Temporal, Spatial and Personal Characteristics in a Literary Text (Exemplified by English Prose of the Early 20th Century)

Grammar deviations in W. S. Maugham’s and G. Orwell’s texts are considered in the article, estimating their potential in creating a multi-dimensional text with spatiotemporal parameters and actualization of extra char-acters’ features solely by means of grammar. As long as the article does not deal with literature studies, it analyzes not the novels as a whole but the text piercing through them and this text’s characteristics. The work is relevant because it researches the classical authors’ deviations from normative grammar describing not their characters’ speech peculiarities, but employed as a means of creating artistic effects, such cases being rare and standing out in grammatically normal texts. The structure of the paper includes sections illustrating grammar fluctuations’ analysis, which build up temporal, spatial, quantitative and personal characteristics respectively. Grammar variations comprise non-conventional uses of tenses, articles and cardinal numerals. Chronotopos, which is formed by the author-customized uses of grammar, brings about several effects: stop motion, super still and vacuum space effects; the characters’ personal traits transformation, such as personification, de-personification, etc. Grammar fluctuations are studied in order to single out additional connotation layers of the text, with translation of these cases into Russian analyzed as well. The paper raises the issue of lacunae where deviations from normative grammar in the original text are not adequately translated due to the absence of corresponding grammar means in the Russian language, nor compensated by other linguistic means. Another issue is raised concerning the tradition to deviate from normative grammar in later English literary texts, i.e. the end of the XX century, calling for further research. Findings of the article may appear of practical use in teaching foreign languages and literature, as well as attracting fiction translators’ attention.