STYLISTIC FUNCTION OF PRONOUNS

Date: 2015-10-07; view: 641.

From the point of view of stylistics the most important are personal, demonstrative and indefinite pronouns.

I and you are often used in poetry in lyric poems, where the author represents deep psychological feelings of a hero. In prose their function is quite different. For example, the pronoun I may indicate selfishness, egoism, self-satisfaction.

e.g. “I know I'm not a great novelist,” he will tell you. “When I compare myself with

the giants Isimply don't exist. I used to think that one day Ishould write a really great novel, but I've long ceased even to hope for that. All Iwant people to say is that I do my best. I do work. I never let anything slip-shod get past me. I thinkI can tell a good story and Ican create characters that ring true. And after all, the proof of the pudding is in the eating: “The Eye of the Needle” sold 35 thousand in England an 80 thousand in America, and for the serial rights of my next book I've got the biggest terms I've ever had yet.” (Maugham)

Here, revealing Kear's attitude to his own art, S.Maugham pointedly stresses his egotism and self-complacency by making him use the first person singular almost to the exclusion of any other form (The pronoun I occurs 16 times in this paragraph). In this way the speech intended as a proof of Kear's modesty rings brazenly boastful.

The use of one and you instead of the first person singular (I) on the contrary makes the utterance more modest, respectful and reserved, self-controlled.

e.g. Olwen: It's not so bad then. You can always build another image for yourself to

fall in love with

Robert: No, you can't . That's the trouble. You lose the capacity for building. You

run short of the stuff that creates beautiful illusions.

In Olwen's words you is used in its direct meaning. In Robert's – in generalized meaning. He includes in his YOU himself, Olwen, all other people, and with its help he rebuffs Olwen's irony.

The primary meaning of the pronoun we is “the speaker + another person (persons)”. Its secondary functions are:

1) the intimate substitute for you

(physician or nurse addressing a patient: “Now, are we getting better today?”)

2) it may imply “the plural of majesty” (Lat. Pluralis Majestatis – множественное

величия) – By the grace of Our Lord, We, Charles the Second…

3) the plural of modesty (Lat. Pluralis Modestial – множественное скромности) -in scholarly tests, implying the author and his imaginary reader – Now that we come to the conclusion that…

4) the plural of humility (in the speech of uneducated people – Eliza Doolitle's

remark: “Oh, we are proud…”)