Izučaj — ne xoču: from a fixed idiom to a construction

The article examines a construction consisting of an imperative form of the verb and the negative phrase ne xoču (Vimp — ne xoču), and its development since the 19th century, when it first emerged, according to the Russian National Corpus. Early occurrences of the construction feature a limited set of verbs taking the imperative position (primarily eš' ‘eat’ and pej ‘drink’), thus the expression in this period can be qualified as a lexically fixed idiom, which is additionally confirmed by its lexicographic descriptions. Over time, the range of verbs used in the expression has expanded significantly, so at the present stage it is already a construction with a variable slot and the anchor part ne xoču. Among the verbs which occur in the construction, eš' ‘eat’ and pej ‘drink’ are not even the most frequent—based on the analysis of various text samples, the verb beri ‘take’ is now the most frequent. The change of the main placeholder of the imperative slot is associated with a semantic shift in the construction: in many contexts the meaning ‘a large number’ gives way to the broader idea of unlimited possibility of action.