Stylistic devices of semasiology

Stylistic devices of semasiology

 

Metaphorical group

Now, we come to the most difficult, yet the most inventive and interesting, use of language, figurative language. This term refers to the use of words, not in their literal sense, but in a metaphorical or imaginative way. Although you may associate figurative language primarily with poetry, prose writers also use it to give great immediacy, greater drama, or stronger impact on an otherwise commonplace idea. 

 

Metaphor is the transfer of the name of one object or person to another based on likeness, similarity of some features of these two objects.

A metaphor, in place of proper Words, Resemblance puts; and Dress to Speech affords.

Galperin considers that the idea that metaphor is based on similarity of two objects is erroneous. Identification should not be equated to resemblance. Therefore, it is better, in his view, to define metaphor as the power of realising two lexical meanings simultaneously.

A metaphor refers to a direct comparison in which the dominant quality or characteristic of one thing is transferred to another. Literally, such transference of meaning does not make sense, but the reader knows to interpret it as a comparison. In the phrase, "a will of granite," we are meant to see that the characteristics of granite - hardness, durability, and inflexibility - are being likened to the person's steadfastness and unwillingness to change. A dog, admittedly old, fat, and lazy, was once humorously described as "a barrel perched on four toothpicks."

John Knowles metaphorically described the ocean swimmer as "flotsam" to emphasise the swimmer's powerlessness against the turbulent force of the ocean.

 

Metaphor is a process of mapping between two different conceptual domains. The different domains are known as the target domain (tenor or topic) and the source domain (vehicle or object of nomination). The target domain is the topic or concept that you want to describe through the metaphor while the source domain refers to the concept that you draw upon in order to create the metaphorical construction.

In a news headline like THE WAR ERUPTS ON NEW FRONT, the sudden and unexpected outbreak of war is reported in the same terms as the violent eruption of a volcano. In rhetorical terms, the tenor (or topic) of the metaphor is war, but the vehicle/ object of nomination by which it is described is volcano.

Metaphors are a part and parcel, so to speak, of everyday discourse. The difference between sorts of metaphors in different discourse contexts is in the degree of novelty exhibited by a metaphor. As with any figure of speech, repeated use leads to familiarity, and so commonplace metaphors can sometimes develop into idioms or fixed expressions in the language. However, what arguably sets the use of metaphor in literature apart from more “idiomatised” uses of the trope is that in literature metaphors are on the one hand typically more novel and on the other stylistically less clear (P. Simpson). Writers consciously strive for novelty in literary expression and this requires developing not only new conceptual mappings but also new stylistic frameworks through which these mappings can be presented.

  That’s why semantically there are two kinds of metaphor: trite/dead and genuine/living.

Different from trite/ dead  metaphors, which are no longer felt as such, dead or disguised metaphors add to the stock of words and are studied in Lexicology. By trite metaphor we mean the transferred usage which, though the metaphoric nature of the expression is evident, is so familiar and customary that one does not always notice it, and the expression is repeated as a ready-made one, not created in actual speech.

Metaphors may be created on the similarity of different physical properties, such as, for instance:

1. similarity of shape – crane, bulb, table’s leg;
2. similarity of position – foot of the mountain, head of the procession;
3. similarity of movement – fox-trot, to worm one’s way;
4. zoosemy – a fox, a bear, a monkey, to ape

Trite metaphors give rise to phraseological word groups: to fly into a passion, to jump to conclusion, to fall in love.

Genuine metaphor is fresh and original. They serve as an expressive means in pictorial language. Genuine metaphors are generally created and accepted with a consciousness of their nature as substitutes for their literal equivalents. The wider the gap between the associated objects the more striking and unexpected and expressive is the metaphor.  They are studied in stylistics.

His words were coming so fast; they were leap-frogging themselves. (R. Chandler)

A metaphor implies a resemblance between two distinctly different things without using like or as, e.g.: Life is a bowl of cherries.

