Stylistic Devices

SYNTACTICAL EXPRESSIVE MEANS AND STYLISTIC DEVICES. GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS

2014-01-28T14:55:00.000-08:00

It is well known that the study of the sentence and its types and especially the study of the relations between different parts of the sentence has had a long history. Rhetoric was mainly engaged in the observation of the juxtaposition of the members of the sentence and in finding ways and means of building larger and more elaborate spans of utterance, as for example, the period or periodical sentence.
Modern grammars have greatly extended the scope of structural analysis and have taken under observation the peculiarities of the relations between the members of the sentence, which somehow has overshadowed problems connected with structural and semantic patterns of larger syntactical units. It would not be an exaggeration to state that the study of units of speech larger than the sentence is still being neglected by many linguists. Some of them even consider such units to be extralinguistic, thus excluding them entirely from the domain of Linguistics.
Stylistics takes as the object of its analysis the expressive means and stylistic devices of the language, which are based on some significant structural point in an utterance, whether it consists of one sentence or a string of sentences. In grammar certain types of utterances have already been patterned, thus for example, we have all kinds of simple, compound or complex sentences, even a paragraph long, that may be regarded as neutral or non-stylistic patterns. At the same time, the peculiarities of the structural design of utterances, which bear some particular emotional colouring, that is, which are stylistic and therefore non-neutral, may also be patterned and presented as a special system, which we shall call "stylistic patterns". Stylistic patterns should not be regarded as violations of the literary norms of standard English. On the contrary, these patterns help us to establish the norm of syntactical usage, inasmuch as their study reveals the invariant of the form together with the variants and what is more, reveals the borders beyond which the variants must not be extended.
Stylistic syntactical patterns may be viewed as variants of the general syntactical models of the language and are the more obvious and conspicuous if presented, not as isolated elements or accidental usages, but as groups easily observable and lending themselves to generalization.
Prof. G. Vinokur maintains that in syntax it is no new material that is coined, but new relations, because the syntactical aspect of speech is nothing more than a definite combination of grammatical forms, and in this sense the actual words used are essentially immaterial. Therefore syntactical relations, particularly in poetic language, are that aspect of speech in which everything presents itself as actualization of the potential and not merely the repetition of the ready-made. By "the potential" G. Vinokur apparently means variations of syntactical patterns. It follows therefore, that in order to establish the permissible fluctuations of the syntactical norm, it is necessary to ascertain what is meant by the syntactical norm itself. We have already pointed out what the word norm means as a generic term. In English syntax the concept of norm is rather loose. In fact any change in the relative positions of the members of the sentence may beregarded as a variant of the received standard, provided that the relation between them will not hinder the understanding of the utterance. But here we are faced with the indisputable interdependence between form and content; in other words, between the syntactical design of the utterance and its concrete lexical materialization. Syntactical relations can be studied in isolation from semantic content. In this case they are viewed as constituents of the whole and assume their independent grammatical meaning. This is most apparent in forms embodying nonsense lexical units, as in Lewis Carroll's famous lines, so often quoted by linguists.
"Twas brilling, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimbol in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogroves,
And the mome raths outrabe."
The structural elements of these lines stand out conspicuously and make sense even though they are materialized by nonsense elements. Moreover they impose on the morphemes they are attached to a definite grammatical meaning, making it possible to class the units. So it is due to these elements that we can state what the nonsense words are supposed to mean. Thus we know that the sequence of the forms forcibly suggests that after twas we should have an adjective; the y in slithy makes the word an adjective; gyre after the emphatic did can only be a verb. We know that this is a poem because it has rhythm (iambic tetrameter) and rliyme (abab in 'toves - borogroves;' 'wabe - outgrabe'). A closer examination of the structural elements will show that they outnumber the semantic units: nineteen structural elements and eleven, which are meant to be semantic. The following inferences may be drawn from this fact: 1) it is the structural element of the utterance that predetemines the possible semantic aspect; 2) the structural elements have their own independent meaning which may be called structural or, more widely, grammatical; 3) the structural meaning may affect the lexical, giving contextual meaning to some of the lexical units.
(I.R.Galperin. Stylstics. Moscow., 1971, pp. 190-193).

Poetic and Highly Literary Words

2014-01-28T14:52:00.001-08:00

Poetic words, as the term itself implies, are used primarily in poetry. They may be likened to terms in more than one way. First of all they belong to a definite style of language and perform in it their direct function. If encountered in another style they assume a new function, mainly satirical, for the two notions, poetry and prose, have been opposed to each other from time immemorial. Poetic language has special means of communication, i. e. rhythmical arrangement, some syntactical peculiarities and a certain number of special words. The special poetic vocabulary has a marked tendency to detach itself from common literary word stock and assume a special significance. Poetic words claim to be, as it were, of higher rank. They are aristocrats in the language and do not allow any mingling with the lower ranks. They make a careful selection of the company they circle in. Poetic words and expressions were called upon to sustain the special elevated atmosphere of poetry a function, which they even now claim to carry out.
V.V. Vinogradov gives the following properties of poetic words: "...the cobweb of poetic words and images veils the reality, stylizing it according to the established literary nor canons. A word is torn away from its referent. Being drawn into the system of literary styles, the words are selected and arranged in groups of definite images, in phraseological series, which grow standardized and stale and are becoming conventional symbols of definite phenomena or characters or of definite ideas impressions." Poetic words in the English language do not a homogeneous group: They include archaic words, such whilom, ne, lemon, and many others, as in the second stanza Childe Harold's Pilgrimage:
Whilome in Albion's Isles there dwelt a youth,
Who ne in virtue's ways did take delight,
But spent his days in riot most uncouth,
And vex'd with mirth the drowsy ear of Night.
Ah me! In sooth he was a shameless wight
Sore given to revel and ungodly glee;
Few earthly tilings found favour in his sight
Save concubines and carnal companie,
And flaunting wassailers of high and low degree.

Poetical tradition has kept alive such archaic words an_ forms as yclept (p. p. of the old verb clipien- 'to call, name quoth (p. t. of cuoethan -'to speak1); eftsoons (eftsona, -'again, 'soon after'), which are used even by modern ballad-mongers. Let us note in passing that archaic words are here to be understood as units that have either entirely gone out of use, or as words some of meanings have grown archaic, e. g.. hall in the following Byron's Childe Harold's Pilgrimage: Deserted is my own hall, its hearth is desolate. It must be remembered though, nt all English poetry makes use of "poeticisms or poetical hey might be named. In the history of English literature were periods, as there were in many countries, which were characterized by protests against the use of such conventional symbols. The literary trends known as classicism and romanticism were partcularly rich in fresh poetic terms.
Poetical words in an ordinary environment may also have a satirical function as seen in this passage from Byron. But Adeline was not indifferent: for
(Now for a common-place!) beneath the snow, As a volcano holds the lava more
Within - et cetera. Shall I go on? - No, I hate to hunt down a tired metaphor,
So let the often-used volcano go. Poor thing: How frequently, and others, It hath been stirred up till its smoke quite smothers! (Don Juan)
The satirical function of poetic words and conventional poetic devices is well revealed in this stanza. The 'tired metaphor' and the volcano' are typical of Byron's estimate of the value of conventional metaphors and stereotyped poetical expressions. The striving for the unusual - the characteristic feature of some kinds of poetry - is akin to the sensational and is therefore to be not only in poetry, but in many other styles. A modern English literary critic has remarked that in journalese a man never goes to an appointed spot; he proceeds to it. The picturesque reporter seldom talks of a horse, it is a steed or a charger. The sky is the welkin; the valley is the vale: fire is the devouring element... Poetical words and word combination can be likened to terms in that they do not easily yield to polysemy. They are said to evoke emotive meanings. They colour the utterance with a certain air of loftiness, but generally fail to produce a genuine feeling of delight: they a hackneyed for the purpose, too stale. And that is the reason that the excessive use of poetisms at present calls forth protest and derision towards those who favour this conventional device. The use of poetic words does not as a rule create the atmosphere of poetry in the true sense; it is a substitute for real art. This is probably due to the very low degree of predictability, which is a property of a truly poetical work. Poetic words are not freely built in contrast to neutral, colloquial and common literary: words, or terms. The commonest means is b\ compounding, e.g. 'young-eyed', 'often-used', in the above quotations from Byron. There is however one means of creating new poetic words recognized as productive even in present-day English, viz. use of a contracted form of a word instead of the full one, e.g., drear instead of dreary, scant (= 'scanty'). Sometimes reverse process leads to the birth of a poetism, e. g., : vasty (='vast" 'The vasty deep,' i. e. the ocean); sleepy (='steep'); 'paly' (='pale'). These two conventional devices are called forth b\ requirements of the metre of the poem, to add or remove a syllable, and are generally avoided by modern English poets, as the reader is apt to think him a poor poet if he could not find a better way to express himself in the chosen form.
Poetical words and set expressions make the utterance understandable only to a limited number of readers. It is mainly due to poeticisms that poetical language is sometimes called d jargon. In modern English poetry there is a strong tendency to use words in strange combinations. It manifests itself in the coinage of new words and, most of all, in combining old and familiar words in a way that hinders understanding and forces the reader to stop and try to decipher the message so
The following may serve as examples: "and time yet for a hundred indecisions." (T. S. Eliot) "he danced his did."E.E.Cummings) "a grief ago." (Dylan Thomas)

Source: I.R.Galperin. Stylstics.

Oxymoron, Antithesis, Irony - stylistic devices of contrast. Examples from Literature

2012-06-10T17:57:00.003-07:00

Oxymoron (Greek oxys + moros - "pointedly foolish") is a stylistic device the syntactic and semantic structures of which come to clashes. It involves a combination of two contrasting ideas within the same syntactical whole, thus ascribing some features to an object incompatible with it.

Antithesis (Greek anti + thesis - "opposition") is a stylistic device involving the use of a parallel construction, the two parts of which must be semantically opposed to each other.

Irony (Greek eironeia - "mockery concealed") - as a trope - is a stylistic device in which the contextual evaluative meaning of a word is directly opposite to its dictionary meaning.

The following information will provide more info on the peculiarities of each stylistic device.

Oxymoron

As a rule, one of the two members of oxymoron illuminates the feature which is universally observed and acknowledged while the other one offers a purely subjective individual perception of the object. Kukharenko names three structural patterns that are possible (the first three points in the table below), the forth is mentioned in the text-book Stylistics by Galperin:

The structural pattern	The examples
a. attributive structures (the most widely known structure)	"with careful carelessness" (Dickens)
b. verbal structures	"to shout mutely" fining Shaw) "to cry silently" (Wilson)
c. non-attributive structures	"the street damaged by improvements" (O. Henry) "silence was louder than thunder" (Updike)
d. adverbial-attributive structures	"awfully pretty" (Cusack)

Oxymora rarely become trite, for their components, linked forcibly, repulse each other and oppose repeated use. There are few colloquial oxymora. all of them showing a high degree of the speaker's emotional involvement in the situation, as in "damn nice." "awfully pretty".

