@article{Utgof_2012, title={Quasi-trochees in Nabokov’s prose}, volume={40}, url={https://ojs.utlib.ee/index.php/sss/article/view/SSS.2012.1-2.13}, DOI={10.12697/SSS.2012.1-2.13}, abstractNote={Summing up the ideas expressed in the most influential articles on the semantic halo of the Russian trochaic pentameter, scholars tend to avoid one particularly tricky question: how many units – and what kind of units – are needed to detect extra layers of meaning in a particular text? While the article of Kiril Taranovsky "<em>О взаимоотношении стихотворного ритма и тематики</em>" had implied that the source of these meanings (e.g. the dynamic theme of the journey) should be sought in a line starting from the 3- to 4-syllable structure, incorporating a verb of motion and an anapestic anacrusis (<em>Выхожу</em> [verb of motion, last syllable stressed] <em>один я на дорогу</em>), later research objected to this principle as an oversimplification. At the same time two later contributions on the subject (Kirill Vishnevsky’s "<em>Экспрессивный ореол пятистопного хорея</em>" and Mikhail Gasparov’s "The semantic halo of the Russian trochaic pentameter: Thirty years of the problem") proposed the idea of operating with whole texts as potential sources of meanings, thus calling into question a micro-level approach to the origin of the phenomenon. In my article I propose an empirical model that makes it possible to evaluate some limitations of both practices: I concentrate on some quasi-trochaic pentameters culled from the prose text of <em>Подвиг</em> (Glory) by Vladimir Nabokov (Sirin), and examine these quasi-verse incidents in the framework of both approaches.}, number={1/2}, journal={Sign Systems Studies}, author={Utgof, Grigori}, year={2012}, month={Sep.}, pages={244–259} }