«OUR SINS ARE HEAVY» AS PHRASEOLOGICAL ACTUALISATION OF N.S. LESKOV’S TEXTS

«An overlooked genius», «a wizard of the wording» - all this is about N.S.Leskov. That is the reputation he gained in the classical Russian literature, that is what he was called by Russian writers. N.S. Leskov had an interesting fate - having gained recognition and attention of his fellow writers, he had to wait far too long for the attention of philologists and linguists. Multilateral study of his work did not begin until second half of the XX century, when such linguists as Viduetskaya I.P., Ledeneva V.V., Aleshina L.V., Golovacheva OA, set themselves the goal of exploring N.S. Leskov’s language, his idiostyle and idiolect. In this paper we consider the functions of phraseology in N.S. Leskov’s article «Our provincial life» («Byrzhevye vedomosty» №49, 1870). The most interesting aspest of the research is the analysis of how through the use of Russian phraseology N.S. Leskov vividly and emotionally expresses his standpoint in relation to many vital problems of the provincial Russian society and tries to identify and point out to the readers the causes of some social disasters like theft, lawlessness, mob law, drunkenness, railroad accidents. Among the phraseological units we analysed there are some expressing temporal semantics, an idiom of biblical origin, a unique proverb, recorded also in the V.I. Dal dictionary, and a few idioms with a pronounced emotional and expressive colouring. The study of N.S. Leskov’s style and language is a promising field of linguistic research which may result in compiling the writer’s vocabulary.