Gastronomic Vocabulary in Comparative Constructions of Modern Russian Prose

The article discusses metaphors and similes that include culinary vocabulary and are used in modern literary texts. The purpose of this work is to examine the functioning of comparative constructions, including images of food and drinks, in modern Russian prose. The article suggests thematic groups of the images, which are often used to characterize various objects. The results shown that the most voluminous and frequent in use are names of flour products, dairy products and cereals. The article analyses the objects of comparison, among which the most frequent are the units associated with the image of a person, his/her appearance, emotions and behavior. There is a tendency to specify and detail the images of food and drinks in the composition of comparative structures, which is manifested in the regular use of specific names and qualifying definitions. It is shown that gastronomic comparative constructions perform various functions in modern literary texts: a characterological function, an evaluative function and a text-forming one. It is concluded that modern Russian prose presents both traditional metaphors and similes of the groups under consideration, as well as their individual author transformations and new, original tropes.