For instance: pay attention to the structure and semantics of the oxymora. Also notice which of their members conveys the individually viewed feature of the object and which one reflects its generally accepted characteristic:

1. If out of my meager vocabulary only the term unenthusiastic excitement comes anywhere near describing the feeling with which all my thoughts were suffused, you must resolve my meaning from that term's dissonance. (Earth)

2. "Heaven must be the hell of a place. Nothing but repentant sinners up there, isn't it?" (Delaney)

3. He opened up a wooden garage. The doors creaked. The garage was full of nothing. (Chandler)

4. He caught a ride home to the crowded loneliness of the barracks. (Jones)

5. Sprinting towards the elevator he felt amazed at his own cowardly courage. (Markey)

6. They were a bloody miserable lot - the miserablest lot of men I ever saw. But they were good to me. Bloody good. (Steinbeck)

7. Harriet turned back across the dim garden. The lightless light looked down from the night sky. (Murdoch)

8. It was an open secret that Ray had been ripping his father-in-law off. (Uh-nak)

9. A neon sign reads "Welcome to Reno - the biggest little town in the world." (A. M.)

10. Huck Finn and Holden Caulfield are Good Bad Boys of American literature. (Vallins)

11. He was sure the whites could detect his adoring hatred of them. (Wright)

Antithesis

In contrast to oxymoron the two opposed notions of an antithesis can refer to the same object of thought or to different objects. Antithesis is based on the use of antonyms, both usual (registered in dictionaries) and occasional or contextual. It is essential to distinguish between antithesis and what is termed contrast. Contrast is a literary (not linguistic) device, based on logical opposition between the phenomena set one against another.

Discuss the semantic centers and structural peculiarities of the following antitheses:

1. Don't use big words. They mean so little. (Wilde)

2. ... quite frequently, things that are obvious to other people aren't even apparent to me. (Barth)

3. ... drunkenness was an amusing but unquestioned vice: churchgoing a soporific but unquestioned virtue. (Barth)

4. I like big parties. They are so intimate. At small parties there isn't any privacy. (Fitzgerald)

5. Rup wished he could be swift, accurate, compassionate and stem instead of clumsy and vague and sentimental. (Murdoch)

6. His coat-sleeves being a great deal too long, and his trousers a great deal too short, he appeared ill at ease in his clothes. (Dickens)

7. It is safer to be married to the man you can be happy with than to the man you cannot be happy without. (Esar)

8. It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair: we had everything before us. we had nothing before us. we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way - in short the period was so far like the present period, that some of its nosiest authorities insisted on its being received for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only. (Dickens)

9. His fees were high: his lessons were light. (O. Henry)

Irony

Irony occurs when a person says one Thing but really means something else. Therefore, irony does not exist outside the context. Irony is a wide-ranging phenomenon and may be achieved both by linguistic and extra-linguistic means. Three kinds of irony are usually distinguished.

Verbal (or linguistic) irony is a figure of speech involving discrepancy between what is said and what is meant. The context is arranged so that the qualifying word reverses the direction of the evaluation, and the word positively charged is understood as a negative qualification and (much rarer) vice versa.

Besides, according to Skrebnev, irony can be based on stylistic incongruity. It happens when high-flown, elevated linguistic units are used in reference to insignificant, socially low topics.

In cases of extra-linguistic irony it is usually extended over a whole story.

In dramatic irony the contrast is between what a character says and what the reader knows to be true. The value of this kind of irony lies in the comment it implies on the speaker or the speaker's expectations.

In irony of situation (or irony of life) the discrepancy is between appearance and reality, or between expectation and fulfillment, or between what is and what would seem appropriate.

Thus, irony makes it possible to suggest meanings without stating them. It can be used to convey both the seriousness and humour of situations.

In the following excerpts you will find mainly examples of verbal irony. Explain how the context makes the irony perceptible. Try to indicate the exact word whose contextual meaning diametrically opposes its dictionary meaning.

1. She turned with the sweet smile of an alligator. (Steinbeck)

2. The book was entitled Murder at Milbury Manor and was a whodunit of the more abstruse type, in which everything turns on whether a certain character, by catching the three-forty-three train at Hilbury and changing into the four-sixteen at Mil-bury, could have reached Silbury by five-twenty-seven, which would have given him just time to disguise himself and be sticking knives into people at Bilbury by six-thirty-eight. (Woodhouse)

3. When the war broke out she took down the signed photograph of the Kaiser and. with some solemnity, hung it in the men-servants" lavatory: it was her own combative action. (Murdoch)

4. From her earliest infancy Gertrude was brought up by her aunt. Her aunt had carefully instructed her to Christian principles. She had also taught her Mohammedanism, to make sure. (Leacock)

5. She's a charming middle-aged lady with a face like a bucket of mud and if she has washed her hair since Coolidge's second term. I'll eat my spare tire, rim and all. (Chandler)

6. With all the expressiveness of a stone Welsh stared at him another twenty seconds apparently hoping to see him gag. (Chandler)

7. Apart from splits based on politics, racial, religious and ethnic backgrounds and specific personality differences, we're just one cohesive team. (Uhnak)

8. I had been admitted as a partner in the firm of Andrews and Bishop, and throughout 1927 and 1928 I enriched myself and the firm at the rate of perhaps forty dollars a month. (Barth)

9. But every Englishman is bom with a certain miraculous power that makes him master of the world. As the great champion of freedom and national independence he conquers and annexes half the world and calls it Colonization. (Bernard Shaw)

Identifying oxymoron, antithesis, and irony as well as defining the function performed in the following examples:

1. Sara was a menace and a tonic, my best enemy; Rozzie was a disease, my worst friend. (Cory)

2. Mrs. Nork had a large home and a small husband. (Lewis)

3. Bookcases covering one wall boasted a half-shelf of literature. (Capote)

4. You have got two beautiful bad examples for parents. (Fitzgerald)

5. A very likeable young man with a pleasantly ugly face. (Cronin)

6. There were some bookcases of superbly unreadable books. (Waugh)

7. I liked him better than I would have liked his father... We were fellow strangers. ( Greene)

8. All this blood and fire business tonight was probably pan of the graft to get the Socialists chucked out and leave honest business men safe to make their fortunes out of murder. (Charteris)

9. I'm interested in any number of things, enthusiastic about nothing. (Barth)

10. Ah. me. Everything. I'm afraid, is significant, and nothing is finally important. (Barth)

11. A local busybody, unable to contain her curiosity any longer, asked an expectant mother point-blank whether she was going to have a baby. '"Oh. goodness, no." the young woman said pleasantly. "I'm just carrying this for a friend." (Wodehouse)

12. I also assure her that I'm an Angry Young Man. A black humorist. A white Negro. Anything. (Richler)

13. Last time it was a nice, simple. European-style war. (Irving Shaw)

Litotes and meiosis as a figures of quantity

2012-06-10T17:40:00.002-07:00

There was an Old Man of Coblenz,

The length of whose legs was immense;

He went with one pronce,

From Turkey to France,

That surprising Old Man of Coblenz.

What makes it funny? What relations are distorted for the sake of the humorous effect?

This rhyme is an example of figures of quantity, which according to Skrebnev are considered the most primitive type of renaming as their basis is disproportion of the object and its verbal evaluation. There are two main relations possible - those of over- and understatement. The figures of quantity include these: hyperbole, meiosis, and litotes.

Read the limerick the drawing illustrates

There was an Old Man in a Barge,

Whose nose was exceedingly large;

But in fishing by night,

It supported a light,

Which helped that Old Man in a Barge.

The logical and psychological opposite of hyperbole is meiosis, or understatement.

Meiosis (Greek - "lessening") is a deliberate use of understatement, the aim of which is to lessen, weaken, reduce the real characteristics of the object so that to show its insignificance.

A specific form of meiosis is called litotes.

Litotes (Greek - "plainness, simplicity") is an understatement that shows the insignificance of the object by means of a peculiar use of negative constructions, due to which the assertion of a positive feature is generated by denying the opposite or contrary of the word or expression which otherwise would be used. As a result, the positive feature is somehow diminished by the negation.

The structural pattern can be as follows:

"not" /"no"/	N. / Adi. / Adv. (the notional part should be
"never"/ etc.	~ negative either in form or in meaning)

Analyse the structure, the semantics and the functions of litotes:

1. "To be a good actress, she must always work for the truth in what she's playing," the man said in a voice not empty of selflove. (Mailer)

2. It was not unnatural if Gilbert felt a certain embarrassment. (Waugh)

3. I was quiet, but not uncommunicative: reserved, but not reclusive: energetic at times, but seldom enthusiastic. (Bunyan)

4. He had all the confidence in the world, and not without reason. (O'Hara)

5. Kirsten said not without dignity: "Too much talking is unwise." (Christie)

6. I felt I wouldn't say "no" to a cup of tea. (Mansfield)

7. "J don't think you've been too miserable, my dear." (Priestley)

8. Still two weeks of success is definitely not nothing and phone calls were coming in from agents for a week. (Ph. Roth)

Distribute the examples of figures of quantity in accordance with the type they belong to (hyperboles, meioses, litotes):

1) "Yeah, what the hell." Anne said and looking at me. gave that not unsour smile. (Warren)

2) The girls were dressed to kill (Braine)

3) Newspapers are the organs of individual men who have jockeyed themselves to be party leaders, in countries where a new party is bom eveiy hour over a glass of beer in the nearest cafe. (Reed)

4) The idea was not totally erroneous. The thought did not displease me. (Murdoch)

5) Henry and Catherine were married, the bells rang, and everybody smiled ... To begin perfect happiness at the respective ages of twenty-six and eighteen is to do pretty well. (Jane Austen)

6) The car which picked me up on that particular guilty evening was a Cadillac limousine about seventy-three blocks long. (Baldwin)

7) Last week I saw a woman flayed, and you will hardly believe how much it altered her person for the worse. (Jonathan Swift)

8) "It isn't verv serious. I have this tinv little tumor on the brain" (Salinger)

9) Four loudspeakers attached to the flagpole emitted a shattering roar of what Benjamin could hardly call music, as if it were played by a collection of brass bands, a few hundred fire engines, a thousand blacksmiths' hammers and the amplified reproduction of a force-twelve wind. (Saxton)

10) Her family is one aunt about a thousand years old. (Fitzgerald)

11) She was a giant of a woman. Her bulging figure was encased in a green crepe dress and her feet overflowed in red shoes. She carried a mammoth red pocketbook that bulged throughout as if it were stuffed with rocks. (O'Connor)

12) A figure lean or corpulent, tall or short, though deviating from beauty, may still have a certain union of the various parts, which may contribute to make them on the whole not unpleasing. (Sir Joshua Reynolds)

13) "No. I've had a profession and then a firm to cherish." said Ravenstreet. not without bitterness. (Priestley)

14) Babbitt's preparations for leaving the office to its feeble self during the hour and a half of his lunch-period were somewhat less elaborate than the plans for a general European War. (Lewis)

15) I wouldn't say "no" to going to the movies. (Waugh)

16) The little woman, for she was of pocket size, crossed her hands solemnly on her middle. (Galsworthy)

17) If anyone comes to me. and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. (Luke 14:26 (NASB))

18) We danced on the handkerchief-big space between the speak-easy tables.

