2.2. Syntactical Level

Stylistic inversion aims at attaching logical stress or additional emotional coloring to the surface meaning of the utterance.

The following patterns of stylistic inversion are most frequently met in both English prose and English poetry:

1 The object is placed at the beginning of the sentence.

E.g "Talent Mr Micauber has; capital Mr Micauber has not." (Dickens)

The attribute is placed after the word it modifies, e.g. "Once upon a midnight dreary.." (E.A. Poe)

2. The predicative is placed before the subject, e.g. "Rude am 1 in my speech..." (Shakespeare)

3. The adverbial modifier is placed at the beginning of the sentence.

e.g. "Eagerly 1 wished the morrow." (E.A..Poe)

4. Both modifier and predicate stand before the subject, e.g. '"In went Mr. Pickwick."

Detached Constructions. Sometimes one of the secondary parts of the sentence by some specific consideration of the writer is placed so that it seems formally independent of the word it logically refers to. Such parts of structures are called detached. They seem to dangle in the sentence as isolated parts. The detached part being torn away from its referent, assumes a greater degr?e of significance and is given prominence by intonation. The functions of the detachment are almost the same as those of the inversion, but detached construction produces a much stronger effect.

e.g. "...Daylight was dying, the moon rising, gold behind the poplars." (Galsworthy)

Parallel construction is a device which may be encountered not so much in the

scntcr.cc as in the macro-structure ( the syntactical whole and the paragraph). The necessary condition in parallel construction is identical or similar, syntactical structure in two or more sentences or parts of a sentence.

e.g. "There were...real silver spoons to stir the tea with, and real china cups to drink it out of, and plates of the same to hold the cakes and toast in." (Dickens)

Parallel constructions are often backed up by repetition of words and conjunctions and prepositions.

Chiasmus belongs to the group of stylistic devices based on the repetition of a syntactical pattern, but it has a cross order of words and phrases. Chiasmus can appear only when there are two successive sentences or coordinate parts of a sentence.

e.g. "Down dropped the breeze, The sails dropped down." (Coleridge)

The purpose of chiasmus is to bring in some new shade of meaning or additional emphasis on some portion of the second part.

Repetition is an expressive means of language used when the speaker is under the stress or strong emotion. It shows the state of mind of the speaker. Repetition is classified according to compositional design. If the repeated word (or phrase) comes at the beginning of two or more consecutive sentences, clauses or phrase, we have anaphora.

e.g. "Ignorant of the long and stealthy march of passion..., ignorant of how Soames had watched her, ignorant of Fleurs's reckless desperation...-ignorant of all this..." (Galsworthy)

The stylistic function of anaphora is to create the background for the non- repeated unit.

If the repeated unit is placed at the end of consecutive sentences, clauses or phrases we have the type of repetition called epiphora.

e.g. "I am exactly the man to be placed in a superior position in such a case as that. 1 am above the rest of mankind, in such a case as that..." (Dickens)

The stylistic function of epiphora is to add stress to the final words of the

sentence.

If the beginning of the sentence is repeated in the end we have the framing repetition, the function of which is to elucidate the notion mentioned in the beginning of the sentence.

Catch repetition (anadiplosis) is when the end of one clause (sentence) is repeated in the beginning of the following one.

Chain repetition presents several successive anadiploses. The eflect is that ol the smoothly developing logical reasoning.

e.g. "For glances beget ogles, ogles sighs, sighs washes, wishes words, and words a letter. (Byron)

Ordinary repetition has no definite place in the sentence and the repeated unit occurs in various positions. Ordinary repetition emphasizes both the logical and the emotional meanings of the reiterated word (phrase).

Successive repetition is a string of closely following each other reiterated units. This is the most emphatic type of repetition which signifies the peak of emotions of the speaker.

Another variety of repetition may be called synonym repetition. This is the repetition of the same idea by using synonymous words and phrases which b\ adding a slightly different nuance of meaning intensify the impact of the utterance, e.g. "The poetry of earth is never dead... The poetry of earth is ceasing never." (Keats)

There are two terms frequently used to show the negative attitude of the critic to all kinds of synonym repetitions. These are pleonasm and tautoloirw

Enumeration is a stylistic device by means of which homogenec^is pans of an utterance are made heterogeneous from the semantic point of view, e.g. "Famine, despair, cold, thirst and heat had gone Their work on them by turns, and thinn'd them too..." (Byron) Suspense is a compositional device which consists in arranging the matter or" a communication in such a way that the less important descriptive, subordinate pans are amassed at the beginning, the main idea being withheld till the end of thesentence. Thus the reader's attention is held and his interest kept up.

e.g. "Mankind, says a Chinese manuscript, which my friend M. was obliging enough to read and explain to me, for the first seventy thousands ages ate their meat raw." (Ch. Lamb)

Climax is an arrangement of sentences (or of the homogeneous parts of one sentence) which secures a gradual increase in significance, or emotional tension in the utterance.

e.g. "It was a lovely city, a beautiful city', a fair city, a veritable gem of a city." Antithesis is based on relative opposition which arises out of the context through the expansion of objectively contrasting pairs, e.g. "Youth is lovely, age is lonely, Youth is fiery, age is frosty." (Longfellow)

Antithesis has the following basic functions: rhythm forming, copulative, dissevering, and comparative. These functions often go together and intermingle in their own peculiar manner.

