IV. Particular Ways of Combining Parts of the Utterance (Linkage) Asyndeton

Asyndeton, i.e. connection between parts of a sentence or between sentences without any formal sign, becomes a SD if there is a deliberate omission of the connectives where they are generally expected to (according to the norms of the literary language). It should be mentioned that there is an essential difference between the ordinary norms of the language, both literary and colloquial, and SDs which are skillfully used for special informative and aesthetic purposes.

e.g. Cf.: “Bicket did not answer his throat felt too dry” (Galsworthy)

The absence of the conjunction and of punctuation here can be regarded as a deliberate introduction of the norms of colloquial speech into the literary language. Such structures make the utterance sound like one syntactical unit and should be pronounced as one syntagm, without a pause.

e.g. Soames turned away; he had an utter discinclination to talk… (Galsworthy)

Here the semicolon indicates a longish pause which breaks the utterance into 2 parts.

Polysyndeton

Polysyndeton is a SD connecting sentences, phrases, syntagms, or words by using connectives (mostly conjunctions and prepositions) before each component part of the utterance.

e.g. The heaviest rain, and snow, and hail, and sleet, could boast of the advantage over him in only one respect. (Dickens)

e.g. Longfellow’s “The Song of Hiawatha” (both conjunctions and prepositions):

Should you ask me, whence these stories?

Whence these legends and traditions,

With the odours of the forest

With the dew, and damp of meadows,

With the curling smoke of wigwams,

With the rushing of great rivers….

The repetition of conjunctions and other means of connection makes the utterance more rhythmical; so rhythmical, in fact, that that prose may look like verse.

Apokoinu Construction

In this construction the omission of the pronominal (adverbial) connective creates a blend of the main and subordinate clause, so that both the predicative or the object of the 1-st one is simultaneously used as the subject of the second one.

e.g. There was a door led into the kitchen.

He was the man killed that deer.

The double syntactical function played by one word produces the general impression of clumsiness of speech and is used as a means of speech characteristics in dialogue, in reported speech and entrusted narrative in which the author entrusts the telling of the story to an imaginary narrator who is either an observer or participant of the described events.

Attachment

(Also see: Galperin, I.R., pp. 227-229: The Gap-Sentence-Link)

Together with polysyndeton and asyndeton, attachment belongs to various types of connection used within the sentence or between sentences. It is mainly represented in voices of personages - dialogue, reported speech, entrusted narrative. In the attachment the second part of the utterance is separated from the first one by a full stop, though their semantic and grammatical ties remain very strong. The second part appears as an afterthought and is often connected with the beginning of the utterance with the help of a conjunction which brings the latter into the foregrounded opening position.

e.g. – “It wasn’t his fault. It was yours. And mine. I now humbly beg you to give me the money with which to buy meals for you to eat. And hereafter do remember it: the next time I shan’t beg. I shall simply starve.”

e.g. Prison is where he belongs. And my husband agrees one hundred percent.