(Warren)

19) She was a sparrow of a woman. (Larkin)

20) And if either of us should lean toward the other, even a fraction of an inch, the balance would be upset. (Wilde)

21) He smiled back, breathing a memory of gin at me. (W. S. Gilbert)

22) She busied herself in her midget kitchen. <Capote)

23) The rain had thickened, fish could have swum through the air. (Capote)

Figures of quantity can often be the final effect of another stylistic device as in:

"He didn't appear like the same man; then he was all milk and honey - now he was all starch and vinegar." (Dickens)

In this sentence the hyperbole appears on top of metaphor.

Hyperbole as a figure of quantity

2012-06-10T17:33:00.001-07:00

Hyperbole (Greek- "excess, exaggeration") is a deliberate overstatement or exaggeration, the aim of which is to intensify qualitive or quantitative aspects of the object to such a degree as to show its utter absurdity.

There was a Young Lady whose chin

Resembled the point of a pin;

So she had it made sharp,

And purchased a harp,

And played several tunes with her chin.

There was a Young Lady whose eyes

Were unique as to colour and size;

When she opened them wide,

People all turned aside,

And started away in surprise.

There was an Old Person of Buda,

Whose conduct grew ruder and ruder,

Till at last, with a hammer

They silenced his clamour,

By smashing that Person of Buda.

Hyperbole is one of The most common expressive means of our everyday speech. The feelings and emotions of the speaker are so ruffled that s/lie resorts in his/her speech to intensifying.

Skrebnev points out that linguistic means of expressing exaggeration are varied. He considers certain tautologies (pleonastic, overburdened structures using more words than are necessary to express the meaning conveyed) to be examples of hyperbole, as in the following instance:

There was an old person of Dutton,

Whose head was so small as a button;

So to make it look big,

He purchased a wig,

And rapidly rushed about Dutton.

Note that the redundancy of expression of the kind can be merely a fault of style-Hyperbole should not be confused with grotesque. Though the both are based on overstatement there is a clear line of demarcation between them. It lies in the speaker's / writer's attitude to the thing described. Grotesque is necessarily negatively charged. Its object is a certain negative feature inherent in the object, whereas hyperbole is used to exaggerate both - the positive and the negative, with no criticism leveled in the latter case. The only aim it strives to gain is provoking laughter and amusing the audience.

Epithet as a stylistic device

2012-05-27T14:33:00.001-07:00

Epithet (Greek - "addition") is a stylistic device emphasizing some quality of a person, thing, idea or phenomenon. Its function is to reveal the evaluating subjective attitude of the writer towards the thing described.

Let us have a look at the following sentences describing the participants of the episode from the John Fowles novel. Focus on the words in bold type.

Charles put his best foot forward, and thoughts of the mysterious woman behind him, through the woods of Ware Commons.
It was opened by a small barrel of a woman, her fat arms shiny with suds.
He was a bald, vast-bearded man with a distinctly saturnine cast to his face; a Jeremiah.
He plainly did not allow delicacy' to stand in the way of prophetic judgment.
He seemed to Charles to incarnate all the hypocritical gossip — and gossips — of Lyme.
Charles could hare believed many things of that sleeping face; but never that its owner was a whore.
What do all the structures have in common?

Cases like these are called epithets.

Epithets should not be confused with logical attributes, the latter having no expressive force but indicating those qualities of the objects that may be regarded as generally recognized (for instance, round table, green meadows, lofty mountains and the like). Though, it is sometimes difficult to draw a clear line of demarcation between epithet and logical attribute. In some passages the logical attribute becomes so strongly enveloped in the emotional aspect of the utterance that it begins to radiate emotiveness. though by nature it is logically descriptive.

Epithets are deemed to be two-fold in nature as their striking effect is owed both to semantics and structure. Thus. Galperin and Kukharenko classify epithets from at least two standpoints - semantic and structural. The tables below illustrate the two possible ways of division.

Semantically epithets are looked at from different angles, which is reflected in the following:

Galperin

Associated epithets are those that point to a feature which is essential to the object they describe: the idea expressed is to a certain extent inherent in the concept of the object, as in: 'darkforest \ fantastic terrors \ 'dreary midnight'.

Unassociated epithets are attributes used to characterize the object by adding a feature not inherent in it. i.e. a feature which may be so unexpected as to strike the reader by its novelty. The adjectives do not indicate any property inherent in the objects but fitting in the given circumstances only, as in 'heart-burning smile',

'voiceless sands', 'bootless cries'._

Note: As far as novelty is concerned epithets can be trite and genuine. Through their long run some of the latter have become fixed without losing their poetic flavour. Such epithets are mostly used in folk songs and ballads.

Kukharenko

Affective (or emotive proper) epithets serve to convev the emotional evaluation of the object by the speaker. Most of the qualifying words found in the dictionary can be and are used as effective epithets (e.g. gorgeous, magnificent, atrocious)

Figurative for transferred; epithets are

formed of metaphors, metonymies and similes expressed by adjectives. Thus epithets can also be based on similarity of characteristics, on nearness of the qualified objects, and on their comparison respectively. The third and the first types can be found in this:

7 cannot imagine what Bosch-like picture of Ware Commons Mrs Pouiteney had built up over the years; what satanic orgies she divined behind every tree...' (Fowles) As for the metonymic one. study this: 'Her painful shoes slipped off (Updike)

Note: Skrebnev points out that epithets can be metaphorical, metonymic and ironical.

As far as structural division is concerned, the classifications of the scholars have more points in common. Despite the differences in terms, hi essence they are very much alike. The table below contrasts these two approaches.

Epithets [Structurally)

Galperin

Simple

Simple (single) epithets are ordinary adjectives (one epithet is used at a time), as in ' the mysterious woman'.

Compound

Compound epithets are built like some compound adjectives as in 'cloud-shapen giant \

Note: Some of them can be based on a simile, as in 'Bosch-like

Phrase

Phrase epithets can consist of a phrase or even a sentence, in which words are crammed into one language unit. Structural elements generally include: (a) the words expression, air, attitude, and others which describe behaviour or facial expression: (b) attributive clauses beginning with that. Phrase epithets are usually hyphenated, thus pointing to the temporary structure of the compound word. They always produce an original impression. For instance, 'a move-if-you-dare expression' (J. Baldwin)

String

The suing (chain) of epithets gives a many-sided description of the object. But in the enumeration of comparatively homogeneous attributes there is always a suggestion of an ascending order of emotive elements, culminating in the last one. as in 'You're a scolding, unjust, abusive, aggravating, bad old creature' (Dickens).

Reversed

Reversed (inverted) epithets are composed of two nouns linked in an of-phrase. The subjective, evaluating, emotional element is embodied not in the noun attribute but in the noun described, as in 'a small barrel of a woman '. The epithets like these are called reversed or inverted as what is syntactically an attribute (of a woman) is, in fact, the word which is really defined.

Kukharenko

Simple

Simple (single) epithets are ordinary adjectives (one epithet is used at a time), as in ' the mysterious woman'.

Pair epithets

Pair epithets are represented by two epithets joined by a conjunction or asyndeti-cally, as in: 'wonderful and incomparable beauty⁷' (Oscar Wilde) or 'a tired old town' (Harper Lee). They are often united by alliteration, as in: 'everyone would be on the lookout of a masked and muffled man' (H G. Wells).

Phrase-Attributes

The chain of epithets gives a many-sided description of the object. But in the enumeration of comparatively homogeneous attributes there is always a suggestion of an ascending order of emotive elements, culminating in the last one. as in 'You're a scolding, unjust, abusive, aggravating, bad old creature' (Dickens).

Inverted

Inverted epithets are composed of two nouns linked in an of-phrase. The subjective, evaluating, emotional element is embodied not in the noun attribute but in the noun described, as in 'a small barrel of a woman '. The epithets like these are called reversed or inverted as what is syntactically an attribute (of a woman) is, in fact, the word which is really defined.

Two-step

Two-step epithets are called so because The process of qualifying seemingly passes two stages:

The qualification of the object and the qualification of the qualification itself as in 'a distinctly saturnine cast'.

Two step epithets have a fixed structure of Adv + Adj model.

Read the sentences that follow. Discuss the structure and semantics of epithets used in them in terms covered above. Follow this plan:

1. Structure:

a) Syntactic function or / and part of speech

b) Structural type

2. Semantics;

a) Associated / non-associated type

b) Affective /figurative

c) The type of the figurative epithet.

