Stylistic Devices in English
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Alliteration is a phonetic stylistic device which aims at imparting a melodic effect to the utteran utterance. ce. The essence essence of this this device device lies lies in the repeti repetitio tion n of simila similarr sounds sounds,, in partic particula ular r consonant consonant sounds, sounds, in close succession, succession, particularly particularly at the beginning beginning of successiv successivee words: words: "The possessive instinct never stands still. Through florescence and f eud, frosts and fires it follows the laws of progression." (Galsworthy) Alliteration, like most phonetic expressive means, does not bear any lexical or other meaning unless we agree that a sound meaning exists as such. But even so we may not be able to specify clearly the character of this meaning, and the term will merely suggest that a certain amount of information is contained in the repetition of sounds, as is the case with the repetition of lexical units. However, certain sounds, if repeated, may produce an effec effectt that that can can be speci specifi fied ed.. Ther Therefo efore re alli allite terat ratio ion n is gene general rally ly regard regarded ed as a musi musica call accompaniment of the author's idea, supporting it with some vague emotional atmosphere which each reader interprets for himself. Thus the repetition of the sound Id] in the lines quoted from Poe's poem "The Raven" prompts the feeling of anxiety, fear, horror, anguish or all these feelings simultaneously. Alliteration in the English language is deeply rooted in the traditions of English folklore. The laws of phonetic arrangement in Anglo-Saxon poetry differed greatly from those of present-day English poetry. In Old English poetry alliteration was one of the basic principles of verse and considered, along with rhythm, to be its main characteristic. Each stressed meaningful word in a line had to begin with the same sound or combination of sounds. The traditi traditions ons of folklo folklore re are except exception ionall ally y stable stable and alliterati alliteration on as a struct structura urall device device of Old English poems and songs has shown remarkable continuity. It is frequently used as a well-tested means not only in verse but in emotive prose, in newspaper headlines, in the titles of books, in proverbs-and sayings, as, for example, in the following: Tit for tat; blind as a bat, betwixt and between; It is neck or nothing; to rob Peter to pay Paul;
Read some more additional information on Stylistic Devices Here Antithesis In order to characterize a thing or phenomenon from a specific point of view, it may be necessary not to find points of resemblance or associa-tion between it and some other thing or phenomenon, but to find points of sharp contrast, that is, to set one against the other, for example: "A saint abroad, and a devil at home." (Bunyan) "Better to reign in hell than serve in heaven." (Milton) A line of demarcation must be drawn between logical opposition and stylistic opposition. Any opposition will be based on the contrasting features of two objects. These contrasting features are represented in pairs of words which we call antonyms, provided that all the properties properties of the two objects in question question may be set one against against another, as 'saint' 'saint' —'devil', —'devil', 'reign'—'serve', 'hell'—'heaven'. Many word-combinations are built up by means of contrasting pairs, as up and down, inside and out, from top to bottom and the like. Stylistic opposition, which is given a special name, the term antithesis, is of a different linguistic nature: it is based on relativ relativee opposi oppositio tion n which which arises arises out of the contex contextt throug through h the expans expansion ion of the literar literary y cont contras rasti ting ng pair pairs, s, as in: in: "You "Youth th is love lovely ly,, age age is lone lonely ly,, Yout Youth h is fiery fiery,, age age is fros frosty ty;" ;" (Longfellow) Here the objectively contrasted pair is 'youth' and 'age'. 'Lovely'and lonely' cannot be regarded as objectively opposite concepts, but being drawn into the scheme contrasting 'youth' and 'age', they display certain features which may be counted as antonymical antonymical.. This is strengthstrengthened also by the next line where not only 'youth' and 'age' but also 'fiery' and 'frosty' are objective antonyms. It is not only the semantic aspect which explains the linguistic nature of antithesis, the struct structura urall patter pattern n also also plays plays animpo animportan rtantt role. role. Antith Antithesi esiss is general generally ly moulde moulded d in parall parallel el constr construct uction ion.. The antago antagonis nistic tic featur features es of the two objects objects or pheno phenomen menaa are more more easily easily perceived when they stand out in similar structures. Antithesis has the following basic functions: rhythm rhythm-fo -formi rming ng (becau (because se of the parall parallel el arrange arrangemen mentt on which which it is founde founded); d); copula copulative tive;; dissev disseveri ering; ng; compar comparati ative. ve. These These functi functions ons often often go togeth together er and inter-m inter-ming ingle le in their their own 2
peculiar manner. But as a rule antithesis displays one of the functions more clearly than the others. This particular function will then be the leading one in the given utterance.
