Lecture #1 General notes on style and stylistics: Style and stylistics. Stylistics and its tasks

2. INTERACTION OF DIFFERENT TYPES OF LEXICAL MEANING
Words in a context, as has been pointed out, may acquire addition­al lexical meanings not fixed in dictionaries, what we have called contextual meanings. The latter may sometimes deviate from the dictionary meaning to such a degree that the new meaning , even becomes the opposite of the primary meaning, as, for example, with the word sophisticated. (See p. 116) This is especially the case when we deal with transferred meanings.
What is known in linguistics as transferred meaning is practically the interrelation between two types of lexical meaning: dictionary and contextual. The contextual meaning, as has been point-ed out, will always depend on the dictionary (logical) meaning to a greater or lesser extent. When the deviation from the acknowledged meaning is carried to a degree that it causes an unexpected turn in the recognized logical meanings, we register a stylistic device.
The transferred meaning of a word may be fixed in dictionaries as a result of long and frequent use of the word other than in its primary meaning. In this case we register a derivative meaning of the word. The term transferred is meant to point to the process of the formation of the derivative meaning. Hence the term trans­ferred should be used, to our mind, as a lexicographical term signifying diachronically the development of the semantic structure of the word. In this case we do not perceive two meanings.
When, however, we perceive two meanings of the word simul­taneously, we are confronted with a stylistic device in which the two meanings interact.
INTERACTION OF DICTIONARY AND CONTEXTUAL LOGICAL MEANINGS
The relation between the dictionary and contextual logical mean­ings may be maintained along different lines: on the principle of affinity, on that of proximity, or symbol — referent relations, or on opposition. Thus the stylistic device based on the first principle is metaphor, on the second, metonymy and on the third, irony.
a)Metaphor
A metaphor is a relation between the dictionary and context­ual logical meanings based on the affinity or similarity of certain prop­erties or features of the two corresponding concepts.
The more obvious the similarity, the less need there is for deciph­ering words in the context. Thus in
"Dear Nature is the kindest Mother still." (Byron, "Childe Harold") no explanatory words are used. Nature is likened to a Mother in her attitude to man. The action of nursing is implied but not directly stated.
In the following example, however, an explanation is given:
"The indicators became enemies if they lagged behind his wish:
dear and reliable friends when they showed what he wanted."
(Mitchel Wilson, "Live with Lightning")
The explanatory words 'if they...', 'when they...' help the reader to decipher the true meaning of the metaphor.
Metaphor can be embodied in all the meaningful parts of speech, in nouns, adjectives, verbs, adverbs and sometimes even in the auxilia­ry parts of speech, as in prepositions.
In "The human tide is rolling westward." (Dickens, "Dombey and Son"), the metaphor is embodied in the adjective.
"In the slanting beams that streamed through the open win­dow, the dust danced and was golden." (O. Wilde, "The Picture
of Dorian Gray") Here the metaphors lie in the verbs. "The leaves fell sorrowfully.'' Here it is the adverb that is a metaphor.
The metaphor is a well-known semantic way of building new mean­ings and new words. "It is due to the metaphor" according to the remark of Quintilian, "that each thing seems to have its name in lan­guage." Even language has been figuratively defined as a dictionary of faded metaphors.
"Try to be precise," writes J. Middleton Murry, "and you are bound to be metaphorical; you simply cannot help establi­shing affinities between all the provinces of the animate and inanimate world."
Metaphors, like all stylistic devices can be classified according to their degree of unexpectedness. Thus metaphors which are absolutely unexpected, i. е., are quite unpredictable, are called genuine metaphors. Those which are commonly used in speech and therefore are sometimes even fixed in dictionaries as expressive means of lan­guage are trite metaphors, ox dead metaphors. Their predictabili­ty therefore is apparent. Genuine metaphors are regarded as belonging to language-in-action, i. е., speech metaphors; trite metaphors belong to the language-as-a-system, i. e. language proper, and are usually fixed in dictionaries as units of the language.
V. V. Vinogradov states:
"...a metaphor, if it is not a cliché, is an act of establishing an individual world outlook, it is an act of subjective isola­tion... Therefore a word metaphor is narrow, subjectively en­closed, ...it imposes on the reader a subjective view of the object or phenomenon and its semantic ties."
