Stylistic semasiology

Unfinished sentences (aposiopesis). Aposiopesis (which means «silence») refers to cases when the speaker stops short in the very beginning or in the middle of the utterance, thus confining his mode of expression to a mere allusion, a mere hint at what remains unsaid. Care should be taken not to confuse the aposiopesis with cases when speaker is overwhelmed with emotion. Aposiopesis is a deliberate abstention from bringing the utterance up to the end:
«She had her lunches in the department-store restaurant at a cost of sixty cents for the week; dinners were one dollar five cents. The evening papers... came to six cents; and Sumnday papers... were ten cents. The total amounts to 4 dollars 76 cents. Now, one had to buy clothes, and-» (O'Henry).
It is a stopping short for rhetorical effect. In the spoken variety of the language it is caused by unwillingness to proceed or by the supposition that what remains to be said is understood by the implication, or by the speaker's uncertainty as to what exactly he is to promise (to threaten, to beg):
e.g. You just come home, I'll...
In writing aposiopesis conveys to the reader a very strong upsurge of emo­tions: the speaker cannot proceed, his feelings depriving him of the ability to express himself in terms of language:
e.g. "And it was unlikely that anyone would trouble to look there-until-until-well" (Th. Dreiser)
A sudden break in the narrative will inevitably focus the attention on what is left unsaid. It is caused by euphemistic consideration — unwillingness to name a thing as too offensive or fearful.


Question-In-The-Narrattve
Usually questions are asked by one person and expected to be answered by another. Question-in-the-narrative changes the real nature of question and turns it into a SD. It is asked and answered by the same person, usually the author. It assumes a semiexclamatory nature:
e.g. "Scrooge knew he was dead? Of course he did" (G. Dickens).
Question-in-the-narrative may also remain unanswered thus showing a gradual transition to rhetorical questions:
e.g. How long must it go on? Where is the end? There are only hints at possible answers.