Assignment Question

‘Write a note on the significance of the subject of Stylistics and

the role it plays in a subtler and objective interpretation of both
literary language and content.
Subject: Stylistics

Submitted by:
Lubna Hussain
Roll No: E18424
Section 7C / Evening
Submitted to:
Miss Kalsoom

Submission Deadline: 28th March, 2021

Dept. BS-ENGLISH
NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF MODERN LANGUAGES,
ISLAMABAD
A short note on the significance of the subject of Stylistics and the role it plays in a

subtler and objective interpretation of both literary language and content

It is suggested by a scholarly study of Stylistics that this subject tends to scan and
scrutinize the defamiliarized expression and the style of description of an author in a
language. It, furthermore, endeavors to explicate its motive and outcomes. This advanced
academic field not only cope with the style of language of literary works but also, very
often, with linguistic style of non-literary text as well. The discipline of Stylistics is of
worth importance to be contemplated due to its nature of splitting hairs in order to
distinguish style of a particular era, movement, genre, or an author from its
contemporaries. In other words, it examines the literary techniques used by the writer that
conjure up aesthetic sense and mirrors to what extent the author is successful in his
creativity in using language and appealing the readers. It, moreover, provides various
lenses to comprehend language and come up with a number of gateways deviating us from
ordinary ways of understanding literature.
The content of any literary work is constructed through a verbal structure, therefore, the
role of Stylistics, unlike literary criticism, is to build up an objective analysis on the
content by investigating the literary language and its features that may include figures of
speech, forms and expressions, choice of diction, and linguistic characteristics like lexis,
syntax, semantics and phonological properties. A stylistician, in contrary to a literary critic,
is apathetic towards author’s intentions or his own opinions, thus making the interpretation
free of impressionistic values, subjectivity and judgments.