Asyndeton is a conncction between parts of a sentence or between sentences without any formal sign.

e.g. "Soames turned away; he had an utter disinclination for talk, like one standing before an open grave, watchifig a coffin slowly lowered." (Galsworthy)

The deliberate omission of the subordinate conjunction "because" or "for" makes the sentence "he had an utter...*' almost entirely independent.

Polysyndeton is the stylistic device of connecting sentences or phrase or syntagms or words by using connectives before each component part.

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

The repetition of conjunctions and other means of connection make an utterance more rhythmical: so much so that prose may even seem like verse. In addition to this, polysyndeton has a disintegrating function. It generally combines homogeneous elements of thought into one whole resembling enumeration. Polysyndeton has also the function of expressing sequence.

The Can Sentence Link is a peculiar type of connection of sentences. The connection is not immediately apparent and it requires a certain mental effort to grasp the interrelation between the parts of the utterance.

e.g. "She and that fellow ought to be the sufferers, and they were in Italy." The gap sentence link has various functions. It may serve to signal the introduction of inner represented speech; it may be used to indicate a subjective evaluation of the facts; it may introduce an effect resulting from a cause which has already had verbal expression.

Ellipsis is a deliberate omission of at least one member of the sentence. In contemporary prose ellipsis is mainly used in dialogue where it is consciously employed by the author to reflect the natural omission characterizing oral colloquial speech.

e.g. "So Justice Oberwaltzer- solemnly and didactically from his high seat to the jury." (Dreiser)

One-member sentence is a sentence consisting only of a nominal group, which is semantically and communicatively self-sufficient. In creative prose such sentences are mostly used in descriptions where they produce the effect of a detailed but laconic picture foregrounding its main components; and as the background of dialogue, mentioning the emotions, attitudes, moods of the speakers.

Break-in- the-Narralive (Aposiopesis) is a device expressed by a stopping shon for rhetorical effect. It conveys to the reader a very strong upsurge of emotions. The idea of this stylistic device is that the speaker cannot proceed, his feelings depriving him of the ability to express himself in terms of language.

e.g. "You just come home or I'll..." ^

Rhetorical question is a question that does not demand any, information but serves to express the emotions of the speaker and also to call the attention 01 listeners.

e.g. What am I supposed to do?

Practical Assignments

1. Find the cases of repetition, parallelism and chiasmus, state their stylistic functions:

1) I wake up and I am alone and 1 walk round Warley and I am alone; and I talk with people and 1 am alone and 1 look at his face when 1 am home and it's dead.

2) Babbitt was virtuous. He advocated, though he did not practice, the prohibition of alcohol: he praised, though he did not obey, the laws against motor-speeding.

3) I might as well face facts: good-by, Susan, good-by a big car, good-by a big house, good-by power, good-by the silly handsome dreams.

4) On her father's being groundlessly suspected, she felt sure. Sure.

Sure.

5) And a great desire for peace, peace of no matter what kind, swept through her.

6) And everywhere were people. People going into gates and coming out of gates. People staggering and falling. People lighting and cursing.

7) He ran away from the battle. He was an ordinary human being that didn't want to kill or be killed. So he ran away from the battle.

8) 1 notice that father's is a large hand, but never a heavy one when it touches me, and that father's a rough voice but never an angry one when it speaks to me.

2. hind and analyze cases of detachment, suspense and inversion:

1) She narrowed her eyes a trifle at me and said I looked exactly like Celia Briganza's boy. Around the mouth.

2) He observes it all with a keen quick glance, not unkindly, and full rather of amusement than of censure.

3) Of all my old association, of ail my old pursuits and hopes, of all the living and the dead world, this one poor soul alone comes natural to me.

4) Benny Collan, a respected guy, Benny Col tan wants to marry her. An agent could ask for more?

4) Women are not made for attack. Wait they must.

5) Out came the chase- in went the horses- on sprang the boys- in got the travelers.

6) Then he said: "You think it's'so? She was mixed up in this lousy business?"

7) In manner, close and dry. In voice, husky and low. In face, watchful behind a blind.

3. Discuss the semantic centers and structural peculiarities of antithesis:

1) Mrs. Nork had a large home and a small husband.

2) Don't use big words. They mean so little.

3) 1 like big parties. They are so intimate. At small panics there isn't any privacy.

4) There is Mr. Guppy, who was at first as open as the sun at noon, but who suddenly shut up as close as midnight.

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

4. Analyze the following sentences:

1) Is it shark?" said Brody. The possibility that he at last was going to confront the fish-the beast, the Monster, the nightmare- made Brody's heart pound.

2) Rup wished he could be swift, accurate, compassionate and stern instead of clumsy and vague and sentimental. ^

3) By the time he had got all the bottles and dishes and knives, and forks and glasses and plates and spoons and things piled up on big trays, he was getting very hot, and red in the face, and annoy ed.

4) Malay Camp. A row of streets crossing another row of streets. Mostly narrow streets. Mostly dirty streets. Mostly dark streets.

5) His forehead was narrow, his face wide, his head large, and