1. He lias that unmistakable tall lanky "rangy" loose-jointed graceful close-cropped formidably clean American look. (Murdoch)

2. Across the ditch Doll was having an entirely different reaction. With all his heart and soul, furiously, jealously, vindictively, he was hoping Queen would not win. (Jones)

3. During the past few weeks she had become most sharply conscious of the smiling interest of Hauptwanger. His straight lithe body - his quick, aggressive manner - his assertive, seeking eyes. (Dreiser)

4. He's a proud, haughty, consequential, turned-nosed peacock. (Dickens)

5. The Fascisti. or extreme Nationalists, which means black-shirted. knife-carrying, club-swinging, quick-stepping, nineteen-year-old-pot-shot patriots, have worn out their welcome in Italy. (Hemingway)

6. Where the devil was heaven? Was it up? Down? There was no up or down in a finite but expanding universe in which even the vast, burning, dazzling, majestic sun was in a state of progressive decay that would evennially destroy the earth too. (Hawkes)

7. She has taken to wearing heavy blue bulky shapeless quilted People's Volunteers trousers rather than the tight tremendous how-the-West-was-won trousers she formerly wore. (Barthehne)

8. Harrison - a fine, muscular, sun-bronzed, gentle-eyed, patrician-nosed, steak-fed. Oilman-Schooled, soft-spoken, well-tailored aristocrat was an out-and-out leaflet-writing revolutionary at the time. (Barth)

9. In the cold. gray, street-washing, milk-delivering, shutters-coming-oii-tlie-shops early morning, the midnight train from Paris arrived in Strasbourg. (Hemingway)

10. She was a faded white rabbit of a woman. (Cronin)

11. And she still has that look, that don't-you-touch-me look that women who were beautiful cany with them to the grave. (Barth)

12. Ten-thirty is a dark hour in a town where respectable doors are locked at nine. (Capote)

13. He loved the afterswim salt-and-sunshine smell of her hair. (Banyan)

14. I was to secretly record, with the help of a powerful long-range movie-camera lens, the walking-along-the-Batteiy-in-the-simshine meeting between Ken and Jerry. (Uhnak)

15. "Thief!" Pilon shouted. "Dirty pig of an untrue friend!" (Steinbeck)

16. She spent hausfrau afternoons hopping about in the sweatbox of her midget kitchen. (Capote)

17. He acknowledged an early-afternoon customer with a be-with-you-in-a-minute nod. (Uhnak)

18. He thoroughly disliked this never-far-from-tragic look of a ham Shakespearian actor. (Hemingway)

19. "What a picture!" cried the ladies. "Oh! The lambs! Oh. the sweets! Oh. the ducks! Oh. the pets!" (Mansfield)

20. A branch, cracking under his weight sent through the tree a sad cruel thunder. (Capote)

21. There was none of the Old-fashioned Five-Four-Three-Two-One-Zero business, so tough on the human nervous system. (Clarke)

22. His shrivelled head bobbed like a dried pod on his frail stick of a body. {Gardner)

23. The children were very brown and filthily dirty. (V. Wool/)

24. Liza Hamilton was a veiy different kettle of Irish. Her head was small and round and it held small and round convictions. (Steinbeck)

25. He sat with Daisy in his amis for a long silent time. (Fitzgerald)

Euphemistic periphrases

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The cases like those presented below are called euphemistic periphrases.

'Good heavens. I took That to be a fisherman. But isn't it a woman?'

'By jove. look at this.' 'Bv heavens. I'm not sitting with a socialist. am I?¹

'Heaven forbid. I have heard terrible account of them/

'Sam! I am an absolute one hundred per cent Heaven forgive me damned fool!

The social practice of replacing The Taboo words with words or phrases that seem less straightforward, milder, more harmless (or at least less offensive) exists in any language, whereas genuine euphemisms are often an effective stylistic means.

Euphemism (Greek - "speaking well") is a stylistic device that consists in the substitution of an unpleasant word or expression by a conventionally more acceptable one.

PRACTICE

Read one more passage from the novel and do the tasks to follow.

Charles put his best foot forward, and thoughts of the mysterious woman behind him. through the woods of Ware Commons. He walked for a mile or more, until he came simultaneously to a break in the trees and the first outpost of civilization. This was a long thatched cottage, which stood slightly below his path. There were two or three meadows round it. miming down to the cliffs; and just as Charles came out of the woodlands he saw a man hoying a herd of cows away from a low byre beside the cottage. There slipped into his mind an image: a deliciously cool bowl of milk. He had eaten nothing since the double dose of muffins. Tea and tenderness at Mrs. Tranter's called: but the bowl of milk shrieked ... and was much closer at hand. He went down a steep grass slope and knocked on the back door of the cottage.

It was opened by a small barrel of a woman, her fat aims shiny with suds. Yes. be was welcome to as much milk as he could drink. The name of the place? The Dairv. it seemed, was all it was called. /.../ Charles remembered then to have heard of the place. Its cream and butter had a local reputation; Aunt Tranter had spoken of it. He mentioned her name, and the woman who ladled the rich milk from a chum bv the door into just what he had imagined, simple blue-and-white china bowl, glanced at him with a smile. He was less strange and more welcome.

As he was talking, or being talked to. by the woman on the outside the Dairy, her husband came back driving out his cows. He was a bald, vast-bearded man with a distinctly saturnine cast to his face; a Jeremiah. He gave his wife a stem look. She promptly forwent her chatter and returned indoors to her copper. The husband was evidently a taciturn man. though spoke quietly enough when Charles asked him how much he owed for the bowl of excellent milk. A penny, one of those charming heads of the young Victoria that still occasionally turn up in one's change, with all but that graceful head worn away by the century's use. passed hands.

Analyse the fragment in terms to follow. Expressive means:

• Comment on the usage of words. What layers of language do they belong to? Why?

Comment on the choice of words. Are they mostly bookish or neutral? Up-to-date or obsolete? What effect does John Fowles pursue and why? Analyse the personages speech. What conclusions can you come to in regard to their social status and educational level?

• Comment on the grammar and syntax of this piece of prose. Find grammatical expressive means and say how they contribute to the intended effects.

Are the grammar constructions employed more typical for the nineteenth or twentieth century?

Are the rules of reported speech usage always obsen'ed or not? What is achieved? Stylistic Devices (periphrasis among them):

• Find stylistic devices belonging to the metaphoric group and comment on the effect produced.

metaphor
personification
antonomasia
allusion (the sources referred to)

Find example(s) of metonymy. What type of transfer is (are) it (they) based upon?

Find example(s) of periphrasis. Identify its kind.

Summing Up (Base your opinion on all the excerpts quoted if necessary):

• Make character sketches of the people portrayed.

Charles: Does he conform to the tastes of the time? If not what seems to repel him in it? Is he in any way different from his contemporaries? The dairyman: are his values and manners with or against the conventional stream of the period? Take his social status into account. Dwell upon the social role of woman in Victorian society.

Periphrasis

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The stylistic device that is in charge of renaming of the kind is called periphrasis.

Periphrasis is a stylistic device that consists in the renaming of an object by a phrase that brings out some particular feature of it. Rendering a purely individual perception of the object the device can be decipherable only in context. If a periphrastic locution is understandable outside the context, it is not a stylistic device but merely a synonymous expression. Such easily decipherable periphrases are also called traditional, dictionary or language periphrases.

e.g. 'My dear Tina, we have paid our homage to Neptune. He will forgive us if we now turn our backs on him.'

Though this periphrasis is not strikingly genuine, it is still rather difficult to grasp the speaker's idea. One needs context to perceive that Charles Smithson. the main male character in The French Lieutenant's Woman by John Fowles. Suggests to his companion that they stop gazing at the sea and go back to town.

Writers of past epochs employed periphrasis a great deal, seeing in it a more elegant manner of expression. No wonder, it was one of the most favourite devices of Victorian writers. The same can be attributed to all the educated people of the time, hypocrisy being its distinguishing feature - the thing Oscar Wilde made the object of his ridicule in the play quoted above.

Read the following fragments and identify logical and figurative (both metaphoric and metonymical) periphrases, and comment on the effect achieved.

The 'sixties had been indisputably prosperous: an affluence had come to the ar-tisanate and even to the labouring classes that made the possibility of revolution recede, at least in Great Britain, almost out of mind. Needless to say, Charles knew nothing of the beavered German Jew quietly working, as it so happened, that very afternoon in the British Museum library: and whose work in those sombre walls was to bear such bright red fruit. Had you described that fruit, or the subsequent effects of its later indiscriminate consumption. Charles would almost certainly not have believed you — and even though, in only six months from this March of 1867. the first volume of Kapitcri was to appear in Hamburg.

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Synecdoche is a trope consisting in the usage of a part to signify the whole, or the genus - the species, and vice versa.

As well as metonymy, synecdoche can be trite (as in All hands on deck! and The army included two hundred horse and three hundred foot), and genuine. Study the example of the latter:

'She saw around her, clustered about the white tables, multitudes of violently red Hps, powdered cheeks, cold, hard eyes, self-possessing arrogant faces, and insolent bosoms.' (Bennett)

What picture does the author create? How can people depicted in such a manner be characterised?

1. Study the following examples of metonymy identifying the type ofmetonymi-cal transfer:

1) I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears, and sweat. (Churchill)

2) The leaves dropped off his imaginary crown of laurel, he turned to the gate, leaned against it. and cried bitterly. (Th. Hardy)

3) Give every man thine ear and few thy voice. (Слушай каждого, а говори с немногими). (Shakespeare)

4) 'Good morning, sir.' Authority has suddenly changed into subservience. -T hear you had some trouble with the turnstiles this morning." said Evelyn benevolently. - 'Trouble, sir? Turnstiles?' replied subservience, as if quite at a loss, to understand the sinister allusion. 'They've told you wrong...subservience sprang round the comer. (Bennett)

5) She is coming, my life, my fate. (Tennison)

6) We smiled at each other, but we didn't speak because there were ears all around us. (Chase)

7) 'Save your breath.' I said. 1 know exactly what you have been thinking.' (Chase)

8) Except for a lack of youth, the guests had no common theme, they seemed strangers among strangers; indeed, each face, on entering, had struggled to conceal dismay at seeing others there. (Capote)

9) Dinah, a slim, fresh, pale eighteen, was pliant and yet fragile. (Holmes)

10) The man looked a rather old forty-five, for he was already going grey. (Prichard)

11) The delicatessen owner was a spry and jolly fifty. (Ramon)

12) 'Did he say where he was going?' - 'No. He paid his rent and beat it. You don't ask Joe questions unless you want a new set of teeth. (Clifford)

13) There was something so agreeable in being so intimate with such a waistcoat: in being on such off-hand terms so soon with such a pair of whiskers that Tom was uncommonly pleased with himself. (Dickens)

14) 'Well. Mr. Weller. says the gentl'mn. you're a very good whip, and can do what you like with your horses, we know.' (Dickens)

15) Miss Tox's hand trembled as she slipped it through Mr. Dombey's arm. and felt herself escorted up the steps, preceded by a cocked hat and a Babylonian collar. (Dickens)

16) She wanted to have a lot of children, and she was glad that things were that way. that the Church approved. Then the little girl died. Nancy broke with Rome the day her baby died. It was a secret break, but no Catholic breaks with Rome casually. (O'Hara)

17) "You have nobody to blame but yourself. "The saddest words of tongue or pen." (I. Shaw)

18) Then they came in. Two of them, a man with long fair moustaches and a silent dark man... Definitely, the moustache and I had nothing in common.

(Lessing)

19) ... Ralph could make out a familiar rhythm. - "Kill the beast! Cut his throat! Spill his blood!" - The tribe was dancing. (Golding)

Metonymy

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Transfer by contiguity is based upon a real connection between two objects: that which is named and that the name of which is taken. For instance, the word love in the line above is applied to name the person who inspires this feeling in the poet, there being an actual connection between the objects, not an imaginary one as, for instance, in:

My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun, etc. The transfer by contiguity is represented by the so-called métonymie group.

