Function of a Rhetorical Question
Writers employ rhetorical questions for rhetorical effects and we cannot easily quantify the impact rendered by a rhetorical question. The idea becomes all the more powerful, and our interest is aroused to continue to read and enjoy the technical and aesthetic beauty that a rhetorical question generates. Moreover, it is a requirement in persuasive speeches.
Euphenism. Periphrasis
Euphemisms
This term denotes the use of a different, more gentle or favourable name for an object or phenomenon so as to avoid undesirable or unpleasant associations. Thus, the verb to die may be replaced by euphemisms like to expire, to be no more, to join the majority, to begone, to depart; a madhouse may be called a lunatic asylum or a mental hospital; euphemisms for toilet, lavatory are ladies'(men's) room; rest-room; bathroom. Euphemistic expressions may have the structure of a sentence: China is a country where you often get different accounts of the same thing (= where many lies are told) (from Lord Salisbury's Speech). There are euphemisms replacing taboo-words (taboos), i.e. words forbidden in use in a community: The Prince of darkness or The Evil One (=the Devil); the kingdom of darkness or the place of no return (= Hell).
Function of Euphemism
Euphemism helps writers to convey those ideas which have become a social taboo and are too embarrassing to mention directly. Writers skillfully choose appropriate words to refer to and discuss a subject indirectly which otherwise are not published due to strict social censorship e.g. religious fanaticism, political theories, sexuality, death etc. Thus, euphemism is a useful tool that allows writers to write figuratively about the libelous issues.
Periphrasis is a word-combination which is used instead of the word designating an object.
Every periphrasis indicates the feature of a notion which impressed the writer and conveys a purely individual perception of a given phenomenon.
As a result of frequent repetition periphrasis may become well established in the language as a synonymous expression for the word generally used to signify the object. Such word-combinations are called periphrastic synonyms.
In contrast to periphrastic synonyms genuine periphrasis is created in the process of writing and is an element of the individual style of a writer.
Periphrasis may be logical and figurative. Logical periphrases are based on logical notions. Figurative periphrasis may be based on metaphor and on metonymy.
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Euphemistic periphrasis is a variety of periphrasis which substitutes a mild, delicate expression for one which seems to be rude or unpleasant. Euphemistic periphrasis has some features in common with euphemisms.
Periphrasis is used for various stylistic purposes, usually to achieve a humorous or satirical effect.
e.g. He bore under his arm the instruments of destruction.
Hyperbole. Litotes.
Hyperbole is a stylistic device based on the interaction between the logical and emotive meanings of a word. It is a deliberate over statement. Both the writer and the reader (or the speaker and the listener) are fully aware of the deliberateness of the exaggeration. The use of hyperbole shows the overflow of emotions in the speaker, and the listener is carried away by the flood.
Very often the hyperbole is used to create humorous or satirical effect and so to express the author’s attitude towards the described.
Through continuous usage hyperbole may lose its originality and become trite.
A kind of hyperbole with the same inner mechanism of the device is presented by understatement which is, too, based on the interaction between the logical and emotive meaning and shows the overflow of the speaker’s sentiments.
The specific feature of this kind of hyperbole is the direction of the exaggeration: hyperbole enlarges, while understatement deliberately diminishes the described object, phenomenon, etc.
e.g. “The little woman, for she was of pocket size, crossed her hands solemnly on her middle.”
Litotes presents a statement in the form of a negation.
The stylistic device of litotes is used to weaken the positive characteristics of a thing or phenomenon. It is based upon discrepancy between the syntactical form, which is negative and the meaning which is positive. E.g. “She said it, but not impatiently” We have here an assertion of a certain positive fact but its form is negative. The obligatory presence of the particle “not” makes the statement less categorical and conveys certain doubts of the speaker as to the quality he mentions.
The structure of litotes is rather rigid: its first element is always the negative particle “not” and its second element is, too, always negative in meaning, if not in form.
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If the second element of litotes is expressed by an adjective or adverb, it has as a rule a negative affix.
If the form of a noun or a word-combination, presenting the second component of litotes is not negative, its negative meaning is implied.
The final result of litotes is always the assertion of a positive, though weakened quality or characteristics.
e.g. She said it, but not impatiently.
31.Antithesis . Oxymoron .
Oxymoron (Greek oxys + moros - "pointedly foolish") is a stylistic device the syntactic and semantic structures of which come to clashes. It involves a combination of two contrasting ideas within the same syntactical whole, thus ascribing some features to an object incompatible with it.
Antithesis (Greek anti + thesis - "opposition") is a stylistic device involving the use of a parallel construction, the two parts of which must be semantically opposed to each other.
