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2.3.5. The Belles-lettres Style

Belles-lettres style, or the style of imaginative literature, may be called the richest register of communication: besides its own language means which are not used in any other sphere of communication, belles-lettres style makes ample use of other styles too, for in numerous works of literary art we find elements of scientific, official and other functional types of speech. We may call this style eclectic. Besides informative and persuasive functions, also found in other functional styles, the belles-lettres style has a unique task to impress the reader aesthetically.

So the main function of belles-lettres style is cognitive-aesthetic.

The Sub-styles of Belles-lettres Functional Style

1.Poetry

2.Emotive Prose

3.The Drama

Each of these sub-styles has certain common features, typical of the general belles-lettres style.

The belles-lettres style rests on certain indispensable linguistic features, which are:

1 . Genuine, not trite, imagery achieved by purely linguistic devices.

2.The use of words in contextual and very often in more than one dictionary meaning, or at least greatly influenced by the lexical environment.

3.A vocabulary which will reflect to a greater or lesser degree the author's personal evaluation of things or phenomena.

4.A peculiar individual selection of vocabulary and syntax, a kind of lexical and syntactical idiosyncrasy.

5.The introduction of the typical features of colloquial language.

Poetry

The first differentiating property of poetry is its orderly form, which is based mainly on the rhythmic and phonetic arrangement of the utterances. The rhythmic aspect calls forth syntactical and semantic peculiarities which also fall into more or less strict orderly arrangement. Both the syntactical and semantic aspects of the poetic sub style may be defined as compact, for they are held in check by rhythmic patterns. Both syntax and semantics comply with the restrictions imposed by the rhythmic pattern, and the result is brevity of expression, epigram-like utterances, and fresh, unexpected imagery. Syntactically this brevity is shown in elliptical and fragmentary sentences, in detached constructions, in inversion, asyndeton and other syntactical peculiarities.

Rhythm and rhyme are distinguishable properties of the poetic sub-style

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provided they are wrought into compositional patterns. They are typical only of this one variety of the belles-lettres style.

Emotive Prose

Emotive prose has the same features as have been pointed out for the belles-lettres style in general; but all these features are correlated differently in emotive prose. The imagery is not so rich as it is in poetry, the percentage of words with contextual meaning is not so high as in poetry, the idiosyncrasy of the author is not so clearly discernible. Apart from metre and rhyme, what most of all distinguishes emotive prose from the poetic style is the combination of the literary variant of the language, both in words and syntax, with the colloquial variant. It would perhaps be more exact to define this as a combination of the spoken and written varieties of the language.

Present-day emotive prose is to a large extent characterized by the breaking-up of traditional syntactical designs of the preceding periods. Not only detached constructions, but also fragmentations of syntactical models, peculiar, unexpected ways of combining sentences are freely introduced into present-day emotive prose.

The Drama

The third subdivision of the belles-lettres style is the language of plays. Unlike poetry, which, except for ballads, in essence excludes direct speech and therefore dialogue, and unlike emotive prose, which is a combination of monologue and dialogue, the language of plays is entirely dialogue. The author's speech is almost entirely excluded except for the playwright's remarks and stage directions, significant though they may be. The language of a play has the following peculiarities:

·It is stylized (retains the modus of literary English).

·It presents the variety of spoken language.

·It has redundancy of information caused by necessity to amplify the utterance.

·Monologue is never interrupted.

·Character's utterances are much longer than in ordinary conversation.

2.4. Colloquial Styles

Colloquial style is the type of speech which is used in situation that allows certain deviations from the rigid pattern of literary speech used not only in a private conversation, but also in private correspondence. So the style is applicable both to the written and oral varieties of the speech. The terms "colloquial" and "bookish" do not exactly correspond to the oral and written

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forms of speech. Maltzev suggests terms "formal" and "informal" and states that colloquial style is the part of informal variety of English which is used orally in conversation.

The main functions of this style: communicative, contacting and emotive. Following Arnold and Skrebnev we distinguish Literary and Familiar

colloquial styles.

E.g. They are holding a meeting to discuss the issue. (Standard) They are getting together to talk it over. (Literary colloquial) They are sitting down to wrap about it. (Familiar colloquial)

2.4.1. Literary colloquial style

Phonetic features:

1.Standard pronunciation in compliance with the national norm, good enunciation.

2.Phonetic compression of frequently used forms: e.g. it’s, don’t, I’ve

3.Omission of unaccented elements due to the quick tempo: e.g. you know him?

Morphological features:

1.Use of regular morphological features, with interception of evaluative suffixes: e.g. deary, doggie

Syntactical features:

1.Use of simple sentences with a number of participial and infinitive constructions and numerous parentheses.

2.Syntactically correct utterances compliant with the literary norm.

3.Use of various types of syntactical compression, simplicity of syntactical connection.

