Стилистика английского языка

Parallel constructions are often backed up by repetition of words (lexical repetition) and repetition of conjunctions and prepositions (polysyndeton). Parallel constructions may be partial or complete.

Parallel construction is used in such lexico-stylistic devices as enumeration, antithesis and in climax.

Parallel construction is used in different styles of writing with slightly different functions. When used in the style of official documents it carries the idea of semantic equality of the parts, as in scientific prose, where the logical principle of arranging ideas predominates. In the belles-letters style parallel construction carries an emotive function.

Reversed parallel constructions (chiasmus). Chiasmus is based on the repetition of a syntactical pattern, but the order of words in the second pattern is cross to the first syntactical pattern.

Like parallel construction chiasmus contributes to the rhythmical quality of the utterance. Chiasmus will always bring in some fresh shade of meaning or additional emphasis on some portion of the second part of chiasmatic construction.

(Skrebnev Y.M. Fundamentals of English stylistics. – M., 1994. – p. 98-156)

 

Тема 10. SYNTACTICAL DEVICES BASED ON (1) PECULIAR SYNTACTICAL MEANS OF CONNECTION, (2) PECULIAR USE OF STRUCTURAL MEANING, (3) PECULIAR USE OF SPOKEN SYNTACTICAL NORMS.

1.Syntactical devices based on peculiar syntactical means of connection: polysyndeton, asyndeton, gap-sentence link.

Polysyndeton is a syntactical stylistic device based on the repetition of connections (mostly conjunctions and prepositions). The repetition of conjunctions and other means of connection makes an utterance more rhythmical. Besides polysyndeton draws our attention to each member of a string of facts.

Asyndeton is connection between parts of a sentence or between sentences without any formal sign. It becomes a stylistic device if there is a deliberate omission of the connective where it is generally expected to be according to the norms of the literary language.

Gap-sentence link is a way of connecting two sentences which seem unconnected and leave it to the reader to grasp the idea implied, but not worded.

2.Syntactical devices based on peculiar use of structural meaning: rhetorical questions, litotes, break-in-the-narrative.

The rhetorical question  is a special syntactical stylistic device the essence of which consists in reshaping the grammatical meaning of the interrogative sentence. It is a statement expressed in the form of an interrogative sentence. Unlike an ordinary question the rhetorical question does not demand any information but serves to express the emotions of the speaker and also to call the attention of listeners.

Rhetorical questions, due to their power of expressing a variety of modal shades of meaning, are most often used in publicist style and particularly in oratory. Rhetoric questions are very important part of oratoric speech for they very successfully emphasize the orator’s ideas.

Litotes is a stylistic device consisting of a peculiar use of negative constructions. The negation plus noun or adjective serves to establish a positive feature in a person or thing. Affirmation is expressed by denying its contrary. Double negation is expressed through the negative particle no or not and through

– a word with a negative affix (not hopeless)

– a word with a negative or derogatory meaning (not a coward)

– a negative construction (not without love)

– an adjective or adverb preceded by too (not too awful).

The stylistic function of litotes is to convey the doubts of the speaker concerning the exact characteristics of the object in question. Litotes is used in different styles of speech except official style and scientific prose.

Break-in-the-narrative (aposiopesis) is the sudden breaking off in speech, without completing a thought, as if the speaker was unable or unwilling to state what was in his mind. It is a stylistic device to convey to the reader very strong emotions. Break is used mainly in the dialogue or in other forms of narrative imitating spontaneous oral speech. It reflects the emotional or/and the psychological state of the speaker: a sentence may be broken because the speaker’s emotions prevent him from finishing it. Another cause of the break is the desire to cut short the information with which the sentence began. In many cases break is the result of the speaker’s uncertainty as to what exactly he is to say.

To mark the break dashes and dots are used.

3.Syntactical devices based on peculiar use of spoken syntactical norms: ellipsis, question-in-the-narrative, represented speech.

Ellipsis is a stylistic device based on the omission of the obligatory parts of a sentence. It is a typical phenomenon in conversation, arising out of the situation. Ellipsis, when used as a stylistic device, always imitates the common features of colloquial language. An elliptical sentence is a sentence with one or more of the parts left out. As a rule the omitted part can be reconstructed from the context. In this case ellipsis brings into the text typical features of colloquial English talk.  In contemporary prose ellipsis is mainly used in dialogue where it is consciously employed by the author to reflect the natural omissions characterizing oral colloquial speech.

