Microsoft Word Seminars on stylistics

 Task 2. Indicate the patterns of stylistic inversion: 
1.
Inexpressible was the astonishment of the little party when they returned to 
find that Mr. Pickwick had disappeared. (Dickens) 
2.
Came frightful days of snow and rain. (J. London) 
3.
I can’t bear to see him .Over by St. Paul he stands and there is no money in 
it…(Galsworthy) 
4.
A good generous prayer it was. (M. Twain) 
5.
Eagerly I wished the morrow.(Poe) 
6.
My dearest daughter, at your feet I fall. (Dryden) 
7.
In went Mr. Pickwick.(Dickens) 
8.
Down dropped the breeze… (Coleridge) 
9.
Sure am I from what I have heard and from what I have seen. (Shakespeare) 
10.
Came another tiny moment, while they waited, laughing and talking. 
(Mansfield)
 
 

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Parallel Construction 
True enough, parallel constructions almost always include some type of 
lexical repetition too, and such a convergence produces a very strong effect, 
foregrounding at one go logical, rhythmic, emotive and expressive aspects of the 
utterance. 
Parallelism can be completed when the construction of the second sentence 
fully copies that of the first one: 
 
e.g.:
“The sky was dark and gloomy, the air damp and raw, the streets wet 
and sloppy.” (Dickens) 
e.g.:
Nothing to see but sights, 
Nothing to quench but thirst, 
Nothing to have but what we have got. 
Thus through life we are cursed. (B. King) 
Stylistic functions of 
Parallel construction
 
 
Semantic: either equal semantic 
significance or opposition of the 
repeated parts 
Structural: a rhythmical design to the 
parts of the parallel construction 
Constructions formed by the same 
syntactical pattern, closely following one 
another present the stylistic device of 
parallelism