Read some more additional information on Stylistic Devices Here Archaic Words. The word-stock of a language is in an increasing state of change. Words change their meaning and sometimes drop out of the language altogether. New words spring, up and replace the old ones. Some words stay in the language a very long time and do not lose their faculty of gaining new meanings and becoming richer and richer polysemantically. Other words live but a short time and are like bubbles on the surface of water — they disappear leaving no trace of their existence. In registering these processes the role of dictionaries can hardly be overestimated. estimated. Dictionaries Dictionaries serve to retain this or that word in a language either as a relic of ancient times, where it lived and circulated, or as a still living unit of the system, though it may have lost some some of its meanin meanings. gs. They They may also also preser preserve ve certai certain n nonce-c nonce-creat reation ionss which which were never intended for general use. , In every period in the development of a literary language one can find words which will show more or less apparent changes in their meaning or usage, from full vigour, through a moribund state, to death, i. e. complete disappearance of the unit from the language. We shall distinguish three stages in the aging process of words: The beginning of the aging process when the word becomes rarely used. Such words are called obsolescent, i.e. they are in the stage of gradually passing out of general use. To this category first of all belong morphological forms belonging to the earlier stages in the development of the language. In the English language these are the pronouns thou and its forms thee, thy and thine, the corresponding verbal ending -est and the verb-forms art, wilt (thou makest, thou wilt), the ending -(e)th instead of -(e)s (he maketh) and the pronoun ye. To the category of obsolescent words belong many French borrowings which have been kept in the literary language as a means of preserving the spirit of earlier periods, e. g.'a pallet (=a straw mattress); a palfrey (=a small horse); garniture (^furniture); to pmplume (==to adorn with feathers or plumes).The second group of archaic words are those that have already gone completely out of use but are still recognized by the English-speaking community: e. g. methinks (=it seems to me); nay (==no). These words are called obsolete.The third group, which may be called archaic proper, are words which are no longer recognizable in modern English, words that were in use in Old English and which have either dropped out of the language entirely or have changed in their appearance so much that they have become unrecognizable, e. g. troth (=faith); a losel (==a worthless, lazy fellow).It will be noted that on the diagram (p. 71) the small circles denoting archaic and poetic words overlap and both extend beyond the large circle "special literary vocabulary". This indicates that some of the words in these layers do not belong to the present-day English vocabulary.The border lines betwe between en the groups groups are not distin distinct. ct.-- In fact they they interp interpene enetrat trate. e. It is special specially ly diffio diffioult ult to distinguish between obsolete and obsolescent words. But the difference is important when we come to deal with the stylistic aspect of an utterance in which the given word serves a certain stylistic purpose. Obsolete and obsolescent words have separate functions, as we shall point oirt later.There is still another class of words which is erroneously classed as archaic, viz. historical words. By-gone periods in the life of any society are marked by historical events, and by institutions, customs, material objects, etc. which are no longer in use, for example: -Thane, yeoman, .goblet, baldric, mace. Words of this typeriever disappear from the language. They are historical terms and remain as terms referring to definite stages in the development of society and cannot therefore be dispensed dispensed with,, though the things and phenomena phenomena to which which they refer have long passed into oblivion. This, the main function ofarchaisms,,finds different interpretation in- different novels .by different writers. Some writers overdo things inthisrespect, theresult being that thereader finds all kinds of obstacles in his way. Others under-estimate the necessity of introducing obsolete or obsolescent elements into their narration and thus failtoconvey what is called "local colour". 3
Read some more additional information on Stylistic Devices Here Barbarisms. In the vocabulary of the English language there is a considerable layer of words words called called barbar barbarism isms. s. These These are words words of foreig foreign n origin origin which have have not entire entirely ly been been assimilated into the English language. They bear the appearance of a borrowing and are felt as something alien to the native tongue. The role foreign borrowings played in the development of the English literary language is well known, and the great majority of these borrowed words now form part of the rank and file of the English vocabulary. It is the science of linguistics, in particular its branch etymology, that reveals the foreign nature of this or that word. But most of what were formerly foreign borrowings are now, from a purely stylistic position, not regarded as foreign. But still there are some words which retain their foreign appearance to a greater or lesser degree. These words, which are called barbarisms, are, like archaisms, also considered to be on the outskirts of the literary language. Most of them have corresponding English synonyms; e. g. chic (=stylish); (=stylish); bon mot (==a clever witty saying); saying); en passant passant (= in passing); passing); ad infinitum infinitum (= to infinity) and many other words and phrases. It is very important for purely stylistic purposes to distinguish between barbarisms and foreign words proper. Barbarisms are words which have already become facts of the English language. They are, as it were, part and parcel of the English word-s word-stoc tock, k, though though they they remain remain on the outski outskirts rts of the literar literary y vocabu vocabulary lary.. Foreig Foreign n words, words, though used for certain stylistic purposes, do not belong to the English vocabulary. They are not registered by English dictionaries, except in a kind of addenda which gives the meanings of the foreign words most frequently used in literary English. Barbarisms are generally given in the body of the dictionary. In printed works foreign words and phrases are generally italicized to indicate their alien nature or their stylistic value. Barbarisms, on the contrary, are not made conspicuous in the text unless they bear a special load of stylistic information. There are foreign words words in the Englis English h vocabu vocabulary lary which which fulfil fulfil a termin terminolo ologica gicall functi function. on. It is eviden evidentt that that barbarisms are a historical category. Many foreign words and phrases which were once just foreign words used in literary English to express a concept non-existent in English reality, have little by little entered the class of words named barbarisms and many of these barbarisms have gradually lost their foreign peculiarities, become more or less naturalized and have merged with the native English stock of words. Conscious, retrograde, spurious and strenuous are words in Ben Jonson's play "The Poetaster" which were made fun of in the author's time as unnecessary borrowings from the French. With the passing of time they have become common English literary words. The function of the foreign words used in the context may be considered to provide local colour as a background to the narrative. In passages of other kinds units of speech may may be used used whic which h will will arou arouse se only only a vagu vaguee conc concep epti tion on in the the mind mind of the the read reader. er. The The significance of such units, however is not communicative — the author does not wish them to conv convey ey any any clea clearr-cu cutt idea idea — but but to serv servee in maki making ng the the main main idea idea . stan stand d out out more more conspicuously. Another function of barbarisms and foreign words is, to build up the stylistic device of non-personal direct speech or represented speech. The use of a word, or a phrase, or a sentence in the reported speech of a local inhabitant helps to reproduce his actual words, manner of speech and the-environment as well.
A specific arrangement of sentence members is observed in detachment, a stylistic device based on singling out a secondary member of the sentence with the help of punctuation (intonation). The word-o word-orde rderr here here is not violated, violated, but secondar secondary y member memberss obtain obtain their their own stress stress and intonation because they are detached from the rest of the sentence by commas, dashes or even a full stop as in the following cases: "He had been nearly killed, ingloriously, in a jeep accident." (I. Sh.) "I have to beg you for money. Daily." (S. L.) Both "ingloriously" and "daily" remain adverbial modifiers, occupy their proper normative places, following the modified verbs, but-due 4
to detachment and the ensuing additional pause and stress-are foregrounded into the focus of the reader's attention.
Read some more additional information on Stylistic Devices Here Dialectal words This group of words is obviously opposed to the other groups of the nonliterary English vocabulary and therefore its stylistic functions can be more or less clearly defined. Dialectal words are those which in the process of integration of the English national langua language ge remain remained ed beyond beyond its litera literary ry bounda boundarie ries, s, and their their use is general generally ly confin confined ed to a defi defini nite te loca localit lity. y. We excl exclud udee here here what what are calle called d socia sociall diale dialect ctss or even even the the still still loos looser er application of the term as in expressions like poetical dialect or styles as dialects. With reference to this group there is a confusion of terms, particularly between the terms dialectal, slang and vernacular. In order to ascertain the true value and the stylistic functions of dialectal words it is necessary to look into their nature."The history of a very large part of the vocabulary of the present-day English dialects is still very obscure, and it is doubtful whether much of it is of any antiquity. So far very little attempt has been made to sift the chaff from the grain in that very vast receptacle of the English Dialect Dictionary, and to decide which elements are really genuine 'corruptions' of words which the yokel has heard from educated speakers, or read, misheard, or misread misread,, -and -and ignora ignorantl ntly y altered altered,, and adopte adopted, d, often often with with a slight slightly ly twiste twisted d signif significan icance. ce. Probab Probably ly many many hundre hundreds ds of 'dial 'dialect' ect' words are of this this origin origin,, and have no histor historica icall value value whatever, except inasmuch as they illustrate a general principle in the modification of speech. Such words are not, as a rule, characteristic of any Regional Dialect, although