1.6. Tonal System

There is no an without emotion. Fiction appeals to the reader through the senses and evokes responsive emotions. It is affected by the author's view of the world, his outlook, his personal attitude to it. In every literary work the writer's,

feelings and emotions are reflected in the tone, attitude and atmosphere.

Atmosphere is the general mood of a literary work. It is affected by such strands of a literary work as the plot, setting, characters, details, symbols, and language means.

The author's attitude is his view of the characters and actions. It reflects his

judgment of them. The author's attitude establishes the moral standards according to %

which the reader is to make his judgment about the problems raised in the story. The reader is expected to share the author's attitude.

The attitude of a writer to his subject matter determines the tone of the story. The tone is the light in which the characters and events are depicted. The tone, therefore, is closely related to atmosphere and attitude. One should distinguish between the prevailing tone of a literary work and emotional overtones which may accompany particular scenes in the story. They all form a toned system which reflects the changes in the narrator's attitude to his subject matter. The emotional overtones generally form "a tonal unity" which means a consistency of attitude towards the events and characters.

But the tone expresses not only the relationship between the narrator and the subject matter, but also the relationship between the narrator and the reader. The narrator may establish an intimate, personal, or formal relationship with the reader.

Practical Assignments

I. The passage from F.S. Fitzgerald's novel " The Great Gatsby" presented below contains a number of implications shedding light on the personality of Nick Carraway by whom the story is narrated. Consider these implicit details and classify them according to the degree of implication. Make use of the directed-study questions following the excerpt:

My family have been prominent, well-to-do people in this Middle Western city for three generations. The Carraways arc something of a clan, and we have a tradition that we're descended from the Dukes of Buccleuch, but the actual founder of my line

was my grandfather's brother, who came here in fifty-one, sent a substitute to the Civil War, and started the wholesale hardware, business that my father carries on to­day. I never saw this great-uncle, but I'm supposed to look like him - with special reference to the rather hard-boiled painting that hangs in father's office. 1 graduated from New Haven in 1915, just a quarter of a century after my father, and a little later 1 participated in that delayed Teutonic migration known as the Great War. I enjoyed the counter-raid so thoroughly that 1 came back home restless. Instead of being the warm centre of the world, the Middle West now seemed like the ragged edge of the universe - so I decided to go East and learn the bond business. Everybody I knew was in the bond business, so 1 supposed it could support one more single man. All m\ aunts and uncles talked it over as if they were choosing a prep school for me and finally said, "Why - ye-es," with very grave hesitant faces. Father agreed to finance me for a year, and after various delays I came East, permanently, 1 thought, in me spring of twenty-two.

The practical thing was to find rooms in the city, but it was a warm season, and I had just left a country of wide lawns and friendly trees, so when a young man at the office suggested that we take a house together in a commuting town, it sounded like a great idev. He found the house, a weather-beaten cardboard bungalow at eight} a month, bet at the last minute the firm ordered him to Washington, and 1 went out to the country alone. 1 had a dog - at least 1 had him for a few days until he ran away - and an o'c Dodge and a Finnish woman, who made my bed and cooked breakfast and muttered Finnish wisdom to herself over the electric stove.

It was lonely for a day or so until one morning some man, more recently arrived titan 1, stopped me on the road.

"How do you get to West Egg Village?" he asked helplessly. ' told him. And as I walked on 1 was lonely no longer. I was a guide, a pathfinder, an original settler. He had casually conferred on me the freedom of the neighborhood (F.S. Fitzgerald. The Great Gatsby) Directcd-study questions:

1) Why does the narrator allude to "this Middle Western cit\" instead

of identifying it by its proper name?

2) Why is the authenticity detail "Middle Western" given recurrent attention? What two perspectives is the Middle West presented from? How is it counterbalanced by the notion of the "East"?

3) What does the narrator intimate by mentioning the legendary and

actual founders of his clan? «

4) Why does Nick Carraway accentuate his resemblance to "this great-uncle"?

What attitude is implied by the periphrasis "that delayed Teutonic migration"?

5) What cultural implication is embedded in the simile "as if they were choosing

- P^P school for me "?

7) What attitude shows itself through the narrator's polysyndetic enumeration "I had a dog... and an old Dodge and a Finnish woman "?

8) What important cultural implication-is hidden in the sentence "I was a guide, a pathfinder, an original settler"? How does the understanding of this implication contribute to decoding the message of the whole novel?

9) What does the simile "just as things grow in fast movies" intimate about the temporal settings of the novel?