· Oxymoron
As a rule, one of the two members of oxymoron illuminates the feature which is universally observed and acknowledged while the other one offers a purely subjective individual perception of the object. Kukharenko names three structural patterns that are possible (the first three points in the table below), the forth is mentioned in the text-book Stylistics by Galperin:
| The structural pattern | The examples |
| a. attributive structures (the most widely known structure) | "with careful carelessness" (Dickens) |
| b. verbal structures | "to shout mutely" fining Shaw) "to cry silently"(Wilson) |
| c. non-attributive structures | "the street damaged by improvements" (O. Henry) "silence was louder than thunder" (Updike) |
| d. adverbial-attributive structures | "awfully pretty" (Cusack) |
Oxymora rarely become trite, for their components, linked forcibly, repulse each other and oppose repeated use. There are few colloquial oxymora. all of them showing a high degree of the speaker's emotional involvement in the situation, as in "damn nice." "awfully pretty".
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For instance: pay attention to the structure and semantics of the oxymora. Also notice which of their members conveys the individually viewed feature of the object and which one reflects its generally accepted characteristic:
1. If out of my meager vocabulary only the term unenthusiastic excitement comes anywhere near describing the feeling with which all my thoughts were suffused, you must resolve my meaning from that term's dissonance.(Earth)
2. "Heaven must be the hell of a place. Nothing but repentant sinners up there, isn't it?" (Delaney)
3. He opened up a wooden garage. The doors creaked. The garage was full of nothing. (Chandler)
4. He caught a ride home to the crowded loneliness of the barracks. (Jones)
5. Sprinting towards the elevator he felt amazed at his own cowardly courage. (Markey)
· Antithesis
In contrast to oxymoron the two opposed notions of an antithesis can refer to the same object of thought or to different objects. Antithesis is based on the use of antonyms, both usual (registered in dictionaries) and occasional or contextual. It is essential to distinguish between antithesis and what is termed contrast. Contrast is a literary (not linguistic) device, based on logical opposition between the phenomena set one against another.
Discuss the semantic centers and structural peculiarities of the following antitheses:
1. Don't use big words. They mean so little. (Wilde)
2. ... quite frequently, things that are obvious to other people aren't even apparent to me. (Barth)
3. ... drunkenness was an amusing but unquestioned vice: churchgoing a soporific but unquestioned virtue. (Barth)
4. I like big parties. They are so intimate. At small parties there isn't any privacy. (Fitzgerald)
5. Rup wished he could be swift, accurate, compassionate and stem instead of clumsy and vague and sentimental. (Murdoch)
Antonomasia. Personification
A rhetorical term for the substitution of a title, epithet, or descriptive phrase for a proper name (or of a personal name for a common name) to designate a member of a group or class.
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From the Greek, "instead of" plus "name"
Examples and Observations:
Calling a lover Casanova, an office worker Dilbert, Elvis Presley the King, Bill Clinton the Comeback Kid, or Horace Rumpole's wife She Who Must Be Obeyed
"When I eventually met Mr. Right I had no idea that his first name was Always."
"I told you we could count on Mr. Old-Time Rock and Roll!"
"I'm a myth. I'm Beowulf. I'm Grendel."
Antonomasia. This trope is of the same nature as metonymy, although it can not be said to exhibit the idea more vividly. It consists in putting in place of a proper name, another notion which may be either in apposition to it or predicated of it. Its principal use is to avoid the repetition of the same name, and the too frequent use of the pronoun. The most frequent forms of it are, naming a person from his parentage or country; as, Achilles is called Pelides; Napoleon Bonaparte, the Corsican: or naming him from some of his deeds; as, instead of Scipio, the destroyer of Carthage; instead of Wellington, the hero of Waterloo. In making use of this trope such designations should be selected as are well known, or can be easily understood from the connection, and free from ambiguity--that is, are not equally applicable to other well-known persons."
Personification
Personification is a figure of speech in which a thing, an idea or an animal is given human attributes. The non-human objects are portrayed in such a way that we feel they have the ability to act like human beings. For example, when we say, “The sky weeps” we are giving the sky the ability to cry, which is a human quality. Thus, we can say that the sky has been personified in the given sentence.
Common Examples of Personification
Look at my car. She is a beauty, isn’t it so?
The wind whispered through dry grass.
The flowers danced in the gentle breeze.
Time and tide waits for none.
The fire swallowed the entire forest.
We see from the above examples of personification that this literary device helps us relate actions of inanimate objects to our own emotions.
Function of Personification
Personification is not merely a decorative device but it serves the purpose of giving deeper meanings to literary texts. It adds vividness to expressions as we always look at the world from a human perspective. Writers and poets rely on personification to bring inanimate things to life, so that their nature and actions are understood in a better way. Because it is easier for us to relate to something that is human or that possesses human traits. Its use encourages us to develop a perspective that is new as well as creative.
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