3.3. Stylistic devices based on the meaning of the category of case

The category of case in English is one of the most disputable among other grammatical phenomena. The only one unanimously accepted English case form is the possessive case that is created by means of “‘s” inflexion and expresses different meanings: John’s toy, John’s death, John’s robbery, a mile’s walk, the area’s industrial structure, a week’s absence.

Ukrainian nouns 7 case forms and singular and plural opposition in the nominative, genitive, dative, accusative, instrumental, locative and vocative case.

There is no identity in contrasted languages as to the possible stylistic functions of noun case forms. In English, for example, the violation of ‘s form can result in comic effect:

She is the boy I used to go with’s mother.

She is the man that bought my wheelbarrow’s wife.

It is the young fellow in the backroom’s car.

He is the niece I told you about’s husband.

The blond I had been dancing with’s name was Bernice (J. Selinger).

The stylistic role of Ukrainian case forms is more powerful and variegated. The case forms of Ukrainian noun usually acquire the stylistic meaning under condition of parallel functioning of case variants: if one of the case form is stylistically neutral, the other is stylistically marked. Some case forms are characteristic only for a certain functional style or differs in subtle semantic shades. Ukrainian genitive, instrumental and locative cases are considered more stylistically loaded in comparison with other case forms. They render different meanings and perform different syntactic functions. Due to the variety of meanings and syntactic functions they have become capable of imparting an utterance with additional expressive and emotional colouring. Let us compare the neutral forms of these cases and their expressive co-variants:

a) вивчати українську мову;

b) Буду я навчатись мови золотої!

У трави-веснянки, у гори крутої (А. Малишко).

a) Що чуєш ти в гомоні вітру? (Л. Українка)

b) Ти думаєш любитиме тебе – отакого вітра? За що?(С. Васильченко)

a) Прозоре та ясне весняне повітря

b) Повітря зробилось прозорим та ясним (М. Коцюбинський).

a) На передньому краї

b) І в зорі того хлопчини, а з чого й сам не знаю, я бачив всесвітні межі на тім, на переднім краї (А. Малишко).

As a result of grammatical transposition some nouns in instrumental case have acquired adverbial meaning. Functioning predominantly within the sphere of colloquial style, they intensify the main verb and impart stylistic colouring to the whole text:

А дядько поїдом їсть її за пісні, щоб не принаджувала людей на голос (М. Стельмах).

A special type of Ukrainian grammatical structures has been formed as a result of implied comparison. These structures function in emotive prose and poetry as substantive epithets expressed by instrumental case (а) or as personifications (b) and are used to create the variety of images:

(a)

А Воля в темниці, а Воля в тюрмі.

Орлицею б’ється об стіни німі.

Сядь поруч янголом зо мною.

Вечірня сутінь серпанком в’ється .

Я буйним степом розгорнуся, я морем співів розіллюся (О. Олесь).

(b) русалкою стала, стала дівчиною-калиною, зацвів червоним маком, тощо (з народної поезії).

Definite metaphoric meanings are inherent in Ukrainian vocative case forms:

Народе мій, Ясний соколе!

О слово рідне, Орле скутий (О. Олесь).