WHAT IS STYLISTICS

WHA

T IS

STY

LISTI

CS?

INTRODUCTION

Some

years

ago,

the

well- known

linguist

Jean-Jacques

Lecercle

published

a

short

but

damning

critique

of

the

aims,

methods

and

rationale

of

contemporary

stylistics.

His

attack on the discipline, and by implication the entire endeavour of the present book, was

uncompromising.

According to Lecercle, nobody has ever really

known what the term

'stylistics'

means,

and

in

any

case,

hardly

anyone

seems

to

care

(Lecercle

1993:

14).

Stylistics is 'ailing'; it is 'on the wane'; and its heyday, alongside that of structuralism, has

faded to but a distant memory. More alarming again, few university students are 'eager to

declare

an

intention

to

do

research

in

stylistics'.

By

this

account,

the

death

knell

of

stylistics

had

been

sounded

and

it

looked

as

though

the

end

of

the

twentieth

century

would be accompanied by the inevitable passing of that faltering, moribund discipline.

And no one, it seemed, would lament its demise.

Modern stylistics

As it happened, things didn't quite turn out in the way Lecercle envisaged.

Stylistics in

the early twenty-first century is very much alive and well. It is taught and researched in

university departments of language,

literature and linguistics the world over.

The high

academic profile stylistics enjoys is mirrored in the number of its dedicated book-length

publications,

research

journals,

international

conferences

and

symposia,

and

scholarly

associations. Far from moribund, modern stylistics is positively flourishing, witnessed in

a

proliferation

of

sub-disciplines

where

stylistic

methods

are

enriched

and

enabled

by

theories

of

discourse,

culture

and

society.

For

example,

feminist

stylistics,

cognitive

stylistics

and

discourse

stylistics,to

name

just

three,

are

established

branches

of

contemporary

stylistics

which

have

been

sustained

by

insights

from,

respectively,

feminist theory, cognitive psychology and discourse analysis. Stylistics has also become

a much valued method in language teaching and in language learning, and stylistics in

this 'pedagogical' guise, with its close attention to the broad resources of the system of

language, enjoys particular pride of place in the linguistic armoury of learners of second

languages. Moreover, stylistics often forms a core component of many creative writing

courses, an application not surprising given the discipline's emphasis on techniques of

creativity and invention in language.

So

much

then

for

the

current

'health'

of

stylistics

and

the

prominence

it

enjoys

in

modern scholarship. It is now time to say a little more about what exactly stylistics is and

what it is for. Stylistics is a method of textual interpretation in which primacy of place is

assigned to

language.

The reason why language is so important to stylisticians is because

the various forms, patterns and levels that constitute linguistic structure are an important

index of the function of the text. The text's functional significance as discourse acts in

turn

as

a

gateway

to

its

interpretation.

While

linguistic

features

do

not

of

themselves

constitute

a

text's

'meaning',

an

account

of

linguistic

features

nonetheless

serves

to

ground a stylistic interpretation and to help explain why, for the analyst, certain types of

meaning are preferred object of study in stylistics is literature, whether that

be institutionally sanctioned 'Literature' as high art or more popular 'noncanonical' forms

of writing. The traditional connection between stylistics and literature brings with it two

important caveats, though.

WHAT IS STYLISTICS?

3

The

first

is

that

creativity

and

innovation

in

language

use

should

not

be

seen

as

the

exclusive preserve of literary writing. Many forms of discourse (advertising, journalism,

popular

music

-

even

casual

conversation)

often

display

a

high

degree

of

stylistic

dexterity, such that it would be wrong to view dexterity in language use as exclusive to

canonical literature. The second caveat is that the techniques of stylistic analysis are as

much

about

deriving

insights

about

linguistic

structure

and

function

as

they

are

about

understanding

literary

texts.

Thus,

the

question

'What

can

stylistics

tell

us

about

literature?' is always paralleled by an equally important question 'What can stylistics tell

us about language?'.

