Lexical Stylistic Devices

Oxymoron is a stylistic device the syntactic and semantic structures of which come to clashes. In Shakespearian definitions of love, much quoted from his Romeo and Juliet, perfectly correct syntactically, attributive combinations present a strong semantic discrepancy between their members. Cf.: "O brawling love! О loving hate! О heavy lightness! Serious vanity! Feather of lead, bright smoke, cold fire, sick health!"

As is clearly seen from this string of oxymorons, each one of them is a combination of two semantically contradictory notions, that help to emphasize contradictory qualities simultaneously existing in the described phenomenon as a dialectical unity. 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. Thus in an oxymoron we also deal with the foregrounding of emotive meaning, only of a different type than the one observed in previously discussed SDs. The most widely known structure of oxymoron is attributive, so it is easy to believe that the subjective part of the oxymoron is embodied in the attribute-epithet, especially because the latter also proceeds from the foregrounding of the emotive meaning. But there are also others, in which verbs are employed. Such verbal structures as "to shout mutely" (I.Sh.) or "to cry silently" (M.W.) seem to strengthen the idea, which leads to the conclusion that oxymoron is a specific type of epithet. But the peculiarity of an oxymoron lies in the fact that the speaker's (writer's) subjective view can be expressed through either of the members of the word combination.

Originality and specificity of oxymoron becomes especially evident in non-attributive structures which also, not infrequently, are used to express semantic contradiction, as in "the stree' damaged by improvements" (O. H.) or "silence was louder than thunder" (U.).

Oxymorons rarely become trite, for their components, linked forcibly, repulse each other and oppose repeated use. There are few colloquial oxymorons, all of them showing a high degree of the speaker's emotional involvement in the situation, as in "damn nice", "awfully pretty".

Exercise VIII. In the following sentences pay attention to the structure and semantics of oxymorons. Also indicate which of their members conveys the individually viewed feature of the object and which one reflects its generally accepted characteristic:

1. He caught a ride home to the crowded loneliness of the barracks. (J.)

2. Sprinting towards the elevator he felt amazed at his own cowardly courage. (G. M.)

3. They were a bloody miserable lot - the miserablest lot of men I ever saw. But they were good to me. Bloody good. (J. St.)

4. He behaved pretty busily to Jan. (D. C.)

5. Well might he perceive the hanging of her hair in fairest quantity in locks, some curled and some as if it were forgotten, with such a careless care and an art so hiding art that it seemed she would lay them for a pattern. (Ph. S.)

6. There were some bookcases of superbly unreadable books. (E.W.)

7. Absorbed as we were in the pleasures of travel - and I in my modest pride at being the only examinee to cause a commotion - we were over the old Bridge. (W.G.)

8. "Heaven must be the hell of a place. Nothing but repentant sinners up there, isn't it?" (Sh. D.)

9. Harriet turned back across the dim garden. The lightless light looked down from the night sky. (I.M.)

10. Sara was a menace and a tonic, my best enemy; Rozzie was a disease, my worst friend. (J. Car.)

11. It was an open secret that Ray had been ripping his father-in-law off. (D.U.)

12. A neon sign reads "Welcome to Reno - the biggest little town in the world." (A. M.)

13. Huck Finn and Holden Caulfield are Good Bad Boys of American literature. (V.)

14. Haven't we here the young middle-aged woman who cannot quite compete with the paid models in the fashion magazine but who yet catches our eye? (Jn. H.)

15. Their bitter-sweet union did not last long. (A. C.)

16. He was sure the whites could detect his adoring hatred of them. (Wr.)

17. You have got two beautiful bad examples for parents. (Sc.F.)

18. He opened up a wooden garage. The doors creaked. The garage was full of nothing. (R.Ch.)

19. She was a damned nice woman, too. (H.)

20. A very likeable young man with a pleasantly ugly face. (A. C.)