Question –in-the -Narrative

Questions (structurally and semantically one of the types of sentences) are usually asked by one person and expected to be answered by another. They belong to spoken language and presuppose the presence of an interlocutor, i.e. they are commonly used in dialogue.

Question-in-the-narrative changes the real nature of a question and turns it into a SD. It is asked and answered by the same person, usually the author.

e.g. from Byron’s “Don Juan”

“And starting, she awoke, and what to view?”

Oh, Powers of Heaven. What dark eye meets she there?

“Tis – ‘tis her father’s –fixed upon the pair.”

As seen from the example, the questions asked, unlike rhetorical questions, do not contain statements (answers).

Sometimes question –in – the –narrative gives the impression of an intimate talk between the writer and the reader:

e.g. “Scrooge knew he was dead? Of course he did. How could it be otherwise? Scrooge and he were partners…” (Dickens)

Question-in-the-narrative is often used in oratory. This is explained by one of the leading features of oratorical style – to induce the desired reaction to the content of the speech. Questions chain the attention of the listeners to the matter under discussion and prevent it from wandering. They also give the listeners time to absorb what has been said, and prepare them for the next point.

Represented Speech

See: Types of Narration

II: Stylistic Use of Structural Meaning

On analogy with transference of lexical meaning, in which words are used in a sense other than their primary logical meaning, syntactical structures can also be used in meanings different from their primary ones.

When a structure is used in some other function, it assumes a new structural meaning (which is) similar to a transferred lexical meaning. Among syntactical SDs with transferred meaning we distinguish – rhetorical question and litotes.

Rhetorical Question

(From the Greek ‘rhetor’ - оратор)

The essence of the rhetorical question consists in reshaping the grammatical meaning of the interrogative sentence. In other words the rhetorical question is no longer a question but a statement in the form of an interrogative sentence. Thus, there is an interplay of 2 structural meanings: (1) that of the question and (2) that of the statement (affirmative or negative). Both are materialized simultaneously.

e.g. “Is there not blood enough upon your penal code, that more must be poured forth to ascend to Heaven and testify against you?”

Rhetorical questions are generally structurally embodied in complex sentences where a subordinate clause contains the pronouncement. Rhetorical questions based on negation have an additional shade of meaning implied: doubt, suggestion, etc. They are full of emotive meaning and modality.

The stylistic effect of the transference of structural meaning is achieved only through the simultaneous realization of the 2 grammatical meanings: direct and transferred. Both the question-meaning and the statement-meaning are materialized with an emotional charge which can be deciphered only through the intonation of the speaker.

e.g. In the question-sentence (from Byron) instead of a categorical pronouncement one can detect irony:

“Is the poor privilege “to turn the key upon the captive, freedom?”

Rhetorical questions may also be defined as utterances in the form of questions which pronounce judgement and also express various kinds of modal shades of meaning: doubt, challenge, scorn, irony, etc.

Due to their power of expressing a variety of emotive meanings, they are often used in publicist style and oratory, where the rousing of emotions is the effect that is generally aimed at.