In

spite

of

its

clearly

defined

remit,

methods

and

object

of

study,

there

remain

a

number of myths about

contemporary stylistics. Most of the time, confusion about the

compass of stylistics is a result of confusion about the compass of language. For instance,

there appears to be a belief in many literary critical circles that a stylistician is simply a

dull

old

grammarian

who

spends

rather

too

much

time

on

such

trivial

pursuits

as

counting the nouns and verbs in literary texts. Once counted, those nouns and verbs form

the basis of the stylistician's 'insight', although this stylistic insight ultimately proves no

more far- reaching than an insight reached by simply intuiting from the text. This is an

erroneous

perception

of

the

stylistic

method

and

it

is

one

which

stems

from

a

limited

understanding

of

how

language

analysis

works.

True,

nouns

and

verbs

should

not

be

overlooked, nor indeed should 'counting' when it takes the form of directed and focussed

quantification. But the purview of modern language and linguistics is much broader than

that

and,

in

response,

the

methods

of

stylistics

follow

suit.

It

is

the

full

gamut

of

the

system of language that makes all aspects of a writer's craft relevant in stylistic analysis.

Moreover,

stylistics

is

interested

in

language

as

a

function

of

texts

in

context,

and

it

acknowledges that utterances (literary or otherwise) are produced in a time, a place, and

in

a

cultural

and

cognitive

context.

These

'extra-linguistic'

parameters

are

inextricably

tied

up

with

the

way

a

text

'means'.

The

more

complete

and

context-sensitive

the

description of language, then the fuller the stylistic analysis that accrues.

The purpose of stylistics

Why should we do stylistics? To do stylistics is to explore language, and, more specif-

ically, to explore creativity in language use. Doing stylistics thereby enriches our ways

of

thinking

about

language

and,

as

observed,

exploring

language

offers

a

substantial

purchase on our understanding of (literary) texts. With the full array of language models

at our disposal, an inherently illuminating method of analytic inquiry presents itself. This

method of inquiry has an important reflexive capacity insofar as it can shed light on the

very language system it derives from; it tells us about the 'rules' of language because it

often explores texts where those rules are bent, distended or stretched to breaking point.

Interest in language is always at the fore in contemporary stylistic analysis which is why

you should never undertake to do stylistics unless you are interested in language.

Synthesising more formally some of the observations made above, it might be worth

thinking of the practice of stylistics as conforming to the following three basic principles,

cast mnemonically as three 'Rs'. The three Rs stipulate that:

4

INTRODUCTION

?

?

?

stylistic analysis should be rigorous

stylistic analysis should be retrievable

stylistic analysis should be replicable.

To argue that the stylistic method be

rigorous

means that it should be based on an explicit

framework

of

analysis.

Stylistic

analysis

is

not

the

end-product

of

a

disorganised

sequence

of

ad

hoc

and

impressionistic

comments,

but

is

instead

underpinned

by

structured models of language and discourse that explain how we process and understand

various patterns in language. To argue that stylistic method be

retrievable

means that the

analysis

is

organised

through

explicit

terms

and

criteria,

the

meanings

of

which

are

agreed upon by other students of stylistics. Although precise definitions for some aspects

of language have proved difficult to pin down exactly, there is a consensus of agreement

about what most terms in stylistics mean (see A2 below). That consensus enables other

stylisticians to follow the pathway adopted in an analysis, to test the categories used and

to see how the analysis reached its conclusion; to retrieve, in other words, the stylistic

method.

To say that a stylistic analysis seeks to be

replicable

does not mean that we should all

try to copy each others' work.

It simply means that the methods should be sufficiently

transparent

as

to

allow other

stylisticians

to

verify

them,

either

by

testing

them

on

the

same text or by applying them beyond that text. The conclusions reached are principled if

the pathway followed by the analysis is accessible and replicable. To this extent, it has

become

an

important

axiom

of

stylistics

that

it

seeks

to

distance

itself

from

work

that

proceeds

solely

from untested or un testable intuition.