A variety of ellipsis in English are one-member nominal sentences. They have no separate subject and predicate but one main part instead. One-member sentences draw attention to the subject named, they are often used in descriptive narration, the economy of the construction gives a dynamic rhythm to the passage.

Question-in-the-narrative changes the real nature of a question and turns it into a stylistic device. A question-in-the-narrative is asked and answered by one and the same person, usually the author. It becomes similar to a parenthetical statement with strong emotional implication. Here the question asked, unlike the rhetorical questions, does not contain a statement. The question is answered by one who knows the answer, it assumes a semi-exclamatory nature.

Represented speech. There are three ways of reproducing actual speech:

• repetition of the exact utterance as it was spoken (direct speech),
• conversion of the exact utterance into indirect speech,
• representation of the actual utterance (by a second person, usually the author) as if it had been spoken, though it has not really been spoken but is only represented in the author’s words (represented speech).

There are two varieties of represented speech: uttered represented speech and unuttered (inner) representedspeech.

Uttered represented speech demands that the tense should be shifted from present to past and that the personal pronouns should be changed from 1^st and 2^nd person to 3^rd person as in indirect speech, but the syntactical structure of the utterance does not change.

Unuttered (inner) represented speech expresses feelings and thoughts of the character which were not materialized in spoken or written language. It usually has many exclamatory words and phrases, elliptical constructions, breaks and other means of conveying the feelings and psychological state of the character. This device makes the language of the author livelier and gives him an opportunity to show the inner springs which guide the character’s actions and utterances. Inner represented speech, unlike uttered represented speech, is usually introduced by verbs of mental perception as think, meditate, feel, occur, wonder, ask, tell, etc. Inner represented speech remains the monopoly of belles-letters style.

(Skrebnev Y.M. Fundamentals of English stylistics. – M., 1994. – p. 98-156)

 

Тема 11. LEXICO-SYNTACTICAL DEVICES: (1) REPETITION AND ITS TYPES – ANAPHORA, EPIPHORA, FRAMING, LINKING REPETITION (ANADIPLOSIS), CHAIN REPETITION, SYNONYMICAL REPETITION, (2) ENUMERATION, (3) SUSPENCE, (4) CLIMAX (GRADATION) AND ITS TYPES, (5) ANTITHESIS.

As a stylistic device repetition aims at logical emphasis, when it’s necessary to fix the attention of the reader on the key-word of the utterance. Repetition is classified according to compositional design: anaphora and epiphora.

If the repeated word or phrase comes at the beginning of two or more consecutive sentences, clauses or phrases, we have anaphora, if the repeated unit is placed at the end of the consecutive sentences we have the type called epiphora. Repetition may also be arranged in the form of a frame.

Linking repetition (anadiplosis) is a repetition of the last word or any prominent word in a sentence at the beginning of the next, with an adjunct idea. Chain repetition is used for intensifying the idea. Synonymous repetition.

The primary stylistic function of repetition is to intensify the utterance. Repetition may also stress monotony of action, it may suggest fatigue or despair.

Enumeration is a stylistic device by means of which homogeneous parts of an utterance are made heterogeneous from the semantic point of view.

Suspence is a compositional device which consists in arranging the matter of a communication in such a way that the less important, descriptive, subordinate parts are put at the beginning, the main idea – at the end of the sentence. Sentences of this type are called periodic sentences or periods. The device of suspence is used by orators. In poetry the whole of a poem can be built on suspence.

Climax is the highest point of an action in a story. It is an arrangement of sentences with a gradual increase in significance, importance, or emotional tension in the utterance, each successive unit is perceived stronger than the preceding one. A gradual increase in significance may be maintained in three ways: logical, emotional and quantitative.

Climax is a means by which the author discloses his world outlook, his evaluation of objective facts and phenomena. The concrete stylistic function of this device is either

1. to show the relative importance of things as seen by the author, or
2. to impress upon the reader the significance of the things described by suggested comparison, or
3. to depict phenomena dynamically.

