W.s. l.p. hatley/ analysis essay

The fragment of emotive prose, which has been chosen for stylistic analysis is one of the numerous stories, belonged to a prominent English novelist – L.

P. Hartley “ W. S. ” The author was a highly skilled narrator and all his tales are admirably told. “ W. S.

” comes from “ The Complete Short Stories of L. P. Hartley.

” A close study of the story for the purpose of examining its style involves a careful observation and a detailed description of the language phenomena at various levels. The text of the fragment is complete in itself and it is interesting from the point of view of its idea. The excerpt is not homogeneous: the narration is interrupted by the elements of description; inner thoughts and feelings of the main character are imperceptibly interwoven with the narration. The type of the narration is author’s narrative.

Also we can observe non-personal direct speech. The type of character drawing is direct because while reading this very excerpt we get information about the character and it may be said that the author tries to thrust his opinion on the readers. The very structure of the story adds to the effect of implication but the actual meaning of what is going on is not clear at the beginning of the story as he feelings suggested by the writer are not precisely determined. The reader however feels that something had happened and the character is strained and full of hidden apprehension and suppressed emotions. What strikes one’s eye at the first glance is that the tension of the atmosphere in this excerpt is gradually increasing and gets its top at the end of it. The text can be logically divided into only one part: the story itself. According to this kind of division the fragment has opened plot structure. We can also divide the text into the following supra-phrasal unities: 1.

The postcards 2. Anonymous correspondent 3. Wondering 4. Difficulties 5. The woman 6. Piece of him 7. Panic 8. Police The most of the supra-phrasal unities coincide with the paragraphs and the most of the key sentences are at the top of the sentences and that’s all the paragraphs are structured according to the deductive type of paragraph.

It should be noted that the paragraphs are knit together asyndetically. Let’s now try to find out lexical-thematic chains and the number of its components. SPU LTC Number of components Totally The postcards It I You 205060 130 Anonymous correspondent Walter Streeter Strangers 165 21 Wondering Sender 8 8 Difficulties The last two chapters Barrier 210 12 The woman She 12 12 Piece of him Something 11 11 Panic Significant fact Alienist 34 7 Police They 8 8 The lexical thematic net work method allows a quantitative criterion to be used for appreciating the importance of themes. It can be seen from the scheme that the theme 1 has the most number of components for it is represented by different sub themes and is spread throughout the textual field. Theme 2 provides cohesion between different parts of the text.

Lexical thematic chains are knit together by means of pronominal substitution, lexical repetition, and change of the grammatical form and function of the word. For example let’s take the supra-phrasal unity 5. It is represented only by one lexical thematic chain – She, nevertheless it worth examining.

Here we can observe pronominal substitution: a woman – she – her; lexical repetition: she – she; occasional synonym: A woman – a little mouse-like creature. The sentences are not long. There are many interrogative sentences and that shows hesitation and anxiety of the character. While analyzing this fragment we can observe some stylistic devices, such as antonomasia – “ Walter Streeter”; zeugma – “ took up the time and energy”; metonymy – “ faint strings of curiosity”; personification – “ growing pains”; periphrasis – “ conscious mind“, “ little mouse-like creature”, “ poison pens”, many examples of inversion. As we see the language of the writer is very rich and full of various kinds of stylistic devices and that makes his story more vivid and picturesque.

Summing up the analysis it can be said that the text seems like a detective story with a victim – the writer Walter Streeter.