2. Read the excerpt from W.S. Maugham's story "The Lotus Eater". It is recommended that you initiate your interpretation by writing out key words and phrases used as characterological details of the protagonist Wilson's portrayal.

I low does the narrator present his state of bewilderment vis-a-vis the hero whose personality is obfuscated by a number of rumours? The questions below can help you to decode the implicit details that contribute to the message of the passage - Wilson is a stranger on the island of Capri. Directed-study questions:

1) Does Wilson seem to be a friendly person?

2) What do the two remarks made by Wilson tell about his character?

2) Are all the details of Wilson's appearance coordinated?

3) What ethnical features can be traced in Wilson's looks?

4) What details of the hero's appearance suggested the narrator a comparison with "the manager of a branch office"?

5) Why does the narrator introduce the episodic image of Donna Lucia right after Wilson's description?

6) What could be meant by the "ordinary Capri tittle-tattle "?

My friend then introduced me. Wilson shook hands with me politely, but with indifference; a great many strangers come to Capri for a few days, or a few weeks, and I had no doubt he was constantly meeting people who came and went; and then my friend asked him to come along and have a drink with us. "I was just going back to supper." he said. "Can't it wait?" I asked. "I suppose it can," he smiled.

Though his teeth were not very good his smile was attractive, it was gentle and kindly. He was dressed in a blue cotton shirt and a pair of grey trousers, much creased and none too clean, of a thin canvas, and on his feet he wore a pair of very old espadrilles. The get-up was picturesque, and very suitable to the place and the weather, but it did not at all go with his face. It was a lined, long face, deepis sunburned, thin-lipped, with small grey eyes rather close together and tight, neat features. The grey hair was carefully brushed. It was not a plain face, indeed in his youth Wilson might have been good-looking, but a prim one. He wore the blue shirt, open at the neck and grey canvas trousers, not as though they belonged to him, but as though, shipwrecked in his pyjamas, he had been fitted out %vith odd garments by compassionate stranger. Notwithstanding this careless attire he looked like the manager of a branch office in an insurance company, who should by rights be wearing a black coat with pepper-and-salt trousers, a white collar and an unobjectionable tie. I coulc very well see myself going to him to claim the insurance money when I had lost a v atch, and being rather disconcerted while I answered the questions he put to me by his obvious impression, for all his politeness, that people who made such claims were either fools or knaves.

Moving off, we strolled across the Piazza and down the street till we came to Morgano's. We sat in the garden. Around us people were talking in Russian, German, Italian and English. We ordered drinks. Donna Lucia, the host's wife, waddled up and in her low, sweet voice passed the time of day with us. Though middle-aged now and portly, she had still traces of the wonderful beauty that thirty years before had driven artists to paint so many bad portraits of her. Her eyes, large and liquid, were the eyes of Hera and her smile was affectionate and gracious. We three gossiped for a while, for there is always a scandal of one sort or another in Capri to make a topic of conversation, but nothing was said of particular interest and in a little while Wilson got up and left us. Soon afterwards we strolled up to my friend's villa to dine. On the way he asked me what I had thought of Wilson.

"Nothing," I said, "I don't believe there's a word of truth in your story." "Why

not?"

"He isn't the sort of man to do that sort of thing."

"How docs anyone know what anyone is capable of?"

"I should put him down as an absolutely normal man of business who's retired on a comfortable income from gilt-edged securities. I think your story's just the ordinary Capri tittle-tattle." "Have it your own way," said my friend (W.S. Maugham, The Lotus Eater)

3. In the excerpts that follow, define the narrative perspective and the type of narrator. Comment on the types and forms of speech used.

1. Once upon a lime, a very long time ago, about last Friday, Winnie-the-Pooh lived in the forest all by himself under the name of Sanders.

("What docs 'under the name' mean?" asked Christopher Robin.

"It means he had the name over the door in gold letters, and lived under it."

"Winnie- the-Pooh wasn't quite sure," said Christopher Robin.

"Now I am," said a growly voice.

"Then I will go on," said I.)