The wide curving street dozed peacefully in the sun. (R. Chandler)

Structurally metaphorical use of language ranges from single words or phrases (simple / elementary) to whole contexts consisting of several sentences (sustained metaphors).

 Single words: The TV programmes rekindled her fears of revolution. ... 

Compound words: The vinegar-hearted cook

Phrases: Sales will ...go through the roof.

Sustained/prolonged/extended metaphors: sentences and beyond

Blondes, wars, famines - they all arrived on the same train. They unpacked together. They stayed at the same hotel. It is а small step from the playground into the classroom, and the men have already taken it.

Metaphor is usually realised in the predicative group.

E.g.: He turned his head. His eyes were lumps of ice. (R. Chandler)

Functionally there are several types of metaphor:

• nominative ( one name which is substituted for by another). The nominative metaphor gives a new name to a class of objects: a leg of the table, an arm of the clock
• cognitive (is created as a result of the shift in the combinability of qualifying lexical units, when their meaning becomes more abstract). Objects named are given the features of quite different objects: black despair, time flie.
• figurative or image bearing ( a means of evaluation and discriminations of the shades of meaning): The machine sitting at that desk was no longer a man; it was a busy New York broker.  (O. Henry)
• Canonised metaphors turn into  symbols: rose = love; dove = peace; red colour = love, passion

Functions and stylistic effects

• to  carry out the aesthetic function (it appeals to imagination rather than gives information)
• to create imagery
• to reveal the author’s emotional attitude towards what he describes

 

There are several structural varieties of metaphors – metaphorical epithet, antonomasia, personification, allegory.

 

Antonomasia is an identification of human beings with things, which surround them. It is a type of renaming for giving an additional information about the bearer of the name.

There are two types:

1. the use of a proper name for a common noun: Othelo, Don Quixote;

He is the Napoleon of crime (C. Doyle)

But he kept snowing her in this Abraham Lincoln, sincere voice.  (J. Salinger)

2. the use of common nouns as proper names ( speaking/token/telling names): Mr. Murdstone;  Mrs. Snake; Miss Toady

 

Functions and stylistic effects

• to characterise a person
• to point out the leading, most conspicuous features of a person
• to achieve a humorous effect

• Personification is ascribing human behaviour and thoughts to inanimate objects. It is a transfer of features and characteristics of a person to a thing (very often nature); ascribing to a natural phenomenon qualities, feelings and thoughts of a human being.

E.g. She had been asleep, always, and now life was thundering imperatively at all her doors. (J. London) 

Slowly, silently, now the moon walks the night in her silvery shoon (shoes) (de la Mare)

If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster.

And treat those two impostors just the same  (R. Kipling)

Old father time

My love is young.

Dylan Thomas in Under Milk Wood personifies the sunrise and likens it to an energetic person:

The sun springs down on the rough and tumbling town. It runs through the hedges of Goosegog Lane, cuffing the birds to sing. Spring whips green down Cockle Row, and the shells ring out.

It is realised only within a certain context and is used only in emotive prose/fiction.

Functions and stylistic effects

• to give vivid characteristics to a phenomenon
• to create the imagery
• to enhance the expressiveness of the text

 

Allegory is the expression of an abstract idea through some concrete image or object. It is realised within the frames of the whole text. It is Antonomasia realised within the whole text.

It may be presented by:

1. a proverb/saying: It’s time to turn ploughs into swords. All is not gold that glitters. Still waters run deep.
2. fable
3. literary fiction

Some genres of literature are fully based on allegory: fables, fairy tales.

After two centuries of crusades the Crescent (=the Moslem religion) defeated the Cross (= Christianity) in all south-western Asia.

Functions and stylistic effects

• to stress the logical meaning of speech by adding to it some emotive colouring
• to enhance the poetic expressiveness of the text

 

Epithet – word or word combination used attributively to give not logical but expressive characteristics (both real and imaginary) of a thing or person. It is an interaction of logical and emotive meanings, which produce a subjective evaluation.