4.Prevalence of active and finite verb forms.

5.Use of grammar forms for emphatic purposes, e.g. progressive verb forms to express emotions of irritation, anger, etc. e.g. You are always loosing your keys.

6.Decomposition and ellipsis of sentences in a dialogue.

7.Use of special colloquial phrases, e.g. that friend of yours.

Lexical features:

1.Wide range of vocabulary strata in accordance with the register of communication and participants’ roles: formal and informal, neutral and bookish, terms and foreign words.

2.Basic stock of communicative vocabulary is stylistically neutral.

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3.Use of socially accepted contracted forms and abbreviations: e.g. fridge for refrigerator, ice for ice-cream, TV for television, CD for compact disk.

4.Use of etiquette language and conversational formulas: e.g. nice to see you, my pleasure, on behalf of

5.Extensive use of intensifiers and gap-fillers: e.g. absolutely, definitely, awfully, kind of, so to speak, I mean, if I may say so.

6.Use of interjections and exclamations: e.g. Dear me, My God, Goodness, well, why, now, oh.

7.Extensive use of phrasal verbs: e.g. let smb down - подвести, put up with – терпеть, мириться; stand smb up – казаться правдоподобным.

8.Use of words of indefinite meaning: e.g. thing, stuff.

9.Devoid of slang, vulgarisms, dialect words, jargon.

10.Use of phraseological expressions, idioms and figures of speech.

Compositional features:

1.Can be used in written and spoken varieties: dialogue, monologue, personal letters, diaries, essays, articles, etc.

2.Prepared types of texts, such as letters, presentations, articles, interviews may have thought out and logical composition, to a certain extent determined by conventional forms.

3.Spontaneous types have a loose structure, relative coherence and uniformity of form and content.

2.4.2. Familiar Colloquial Style (represented in spoken variety)

Phonetic features:

1.Casual and often careless pronunciation, use of deviant forms: e.g. gonna instead of going to, whatcha instead of what do you, dunno instead of don’t know.

2.Use of reduced and contracted forms: e.g. you’re, they’ve, I’d.

3.Omission of unaccented elements due to quick tempo: e.g. you hear me?

4.Emphasis on intonation as a powerful semantic and stylistic instrument capable to render subtle nuances of thought and feeling.

5.Use of onomatopoeic words e.g. whoosh (свист), hush (ш-ш! Тс!), yum

(ням-ням).

Morphological features

1.Use of evaluative suffixes, nonce words formed on morphological and phonetic analogy with other nominal words e.g. mawkish – 1) вызы-

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вающий тошноту, противный на вкус; приторный; 2) сентиментальный, слащавый, слезливый, moody: 1) легко поддающийся переменам настроения 2) унылый, угрюмый; в дурном настроении, hanky-panky – мошенничество, обман, надувательство, проделки, helter-skelter – беспорядок, суматоха, hugger-mugger – секрет,

тайна.

2.Extensive use of collocations and phrasal verbs instead of neutral and literary equivalents: e.g. to turn in instead of to go to bed.

Syntactical features

1.Use of simple short sentences.

2.Dialogues are usually of the question-answer type.

3.Use of echo questions, parallel structures. Repetitions of various kinds

4.In complex sentences asyndetic coordination is the norm

5.Coordination is used more often than subordination, repeated use of conjunction and is a sing of spontaneity rather than an expressive device.

6.Extensive use of ellipsis, including the subject of the sentence: e.g. Can’t say anything.

7.Extensive use of syntactic tautology: e.g. That girl, she was something else!

8.Abundance of gap-fillers and parenthetical elements, such as sure, indeed, okay, well.

Lexical features

1.Combination of neutral, familiar and low colloquial vocabulary, including slang, vulgar and taboo words.

2.Extensive use of words of general meaning, specified in meaning by the situation: e.g. guy, job, get, do, fix, affair.

3.Limited vocabulary resources, use of the same word in different meaning it may not possess e.g. ‘some’ in the meaning ‘good’ – Some guy! Some game!, ‘nice’ in the meaning ‘impressive, fascinating, high quality’ – Nice music!

4.Abundance of specific colloquial interjections e.g. boy, wow, hey, there, ahoy.

5.Use of hyperbole, epithets, evaluative vocabulary, trite metaphors and simile: e.g. if you say it once more I’ll kill you. As old as the hills. Horrid, awesome, etc.

6.Tautological substitution of personal pronouns and names by other nouns: e.g. you-baby, Johnny-boy.

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7.Mixture of curse words and euphemisms: e.g. damn, dash, darned - Dashed if I know. – Будь я проклят, если я знаю.

Compositional features

1.Use of deviant language on all levels.

2.Strong emotional coloring.

3.Loose syntactical organization of an utterance.

