Stylistic Features of Oscar Wilde’s Wrightings

Thus, in the English language not only lexical expressive means and stylistic devices but also syntactical expressive means and stylistic devices are used. Considering these stylistic devices and expressive means and their characteristic features we should say that out of the number of features which are clear in the styles, some should be considered primary, others-secondary. They are not equal in their significance, some of them bear reference to the main importance, others are widely used in everyday speech.

Having analysed the four plays of Oscar Wilde: “Lady Windermere’s Fan”, ”A Woman of No Importance”, “An Ideal Husband”, “The Importance of Being Earnest”, I came to a conclusion that it is not an easy task to single them out.

Some of them make the speech of the characters vivid, interesting, humorous, ironical, emotional, understandable ; they reflect their thoughts and feelings.

The following tables give us an idea of the frequency of the usage of all expressive means and stylistic devices tackled in this diploma paper.

Table № 1

EMs and SDsThe volume of the book (pp)%

Lexical 36070%

Syntactical 36030%

This table shows that Wilde resorts to the use of lexical expressive means and stylistic devices more than to the use of syntactical ones. According to this table we can make a conclusion that lexical stylistic devices prevail in Wilde’s plays.

The following table shows the frequency of the usage of the most used lexical EMs and SDs in O.Wilde’s plays.

Table № 2

№EMs and SDsThe volume of the book(pp)%

1Epigram and paradox36030 %

2Irony and pun36020%

3epithet36016%

4metaphor36011%

5simile36010%

6hyperbole3608%

7metonymy3605%

Thus, we can see that Wilde pays much attention to epigrams and paradoxes which are his most favourite lexical stylistic devices.

The next table shows the frequency of the usage of syntactical expressive means and stylistic devices in O.Wilde's plays.

Table № 3

№EMs and SDsThe volume of the book(pp)%

1antithesis360 28%