The iron hate in Soul pushed him on again. (M. Wilson)

The difference between a logical attribute and an epithet: the logical attribute is objective and non-evaluative: wooden table, blank sheet of paper.

The epithet gives an emotional assessment and individual evaluation to the object described: a wooden/blank face, iron lady.

There is an interaction of logical and emotive meaning. It is markedly subjective and evaluative

I got up and started towards the door in a dead silence.  (R. Chandler)

Semantically there are:

1. affective/emotive epithets: they convey the emotional evaluation of the object (gorgeous, atrocious);
2. figurative/unassociated: based on metaphors, metonymies and similes: a ghost-like face; helpless loneliness.

It was a sad old bathrobe (J.Salinger)

There is a group of associated/fixed/conventional/standing epithets: true love, Merry Christmas, fair lady.

Structurally the epithet may be:

1. simple (used singly (in the attributive or adverbial positions): an angry sky;
2. compound (a cloud-shaped giant);
3. two-step structures ( a pompously majestic female);
4. a phrase/clausal (a don’t-care attitude, six-o’clock-in-the-evening-enthusiastic-determined-and-well-intentioned-studier-until-midnight type)
5. inverted/reversed/metaphorical is based on a metaphor and commonly expressed by an “of-phrase” (a toy of a girl).

        The difference between the inverted epithet and an ordinary of-phrase: the article with the second noun: the toy of the girl is a noun phrase; the toy of a girl is an epithet.

A ghost of a smile appeared on Soames’s face. (J. Galsworthy)

Functions and stylistic effects

• to give an emotional evaluation 
• to convey the subjective attitude of the writer

 

metaphor -  metonymy

Thus, metaphor and metonymy are two basic and universal means of the transfer of a name from one denotate to another.

What is the difference between them?

Semantically:

1. Metonymical group of EM is based on the contiguity of two objects.  Metaphorical group is based on the transfer of the meaning based on the likeness (real or imaginary) of two objects. 
2. Both metonymical and metaphorical transfer of meaning depends on the lexical meaning of the units. However, metonymical transfer of meaning is characterised by widening of the lexical meaning: The hall applauded. The metaphorical transfer is characterised by the narrowing of the lexical meaning: He is a bear.
3. Metonymy and metaphor differ in the way they are deciphered. In the process of disclosing the meaning implied in a metaphor, one image excludes the other. E.g.: The sky lamp of the night – the moon. This is not the case with metonymy. Metonymy while presenting one object to our mind doesn’t exclude the other: The blue coat started laughing.

Syntactically:

There are two communicative functions, which influence the formation of categorial and lexical meanings of the word:

1. the function of identification/nomination – the theme of the sentence
2. the predicative function (the rheme of the sentence)

Metonymy is linked to the identification function. It is usually expressed by nouns and is used in syntactical functions characteristic of nouns. It is more often found in the subject and object group. E.g.: The bottle-neck coloured.

The primary function of the metaphor is that if the predicative, the secondary function is identification. Metaphor is commonly used in the predicative group. When it is used as a subject, it takes on an anaphoric pronoun. E.g.: She was a fox. But this fox was especially cunning.

Лапти потянулись в город. – metonymy – identification function - theme

Он – настоящий  лапоть. – metaphor – it entered the position of the predicative.

•          Irony is also based on the transfer of the meaning, but if metaphor is based on similarity and metonymy on contiguity, irony is based on the opposition / difference of two meanings of a speech unit (the one that is expressed and the one that is meant). Words acquire meanings opposite to their primary language meanings.

Irony (concealed mockery) is the use of a word, a phrase or a sentence, which has a positive meaning to express a negative one.

E.g. The house itself was not so much. It was smaller than Buckingham Palace, rather grey for California, and probably had fewer windows then the Chrysler Building. (R. Chandler)

Usually taking the form of sarcasm or ridicule in which laudatory expressions are used to imply condemnation or contempt. It foregrounds not the logical, but the evaluative meaning.