they may be ascribed to one of, these, simply because some collector of dialect forms has happened .to hear them in a particular area. They belong rather to the category of 'mistakes' which any ignorant speaker may make, and which such persons do make, again and again, in every part of the country." We are not concerned here with the historical aspect of dialectal words. For our purpose it will suffice to note that there is a definite similarity of functions in the use of slang, cockney and any other form of non-literary English and that of dialectal words. Some dialectal words have become so familiar in good colloquial or standard colloquial English that they are universally accepted as recognized units of the standard colloquial English. To these words belong lass, meaning 'a girl or a beloved girl' and the corresponding lad, '& boy or a young man', daft from the Scottish and the northern dialect, meaning 'of unsound mind, silly'; fail also Scottish, with the meaning of 'trouble, cares'. Still they have not lost their dialectal associations and therefo therefore re are used used in literar literary y Engli English sh with with the aboveabove-men mentio tioned ned stylis stylistic tic functi function on of characterization. Of quite a different nature are dialectal words which are easily recognized as corruptions of standard English words, although etymol^gical-ly they may have sprung from the peculiarities of certain dialects. The I, following words may serve as examples: hinny from honey: tittle appar-1 ently from sister, being a childish corruption of the word; cutty meaning a I' 'testy or naughty girl or woman'. I Most of the examples so far quoted come from the Scottish and the I northern dialects. This is explained by the fact that Scotland has strug-1 gled to retain the peculiarities of her language. Therefore many of the I words fixed in dictionaries as dialectal are of Scottish origin. I Among other dialects used for stylistic purposes in literature is the l:'southem l:'southem dialect (in particular particular that of Somersetshire). Somersetshire). This dialect dialect has ца phonetic phonetic peculiarity that distinguishes it from other dialects, viz. lpnitial tsl and {f] are voiced, and are written in the direct speech of char-latters as lz] and tv], for example: 'volk' (folk), 'vound' (found), 'zee' l^ee), '^inking' (sinking). To show how the truly dialectal wotds are ^ intermingled with all kinds of improprieties of speech, it will be enough to I quote the following excerpt from Galsworthy's "A Bit of Love." Dialectal words are only to be found in the style of emotive prose, ^very rarely in other styles. And even here their use is confined to the ^function of characterizing personalities through their speech. Perhaps lit would not be a false supposition to suggest that if it were not for the I' use of the dialectal words in emotive prose they would have already l^sappeared entirely 5
from the English language, the unifying tendency 1>',of the literary language is so strong that language elements used only lin dialect are doomed to vanish, except, perhaps, those which, because -"Of their vigour and beauty, have withstood the integrating power of " the written language. Writers who use dialectal words for the purpose of characterizing the speech of a person in a piece of emotive prose or drama, introduce them into the word texture in different ways.
Read some more additional information on Stylistic Devices Here Epithet is probably as well known to you as metaphor, because it is widely mentioned by the critic critics, s, schola scholars, rs, teache teachers, rs, and studen students ts discus discussin sing g a literar literary y work. work. Epithe Epithett expres expresses ses a characteristic characteristic of an object, both existing existing and imaginary. imaginary. Its basic feature is its emotiveness emotiveness and subjectivity: the characteristic attached to the object to qualify it is always chosen by the speaker himself. Our speech ontologically being always emotionally coloured, it is possible to say that in epithet epithet it is the emotive meaning of the word that is foreground foregrounded ed to suppress suppress the denotation denotational al meaning of the latter. Epithet has remained over the centuries the most widely used SD, which is understandable-it offers ample opportunities of qualifying every object from the author's partial and subjective viewpoint, which is indispensable in creative prose, publicist style, and everyday speech. Through long and repeated use epithets become fixed. Many fixed epithets are closely conn connec ected ted with with folk folklo lore re and and can be trace traced d back back to folk folk ball ballad adss (e.g (e.g.. "tru "truee love love", ", "merr "merry y Christ Christmas mas", ", etc.). etc.).The The struct structure ure and semant semantics ics of epithe epithets ts are extrem extremely ely variab variable le which which is explained by their long and wide use. Semantically, there should be differentiated two main groups, the biggest of them being affective (or emotive proper). These epithets serve to convey the emotional evaluation of the object by the speaker. Most of the qualifying words found in the dictionary can be and are used as affective epithets (e.g. "gorgeous", "nasty", "magnificent", "atrocious", etc.). The second group -figurative, or transferred, epithets-is formed of metaphors, metony metonymie miess and simile similess (which (which will will be discus discussed sed later) later) expres expressed sed by adjecti adjectives ves.. E.g. E.g. "the "the smiling sun", "the frowning cloud", "the sleepless pillow", "the tobacco-stained smile", "a ghostlike like face", face", "a dreaml dreamlike ike experi experience ence.. In the overwh overwhelm elming ing majori majority ty of exampl examples es epithe epithett is expr expres esse sed d by adjec adjecti tive vess or qual qualit itati ative ve adve adverb rbss (e.g. (e.g. "his "his triu triump mpha hant nt look look"" = he look looked ed triumphantly).