The examples given above may serve as illustrations of genuine metaphors. Here are some examples of metaphors that are considered trite. They are time-worn and well rubbed into the language: a ray of hope, floods of tears, a storm of indignation, a flight of fancy, a gleam of mirth, a shadow of a smile and the like.
The interaction of the logical dictionary meaning and the logical contextual meaning assumes different forms. Sometimes this interac­tion is perceived as a deliberate interplay of the two meanings. In this case each of the meanings preserves its relative independence. Some­times, however, the metaphoric use of a word begins to affect the source meaning, i. e. the meaning from which the metaphor is derived, with the result that the target meaning, that is the metaphor itself, takes the upper hand and may even oust the source meaning. In this case we speak of dead metaphors.
Thus in such words as to grasp (= 'to understand'), to get (== 'to understand'), to see (='to understand'), the meaning in brackets has become a derivative logical meaning and is fixed by all existing dic­tionaries as such. The metaphorical origin of these meanings can hardly be perceived. There is no interplay of the two meanings. Consequently, there is no stylistic device, no metaphor.
In such words as to melt {away) as in "these misgivings gradually melted away," we can still recognize remnants of the original meaning and in spite of the fact that the meaning to vanish, to disappear is ;
already fixed in dictionaries as one of the derivative meanings, the pri­mary meaning still malTrite metaphors are sometimes injected with new vigour, i. e. their primary meaning is re-established alongside the new (derivative) mean­ing. This is done by supplying the central image created by the meta­phor w^ith additional words bearing some reference to the main word. For example: "Mr. Pickwick bottled up his vengeance and corked it down." The verb to bottle up is explained in dictionaries as follovi's: "to keep in check" ("Penguin Dictionary"); "to conceal, to restrain, repress" ("Cassell's New English Dictionary"). So the metaphor in the word can hardly be felt. But it is revived by the direct meaning of the verb to corii down. This context refreshes the almost dead metaphor and gives it a second life. Such metaphors are called sustained or prolonged. Here is another example of a sustained metaphor:
"Mr. Dombey's cup of satisfaction was so full at this moment, however, that he felt he could afford a drop or two of its contents, even to sprinkle on the dust in the by-path of his little daugh­ter." (Dickens, "Dombey and Son")
We may call the principal metaphor the central image of the sus­tained metaphor and the other words which bear reference to the cent­ral image — contributory images. Thus in the example given the word cup (of satisfaction) being a trite metaphor is revived by the following contributory images; full, drop, contents, sprinkle. It is interesting to note that both the central image {the cup) and the contributory words are used in two senses simultaneously: direct and indirect. The second plane of utterance is maintained by the key word — satisfaction. It is this word that helps us to decipher the idea behind the sustained metaphor.
Sometimes however the central image is not given, but the string of words all bearing upon some implied central point of reference are so associated with each other that the reader is bound to create the re­quired image in his mind. Let us take the following sentence from Shakespeare:
"I have no spur to prick the sides of my intent." The words spur, to prick, the sides in their interrelation will inevitably create the image of a steed.
The same is to be seen in the following lines from Shelley's "Cloud":
"In a cavern under is fettered the thunder. It struggles and howls at fits."
Here the central image — that of a captive beast — is suggested by the contributory images — fettered, struggles and howls.
The metaphor is often defined as a compressed simile. But this de­finition lacks precision. Moreover it is misleading, inasmuch as the meta­phor aims at identifying the objects, while the simile aims at find­ing some point of resemblance by keeping the objects apart. That is why these two stylistic devices are viewed as belonging to two dif­ferent groups of SDs. They are different in their linguistic nature.
True, the degree of identification of objects or phenomena in a meta­phor varies according to its syntactic function in the sentence and to the part of speech in which it is embodied. Thus when the metaphor is expressed in a noun-predicative, the degree of identification is very low. This is due to the character of the predicative relation in general. The metaphor in this case can be likened to an epithet.
Indeed, in the sentence 'Expression is the dress of thought' we can hardly see any process of identification between the concepts expres­sion and dress; whereas in the lines
"Yet Time, who changes all, had altered him In soul and aspect as in age: years steal