What a noble illustration of the tender laws of this favoured country! – They let the pauper go to sleep! (Ch. Dickens)

How early you’ve come!

The dictionary defines irony in many ways, but for our purposes, here are the three most relevant ones:

1. the use of words to convey the opposite of their literal meaning;
2. an expression or utterance marked by a deliberate contrast between the apparent and intended meaning;
3. the incongruity between what might be expected and what actually occurs.

I looked at the First of the Barons. He was eating salad – taking a whole lettuce leaf on his fork and absorbing it slowly, rabbit-wise – a fascinating process to watch. (K. Mansfield)

The intended meaning is the opposite of that expressed by words used. The dictionary and contextual meanings stand in opposition to each other.

An Irony, dissembling with an air,

Thinks otherwise than what the words declare.

Armed with these definitions of irony, we can next examine the many shades of meaning that encompass this term. The shades of meaning might be clearer if you can imagine a continuum, a horizontal line on which to plot them. Moving from left to right along the continuum, we move from the most gentle forms of irony to the nastiest.

WIT / IRONY / SATIRE / CYNICISM / SARCASM / SARDONICISM

Wit - This term implies mental keenness, the talent for making an effective comment on them.

E.g.: Oscar Wilde, the Irish dramatist, once defined eternity as two people and a ham.

Irony - This term was defined at the beginning of this section.

Satire - An expression or literary work that seeks to expose folly and wickedness, often by means of irony and sarcasm, is satirical.

Cynicism - Cynicism is characterised by scorn for the motives and virtues of others; the belief that people are motivated by selfishness. The cynical tone is mocking and sneering, often bitter; it may or may not involve irony.

E.g.: When a rich man donates money to a charity, cynics say that his motive is to get a charitable deduction on his tax return.

Sarcasm - This refers to an expression or attitude that is sharply mocking or contemptuous, typically utilising statements or implications pointedly opposite or irrelevant to the underlying purport. Sarcasm suggests open taunting and ridicule; though it uses irony, its effect is considerably harsher, revealing an intention to hurt.

Sardonicism - This term can describe both content and manner of expression and is associated with scorn, derision, mockery, and cynicism. It is closely associated with sarcasm.

Functions and stylistic effects

• to show the author’s attitude to /  evaluation of something
• to convey a negative meaning
• to produce a humorous effect

Figures of identity

They are realised in the context on the basis of semantic affinity of different units within the frames of the given context. The speaker combines within an utterance or text the units whose meaning he/she considers similar.

 

Simile is a partial identification of two objects belonging to different classes or spheres. It is an expressive comparison of two objects which have common features.

E.g. The ugly one, Laverne, wasn't too bad a dancer, but the other one, old Marty, was like dragging the Statue of Liberty around the floor. (J. Salinger )

The object, which is compared, is called the tenor; the one, which it is compared to, is the vehicle. And the feature of similarity between two objects is the foundation.

Structural means of comparison:

1. Conjunctions: as / like

2. Adverbial clauses of comparison: He looked at Sibil as a mouse might look at a cat.

3. Adjectives in the comparative degree: Roy behaved worse than a cut-throat.

4. Adverbial word-combinations containing prepositional attributes: With the quickness of a cat, Samuel climbed up the tree.

 

Implied simile - formal markers are missing, but the relations between two objects are similar, we have implied simile, where notional or seminotional words (nouns, verbs) substitute the formal markers: to remind, to seem, resemblance.

 E.g. He reminded James, as he said afterwards, of a hungry cat. (J. Galsworthy)

The difference between simile and metaphor

Simile mustn’t be confused with metaphor as both are based on comparison of similar objects. They differ structurally and semantically.

Structurally simile consists of two components - the subject of comparison and the object united by formal elements, connective words: as, as ... as, like, as though, as if, etc. 

E.g. His praises went trampling over the delicate little play like a herd of elephants. (A. Huxley)