One day when he was out walking, he came to an open place in the middle of the forest, and in the middle of this place was a large oak-tree, and, from the top of the tree, there came a loud buzzing-noise (A. Miln. Winnie-the-Pooh)

2. 1 ate the ham and eggs and drank the beer. The ham and eggs were in a round dish - the ham underneath and the eggs on the top. It was very hot and at the first mouthful I had to take a drink of beer to cool my mouth. I was hungry and I asked the waiter for another order. I drank several glasses of beer. 1 was not thinking at all but read the paper of the man opposite me. It was about the breakthrough on the British front. When he realized I was reading the back of his paper he folded it over. I thought of asking the waiter for a paper, but I could not concentrate. (...) Suddenly 1 knew I had to go back. I called the waiter, paid the reckoning, got into my coat, put on my hat and started out the door. I walked through the rain up to the hospital (E. Hemingway. Farewell to Arms)

Unit 2. Stylistic Aspects of Analysis 2.1. Lexical EMs and SDs.

Metaphor is a relation between the dictionary and contextual logical meanings based on the affinity or similarity of certain properties or features of the two corresponding concepts. Metaphor can be embodied in all the meaningful parts of speech, in nouns, adjectives, verbs, and adverbs and sometimes even in the auxiliary parts of speech, as in prepositions.

e.g. The leaves fell sorrowfully. *

Metaphors, like all stylistic devices can be classified according to their degree of unexpectedness. Thus metaphors which are absolutely unexpected are called genuine metaphors. Those which are commonly used in speech and therefore are sometimes even fixed in dictionaries as expressive means of language are trite metaphors, or dead metaphors.

e.g. a ray of hope

a flight of fancy - trite metaphors Trite metaphors are sometimes injected with new vigour, i.e. their primary meaning is re-established alongside, the new (derivative) meaning. This is done by supplying the central image created by the metaphor with additional words bearing some reference to the main word.

e.g. Mr Pickwick bottled up his vengeance and corked it down. Such metaphors are called sustained or prolonged.

The metaphor is one of the most powerful means of creating images. This is its main function. Genuine metaphors are mostly to be found in poetry and emotive prose. Trite metaphors are generally used as expressive means in newspaper articles, in oratorical style and even in scientific language.

Metonymy is based on a different type of relation between the dictionary and contextual meanings, a relation based not on affinity, but on some kind of association connecting the two concepts which these meanings represent. The following types of relation arc most common:

1. a concrete thing used instead of an abstract notion. In this case the thing becomes a symbol of the notion.

e.g. "The camp, the pulpit and the law for rich men's sons are free."

(Shelley)

2. the container instead of the thing contained, e.g. The hall applauded.

3. the relation of proximity.

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

4. the material instead of the thing made of it. e.g. The marble spoke.

5. the instrument which the doer uses in performing the action instead of the action or the doer himself.

e.g. "As the sword is the most argument that can be used, so should it be the

last." (Byron)

Ironv is a stylistic device also based on the simultaneous realization of two logical meanings- dictionary and contextual, but the two meanings stand in opposition to each other.

e.g. It must be delightful to find oneself in a foreign country w ithout a penny in one's pocket.

Irony must not be confused with humour, although they have very much in common. Humour always causes laughter. The function of irony is not confined to produce a humorous effect. It rather expresses some feeling (irritation, displeasure.

pity, regret, etc). .. . .

Zeugma is the use of a word in the same grammatical but different semantic relations to two adjacent words in the context, the semantic relations being on the one hand literal, and on the other hand transferred.

e.g. "...And May's mother always stood on her gentility; and Dot's mother never stood on anything but her active little feet." (Dickens)

Zeugma is a strong and effective device to maintain the purity of the primary meaning when the two meanings clash. By making the two meanings conspicuous in this particular way, each of them stands out clearly.

Pun is another stylistic device based on the interaction of two well-known meanings of a word or a phrase. The humorous effect of pun is caused by the interplay of two words.

e.g. When the fat boy, Mr. Wardle's servant, emerged from the corridor, very pale, he was asked by his master: "Have you been seeing any spirits?" "Or taking any?"- added Bob Allen. The first "spirits" refers to supernatural forces, the second one - to strong drinks. (Ch. Dickens)

Epithet is a stylistic device based on the interplay of emotive and logical meaning in an attributive word, phrase or even sentence, used to characterize an Object and pointing out to the reader, and frequently imposing on him, some of the properties or features of the object with the aim of giving an individual perception and evaluation of these features or properties. The epithet is markedly subjective and

evaluative.

e.g. wild wind, heart-burning smile, etc.

The epithet makes a strong impact on the reader, so much so, that the reader unwillingly begins to see and evaluate things as the writer wants him to.

From the point of view of their compositional structure epithets may be divided into simple, compound and phrase epithets. Another structural variety of the epithet is the one which is called ?bversed. The reversed epithet is composed of two nouns linked in an of-phrase (e.g. the shadow of the smile, a devil of a job, etc).