Metonymy (Greek - "change of name") is a trope that consists in calling an object or phenomenon by a word or phrase it is closely associated with, there being an actual connection between the two.

For example, 'My brass will call your brass, ' says one of the characters of A. Hailey's Airport to another, meaning 'My boss will call your boss/ The transference of names is caused by both bosses being officers, wearing uniform caps with brass cockades.

According to Kukharenko, the scope of transference in metonymy is much more limited than that of metaphor, which is quite understandable: the scope of human imagination identifying two objects on the grounds of commonness of one of their innumerable characteristics is boundless while actual relations between objects are more limited. Many attempts have been made to pinpoint the types of relation which metonymy is based on. The table below is based on the classifications compiled by Galperin (first five items) and Screbnev.

The type of relation

1. the container for the thing contained

Presently the tribe returned noisily to the neck. ( Golding)

2. the relation of proximity

The round game table was boisterous and happy. (Dickens)

3. the material instead of the thing made of it

"Evelyn Glasgow, get up out of that chair this minute. /.../ Your satin. The skirt'11 be a mess of wrinkles in the back. "(Ferber)

4. a concrete thing used instead of an abstract notion, becoming its symbol

I crossed a high tall bridge and negotiated a no man's land and came to the place where the Stars and Stripes stood shoulder to shoulder with the Union Jack. (Steinbeck)

5. names of tools instead of actions

As the sword is the worst argument that can be used, so should it be the last. (Byron)

6. consequence instead of cause

...he didn }t realize it, but he was about a sentence away from needing plastic surgery. (Clifford)

7 characteristic feature of the object instead of the object itself

Blue suit grinned, might even have winked. But big nose in the grey suit still stared. (Priestley)

8. the name of the creator for the creation

Some remarkable pictures in this room, gentle¬men. A Holbein, two Van Dycks and if I am not mistaken, a Velasquez.(Christie)

There is a possibility of a reversed relation between the objects in metonymy. For instance, not only a concrete thing may be used as a symbol of an abstract notion, but an abstract notion can stand for a concrete thing as well. The lead-in example of metonymy taken from the Shakespeare is a possible illustration of such an association where a definite woman is named by love.

Genuine metonymies of the kind are infrequent, trite ones being mainly used. The latter instances are called either 'etymological* metonymy or metonymic antonomasia. They render no stylistic appeal and serve to name various objects of our everyday life as in these: I collect old china. I aw fond of Dickens. I need a pair of Wellingtons, etc. Such cases of metonymy are dealt in lexicology, not in stylistics.

The list is in no way complete but it covers the most common relations possible. There is one more type of metonymy, which is often viewed independently due to a considerable frequency of its usage in comparison with others.

Simile emphasizes likeness while metaphor may assert or suggest identity

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Simile (Latin simile "like") is a stylistic device that draws a comparison between two different objects belonging to dissimilar classes yet having something in common. The comparison is made explicit by using some special markers, which makes simile different from metaphor, where affinity is implicit. Simile emphasizes likeness while metaphor may assert or suggest identity. Compare these examples from a Ray Bradbury stoiy:

• The pilot lifted his head, which signaled the lift of the helicopter to swivel and rush away. The white cliffs of Dover vanished. They broke over green meadows so wove back and forth, a giant dragonfly excursioning the stuffs of winter that sleeted their blades.

• And a billion monarch butterflies in June rising up like celebrations tossed on parades to the sea.

What do these two comparisons differ in? What signal indicates simile?

Hence, the general formula for the simile includes the tenor, the vehicle, as well as the element expressing the comparative juxtaposition of the two: Xis like Y. That means that the simile is both lexical and syntactical stylistic device, as a definite structure is involved. Like is just one of the words possible to invoke a simile. Here are a few of the possibilities:

X is like у

X is more/less than у

X is similar to у

X is the same as у

X resembles у

X is y-like/looking

X is not like у

as if X were у

as though X were у

X is у like z

X has a quality of у

X is as y as z

X is less у than z

X does y: so does z

X is more у than z

But a simile can sometimes be implied, or as it is often called, submerged. In such cases no comparative word is needed. Besides, as well as metaphors, similes can be extended. Study the example to follow:

When I think of the English final exam, I think of dungeons and chains and racks and primal screams.

The following examples of simile identifying the tenor, vehicle, and ground for comparison as well as the linking word.

2) The ruby shall be redder than a red rose, and the sapphire shall be as blue as the great sea. (Wilde)

3) With the quickness of a long cat. she climbed up into the nest of coolbladed foliage. (Lawrence)

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

5) Huddled in her grey fiir against the sofa cushions, she had a strange resemblance to a captive owl. (Galsworthy)

6) Mr. Witters method of paying off debts would be a form of feeding a dog with bits of its own tail. (Nesfield)

7) It was as though an iron fist had clenched suddenly around Harry's heart. (J.

K. Rowling)

8) Aunt Petunia often said that Dudley looked like a baby angel - Harry often said that Dudley looked like a pig in a wig. (J. K. Rowling)

9) It was a glorious morning, late spring or early summer, as you care to take it. when the dainty sheen of grass and leaf is blushing to a deeper green: and the year seems like a fair young maid trembling with strange, wakening pulses on the brink of womanhood. (Jerome K. Jerome)

10) He is as beautiful as a weather-cock. (Wilde)

11) A little after midnight Dolores Lane came in and stood holding a microphone the way a drowning man hangs on to a lifebelt. (Chase)

12) They eased me through a door as if I were a millionaire invalid with four days to live, and who hadn't as yet paid his doctor's bill. (Chase)

Blow. blow, thou winter wind. Thou art not so unkind As man's ingratitude.

(Shakespeare)

The seas are quiet when the winds give o're:

So calm are we when passions are no more. (Waller)

It was that moment of the year when the countryside seems to faint from its own loveliness, from the intoxication of its scents and sounds.

(Galsworthy)

Antonomasia can be in a way a variety of allusion

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The choice of the names for the personages is by no means accidental. Characters' names can also become a meaningful vehicle for rendering the author's ideas, the stylistic device being called antonomasia or "speaking names".

Antonomasia (Greek antonomasia-"naming instead") is a trope in which a proper name is used instead of a common noun or vice versa, i.e. a stylistic device, in which the nominal meaning (naming one single individual object) of a proper noun is suppressed by its logical meaning (classifying objects into classes) or the logical meaning acquires The new - nominal - component. There are two Types of metaphorical antonomasia possible*.

First, antonomasia can be in a way a variety of allusion. IT is The use of The name of a historical, or biblical personage applied to a person whose characteristic features resemble Those of a well-known original. Thus, a traitor's name may be referred To as Brutus, a ladies' man deserves the name of Don Juan.

Second, at The basis of antonomasia There can be a metaphor, i.e. The use of a common noun as a proper name. For instance, Becky Sharp, Lady Snake, Miss Ape, etc. Antonomasia of this kind is created mainly by nouns, more seldom by attributive combinations (as in "Dr. Fresh Air") or phrases (as in "Mr. What's-his-name")

Note: in lexicology there exists the so-called metonymic antonomasia (for more details on metonymy refer to Part 2 of the unit) which is usually trite and stylistically neutral. It is observed in cases when a personal name stands for something connected with the bearer of that name who once really existed. Study the following examples: He has sold his Vandykes (Hurst) or This is my real Goya (Galsworthy). Some former proper names are now even spelt with a small letter. For example: mackintosh, sandwich, ohm (each originating from a proper name).

Antonomasia is a much-favoured device in the belles-letters style. In an article called What's in a name? Mr. R. Davis says: "In deciding on names for his characters, an author has an unfair advantage over other parents. He knows so much better how his child will turn out".

To do the following task one needs logic rather than intuition only. Read the excerpts given below substituting the letters with the names from the previous activity. Be ready to defend your hypothesis. The first one has been done for yon as an example.

Example: Mr. and Mrs. X = Mr. and Mrs. Dursleys; Y = Dudley

A suggested explanation; In the first place Dursley is a small town in Britan (by the way. the people depicted in the book are "perfectly normal" and from the activities they are engaged in one can assume that they should in no way be associated with anything global and capital). Besides. Dursley can be interpreted as consisting of D" (a French preposition similar to the English 'of) and 'Ursa* (Major/ Minor), the name of the constellation (Great/ Little Bear). It is interesting that the adjective 'ursaT is often used to name a person who resembles a bear, is clumsy and awkward. Is it not possible that the father and the son are mockingly compared with Great and Little Bears? What is more. Dudley is a play on 'dud', which is British slang for a 'boring person*. As for Mrs. Dursley*s first name, which is Petunia, it is meaningful as well. She is named after the flower that symbolizes anger and resentment.

1.Mr. arid Mrs. X, of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much. They were the last people you'd expect to be involved in anything strange or mysterious, because they just didn't hold with such nonsense.

Mr. X was the director of a firm called Gmnnings. which made drills. He was a big. beefy man with hardly any neck, although he did have a veiy large mustache. Mrs. X was thin and blonde and had nearly twice the usual amount of neck, which came in very useful as she spent so much of her time craning over garden fences, spying on the neighbors. The X had a small son called Y and in their opinion there was no finer boy anywhere. [...]

Y looked a lot like Uncle Vernon (his father). He had a large, pink face, not much neck, small, wateiy blue eyes and thick, blond hair that lay smoothly on his thick, fat head. Aunt Petunia (his mother) often said that Y looked like a baby angel - Hany often said that Y looked like a pig in a wig.

2.The roadless boy was back, but this time he had a girl with him. She was already wearing her new Hogwarts robes.

"Has anyone seen a toad? Neville's lost one." she said. She had a bossy sort of voice, lots of bushy brown hair, and rather large front teeth.

"We've already told him we haven't seen it," said Ron. but the girl wasn't listening, she was looking at the wand in his hand.

"Oh. are you doing magic? Let's see it. then."

She sat down. Ron looked taken aback. [...]

"Sunshine, daisies, butter mellow. Turn this stupid, fat rat yellow."

He waved his wand, but nothing happened. Scabbers stayed grey and fast asleep.

"Are you sure that's a real spell?" said the girl. "Well, it's not very good, is it? I've tried a few simple spells just for practice and it's all worked for me. Nobody in my family's magic at all. it was ever such a surprise when I got my letter, but I was ever so pleased, of course. I mean, it's the very best school of witchcraft there is. I've heard - I've learned all our course books by heart, of course. I just hope it will be enough - I'm c cl by the way. who are you?"

She said all this very fast.

3.Both of them were thickset and looked extremely mean. Standing on either side of the pale boy, they looked like bodyguards.

"Oh. this is Crabbe and this is Goyle." said the pale boy carelessly, noticing where Hany was looking. "And my name's b. a b."

