блудный сын

• БЛУДНЫЙ СЫН lit

[NP; sing only; fixed WO]

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⇒ a person who leaves his parents' home (by extension his collective, social group etc) in search of sth. new and better, but later returns to what he had left (often repentant of what he has done):

- prodigal son.

     ♦ [Мишка] хотел уже пугануть штабного [, который его расспрашивал,] печёным словом, но в этот момент вошёл Штокман. "Блудный сын!.. Что ты его, товарищ, распытываешь? Да ведь это же наш парень!" (Шолохов 4). Не [Mishka] was about to give the clerk [who was interrogating him] the rough edge of his tongue, when the door opened and Stokman entered. "Why, it's our prodigal son!...What are you interrogating him for? He's one of our lads!" (4a).

     ♦ [extended usage] Блудная дочь вернулась к родным осинам. Говорят, сразу по возвращении пошла она [Светлана Аллилуева] к Кремлёвской стене поклониться папиному праху и оставила у могилы его цветы (Войнович 1). ...The prodigal daughter revisited her native aspen trees for a time. They say that the minute Svetlana [Alliluyeva] returned home, she went straight to the Kremlin wall to pay respects to her father's ashes and to put flowers by his grave (1a).

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← From the Biblical parable (Luke 15:11-32).