From the point of view of the distribution of the epithets in the sentence there are the following models:

1) the string of epithets

e.g. Such was the background of the wonderful, cruel, enchanting, bewildering, fatal, great city."'

2) transferred epithet- ordinary logical attribute generally describing the state of human being but made to refer to an inanimate object.

e.g. sleepless pillow, merry hours, etc.

The epithet is a direct and straightforward way of showing the author's attitude towards the things described.

Oxymoron is a combination of two words (mostly an adjective and a noun or an adverb with an adjective) in which the meanings of the two clash, being opposite in sense.

e.g. low skyscraper, nice rascal, etc.

Antonomasia is the interplay between logical and nominal meanings of a word (the two kinds of meanings are realized in the word simultaneously).

e.g. Miss Blue-Eyes

Such token or tell-tale names give information to the reader about the bearer of the name. Antonomasia is intended to point out the leading, most characteristic feature of a person or event, at the same time pining this leading trait as a proper name to the person or event concerned, it may be likened to the epithet in essence if not in form. It categorizes the person and thus simultaneously indicates both the

genera! and the particular.

Simile realizes the intensification of some feature of the concept in question. To use a simile is to characterize one object by bringing it into contact with another object belonging to an entirely different class of things.

e.g. "Maidens, like moths, are ever caught by glare." (Byron) Simile forcibly set one object against another regardless of the fact that the\ may be completely alien to each other. And without our being aware of it the simile gives rise to a new understanding of the object characterizing as well as of the object characterized. Similes have formal elements in their structure: connective words such as" like", "as", "such as", "as if, etc.

Periphrasis is the re-naming of an object by a phrase that brings out some peculiar feature of the object. The essence of this device is that it is decipherable only in context. It is a new genuine nomination of an object, a process which realizes the power of language to coin new names for objects by disclosing some quality of the object.

e.g. "1 understand you are poor, and wish to earn money by nursing the little boy, my son, who has been so prematurely deprived of what can never be replaced." (Dickens)

Stylistic periphrasis can be divided into logical and figurative. Logical periphrasis is based on one of the inherent properties or perhaps a passing feature of the object.

e.g. instruments of destruction- pistols

Figurative periphrasis is base cither on metaphor or on metonymy, e.g. the punctual servant of all work- the sun to tie the knot- to marry. ^

Euphemism is a variety of periphrasis. It is a word or phrase used to replace an unpleasant word or expression by a conventionally more acceptable one. e.g. to die- to pass away, to be no more..

So euphemisms are synonyms which aim at producing a deliberately mild effect. Euphemisms may be divided into several groups according to their spheres of

application. The most recognized are the following: religious, moral, medical, parliamentary.

The life of euphemisms is short. They very soon become closely associated with the referent (the object named) and give way to a newly-coined word or combination of words which being the sign of a sign, throws another veil over an unpleasant or tin«delicate concept.

Hyperbole is a deliberate overstatement or exaggeration, the aim of which is to intensify one of the features of the object in question to such a degree as will show its utter absurdity.

e.g. It's a rare bird that can fly to the middle of the Dnieper.

Hyperbole differs from mere exaggeration in that it is intended to be understood as an exaggeration. It sharpens the reader's ability to make a logical assessment of the utterance.

Practical Assignments

1. Pick out genuine metaphor among trite ones:

1)	the neck of a bottle
2)	time flies
3)	a cold look
4)	to fall in love
5)	a ray of hope
6)	table's leg
7)	a head of cabbage
8)	Your wife's gown is a poem.
9)	the foot of a page.

2. Indicate metonymies, stale the type of relations between the object named and the object implied:

1) He went about the room, after his introduction, looking at her pictures, her bronzes and clays, asking after the creator of this, the painter of that, where a third thing came from.

2) Dinah, a slim, fresh, pale eighteen, was pliant and yet fragile.

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

4) The delicatessen owner was a spry and jolly fifty.

5) "Some remarkable pictures in this room, gentlemen. A Holbein, two Van Dycks and if 1 am not mistaken a Velasquez. 1 am interested in pictures."

6) There you are at your tricks again. The rest of them do earn their bread; you live on my charity.

' 7) "He "matfeliT^

8) We can give her a roof over her head.

9) He is a very good hand at tennis.

10) She was a sunny happy sort of creature, too fond of the

bottle.