* Nouns come next. They are used either as exclamatory sentences (You, ostrich!) or as postpositive, attributes ("Alonzo the Clown", "Richard of the Lion Heart"). Epithets are used singly, in pairs, in chains, in two-step structures, and in inverted constructions, also as phrase-attributes. Pairs are represented by two epithets joined by a conjunction or asyndetically as in "wonderful and incomparable beauty" or "a tired old town". Two-step epithets are so called because the process of qualifying seemingly passes two stages: the qualification of the object and the qualif qualificat ication ion of the qualifica qualificatio tion n itself itself,, as in "an unnatura unnaturally lly mild mild day" day" (Hut.), (Hut.), or "a pompously majestic female". Phrase-epithets always produce an original impression. Cf.: "the sunshine-in-the-breakfast-room smell. Their originality proceeds from rare repetitions of the once coined phrase-epithet which, in its turn, is explained by the fact that into a phrase-epithet is turned a semantically self-sufficient word combination or even a whole sentence, which loses some of its independence and self-sufficiency, becoming a member of another sentence, and strives to return to normality. Inverted epithets. They are based on the contradiction between the logical and the syntactical: logically defining becomes syntactically defined and vice versa. E.g. instead instead of "this devilish devilish woman", woman", where "devilish" "devilish" is both logically logically and syntactical syntactically ly defining, defining, and "woman", also both logically and syntactically defined, W. Thackeray says "this devil of a woman" woman".. Here Here "of a woman" woman" is syntact syntactical ically ly an attrib attribute ute,, i.e. i.e. the defini defining, ng, and "devil "devil"-th "-thee defi define ned, d, whil whilee the the logi logica call relat relatio ions ns betw betwee een n the the two two rema remain in the the same same as in the the prev previo ious us example-"a woman" is defined by "the devil".
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Euphemism, as is known, is a word or phrase used to replace an unpleasant word or expression by a conventionally more acceptable one, for example, the word 'to die' has bred the following euphemisms: to pass away, to expire, to be no more, to depart, to join the majority, to be gone, and the more facetious ones: to kick the bucket, to give up the ghost. So euphemisms are synonyms which aim at producing a deliberately mild effect. Euphemism is sometimes figuratively called "a whitewashing device". The linguistic peculiarity of euphemism lies in the fact that every euphemism must call up a definite synonym in the mind of the reader or listener. Euphemisms may be divided into several groups according to their spheres of application. The most recognized are the following: 1) religious, 2) moral, 3) medical and 4) parliamentary. The life of euphemisms is short. They very soon become closely associated with the referent (the object named) and give way to a newly coined word or combination of words, which, being the sign of a sign, throws another veil over an unpleasant or indelicate concept.
Read some more additional information on Stylistic Devices Here Hyperbole. Another SD which also has the function of intensifying one certain property of the object described is h y p e r b o I e. It can be defined as a deliberate overstatement or exaggeration of a feature essential (unlike periphrasis) to the object or phenomenon. In its extreme form this exagge-' ration is carried to an illogical degree, sometimes ad absurdum. Like many stylistic devices, hyperbole may lose its quality as a sty- listic device through frequent repetition and become a unit of the language-as-a-system, reproduced in speech in its unaltered form. Here are some examples of language hyperbole: 'A thousand pardons'; 'scared to death', 'immensely 'immensely obliged;' obliged;' ' give the world to see him.' Hyperbole Hyperbole differs from mere exaggeratio exaggeration n in that it is intended to be understood as an exaggeration. In this collection the following quotations deserve, a passing note: "Hyperbole is the result of a kind of intoxication by emotion, which prevents a person from seeing things in their-true dimensions... If the reader (listener) is notcarried away by the emotion of the writer (speaker), hyperbole becomes a mere lie." Hyperbole is a device which sharpens the reader's ability to make a logical assessment of the utterance. This is achieved, as is the case with other devices, by awakening the dichotomy of thought and feeling where thought takes the upper hand though not to the detriment of feeling.
Read some more additional information on Stylistic Devices Here Inversion which was briefly mentioned in the definition of chiasmus is very often used as an independent SD in which the direct word order is changed either completely so that the predicate predicate (predicative) (predicative) precedes precedes the subject, or partially partially so that the object precedes precedes the subject predicate pair. Correspondingly, we differentiate between a partial and a complete inversion. The stylistic device of inversion should not be confused with. grammatical inversion which is a norm in interrogative constructions. Stylistic inversion deals with. the rearrangement of the normative
