Expressive means in syntax based on
• the reduction of the basic model (ellipsis, aposiopesis, nominative sentences, asyndeton)
• the extension of the sentence model (repetition, enumeration, syntactical tautology, polysyndeton, emphatic constructions, parenthetic sentences);
• change of the word order (detachment, inversion, separation / syntactical split)
Ellipsis - a syntactic structure in which there is no subject, or predicate, or both
Where did you go? – To the disco.
Asyndeton - a deliberate avoidance of conjunctions used to connect sentences, clauses, phrases or words
Bicket did not answer ; his throat felt too dry.
Aposiopesis (or break-in-the-narrative ) is realized through incompleteness of sentence structure. (If you go on like this...)
Repetition
ordinary :
Please, get well — fast - fast - fast. (J.Webster)
framing or ring :
We are going to be lucky, we are. (J. Priestley )
catch repetition (anadiplosis )
It was a nice face, a face you get to like. (R.Chandler )
chain repetition
The originals were returned to the envelopes, and the envelopes to the box, and the box to the vault. ( R.Stout )
root-repetition
"Schemmer, Karl Schemmer, was a brute, a brutish brute." (London)
Enumeration - the repetition of the homogeneous words or word combinations in the same syntactical position
There were cows, goats, peacocks and sheep in the village.
Syntactical tautology - the repetition of semantically identical elements of the sentence (usually the subject expressed by a noun and a pronoun)
I ain’t got no news from nobody.
Parenthetic sentences - sentences and phrases inserted into a syntactical structure of another sentence
It was only when he had been decisively turned down by everyone approached – banks, trusts, insurance companies, and private lenders – that his original confidence waned. (A.Haily)
Emphatic constructions - intensification of any part of the utterance
• It was to the small house that he came at the end.
Polysyndeton- the repetition of the same conjunction before the enumerated components of the sentence
And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat upon the house; and it fell;and great was the fall of it. (Matthew 7)
Stylistic devices in syntax based on
- interconnection of several syntactical constructions in a certain context (parallelism, chiasmus, anaphora, epiphora)
- the transposition of the meaning of the syntactical construction or the model of the sentence (rhetoric questions)
- the transposition of the meaning of the means of connection between the components of the sentence or sentences (parcellation, subordination instead of coordination)
5. Metaphorical group of stylistic devices. Mechanism of metaphoric transfer of
name. Types of metaphor.
Metaphor – transposition of a name based on similarity/ likeness of two objects;
Types of metaphor
Semantic types:
Genuine or original (created by speakers): The wind was a torrent of darkness among the trees.
Trite or dead (are fixed in the dictionary): To burn with desire, floods of tears;
Structural types:
Simple (elementary)consist of single words, or compound words, or phrases
The good book is the best of friends.
Sustained/extended metaphors appear in cases when a word which has been used metaphorically makes other words of the sentence also realize their metaphoric meanings.
Blondes, wars, famines - they all arrived on the same train. They unpacked together. They stayed at the same hotel...
Functional types:
nominative is technical device of nomination, when a new notion is named by means of the old vocabulary.
A leg of the table, an arm of the clock
cognitive – when an object obtains a quality which is typical of another object
One more day has died.
figurative / imaginative:
Patricia’s eyes were pools of still water.
Antonomasia and Allegory
Antonomasia (Allegory) - identification of human beings with things which surround them (throughout the whole text);