Theory of Translation 1 Introduction

2.13.4.5 Stylistic Approaches 
(I) Simpson’s Approach to Style 
In the contemporary period, stylistics has moved a step further. Modern linguists are 
establishing structured models of language which can be used in stylistic analysis. 
These models explain how the various patterns of language could be assessed and 
understood. Simpson (p. 5) enlists various levels of language and their technical terms 
in his study of language. Different linguistic features are based on the various 
branches of the study of language. 

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Level of language Branch of Language study
The sounds of spoken language;
the way words are pronounced
Phonology/ Phonetics 
The patterns of written language; 
the shape of language on the page
Graphology 
The way words are constructed; 
words and their constituent structure
Morphology 
The way words combine with other 
words to form phrases and sentences
Syntax, Grammar
The words we use; the vocabulary of a language Lexicology 
The meaning of words and sentences Semantics 
The way words and sentences are used in everyday
situations; the meaning of language in context
Pragmatics 
Discourse Analysis 
While explaining these levels, Simpson asserts that they depend on one another. He 
says, “In producing the utterance, they represent multiple and simultaneous linguistic 
operations” (p. 5). So, style is something aggregate of the various functions at 
different levels. There are various issues that concerns stylistic studies. They range 
from patterns of sounds to the structure of sentences. The selection of words, 
figurative language, rhythmic patterns, cohesion, narrative structures, levels of 
formality and so on. Many other such issues are significant for the making of style, as 
a strange linguistic pattern, a ‘foregrounding’ device can be used to create a particular 
style. 
Writings of great authors represent their individual styles. An experienced reader can 
identify the writer of the particular text, e.g., Shakespeare, Milton, Hemingway, etc. 
Scholars get to know this objectively by counting frequencies of particular linguistic 
features in limited contexts. Remy de Gourmont opines that a writer has a ‘style’ 
means that “in the midst of the language shared with others one speaks a particular, 
unique and inimitable dialect, which is at the same time everybody’s language and the 
language of a single individual” (qtd. in Enkvist et al, 26). 

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Gourmont observes an individual style to be the use of ‘unique and inimitable 
dialect’. But to identify ‘the individual style’, the unique features have to be separated 
from all the features present in the text. For this, an investigator must carry out a task 
of a setting up a corpus of reference to find the norms from which a given text differs, 
i.e. the already referred definition of style as ‘deviation from the norm’. There are 
various features that define norms like metre, time, place, language, literary writer or 
his school, genre, and so on. All such norms seem to be roughly circumscribed by 
context.