Lecture 7.

1
The text as the object
of stylistic analysis.
The
• The text is an integrated
definition of
and coherent message
the text and
which is arranged in a
its main
special way to preserve
features. and reveal information.
 The main features of the text:

•1. Integrity
•2. Non-separability
•3. Communicative aim
 • A text has got a message. It`s
created for realization of
some communicative aim. Its
main function is to influence
emotional, voluntary and
Communicat logical sides of the reader`s
ive aim personality. Besides, it has
some aesthetic influence on
the addressee. Thus, the text
has a communicative aim.
 • The question of non-separability
is more complicated. It`s up to
the author to decide whether he
thinks his message is complete or
not. The outer signs of non-
separability are:
Non- • A literary work is published as a
separate book.
separability • There is a title before the story
itself
• The word “end” after the story
• Some information about where
and when the story was written.
 • The inner integrity is made
up by logical, topical
(thematic), structural and
pragmatic completeness. The
content of the text is not a
mere sum of the contents of
Integrity its components. The inner
integrity is provided by
paradigmatical,
syntagmatical and integrative
relations between its
components.
 • . Paradigmatical relations are
relations between the elements
of one and the same level based
on associations (characters are
grouped). Syntagmatical are
relations between the elements
of one level based on their
succession or sequence
Integrity (succession of events).
Integrative are relations between
the elements of different level
(words -> sentences ->
paragraphs). The lexico-thematic
net formed of words, semes and
meanings serves as the main
basis for the integrity of the text.
 • In the exposition the necessary
preliminary details are made
out (time, place, subject of the
actions) Also some light may be
The plot cast on the circumstances that
consists of will influence the development
exposition, of the action. The story is the
story, climax part of the story that represents
and the beginning of the collisions
and the collisions themselves.
denouement. The climax is the highest point
of the action. The denouement
is the event(s) that bring the
action to an end.
A literary work has a theme and a message. The theme
of a literary work is a represented aspect of life which
reveals the interaction of human characters under
certain circumstances in some psychological conflict
and social conflict. Different writers may depict one
and the same theme from different points of view.

A reader needs more effort to decode the author`s

message – that is the idea of the literary work. The idea
of the literary work is an underlined thought and
emotional attitude to the theme of the literary work, it
is transmitted to the reader by the whole poetic
structure of the literary work.
 • Foregrounding is a special
organization of the context
that focuses the reader`s
Foregroun attention on the most
ding and important elements of the
its types. message and establishes
(устанавливает) meaningful
relations between near and
distant elements of the text.
 The stylistic analysis of the text

• The 1st type: you form a certain hypothesis formulating the main
theme or idea of the text under analysis, then – consider lexical,
morphological, syntactical and other peculiarities of the text
that`ll help you to support or refute your guesses. If your idea is
refuted, you change the hypothesis and start the procedure
from the very beginning.

• The 2nd type: at first you single out smth. peculiar in the
arrangement of the text (stylistic devices, word choice, syntax),
then you find some explanations that will finally lead you to the
main theme and idea of the text. You look for some details
that`ll support your idea.
 • Stylistic context – a part of the
text interrupted by the low-
predictable element. It`s built by
the opposition between a stylistic
device and its surrounding. The
aim of the stylistic context is not
Stylistic to restrict the meaning of the
word to one lexico-semantic
context variant but to add some new
shades to that meaning. The
stylistic context helps the word to
realize 2 or more meanings
simultaneously, build some
additional connotations to
achieve maximum stylistic effect.
 • 1. The author`s narrative
• 2. The entrusted (1st person)
narrative – a kind of
There are 2 narration in which the
main types author presents the events
of from the viewpoint of one
narration: of his characters. This
viewpoint may coincide
with the author`s point of
view or it may contradict it.
 • 1. Narrative proper – is an
account of event in the plot.
It`s very dynamic.
• 2. Description – supplies
Compositio some details of the
nal appearance of people and
things (description of place,
narrative time of action)
forms: • 3. Argumentation – reveals
the causes and effects of the
personage’s behaviour,
presents their considerations
upon moral, ethical,
ideological and other issues.
Lecture 7.2
MEANS OF
FOREGROUNDING
There is a level which is located above the level of
stylistic devices and figures of speech.
It consists of means of foregrounding.
Their functions:
1. to set a hierarchy of meaning and elements in the
text, i. e. foreground the main and important parts of
the message;
2. provide the unity of the structure of the text as a
system.
- defeated expectancy
- convergence
- salient features
- coupling…
 The notion of foregrounding is
more comprehensive than
that of a stylistic device or
trope. The units may include
tropes both taxonomically
(группировка объектов по
FOREGROUNDING
наличию признаков) and
syntagmatically.
Foregrounding may cover
bigger parts of texts
containing several devices.
 FOREGROUNDING