3. Analyze various cases of play on words, indicate which type is used:

1) After a while and a cake he crept nervously to the door of the parlour.

2) There are two things 1 look for in a man. A sympathetic character and full lips.

3) Dorothy, at my statement, had clapped her hand over mouth to hold down laughter and chewing gum.

4) Most women in London nowadays seem to furnish their rooms

%

with nothing but orchids, foreigners and French novels.

5) He may be poor and shabby, but beneath those ragged trousers beats a heart of gold.

6) My mother was wearing her best grey dress and gold brooeh and a faint pink flush under each cheek bone.

7) When 1 am dead, 1 hope it may be said: f^His sins were scarlet.

but his books were read."

4. Pick out cases of irony :

1) I was scared to death when he entered the room.

2) Her painful shoed slipped off.

3) Another night, deep in the summer, the heat of my room sent me out into the streets.

4) I got my living by sweat of my brow.

5) Stoney smiled the sweet smile of an alligator.

6) The little woman, for she was a pocket size, crossed her hands solemnly on her middle.

7) Silent early morning dogs parade majestically pecking and choosing judiciously whereon to pee.

5. Analyze the following case of Antonomasia:

1) "You cheat, you no-good cheat-you tricked our son. Took our son with a scheming trick, Miss Tomboy, Miss Sarcastic, Miss Snecrface."

2) Our secretary is Esther D'Eath. Her name is pronounced by vulgar relatives as Dearth, some of us pronounce it Deeth.

3) Now let me introduce you- that's Mr What's his name, you remember him, don't you?

4) He is a real Romeo.

5) Her mother is perfectly unbearable. Never met such a Gordon.

6. Discuss the structure and semantics of epithets in the following camples. Define the type and function of epithets:

1) He's a proud, haughty, consequential, turned-nosed peacock.

2) Her painful shoes slipped off.

3) She was a faded white rabbit of a woman.

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

5) He acknowledged an early-afternoon customer with bc- with-you-in-a-minute nod.

6) The children were very brown and filthily dirts .

7) He sat with Daisy in his arms for a long silent time.

8) The girl gave him a lipsticky smile.

9) Old Jolion seemed master of perennial youth.

7. . Iniilyze the cases of hyperbole and understatement:

1) I was scared to death when he entered the room.

2) The girls were dressed to kill.

3) I was violently sympathetic, as usual.

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

5) Her family is one aunt about a thousand years old.

6) She wore a pink hat, the size of a button.

7) The rain had thickened, fish could swim through the air.

8) He smiled back, breathing a memory of gin at me. 9j She busied herself in the midget kitchen.

10) He didn't appear like the same man: then he was aii milk and honey-now he was all starch and vinegar.

8. Find the cases of the oxymoron:

1) He caught a ride home to the crowded loneliness of the barracks.

2) lie behaved pretty iousily to Jan.

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

4) There were some bookcases of superbly unreadable books.

5) Her eyes were pools of still water.

6) The syntax and idiom of the voice in common conversation are not the syntax and idiom of the pen.

7) A neon sign reads "Welcome to Reno-the biggest little town in the

world".

8) Huck Finn and Holden Caulfieid are Good Bad Boys of American literature.

9) He felt the first watery eggs of sweat moistening the palms of his

hands.

9. Pay intention to the stylistic function of various lexical expressive means used individually and in convergence:

1) Constantinople is noisy, hot, chilly, dirty and beautiful. It is packed with uniforms and rumors.

2) Across the street a bingo parlour was going full blast; the voice of

the

hot dog merchant split the dusk like an axe. The big blue blared down the street.

3) An enormous grand piano grinned savagely at the curtains as if it would_>y

""grab them, given the chance.

4) On that little pond the leaves floated in peace and praised Heaven with their hues, the sunlight haunting over them.

5) Outside the narrow street fumed, the sidewalks swarmed with fat stomachs.

6) They were both wearing hats like nothing on earth which bobbed and nodded as they spoke.

10. Analyze the following:

He might almost have been some other man dreaming recurrently that he was an electrical engineer. On the other side of the edge, waiting for him to peer into it late at night or whenever he was alone and the show of work had stopped, was illimitable unpopulated darkness, a Greenland night: and only his continuing heart beats kept him from disappearing into it. Moving along this edge, doing whatever the day demanded, or the night offered, grimly observant (for he was not without fortitude), he noticed much that has escaped him before. He found he was attending a

comedy, a show that would have been very funny indeed if there had been life outside the theatre instead of darkness and dissolution.