A CONCEPTUAL METAPHORIC ANALYSIS OF POVERTY IN MARIE 
CORELLI’S NOVEL THE SORROWS OF SATAN 
M. Molozhon 
Kiev National Linguistic University 
 
Contemporary research studies carried out within the framework of cognitive 
linguistic have supplemented the conventional scrutiny with a new understanding of 
such a phenomenon as metaphor. While exploring the way in which language reflects 
our perception of the world, cognitive linguists have attested that metaphor does not 
only provide insights into personal and cultural system of views, but also pervades 
everyday language, making sense of such abstract domains as emotions, experiences, 
social institution, etc. Subsequently, when dealing with concepts, metaphors benefit 
the whole procedure of understanding and analyzing certain salient concepts, which 
are typically considered to be broad and abstract [3, p. 203]. Among such concepts is 
the concept of POVERTY. It represents a fundamental social issue and belongs to the 
basic concepts of humanity. Therefore, it wields a great potential for a conceptual 
metaphoric analysis as it fixates individualistic perception of the reality of the 
linguistic society, connected with both the cultural and historical factors as well as its 
national peculiarities. 
The specificity of POVERTY concept manifestation in a fiction novel is 
predetermined by the distinguishing features of a literary epoch. For this purpose, the 
19th century novel by Marie Corelli The Sorrows of Satan as an influential fin de 
siècles text was chosen to depict widespread materialism and visualize Britain of the 
time as morally bankrupt. The novel is full of vivid images and evident references to 
a deprived lifestyle, which together with numerous metaphoric expressions manifest 
several prominent conceptual metaphors among which are POVERTY IS AN 
ABYSS, POVERTY IS AN ILLNESS and POVERTY IS INJUSTICE. 
According to Lakoff and Johnson, in conceptual metaphor interpretation, one 
kind of experience is understood in terms of another one [1, p. 5]. To put it another 
way, the structure of a conceptual source domain (“the comparison point”) is mapped 
onto the structure of the target domain (“the starting point”) to the extent that it 
becomes possible to highlight similarities between them, thereby creating a new 
understanding of the latter one [2, p. 38-39]. Cross-domain mapping is affixed set of 
ontological correspondences between entities in a source domain and entities in a 
target domain [3, p. 203]. Therefore, the similarities between these domains become 
more salient. 
One of the most dominant conceptual metaphors in The Sorrows of Satan is 
POVERTY IS AN ABYSS since the novel is saturated with metaphorical linguistic 
expressions bearing evidence that the properties in the target domain of poverty are 
perceived in terms of the source domain of an abyss. Such references as “deep hole of 
poverty” and “fall into poverty” presuppose the miserable state of a person who is 
forced to face impoverished existence. Here the lexeme “abyss” is used in its primary 
definition “a deep empty hole in the ground” and could be interpreted as reference to 
being below the poverty line where the state of being poor is seen as being in a pitfall 
[4, p. 7]. For this reason, any references to the possible tries of getting out of this 
situation would be perceived as the one demanding tremendous efforts and will.  
In the novel The Sorrows of Satan, the line “poverty is the moral cancer that 
eats into the heart of an otherwise well-intentioned human creature” serves as a 
reference to the conceptual metaphor POVERTY IS A DISEASE [5, p. 3]. Together 
with the linguistic metaphors “to cure poverty”, “to treat poverty”, “the symptoms of 
poverty”, it subtly conveys a wide variety of information to the reader. In order to 
mentally process this phrase, it should be first recognized that such words as “cure”, 
“treat”, “symptoms” and “cancer” (as a medical terms) are being used figuratively. 
This conceptual mapping enables a reader to transfer a variety of properties and 
associations between the two domains of knowledge, such as their association with a 
feeling of helplessness, the existence of sustained efforts to end them, the potential 
for them to spread, and their mutual relationship with ill-health and death. Therefore, 
by identifying the conceptual domains associated with this conceptual metaphor, it 
becomes possible to reason about the target domain (POVERTY) using concepts and 
terms associated with the source domain (DISEASE). 
Special attention should be paid to the rhetorical question “Why should this 
injustice be?”, voiced numerously in the novel [5, p. 3]. In as much as this question 
refers to the notion of poverty, we may entail the conceptual metaphor POVERTY IS 
INJUSTICE. The source domain of injustice is intended to draw on the emotive 
experience of unfairness or undeserved outcome to the target domain of poverty, 
referring that some people are forced to be poor and, consequently, to suffer and 
others do not.  
Overall, metaphors provide us with a deeper understanding of the writer’s intent. 
Employed in fiction, they uncover only a limited scope of associations envisioned by 
the author. Thus, the conceptual metaphors referring to POVERTY in the novel The 
Sorrows of Satan do not only carry negative connotation but evoke the assumption 
that poverty is a state that extremely deteriorates and complicates human existence, 
causes suffering and despair as well as might even result in death. Such images intend 
to underline the destructive essence of poverty, hopelessness and mischief of 
everyone who is forced to experience it. 
 
LITERATURE 
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