A seemingly innocuous piece of anecdotal evidence might help underscore this point.

I once attended an academic conference where a well- known literary critic referred to the

style

of

Irish

writer

George

Moore

as

'invertebrate'.

Judging

by

the

delegates'

nods

of

approval

around

the

conference

hall,

the

critic's

'insight'

had

met

with

general

endorsement.

However,

novel

though

this

metaphorical

interpretation

of

Moore's

style

may

be,

it

offers

the

student

of

style

no

retrievable

or

shared

point

of

reference

in

language, no

metalanguage,

with which to evaluate what the critic is trying to say. One can

only speculate as to what aspect of Moore's style is at issue, because the stimulus for the

observation is neither retrievable nor replicable. It is as if the act of criticism itself has

become

an

exercise

in

style,

vying

with

the

stylistic

creativity

of

the

primary

text

discussed.

Whatever

its

principal

motivation,

that

critic's

'stylistic

insight'

is

quite

meaningless as a description of style.

Unit A2, below, begins both to sketch some of the broad levels of linguistic organ-

isation that inform stylistics and to arrange and sort the interlocking domains of language

study that playa part in stylistic analysis. Along the thread, unit Bl explores further the

history and development of stylistics, and examines some of the issues arising. What this

opening unit has sought to demonstrate is that, over a decade after Lecercle's broadside,

stylistics as an academic discipline continues to flourish. In that broadside, Lecercle also

contends that the term

stylistics

has 'modestly retreated from the titles of books' (1993: 14).

Lest they should feel afflicted by some temporary loss of their faculties, readers might

just like to check the accuracy of this claim against the title on the cover of

the present

textbook!

STYLISTICS AND LEVELS OF LANGUAGE

5

STVLlSTICS AND LEVELS OF LANGUAGE

In view of the comments made in Al on the methodological significance of the three Rs,

it

is

worth

establishing

here

some

of

the

more

basic

categories,

levels

and

units

of

analysis in language that can help organise and shape a stylistic ge in its

broadest

conceptualisation

is

not

a

disorganised

mass

of

sounds

and

symbols,

but

is

instead an intricate web of levels, layers and links. Thus, any utterance or piece of text is

organised through several distinct

levels of language.

Levels of language

To start us off, here is a list of the major levels of language and their related

technical

terms in language study, along with a brief description of what each level covers:

level of language

Branch of language study

phonology; phonetics

graphology

morphology

The

sound

of spoken language;

the way words are pronounced.

The patterns of

written

language;

the shape of language on the page.

The way words are constructed; words

and their constituent structures.

The way words combine with other words

to form phrases and sentences.

The words we use; the vocabulary

of a language.

The

meaning

of words and sentences.

The way words and sentences are used

in everyday situations; the meaning of

pragmatics; discourse analysis

lexical analysis; lexicology

semantics

syntax; grammar

language in context.

These basic levels of language can be identified and teased out in the stylistic analysis of

text,

which

in

turn

makes

the

analysis

itself

more

organised

and

principled,

more

in

keeping

so

to

speak

with

the

principle

of

the

three

Rs.

However,

what

is

absolutely

central

to

our

understanding

of

language

(and

style)

is

that

these

levels

are

inter-

connected: they interpenetrate and depend upon one another, and they represent multiple

and

simultaneous

linguistic

operations

in

the

planning

and

production

of

an

utterance.

Consider in this respect an unassuming (hypothetical) sentence like the following:

(1)

That puppy's knocking over those potplants!

In

spite

of

its

seeming

simplicity

of

structure,

this

thoroughly

innocuous

sentence

requires

for

its

production

and

delivery

the

assembly

of

a

complex

array

of

linguistic

components. First, there is the palpable physical substance of the utterance which, when

written, comprises

graphetic substance

or, when spoken,

phonetic substance.

This