Antithesis is an opposition of ideas expressed by strongly contrasted words placed at the beginning and at the end of a single sentence. Antithesis is often met in parallel construction. The antagonistic features of the objects are more easily understood when they stand out in similar structures.

(Skrebnev Y.M. Fundamentals of English stylistics. – M., 1994. – p. 98-156)

 

Тема 12. FUNCTIONAL STYLES

Professor Galperin distinguishes 5 functional styles and suggests their subdivision into substyles in modern English according to the following scheme:

1. The Belles-Lettres Style
2. Publicist Style
3. Newspaper Style
4. Scientific Prose Style
5. The Style of Official Documents
1. The Belles-Lettres Style.

The common feature of all substyles here is aesthetico-cognitive. This function aims 1) at the cognitive process, which makes possible understanding the idea by the reader, and 2) at the same time at the aesthetic process because it calls forth a feeling of pleasure.

The belles-lettres style rests on the following linguistic features:

1. Genuine imagery, achieved by purely linguistic devices.
2. The use of words in contextual meaning influenced by lexical environment.
3. A vocabulary which reflects the author’s personal evaluation of things or phenomena.
4. A peculiar individual selection of vocabulary and syntax.
5. The introduction of the typical features of colloquial language.

The belles-lettres style is individual in selecting language means and stylistic devices.

Language of poetry. Its first differentiating property is its orderly form, which is based mainly on  the rhythmic and phonetic arrangement of the utterance. Syntactical and semantic peculiarities obey the restrictions imposed by the rhythmic pattern, and the result is brevity of expression, epigram-like utterance, and fresh, unexpected imagery.

Rhythm, rhyme and metre are immediately distinguishable properties of the poetic style.

Emotive prose. The imagery of emotive prose is not so rich as it is in poetry; the percentage of words with contextual meaning is not so high as in poetry. The most distinguishing feature of emotive prose is the combination of the literary variant of the language (both in words and syntax) with the colloquial variant, e.g.

“And every now and then a Forsyte would come up, sidle round, and take a look at him. June stood in front, fending off this idle curiosity – a little bit of a thing, as somebody once said, “all hair and spirit’, with fearless blue eyes, a firm jaw, and a bright colour, whose face and body seemed too slender for her crown of red-gold hair.” (Galsworthy)

The language of the drama is entirely dialogue. But the language of the characters is not the exact reproduction of the norms of colloquial language, it is always stylized. The stylization of colloquial language is one of the features of plays, e.g.

LIZA. Perhaps I could make something of him. But I never thought of us making anything of one another; and you never of anything else. I only want to be natural. I want a little kindness. I know I’m a common ignorant girl, and you a book-learned gentleman; but I’m not dirt under your feet. What I done [correcting herself] what I did was not for the dresses and the taxis: I did it because we were pleasant together and I come – come – to care for you; not to want you to make love to me, and not forgetting the difference between us, but more friendly like. (“Pygmalion” by G.B. Shaw)

2. Publicist Style.The general aim of publicist style is 1) to exert a constant and deep influence on public opinion, 2) to cause the reader or the listener to accept the point of view expressed not merely logically but emotionally. The emotional appeal is generally achieved by the use of words with emotive meaning, the use of imagery and other stylistic devices as in emotive prose. But the stylistic devices used in publicist style are not fresh or genuine. Publicist style is also characterized by brevity of expression. In essays brevity becomes epigrammatic.

Oratory and speeches:

1. The main purpose of oratory is persuasion. Direct contact with the listeners permits the combination of the syntactical, lexical and phonetic peculiarities of both written and spoken language.
2. In its leading features oratorical style belongs to the written variety, though it is modified by the oral form of the utterance and the use of gestures.
3. The most typical features of the spoken variety in oratory are: direct address to the audience (“ladies and gentlemen”), the use of the 2^nd personal pronoun (“you”).
4. Political speeches fall into two categories: parliamentary debates and speeches at rallies, congresses, meetings and election campaigns.
5. Sermons mostly touch upon religious subjects, ethics and morality, sometimes a political problem.
6. The most frequently used stylistic devices are: antithesis, parallel constructions, repetition (linking repetition, synonymous phrase repetition), suspense, climax, rhetorical questions and questions-in-the-narrative. Questions are most frequent because they promote closer contact with the audience. The desire of the speaker to convince the audience results in the use of simile and metaphor, but they are usually trite ones, as fresh figures of speech may divert the attention of the listeners away from the main point of the speech. The use of allusion depends on the contents of the speech and the level of the audience.
7. There are special obligatory forms used to open of an oration: “My lords, Mr. President, Mr. Chairman, Your Worship, Ladies and gentlemen”. At the end of the speech: “Thank you (very much)”.

