Syntactical expressive means and stylistic                   devices: compositional patterns of syntactical arrangement

Essential Terms:

repetition is based upon a repeated occurrence of one and the same word-group. And a great desire for peace, peace of no matter what kind, swept through her. (A.B.) Depending upon the position a repeated unit occupies in the utterance there are several types of repetition:

anaphora – the beginning of some successive sentences, syntagms, lines, etc. (with the same sounds, morphemes, words or word-combinations) is repeated – a…, a…, a…. The main stylistic function of anaphora is not so much to emphasize the repeated unit as to create the background for the nonre-
peated unit, which, through its novelty, becomes foregrounded.

epiphora – repetition of the final word or word-group especially in poetry when some stanzas end with the same line – …a, …a, …a. The main function of epiphora is to add stress to the final words of the sentence.

anadiplosis (catch repetition) -- a figure which consists in the repetition of the same word at the end of one and at the beginning of the following sense-groups (or lines). Thus the two or more parts are linked …a, a…. Specification of the semantics occurs here too, but on a more modest level.

 

CHAIN REPETITION – a string of several successive anadiplosis: …a, a…b, b…c, c…. It smoothly develops logical reasoning.

framing -   the beginning of the sentence is repeated in the end, thus forming the "frame" for the non-repeated part of the sentence (utterance) – a… a. The function of framing is to elucidate the notion mentioned in the beginning of the sentence. Between two appearances of the repeated unit there comes the developing middle part of the sentence which explains and clarifies what was introduced in the beginning, so that by the time it is used for the second time its semantics is concretized and specified.

 

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

Ordinary repetition emphasizes both the logical and the
emotional meanings of the reiterated word (phrase). In this type of repetition the repeated element has no definite place in the sentence or utterance.

prolepsis (syntactic tautology) – a figure of syntactic anticipation, the use of words not applicable till a later time. In prolepsis the noun subject is repeated in the form of a corresponding personal pronoun. “ Miss Tilly Webster, she slept forty days and nights without waking up. (O. H.)

SUSPENsE (retardation) is a deliberate delay in the completion of the expressed thought. What has been delayed is the main task of the utterance, and the reader awaits the completion of the utterance with an everincreasing tension. A suspence is achieved by a repeated occurrence of phrases or clauses expressing condition, supposition, time and the like, all of which hold back the conclusion of the utterance: “ Mankind, says a Chinese manuscript, which my friend was obliging enough to read and explain to me, for the firsteventy thousand ages ate their meatraw. ” (Ch. L)

 

CLIMAX (gradation) is a figure based upon such an arrangement of parts of an utterance which secures a gradual increase in semantic significance or emotional tension: I don’t attach any value to money, I don’t care about it, I don’t know about it, I don’t want it, I don’t keep it, it goes away from me directly.

The increase in significance may be: logical, emotional or quantitative.

Logical – the relative importance of the components is looked from the point of view of the concepts embodied in them. Every successive word or word-combination in logical climax is semantically more important than the previous one.

Emotive climax is based on the relative emotive meaning. It is mainly found in one sentence as emotive charge cannot hold long. It is usually based on repetition of the semantic centre, usually expressed by an adjective or adverb and the introduction of an intensifier between the repeated items.

Quantitative is an evident increase in the volume of the corresponding concepts: numerical increase, concepts of measure and time.

 

ANTICLIMAX is the reverse of climax. It is the descent from the sublime to the ridiculous. In this figure of speech emotive or logical importance accumulates only to be unexpectedly broken and brought down. The sudden reversal usually brings forth a humorous or ironic effect. Many paradoxes are based on anticlimax:

America is the Paradise for women. That is why, like Eve, they are so extremely anxious to get out of it!

antithesis (a variant of Syntactic Parallelism) - a figure of speech based on parallel constructions with contrasted words (usually antonyms):

1) Yet each man kills the thing he loves,

By each let this be heard,

Some do it with a bitter look,

Some with a flattering word,

The coward does it with a kiss,

The brave man with a sword!

(O.Wilde)

2) God made the country, and man made the town (Cowper).

nonsense of non-sequence rests on the extension of syntactical valency and results in joining two semantically disconnected clauses into one sentence, as in: " Emperor Nero played the fiddle, so they burnt Rome." (E.) Two disconnected statements are forcibly linked together by cause / effect relations.

I. Speak on the following:                                                                                        Compositional pattern of syntactical arrangement:

5) repetition;

6) prolepsis (syntactic tautology);

7) suspense;

8) climax / anticlimax;

9) antithesis;

10)  nonsense of non-sequence.