4.Frequently little coherence and adherence to the topic.

5.No special compositional patterns.

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Lecture 3: Stylistic Classification of English Vocabulary

3.1.The problem of the Norm.

3.2.Stylistic Classification of the English Vocabulary. Stylistically neutral vocabulary.

3.3.Formal vocabulary.

3.4.Informal vocabulary.

3.1. The problem of the Norm

Selection, or deliberate choice of language, and the ways the chosen elements are treated are the main distinctive features of style. It brings up the problem of the norm. The notion of the norm mainly refers to the literary language and always presupposes a recognized or received standard. At the same time it likewise presupposes vacillations of the received standard.

There is no universally accepted norm or the standard literary language, there are different norms and there exist special kinds of norm, which are called stylistic norms. Indeed, it has long been acknowledged that the norms of the spoken and the written varieties of language differ in more than one respect. Likewise it is perfectly apparent that the norms of emotive prose and those of official language are heterogeneous. Even within what is called the belles-lettres style of language we can observe different norms between, for instance, poetry and drama.

But the fact that there are different norms for various types and styles of language does not exclude the possibility and even the necessity of arriving at some abstract notion of norm as invariant, which should embrace all variants with their most typical properties. Each style of language will have its own invariant and variants, yet all styles will have their own invariant, that of the written variety of language. Both oral and written varieties can also be integrated into an invariant of the standard (received) language.

The norm, therefore, should be regarded as the invariant of the phonemic, morphological, lexical and syntactical patterns circulating in lan- guage-in-action at a given period of time. Variants of these patterns may sometimes diverge from the invariant but they never exceed the limits set by the invariant lest it should become unrecognizable or misleading. The development of any literary language shows that the variants will always center around axis of the invariant forms. The variants, as the term itself suggests, will never detach themselves from the invariant to such a degree as to claim entire independence.

The branch of stylistics dealing with norms of "correct speech" is normative stylistics or orthology.

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3.2. Stylistic Classification of the English Vocabulary.

It is known that words are not used in speech to the same extent. Since certain words occur less frequently than others, it is natural to presume that the difference between them is reflected upon the character of the words themselves. Those words that are indispensable in every act of communication have nothing particular about them – cause no definite associations. On the contrary, words used only in special spheres of linguistic intercourse have something attached to their meaning, a certain stylistic colouring.

Indispensable words are stylistically neutral. Words of special spheres are stylistically coloured. This is the main division of words from the stylistic viewpoint. Stylistically coloured words are not homogeneous. It is evident that certain groups of stylistically coloured words must be placed, figuratively speaking, above the neutral words. These groups are formed by words with a tinge of officiality or refinement about them, poetic words, high-flown words in general. Other groups are to be placed below the neutral words. Their sphere of use is socially lower than the neutral sphere. These two groups form literary and colloquial strata respectively

Different scholars may employ different terms in their classification, main difference still being preserved:

Formal (super-neutral, bookish, casual, correct) Vocabulary

Stylistically Unmarked/ Neutral Vocabulary

Informal (sub-neutral, colloquial, noncasual, common)Vocabulary

But this differentiation does not remain stable. The stylistic value undergoes changes in the course of history, with the lapse of time. Therefore, stylistic classifications must be confined to synchronic aspect.

The literary and the colloquial layers contain a number of subgroups each of which has a property it shares with all the subgroups within the layer. This common property, which unites the different groups of words within the layer, may be called its aspect. The aspect of the neutral layer is its universal character. That means it is unrestricted in its use. It can be employed in all styles of language and in all spheres of human activity.

The aspect of the formal layer is its markedly bookish character. It is this that makes the layer more or less stable. The literary layer of words consists of groups accepted as legitimate members of the English vocabulary.

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They have no local or dialectal character.

The aspect of the informal layer of words is its lively spoken character. It is this that makes it unstable, fleeting. The colloquial layer of words as qualified in most English or American dictionaries is not infrequently limited to a definite language community or confine to a special locality where it circulates.

Literary words serve to satisfy communicative demands of official, scientific, poetic messages, while the colloquial ones are employed in nonofficial everyday communication. Though there is no immediate correlation between the written and the oral forms of speech on the one hand, and the literary and colloquial words, on the other, yet, for the most part, the first ones are mainly observed in the written form, as most literary messages appear in writing. And vice versa: though there are many examples of colloquialisms in writing (informal letters, diaries, certain passages of memoirs, etc.), their usage is associated with the oral form of communication.

The classification of English vocabulary suggested by I. Galperin

Neither of the two named groups of words, possessing a stylistic meaning, is homogeneous as to the quality of the meaning, frequency of use, sphere of application, or the number and character of potential users. This is why each one is further divided into the general, i.e. known to and used by most native speakers in generalized literary (formal) or colloquial (informal)

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