Ron gave a slight cough, which might have been hiding a snigger. A b looked at him.

"Think my name's funny, do you? No need to ask who you are. My father told me all the Weasleys have red hair, freckles, and more children than they can afford."

He turned back to Hany. "You'll soon find out some wizarding families are much better than others. Potter. You don't want to go making friends with the wrong sort. I can help you there."

He held out his hand to shake Harry's, but Hany didn't take it.

"I think I can tell who the wrong sort are for myself, thanks." he said coolly.

A b didn't go red. but a pink tinge appeared in his pale cheeks.

Allusion as a special variety of metaphor

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This tradition of alluding to some well-known works of art and to the experience of the humanity on the whole roots far back in history. The ways in which reference is made differ in form, from a mere quotation up to more sophisticated ones, the example of which is allusion.

Allusion

The term allusion denotes a special variety of metaphor. As the very meaning of the word shows, allusion is a brief reference to some commonly known literary or historical event. The speaker (writer) need not be explicit about what it means: he merely mentions some detail of what he thinks analogous in fiction or history to the topic discussed. Quotation is not to be mistaken for allusion, as the latter is only a hint at something, presumably known to the reader.

The poem used by George Orwell is a nursery rhyme, on which many generations of English-speaking children have been brought up. Its popularity is shown by the fact that it is listed in the book "Mother Goose's Rhymes". The names of London's major churches are rhymed in the verse. Nobody knows the origin of this poem but it first appeared in print in 1774. In its unabridged form it runs as follows:

Say The bells of old Bailey.

When I get rich.

Say The bells of Slioreditch.

When will that be?

Say The bells of Stepney.

I don't know

Say The bells of Bow.

Here comes a candle to lighT you To bed.

Here comes a chopper To chop off your head.

Allegory a stylistic device based on metaphor

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Allegory (Greek alegoria - "description of one thing under the name of another'') has a two-fold meaning: as a stylistic term. i.e. pertaining to the realm of rhetoric, and as a denomination for a genre in literature and art on the whole (painting, sculpture, dance, etc). It means expressing abstract ideas through concrete pictures, the transfer based on similarity of objects.

One shouldn't mistake allegory for metaphor and vice versa as the former is generally presented by a more or less complete text, whereas the latter is usually used within a lengthy text in combination with other expressive means. Speaking figuratively, metaphor is usually a brick in the structure of the text, where allegory is the cornerstone, as a rule.

The shortest allegorical texts are represented by proverbs, where we find a precept in visual form. The logical content of the precept is invigorated by the emotive force of the image. Thus the proverb Make hay while the sun shines implies a piece of advice having nothing in common with haymaking or sunshine: 'Make use of a favourable situation: do not miss an opportunity: do not waste time.'

Note. One should not confuse proverbs with maxims, i.e. with non-metaphorical precept, such as A friend in need is a friend indeed. Tins maxim names things directly rather than figuratively. It is understood literally, word-by-word, whereas a proverb can be interpreted just as an inseparable.

Never put off till tomorrow what you can do today.
The road (way) to hell is paved with good intentions.
Every cloud has a silver lining.
What will be will be! or Come what may!
You never know what you can do till you tiy.
No rose without a thorn.
Never promise a fish until it's caught.
If you can't have the best make the best of what you have.
Dot your i's and cross your t's.
Before you choose (make) a friend, eat a bushel of salt with him.
There's no place like home.
Better late than never.
Look before you leap.
Beauty lies in lover's eyes.
When your deed is once begun never leave it till it's done.
All is not gold that glitters.
Early to bed. early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise.
All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.
Every dog returns to its vomit.
There's many a slip between the cup and the lip.
Good fame sleeps, bad fame creeps.
If you want to make friends be one. Appetite comes with eating. Poverty is no vice (sin. disgrace).

As you see proverbs are a means of expressing some truth in a figurative way. Some literary genres, fairy tales and fables among them, cany out the same function. Special attention should be paid to the latter. Seemingly simple on the surface, they contain a more serious idea to render, i.e. they always embody a moral truth.

Personification as a variety of metaphor

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Personification is the presentation of inanimate objects as if they were human beings or animals, i.e. attributing human properties or some features typical of animals to lifeless objects - mostly to abstract notions, such as thoughts, actions, intentions, emotions, seasons of the year, elements, etc.
Consider the following examples of personification:

I can't get the fuel pump back on because these gears are being uncooperative.
The ship began to creak and protest as it struggled against the rising sea.
We bought this house instead of the one on Maple because this one is friendlier.
This coffee is strong enough to get up and walk away.
The angry clouds in the hateful sky cruelly spat down on the poor man who had forgotten his umbrella.
After two hours of political platitudes, everyone grew bored. The delegates were bored; the guests were bored; the speaker himself was bored. Even the chairs were bored.

As seen from the examples above, though used mostly in poetry, when applied to prose personification produces either a poetic or humorous effect.
Read through the list of the personifications given below and say what sort of effect is achieved, either humorous or poetical.
1) Besides the kettle was aggravating and obstinate. It wouldn't allow itself to be adjusted to the top of the bar; it wouldn't hear of accommodating itself to the knobs of the coal; it would lean forward with a drunken air, and dribble, a very idiot of a kettle. (Dickens)
2) In November a cold, unseen stranger, whom the doctors called Pneumonia, stalked about the colony, touching one here and one there with icy fingers. (O. Henry)
3) O, sleep, o gentle sleep. Nature's soft nurse, how have I frightened thee. That thou no more wilt weigh my eyelids down, And sleep my senses in forgetfulness? (Shakespeare)
4) The winds hunt up the sun, hunt up the moon. Trouble the dubious dawn, hasten the drear Heights of a threatening noon. No breath of boughs, no fronds... (Maynell)
Your brother's blood cries out to me from the ground. (Genesis 4:10b)
Montmorency's ambition in life is to get in the way and be sworn at. If it can squirm in anywhere where he particularly is not wanted- and be a perfect nuisance, and make people mad. and have things thrown at his head, then he feels his day has not been wasted. To get somebody to stumble over him. and curse him steadily for an hour, is his highest aim and object; and. when he has succeeded in accomplishing this, his conceit becomes quite unbearable. {Jerome K. Jerome)

Autumn comes And trees are shedding their leaves. And Mother Nature blushes Before disrobing. (N. West)
In the sunlight - in the daytime, when Nature is alive and busy all around us. we like the open hillsides and the deep woods well enough: but in the night, when our Mother Earth has gone to sleep, and left us waking, oh! the world seems so lonesome, and we get frightened, like children in a silent house. (Jerome K. Jerome)
Wisdom cries aloud in the streets: in the markets she raises her voice . .. (Proverbs 1:20)
Fox-terriers are born with about four times as much original sin in them as other dogs are. and it will take years after years of patient effort on the part of us Christians to bring about any appreciable reformation in the rowdiness of the fox-terrier nature. (Jerome K. Jerome)
According to Skrebnev. there are certain formal signals of personification. They are given in the table below: 1.The Night, like some great loving mother, gently lays her hand on our fevered head, and funis our little tear-stained face up to hers, and smiles, and. though she does not speak, we know what she would say and lay our hot. flushed cheek against her bosom and the pain is gone. (Jerome K. Jerome) The use of the personal pronouns he and she with reference to lifeless objects and animals. (There are no strict rules governing the choice of the gender for the personified object - it as a matter of the writer's preference. But traditionally the Sun is always masculine, whereas the Earth and the Moon - feminine (compare - motherland). What is more, there is a tendency to use feminine pronouns for notions naming something unpleasant.)
2.O stretch thy reign, fair Peace! From shore to shore // Till conquest cease, and slavery be no more. Pope) The use of the direct address.
3.No sleep till mom. When Youth and Pleasure meet // To chase the glowing Hours with flying feet. (Byron) Capitalization of the word which expresses a personified notion. Sometimes, however, the capital letter has nothing in common with personification, merely performing an emphasizing function: e.g. It (the wind) seems to chant, in its wild way. of Wrong and Murder done, and false Gods worshipped: in defence of the tables of the Law... (Dickens)

Metaphor

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Metaphor (Greek metaphora – “transference’) is a trope that involves the use of words (word-combinations) in transferred meanings by way of similarity, re-semblance or analogy between them. Let us study the following metaphor: Front Settin in the Baltic to Trestie in the Adriatic, an iron curtain has descended across the continent. (Winston Churchill) Technically. The subject to which the metaphor is applied is the tenor ("political situation, resulting hi the division of the world into two antagonistic parts" in the example above), whereas the metaphorical term is the vehicle ("an iron curtain"). The third notional element of metaphor is the ground, i.e. the bas|is for drawing the comparison, the feature the tenor and the vehicle have in common. There are three types of metaphorical transfer possible: 1. the transfer of the name of one object to another: e.g. Life's but a walking shadow; a poor player... (Shakespeare) 2. the transfer of the mode of action: e.g. / hope this will hare cushioned your loss. Leaving Daniel to his fate, she was conscious ofjoy springing in her heart.(Bennett) 3. the transfer of the typical characteristics: e.g. The fog comes on little cat feet.(Sandburg) Let us consider the following examples of metaphor identifying the tenor, vehicle and ground for comparison as well as naming the type of metaphorical transfer:
1) She looked down on Gopher Prairie. The snow stretching without break from street to devouring prairie beyond, wiped out the town's pretence of being a shelter. The houses were black specks on a white sheet. (Lewis)
2) I was staring directly in front of me. at the back of the driver's neck, which was a relief map of boil scars. (Salinger)
3) She was handsome in a rather leonine way. Where this girl was a lioness, the other was a panther - lithe and quick. (Christie)
4) Wisdom has reference only to the past. The future remains for ever an infi¬nite field for mistakes. You can't know beforehand. (Lawrence)
5) The man stood there in the middle of the street with the deserted dawnlit boulevard telescoping out behind him. (Howard)
6) He smelled the ever-beautiful smell of coffee imprisoned in the can. (Steinbeck)
7) We talked and talked and talked, easily, sympathetically, wedding her experience with my articulation. (John Barth)
8) She and the kids have filled his sister's house and their welcome is wearing thinner and thinner. (John Updike)
9) He had hoped that Sally would laugh at this, and she did. and in a sudden mutual gush they cashed into the silver of laughter all the sad secrets they could find in their pockets. (John Updike)

As far as structure is concerned, metaphor can be conveyed through any notional part of speech and in any pait of the sentence. Metaphors can be divided into genuine and trite (dead).