Essay is a literary composition of moderate length on philosophical, social, aesthetic or literary subjects. An essay is a series of personal and witty comments. The most characteristic features are:

1. personal treatment of a theme and naturalness of expression,
2. brevity of expression,
3. the use of the 1^st person singular,
4. the abundant use of emotive words,
5. the use of similes and sustained metaphors.

Some essays are written in a highly emotional manner resembling the style of emotive prose, others resemble scientific prose and the terms review, memoir or tretise are more applicable to certain essays.

Articles have all above mentioned features of publicist style. The character of the magazine and the chosen subject affects the choice of stylistic devices. But words of emotive meaning are few in popular scientific articles. Bookish words, neologisms, traditional word combinations and parenthesis are more frequent in political magazine articles than for example in newspaper articles.

3. Newspaper Style. English newspaper style is a system of interrelated lexical, phraseological and grammatical means that serves the purpose of informing and instructing the reader. Not all printed matter found in newspapers may be considered newspaper style: stories, poems, crosswords puzzles, etc. Under newspaper style comes the following printed matter.

Brief news items. Their function is to inform the reader. It states only facts without giving comments. The bulk of the vocabulary is neutral and common literary. But apart from this there are:

1. special political and economic terms,
2. non-term political vocabulary,
3. newspaper cliches,
4. abbreviations,
5. neologisms.

The vocabulary of brief news is generally devoid of any emotional colouring. The basic peculiarities of news items lie in their syntactical structure. The sorter the news item, the more complex its structure. It is usually characterized by:

1. complex sentences with a developed system of clauses,
2. Verbal constructions (infinitive, participial, gerundial) and verbal-noun constructions
3. Syntactical complexes, especially the nominative with the infinitive,
4. Attributive noun groups, e.g. “Profit boost plan”, “Dutch move in UN on Torture”.
5. Specific word order. Journalist practice has developed such an order in a sentence: subject – predicate (object) – adverbial modifier of reason (manner) – adverbial modifier of place – adverbial modifier of time,

Headlines. The main function is to inform the reader of the news that follows is about. Sometimes headlines contain elements of appraisal, derision, mockery. Headlines contain emotionally coloured word or phrase. A deliberate breaking-up of set expressions are common.

Syntactically headlines are very short sentences or phrases. The most frequent structures or patterns are:

1. Full declarative sentences;
2. Interrogative sentences;
3. Nominative sentences;
4. Elliptical sentences;
5. Sentences with articles omitted;
6. Phrases with only verbals: infinitive, participial and gerundial constructions;
7. Questions in the form of statements;
8. Complex sentences;
9. Headline including direct speech.

Advertisements and announcements. Their function is to inform the reader. There are two types of advertisements and announcements in the modern English newspaper; classified and non-classified.

In classified advertisements and announcements various kinds of information are arranged according to subject matter into sections: births, marriage, personals, etc. The vocabulary of classified adv. and ann. Is on the whole neutral, there are a number of stereotyped patterns. Brevity is the most essential feature of such advertisements.

The separate advertisements and announcements, or non-classified, touch such subjects that can’t be included into traditional sections. The reader’s attention is attracted then by every possible means: lexical, typographical, etc. There is no call for brevity, as advertiser may buy as much space as he chooses.

Editorials are an intermediate phenomenon between the newspaper style and the publicist style. The function of editorials is to influence the reader by giving interpretation of certain facts. Editorials comment on political and other events of the day. Their purpose is to give the editor’s opinion on the news published and to prove to the reader that it is the correct one. Like any publicistic writing Editorial appeals not only to the reader’s mind but to his feelings as well. Hence the use of emotionally coloured language elements, both lexical and structural.