is a special contextual organization focusing the

reader’s attention on some elements of the
contents of the message and establishing
meaningful relations between close or distant
elements of the same or different levels and the
text as a whole.
Convergence of EMs and SDs

… And heaved and heaved, still

unrestingly heaved the black
sea, as if its vast tides were a
conscience
(H.Melville. Moby Dick).
Convergence of EMs and SDs
in H.Melville’s phrase
1. Inversion
2. Repetition
3. Polysyndeton
4. Rhythm
5. Neologism
6. Expressive epithet «vast»
7. An unusual comparison: tides -
conscience
Stylistic devices build up blocks of
codogrammars which are larger than words.
Means of foregrounding make up blocks out of
stylistic devices.

The principles foregrounding is based are:

1. analogy
2. contrast
3. repetition
4. quantancy
 Coupling
(semantically relevant appearance of equivalent
elements in equivalent position in the text)
It is presented by: parallel constructions, rhyme,
thematic grouping of words
It is found in poetry, proverbs, aphorisms

e.g. Sara was a menace and a tonic, my best enemy,

Rosy was a disease, my worst friend.
Coupling was suggested and worked out by the
American scholar S. Levin (S. Levin. Linguistic Structures
in Poetry - The Hague, 1962). R. Jakobson before him
also analyzed similar structures calling them parallel
constructions. Levin’s contribution is valuable because
he managed to show the almost universal character of
coupling.
Coupling has many points of similarity with parallelism
but parallelism is above all associated with syntactic
repetition, and in coupling other types of positional
equivalence are also possible.
 So long as men can breathe or eyes can see
So long lives this and this gives life to thee.
(Sonnet 18 W. Shakespeare)

Coupling serves here to join two of Shakespeare’s themes – that

of all-destroying time and the power of poetry opposing time
and making beauty immortal. Its most obvious part is the
anaphoric repetition: So long … So long. This is sustained by
elements whose equivalence is synonymic: can breathe, can see,
live – all these render the same notion – life and occupy
syntactically equivalent positions. Finally, anadiplosis is also a
form of coupling, more sophisticated than all the others: the
pronoun “this” whose referent is the whole sonnet, is the last
word of the first half-line and the first word in the second half-
line.
The relevant features of foregrounding by coupling
are not only repetition and parallelism but the
equivalent positions of the elements repeated.
So, it is important to see the difference between
coupling and the related phenomena of parallelism.

• Parallel patterns are based on identical or similar

syntactical structure in two or more sentences or
parts of a sentence in close succession.( I dare
not ask a kiss, I dare not ask a smile… Herrick).
• Coupling is defined as a semantically relevant
appearance of equivalent elements in equivalent
positions. But it is based on both equivalence and
contrast.( Lend your money and loose your friend).
 Defeated expectancy -
Stylistic context is a pattern broken by an
unpredictable element.
The stylistic device is foregrounded due to the
opposition “context + contrast”.
The surprising effect, caused by the contrast of
context and stylistic device makes the reader
undertake a more thorough analysis, forces him
into maximum decoding.
The unexpected element defeats our
expectancy, compels our attention
Defeated expectancy is mostly characteristic of humor and
satire. The following example will make this point clear:
A drunken G.I. shouts to his companion: “I
cannot take another minute of it! The Army is
brutal, dehumanized and full of morons. It’s
time something was done. When I get back to
the barracks, I’ll write my mother about it”.
D E results from a discrepancy between the decision taken and
the scale of the accusation of the state of things in the Army. The
first three sentences make the reader expect that the soldier is
ready for some action of revolt, and when we learn that all he is
prepared is to complain to his mother, this is unexpected and
amusingly childish.
 Jack had a little pony – Tom,
He frequently would take it from
The stable where it used to stand
And give it sugar with his hand.
 Convergence (сближение или
совпадение в одной точке)
The principle of reiteration and redundancy.
Several stylistic devices (fulfilling the same
stylistic function) converge to produce one
striking effect, to create one image.
e.g. A dreadful winter came, each day severe,
Misty when mild, icy cold when clear.
(Crabble)
e.g. And heaved and heaved, still unrestingly heaved
the black sea, as if its vast tides were a conscience.
 In A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man J. Joyce depicts his protagonist
in the state of exaltation:

“His cheeks were aflame, his body was aglow,

his limbs were trembling. On and on and on he
strode far out over the sands singing wildly to
the sea, crying to greet the life that had cried to
him”.
The reader feels how excited the hero is as he perceives the
anaphoric parallel constructions, high-flown archaic metaphoric
synonyms “aflame” and “aglow” used as epithets, but insistent
repetition of “on”, rendering unstoppable energy of motion,
metaphorical personification of life – all these make the reader
share the hero’s feelings.
 Salient features
(philological cycle or cycle of understanding)

A salient feature proves a convenient starting

point for an analysis (further continued on
other types of foregrounding)
e.g. Sonnet 66 by Shakespeare has several
starting points:
- polysyndeton
- parallelism
- past participles have denominator
-vertical division…
Tired with all these, \ for restful death I cry,
As, to behold desert \ a beggar born,
And needy nothing \ trimm’d in jollity,
And purest faith \ unhappily forsworn,
And gilded honour \ shamefully misplaced,
And maiden virtue \ rudely strumpeted,
And right perfection \ wrongfully disgraced,
And strength \ by limping sway disabled,
And art \ made tongue-tied by authority,
And folly, \ doctor-like controlling skill,
And simple truth \ miscalled simplicity,
And captive good \ attending captain ill:
Tired with all these, \ from these would
I be gone,…
One of the most obvious peculiarities is the
polysyndeton, i.e. the repetition in close
succession of the conjunction “and” in the
beginning of ten lines out of fourteen.
Searching for an explanation, one sees that
“and” links together object clauses to the verb
“behold” (созерцать, наблюдать) and reduces a
multitude of things to unity in one vast canvas.
But a canvas of what? To explain this, we pay attention
to the fact that the canvas is structured as a coupling in
a series of parallel constructions. Its equivalent elements
– a series of nouns given prominence by the preceding
“and” have a common denominator – a strongly marked
evaluative seme of ethical character, they are also
semantically equivalent because they denote ethical
categories (virtue, faith, perfection), a third point of
equivalence is that they are marked by syncretism, they
denote not only the qualities but also people
personifying them.
One more salient feature is that the sonnet is
divided vertically; there is a pause after each of
the noun phrases. In the right-hand side of the
poem another set of parallel constructions is
correlated with the first. It has a predicative
force. The pattern is again clear-cut. Participle II
of the verbs meaning “to do great wrong to” is
enhanced by adverbs of the strongest negative
evaluation: “unhappily”, “shamefully”, “rudely”.
A third type of foregrounding present is that of
contrast. Everything good is wronged and
everything evil prospers. This prompts the most
important step of interpretation – the canvas
drawn is that of universal injustice and cruelty
that makes the poet indignant. The first insights
thus justified the reader is stimulated for further
careful interpretation of every linguistic detail
 FOREGROUNDING
In conclusion it is important to stress that there
is a strong tendency for various types of
foregrounding to occur and interact within the
same text.
 CONVERGENCE

Ex.: Define the EMs and SDs in

this example.
Sara was a menace and a
tonic, my best enemy; Rozzie
was a disease, my worst friend.
(J.Gary. The Horse’s Mouth).
 Check yourselves
1) Parallel constructions.
2) Antithesis: enemy-friend, worst - best.
3) Antonymical metaphors: tonic - disease.
4) Violation of usual combinability: instead of
best friend we read best enemy, worst
friend
Stylistic function: deep contradictory rela-
tions inside a love triangle are portrayed.