Thus, metaphors, which are almost absolutely unexpected and unpredictable, are genuine ones, whereas those that are common in speech and therefore are sometimes even fixed in dictionaries as expressive means of language are trite ones. For instance, the metaphor 'an iron curtain ' used to be very striking and truly genuine at the time of Winston Churchill, but has lonle since become trite. Some once-genuine metaphors have become pan and parcel of modem language (especially of its colloquial layer). The classic example of a metaphor's turning into an idiom is 'a green-eyed monster'used by William Shakespeare in relation to Othello. Now it is applied to any jealous person. The sentences below contain trite metaphors, many of which are. In fact, frequently-used idioms. By its structure a metaphor can be simple (one-step) or sustained (prolonged, extended, a chain of metaphors). A simple metaphor consists of one word or word-group whereas a prolonged one is sustained by some additional images.

For example, let us consider the afore-mentioned verse from Macbeth where, in fact, we deal with two extended metaphors: Life's but a walking shadow; a poor player That struts and frets his hour upon the stage, And then is heard no more: it is a tale Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing...

A sustained metaphor may consist of trite metaphors (idioms) expressing or implying a certain logical development of ideas, and yet the objects mentioned in each of them pertain to different semantic spheres, due to which the links of the chain seem disconnected with one another. The general impression is incongruous, clumsy and comical. This phenomenon - a harsh metaphor involving the use of a word beyond its strict sphere or incongruence of the parts of a sustained metaphor - is called cata-chresis (ox mixed metaphors). e.g. I listen vainly, but with thirsty ear (Mac Arthur. Farewell Address) So much attention has been paid to metaphor as its importance in rhetoric can hardly be overestimated. Not only it is one of the most frequently used stylistic devices, it also plays essential role in building many other tropes that rename objects on the basis of similarity. The following presents other stylistic lexical devices that belong to the so-called metaphorical group: Personification; Allusion; Allegory; Simile; Antonomasia.

What are Stylistic Devices?

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Stylistic devices are used in speech with the same aim of intensifying the emo-tional or logical emphasis that the information transferred should convey. Stylis-tic devices are represented by two categories: I. "figures of thought" (tropes, from the Greek tropos ‘turning’), which de-viate from common usage mainly in the meaning of words, i.e. when a word (or a combination of words) is used to denote an object that is not usually correlated with this word; this double meaning creates what is called an image; II. "figures of speech" (rhetorical figures, or schemes), whose stylistic effect is achieved by means of an unusual arrangement of linguistic units, unusual construction or extension of an utterance, etc.; in other words which deviate from normal language mainly in terms of syntax. This arbitrary division of stylistic means into expressive means and stylistic devices does not necessarily mean that these groups cannot overlap. On the contrary, the striking effect of many a stylistic device is based on the logical or emotional emphasis contained in the corre-sponding expressive means and vice versa: a formerly genuine stylistic device can become an expressive means (idioms at large).
Figurative Language is used to express a particular feeling or encourage imagi-nation by a well-developed means of creating images, its purpose being to im-prove the effectiveness, clarity, and enjoyment of both written and oral commu-nication. Figurative language has developed alongside rhetoric, both rooted as far back in history as the times of such classical rhetoricians as Aristotle, Quintillion, and Cicero. Rhetoric is usually defined as the art of persuasion. Aristotle and Quintillion de-veloped a system of methods and tools of persuasion claiming that a rhetorical discourse should consist of - "invention" (developing arguments) - "disposition" (organizing one's subject) - "style" (the means of persuasion). In the modern era "style" and “disposition” (as well as “invention”, though) are still very important form-making categories. They are known as stylistic language means.

Homonyms. Causes and Sources of Homonymy

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Homonyms are words different in meaning but identical in sound or spelling, or both in sound and spelling.

Homonyms can appear in the language not only as a result of split of polysemy, but also as a result of levelling of grammar inflexions, when different parts of speech become identical in their outer aspect: care from caru and care from carian.

They can also be formed by means of conversion: slim – to slim.

They can be formed with the help of the same suffix from the same stem:

reader – a person who reads and a book for reading.

They can be the result of forming splinters, completives and lexical abbreviations: bio – a splinter with the meaning biology, biological as in the word biometrics; bio – a combining form with the meaning life as in the word biology;

bio – a lexical shortening of the word biography with the meaning a short biography.

Homonyms can also appear in the language accidentally when two words coincide in their development, e.g. two native words can coincide in their outer aspects: to bear from beran (to carry) and bear from bera (an animal). A native word and a borrowing can coincide in their outer aspects, e.g. fair from Latin feria and fair from native fager (blond). Two borrowings can coincide, e.g. base from the French base (Latin basis) and base (low) from the Latin bas (Italian basso).

Homonyms can develop through shortening of different words: COD from Concise Oxford Dictionary and cash on delivery.

Polysemy

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The word polysemy means plurality of meanings. It exists only in the language, not in speech. A word which has more than one meaning is called polysemantic.

There are two processes of the semantic development of a word: radiation and concatenation. In cases of radiation the primary meaning stands in the centre and the secondary meanings proceed out of it like rays. Each secondary meaning can be traced to the primary meaning, e.g. face (the front part of the human head -

the primary meaning; the front part of a building, the front part of a watch, the front part of a playing card; expression of the face, outward appearance - secondary meanings).

In cases of concatenation secondary meanings of a word develop like a chain, e.g. crust – 1. hard outer part of bread, 2. hard part of anything (a pie, a cake), 3. harder layer over soft snow, 4. sullen gloomy person, 5. impudence. Here the last meanings have nothing to do with primary ones. In such cases homonyms appeare in the language. This phenomenon is called the split of polysemy.

Semantic Structure of Polysemantic Words
Synchronically, the problem of polysemy ie the problem of interrelation and interdependence of different meanings of the same word. The semantic structure of a polysemantic word is the sum total of relations between its lexico-semantic variants.
The analysis of the semantic structure of a polysemantic word is based onthe following set of oppositions:
1. Direct-derived meaning: rat – animal like, but larger than a mouse; rat –cowardly person; strike-breaker.
2. Extended-restricted meaning: to knock – strike, hit; to knock – of a petrol engine – make a tapping or thumping noise.
3. Free-bound meaning: hat – cover for the head; hat – nonsense (to speak through one’s hat).
4. General-specialized meaning: case – instance or example of the occurence of smth; case – (med.) person suffering from a disease.
5. Neutral-emotional meaning: nut – fruit consisting of a hard shell enclosing a kernel that can be eaten; nut – (slang) head of a human being.

Secondary Ways of Semantic Changes

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There are the following secondary ways of semantic changes:

1. Elevation. It is a transfer of the meaning when it becomes better in the course of time: knight originally meant a boy, then a young servant, then a military servant, then a noble man. Now it is a title of nobility given to outstanding people.

2. Degradation. It is a transfer of the meaning when it becomes worse in the course of time, e.g. villain originally meant working on a villa, now it means a scoundrel.

3. Hyperbole. It is a transfer of the meaning when the speaker uses exaggeration, e.g. to hate (doing something), not to see somebody for ages. hyperbole is often used to form phraseological units, e.g. to split hairs.

4. Litotes. It is a transfer of the meaning when the speaker expresses the affirmative with the negative or vice versa, e.g. not bad (it is good), no coward, not half as important.

Metonymy is a transfer of the meaning on the basis of contiguity

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It is a transfer of the meaning on the basis of contiguity. There are different types of metonymy:

a) the material of which an object is made may become the name of the object: a glass, boards;

b) the name of the place may become the name of the people or of an object placed there: the House – members of Parliement, the White House – the Administration of the USA;

c) names of musical instruments may become names of musicians when they are united in an orchestra: the violin, the saxophone;

d) the name of some person may become a common noun, e.g. boycott was originally the name of an Irish family who were so much disliked by their neighbours that they did not mix with them.

e) names of inventors very often become terms to denote things they invented, e.g. watt, om, roentgen;

f) some geographical names can also become common nouns through metonymy, e.g. holland (linen fabrics), Brussels (a special kind of carpets), china (porcelain).

Metaphor is a transfer of the meaning on the basis of comparison

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It is a transfer of the meaning on the basis of comparison. Metaphor can be based on different types of similarity:

a) similarity of shape: head (of a cabbage), bottleneck, teeth (of a saw, a comb);

b) similarity of position: foot (of a page, of a mountain), head (of procession);

c) similarity of function, behaviour: a whip (an official in the British Parliament whose duty is to see that members were present at the voting), a bookworm (a person who is fond of books);

d) similarity of colour: orange, hazel, chestnut.

A special type of metaphor is when proper names become common nouns, e.g. philistine – a mercenary person, vandals – destructive people.

Meaning of: Irony, Hyperbole, Litotes, Euphemism, Genteelism

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It is connected with strengthening disapproving evaluative connotation which can become pail of the denotative meaning. This process is determined by social and psychological factors. It is mostly observed in the names of persons and reflects disdain of some social group, e.g. wench - daughter -orphan girl - morally bad girl.

Irony means expressing one's meaning by words having an opposite meaning, e.g.. You've got us into a nice mess. A pretty mess you've made of it. These words may develop the opposite ironic meanings in their semantic structures.

Hyperbole is an exaggerated statement not meant to be understood literally but expressing an intensely emotional attitude of the speaker to what he is speaking about. Hyperbole is a characteristic feature of women's speech. Some of the most emphatic words are: absolutely, awfully, terribly, lovely, magnificent, splendid. For example, I haven't seen you for ages. You will be the death of me.

Litotes means expressing the affirmative by the negation of its contrary, e.g. not bad, not half bad. Sometimes there is no negation in the litotes, but a word expressing a smaller degree of some quality is used to express a high degree. Litotes is a characteristic feature of men's speech, e.g. Rather/very -I could do with a cup of tea.

Euphemism means substitution of words with mild connotation for rough, unpleasant, or otherwise unmentionable words. Euphemism is due to social, religious and cultural factors. Taboo is one of these factors. The word lavatory has produced many euphemisms – loo, powder room, washroom, restroom, retiring room, public station, comfort station, ladies', gentlemen's, water-closet (WC), public convenience. Windsor Castle (a comical phrase). Pass away is a euphemism for die, agent for spy, dentures for false teeth.

Euphemisms are particularly common for the processes of reproduction and excretion and for activities, people, and parts of the body involved in these processes. People vary in what they consider to be offensive, and toleration for blunt language also varies from period to period. A euphemism may eventually acquire unpleasant associations and give way to later euphemisms: toilet and lavatory. Themselves euphemisms are frequently replaced by other euphemisms, such as cloakroom. Euphemisms can be used legitimately for politeness and tact, but they are dishonest when they are used to avoid facing unpleasant activities or to conceal and deceive. Dishonest uses are frequent in political and military language: Hitler's plan for the extermination of the Jews was called the final solution; protective custody has been used for imprisonment, industrial action for stickers. police action for war, and armed reconnaissance for bombing.

