Stylistic Features of Oscar Wilde’s Wrightings

The syntactical level plays an important role in the system of language expressive means. Generally speaking, the examination of syntax provides a deeper insight into the stylistic aspect of the utterance.

Stylistics takes as the object of its analysis the expressive means and stylistic devices of the language which are based on some significant structural point in an utterance, whether it consists of one sentence or a string of sentences.

The problem of syntactical stylistic devices appears to be closely linked not only with what makes an utterance more emphatic but also with the more general problem of predication. As is known, the English affirmative sentence is regarded as neutral if it maintains the regular word order, that is subject – predicate – object (or other secondary members of the sentence, as they are called). Any other order of the parts of the sentence may also carry the necessary information, but impact on the reader will be different. Even a slight change in the word order of a sentence or in the order of the sentences in a more complicated syntactical unit will inevitably cause a definite modification of the meaning in the whole. An almost imperceptible rhythmical design introduced into a prose sentence or a sudden break in the sequence of the parts of the sentence, or any other change will add something to the volume of information contained in the original sentence.

Unlike the syntactical expressive means of the language, which are naturally used in discourse in a straight-forward natural manner, syntactical stylistic devices are perceived as elaborate designees aimed at having a definite impact on the reader. It will be borne in mind that any stylistic device is meant to be understood as a device and is calculated to produce a desired stylistic effect.

The first syntactical expressive means used by Oscar Wilde is inversion.

According to Prof. Kurkharenko V.A., inversion is very often used as an independent stylistic device in which the direct word order is changed either completely so that the predicate (predicative) precedes the subject, or partially, so that the object precedes the subject – predicate pair.27

According to Prof. Galperin I.R. the stylistic inversion aims at attaching logical stress or additional emotional colouring to the surface meaning of the utterance. Therefore, a specific intonation pattern is the inevitable satellite of inversion.28

Although Oscar Wilde doesn’t pay much attention to such expressive means as inversion, he also resorts to its usage in his plays. Here are some examples of inversion from Wilde:

e.g. “Told me she that entirely disapproved of people

marrying more than once.” (p. 53)

“Except amongst the middle classes I have been told”.

(p.117)

“But so am I.” (p.261)

“Let go us into the house”. (p.331)These sentences comprise the simple and common models of inversion. It is very important to know that inversion as a stylistic device is always sense-motivated; and it depends on the context. These inversions are used by the author for more expressiveness and for showing the feelings of his characters in a certain situation.

The next syntactical expressive means is a repetition. As the word “repetition” itself suggests, this unit of poetic speech is based upon a repeated occurrence of one and the same word or word group.

According to Prof. Galperin I.R., repetition as a syntactical stylistic device is recurrence of the same word, word combination or a phase for two and more times.29

So, repetition is an expressive means when a certain word or a phrase is repeated for several times. It is an expressive means of language used when the speaker is under the stress of strong emotion. It shows the state of mind of the speaker as in the following example from Wilde:

e.g. “I love you – love you as I have never loved any living

thing. From the moment I met you I loved you, loved

you blindly, adoringly, madly!” (p.51)

Here we can observe the inner state of the hero, his emotions, his great feeling of love.

e.g. “My boy! My boy! My boy!” (p. 168)