Genteelism is a kind of euphemism, which means the substitution of a mild or indirect expression for one that might be offensive. Many euphemisms are entirely justified. We use them not only for decency, with reference to bodily parts and functions, but out of generous feelings towards people whom we should otherwise have to call poor, fat, old, crippled, or stupid. But the kind of euphemism here called genteelism is favoured by people who think the frank and obvious word is vulgar. Since the most effective users of the language are seldom afraid of being frank, it is a mistake to try to sound genteel.

Semantic and Stylistic Peculiarities of Clippings

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Shortenings are coined in two different ways. The first is to make a new word from a syllable of the original word (clipping). The latter may lose its beginning (as in phone made from telephone, fence from defence), its ending (as in hols from holidays, vac from vacation, props from properties, ad from advertisement) or both the beginning and ending (as in flu from influenza, fridge from refrigerator). The second way of shortening is to make a new word from the initial letters of a word group (acronymy or initial abbreviation), e.g.. UNO from the United Nations Organisation, BBC from the British Broadcasting Corporation, MP from Member of Parliament.

Clippings are derived from single words, though sometimes they may be derived from phrases. One component of a phrase is omitted. Clipping means taking away any part of the word. The remaining part of the word which may be neither a morpheme, nor even a syllable acquires all the properties of a regular word. e.g.. He spoke to the vet's wife.

There are three structural types of clippings: Aphaeresis - initial part of the word is clipped, e.g.. history-story, telephone-phone:

Syncope - the middle part of the word is clipped, e.g.. madam- ma 'am: Apocope - the final part of the word is clipped, e.g.. professor-prof editored, vampire-vamp:

Sometimes a combination of some types of clipping may occur: Aphere-sis-syncope. e.g.. influenza-flu. detective-tec.

Clipping is a source of new morphemes in English and clipping may serve as word-building basis, e.g.. taxi - to taxi, taxi-driver, taxidancer. airtaxi. taxitest.

Clipping can be combined with derivation and composition, e.g.. chinee. comfy, labassistant.

Semantic Peculiarities of Clipping

Polysemantic words are usually clipped in one meaning only. e.g.. doc and doctor have the meaning "one who practices medicine", but doctor is also "the highest degree given by a university to a scholar or scientist". Clippings can develop a system of meanings of their own. e.g., fancy. Among abbreviations there are homonyms, so that one and the same sound and graphical complex may represent different words, e.g.. vac - vacation/vacuum

cleaner, prep - preparation/preparatory school, vet - veterinary surgeon/veteran.

Stylistic Peculiarities of Clippings

Clippings are highly colloquial and it is quite common to encounter them in spoken English, e.g.. TV. paper. PC. maths, bike, photo, sales rep. Most of such words are stylistically neutral.

In Modem English clippings are part of professional vocabulary because they represent terms in some scientific spheres. E.g.: ACD-solution (ACID CITRATE DEXTROSE).

In modem English there appear colloquial expressions such as catch-22 which was taken from the novel "CATCH-22" written by G. HELLER. It functions in the meaning "an uphill task", e.g.. It's a catch-22, I need experience to get a job and I need a job to get experience.

The causes of semantic changes

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In comparison with classifications of semantic change the problem of their causes appears neglected. Opinions on this point are scattered through a great number of linguistic works and have apparently never -been collected into anything complete. And yet a thorough understanding of the phenomena involved .in semantic change is impossible unless the whys and wherefores become known. This is of primary importance as it may lead eventually to a clearer, interpretation of language development. The vocabulary is the most flexible part of the language and it is precisely its semantic aspect that responds most readily to every change in the human activity in whatever sphere it may happen to take place.

The causes of semantic changes may be grouped under two main headings, linguistic and extralinguistic ones. Of these the first group has suffered much greater neglect in the past and it is not surprising therefore that far less is known of it than of the second. It deals with changes due to the constant interdependence of vocabulary units in language and speech, such as differentiation between synonyms, changes taking place in connection with ellipsis and with fixed contexts, changes resulting from ambiguity in certain contexts, and some other cases.

Semantic change due to the differentiation of synonyms is a gradual change observed in the course of language history, sometimes, but not necessarily, involving the semantic assimilation of loan words. Consider, for example, the words time and tide. They used to be synonyms. Then tide took on its more limited application to the periodically shifting waters, and time alone is used in the general sense.

Another example of semantic change involving synonymic differentiation is the word twist. In OE it was a noun, meaning 'a rope' whereas the verb thrawan (now throw) meant both 'hurl' and 'twist'. Since the appearance in the Middle English of the verb twisten ('twist') the first verb lost this meaning. But threw in its turn influenced the development of casten (cast), a Scandinavian borrowing. Its primary meaning 'hurl', 'throw' is now present only in some set expressions. Cast keeps its old meaning in such phrases as cast a glance, cast lots, cast smth. in one's teeth. Twist has very many meanings, the latest being 'to dance the twist'

Fixed context may be regarded as another linguistic factor in semantic change. Both factors are at work in the case of token. When brought into competition with the loan word sign, it became restricted in use to a number of set expressions such as love token, token of respect and so became specialized in meaning. Fixed context has this influence not only in phrases but in compound words as well. OE mete meant 'food', its descendant meat refers only to flesh food except in the set expression meat and drink and the compound sweetmeats.

No systematic treatment has so far been offered for the syntagmatic semantic changes depending on the context. But such cases do exist showing that investigation of the problem is important.

One of these is ellipsis. The qualifying words of a frequent phrase may be omitted: sale comes to be used for cut-price sale, propose for to propose marriage, to be expecting for to be expecting a baby. Or vice versa, the kernel word of the phrase may seem redundant: minerals for mineral waters. Due to ellipsis starve which originally meant 'die' (cf. Germ sterben) came to substitute the whole phrase die of hunger, and also began to mean 'suffer from lack of food' and even in colloquial use 'to feel hungry'. Moreover as there are many words with transitive and intransitive variants naming cause and result, starve came to mean 'to cause to perish with hunger'.

English has a great variety of these regular coincidences of different aspects, alongside with cause and result, we could consider the coincidence of subjective and objective, active and passive aspects especially frequent in adjectives. E.g. hateful means 'exciting hatred' and 'full of hatred'; curious—'strange' and 'inquisitive'; pitiful— 'exciting compassion' and 'compassionate'. Compare the different use of the words doubtful and healthy in the following: to be doubtful :: a doubtful advantage, to be healthy :: a healthy climate.

The extralinguistic causes are determined by the social nature of the language: they are observed in changes of meaning resulting from the development of the notion expressed and the thing named and by the appearance of new notions and things. In other words, extralinguistic causes of semantic change are connected with the development of the human mind as it moulds reality to conform with its needs.

Languages are powerfully affected by social, political, economic, cultural and technical change. The influence of those factors upon linguistic phenomena is studied by sociolinguistics. It shows that social factors can influence even structural features of linguistic units, terms of science, for instance, have a number of specific features as compared to words used in other spheres of human activity.

The word being a linguistic realization of notion, it changes with the progress of human consciousness. This process is reflected in the development of lexical meaning. As the human mind achieves an ever more exact understanding of the world of reality and the objective relationships that characterize it, the notions become more and more exact reflections of real things. The history of the social, economic and political life of people, the progress of culture and science bring about changes in notions and things influencing the semantic aspect of language. For instance, OE eorpe meant 'the ground under people's feet', 'the soil' and 'the world of man' as opposed to heaven that was supposed to be inhabited first by Gods and later on, with the spread of Christianity, by God, his saints and the souls of the dead. With the progress of science earth came to mean the third planet from the sun and the knowledge of it was constantly enriched.

The word space from the meanings of 'extension' or 'intervening distance' came to mean 'the limitless expanse in which everything exists' and more recently came to be used especially in the meaning of 'outer space'. Atoms (Gr. atomos 'indivisible' from a 'not' and tomos 'cut') were formerly thought to be indivisible smallest particles of matter and were usually associated in layman's speech with smallness. The word could be metaphorically used in the meaning of 'a tiny creature'. When atoms were found to be made up of a positively charged nucleus round which negatively charged electrons revolve, the notion of an atom brought about connotations of discrete (discontinuous) character of matter. With the advances made since science has found ways of releasing the energy hidden in the splitting of the atomic nucleus, the notion is accompanied with the idea of immense potentialities present, as, for instance, in the phrase Atoms for peace. Since the advent of the atomic bomb the adjective atomic distinctly connotes in the English language with the threat of a most destructive warfare (atomic bomb, atomic warfare).

The tendency to use technical imagery is increasing in every language, thus the expression to spark off in chain reaction is almost international. Some expressions tend to become somewhat obsolete: the English used to talk of people being galvanized into activity, or going full steam ahead but the phrases sound out dated now.

The changes of notions and things named go hand in hand. As they are conditioned by changes in the economic, social, political and cultural history of the people, the extralinguistic causes of semantic change might be conveniently subdivided in accordance with these. Social relationships are at work in the cases of elevation and pejoration of meaning discussed in the previous section where the attitude of the upper classes to their social inferiors determined the strengthening of emotional tone among the semantic components of the word.

Euphemisms may be dictated by publicity needs—hence ready-tailored and ready-to-wear clothes instead of ready-made. The influence of mass-advertising on language is growing; it is felt in every level of the language. Innovations possible in advertising are of many different types. A kind of orange juice, for instance, is called Tango. The justification of the name is given in the advertising text as follows: Get this different tasting Sparkling Tango. Tell you why: made from whole oranges. Taste those oranges. Taste the tang in Tango. Tingling tang, bubbles— sparks. You drink it straight. Goes down great. Taste the tang in Tango. New Sparkling Tango. The reader will see for himself how many expressive connotations are introduced by the salesman in this commercial name in an effort to attract the buyer's attention.

Economic causes are obviously at work in the semantic development o! the word wealth. It first meant 'well-being', 'happiness' from weal from OE wela whence well. This original meaning is preserved in the compounds commonwealth and commonweal. The present meaning became possible due to the role played by money both in feudal and bourgeois society. The chief wealth of the early inhabitants of Europe being the cattle, OE feoh means both 'cattle' and 'money', likewise Goth faihu; Lat. pecu meant 'cattle' and pecunia meant 'money'. ME fee-house is both a cattle-shed and a treasury. The present-day English fee most frequently means the price paid for services to a lawyer or a physician. It appears to develop jointly from the above mentioned OE feoh and the Anglo-French fe, fie, fief, probably of the same origin, meaning 'a recompense' and 'a feudal tenure'. This modern meaning is obvious in the following example: Physicians of the utmost Fame/Were called at once; but when they came/ They answered as they took their fees,/ "There is no cure for this disease." (BELLOC)

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