Figures of Speech

Figures of speech are stylistic devices that make use of a figurative meaning of the language elements
and thus create a vivid image.

Dictionary meaning is the meaning which is registered in the language code as an easily recognized sign
for an abstract notion designating a certain phenomenon or object.

Words in context may acquire additional lexical meanings not fixed in dictionaries, what we have called
contextual meanings. The latter may sometimes deviate from the dictionary meaning to such a degree
that the new meaning even becomes the opposite of the primary meaning.

Transferred meaning is practically the interrelation between two types of lexical meaning: dictionary
and contextual meaning. The contextual meaning will always depend on the dictionary meaning to a
greater or lesser extent. The interaction between the primary dictionary meaning and a contextual
meaning may be maintained along different lines:

1) the author identifies two objects which have nothing in common but in which he sees a function, a
property, a feature that may make the reader perceive these two objects as identical. That is metaphor,
based on identification;

2) the author finds it possible to substitute one object for another on the grounds that there is some
kind of interdependence or interrelation between the two corresponding objects. That is metonymy,
based on substitution;

3) a certain property of an object is used in an opposite or contradictory sense. That is irony, based on
contrary concepts.

Bathos

Heterogeneity of the component parts of the utterance in the basis for a stylistic device called bathos.

Bathos is an abrupt transition in style from the exalted to the commonplace, producing a ludicrous
effect. Unrelated elements are brought together as if they denote things equal in rank or belonging to
one class, as if they were of the some stylistic aspect. By being forcibly linked together, the elements
acquire a slight modification of meaning: eg.

Let us have wine and women, mirth and laughter,

Sermons and soda-water - the day after.

So, we have 3 pairs of words: wine and women, mirth and laughter, sermons and soda-water. The
second pair consists of almost synonyms. This affects the next pair and makes the words sound as if they
were as closely related as the words in the first two pairs. We may interpret them as a tedious but
unavoidable remedy for the sins committed.

The juxtaposition of highly literary norms of expression and words or phrases that must be classed as
non- literary, sometimes low colloquial or even vulgar, will produce a stylistic effect and add an element
of humour:

Will you oblige me by keeping your trap shut, darling?

While often unintended, bathos may be used deliberately to produce a humorous effect: Eg. The
ballerina rose gracefully en poinle and extended one slender leg behind her, like a dog at a fire hydrant.

Metaphor
Metaphor denotes transference of meaning based on resemblance or on associated likeness between
two objects. Not only objects can be compared in a metaphor but also phenomena, actions or qualities:

He's not a man, he is just a machine.

The leaves fell sorrowfully.

Some books are to be tasted, others swallowed.

A metaphor expresses the unfamiliar in terms of the familiar: eg. Love is a rose.

Metaphors can be classified according to their degree of unexpectedness:

1) Metaphors, which are absolutely unexpected, i.e. are quite unpredictable, are called genuine:

Juliet is the sun.

No man is an island.

2) Metaphors, which are commonly used in speech and therefore are sometimes even fixed in
dictionaries as expressive means of the language. They are trite or dead metaphors. They had been
created in poetry, in the Bible, in imaginative prose and have gained wide occurrence and become
known to everybody: eg.: the seeds of evil, a flight of imagination.

That gymnast is a diamond in the rowh.

According to their structure metaphors may be:

1) simple, containing a work or phrase:

Man cannot live by bread along.

2) complex (prolonged or sustained) - when a broader context in required to understand it, or when the
metaphor includes more than one element of the text.

A sustained metaphor may consist of trite metaphors expressing or implying a certain logical
development of ideas, and yet the objects mentioned in each of them pertain to different semantic
spheres. The general impression is incongruous, clumsy and comical:

Mr. Pickwick bottled up his vengeance and corked it down.

The verb to bottle means to keep in check, to restrain. To cork down is used in direct meaning thus
reviving the almost dead metaphor.

Genuine metaphors are mostly to be found in poetry and emotive prose. Trite metaphors are generally
used as expressive means in newspaper articles, in oratorical style and even in scientific language.

Metonymy

Metonymy denotes transference of meaning which is based on contiguity of notions. In metonymy the
name of one object is used instead of another, closely connected with it.

Genuine metonymy reveals a quite unexpected substitution of one word for another or one concept for
another, on the ground of some strong impression produced by a chance feature of the thing:

They came in. Two of them, a man with long fair moustaches and a silent dark man. The moustaches
and I had nothing in common.
Language is full of so-called fossilized (trite- банальный, избитый, неоригинальный) metaphors, which
no longer call up the image of an object from which they were borrowed. The examples of trite
metonymy: crown - king; hand-worker; grave – death.

word

literal meaning

metonymic use

drinking

consuming a liquid

consuming alcohol

word

a unit of language

a promise (to give/keep/break one's word); a conversation (to have a word with)

hand

a part of the human body

a person, specifically a member of a ship's crew or an expert in some trade

head

a part of an animal's body

a domesticated animal; most commonly, a steer

sweat

perspiration

hard work

the press

printing press

the news media

Hollywood

a district of Los Angeles

the American film & television industry

Washington

The city and federal district of Washington, D.C. and its environs. Also a separate U.S. state

The United States Government

The Kremlin

A fortified construction in historic cities of Russia and the Soviet Union

The Government of Russia or the Moscow Kremlin

The White House

the official Presidential residence in Washington, D.C.

the U.S. President, his staff and close advisors

Downing Street

A street in the City of Westminster, on which is located No. 10, the official residence of the UK Prime
Minister

The British Prime Minister's Office

The Crown

A monarch's headwear

the legal embodiment of executive government

The Palace

Buckingham Palace

the monarch's office

Westminster

A City in Greater London

the UK Parliament, which is located there

Whitehall

A street in the City of Westminster, the headquarters of the British Civil Service and various
Governmental Departments

the British Civil service or a Government Department

Fleet Street

A street in London, formerly the location of many of the British national newspapers

the British press, particularly newspapers

Several types of metonymy may be distinguished according to the relations metonymy is based on:
1) a concrete thing used instead of an abstract notion. The thing becomes a symbol of the notion:

The camp, the pulpit and the law;

For rich men ’s sons are free.

2) The container instead of the thing contained:

The hall applauded.

3) The relation of proximity:

The round game table was boisterous and happy.

4) The name of a characteristic feature of an object instead of the object:

The massacre of innocents.

5) the name of the material instead of the thing made of it:

The marble spoke.

6) The instrument which the doer uses in performing the action instead of the action or the doer
himself:

You are a very good whip and can do what you like with your horses.

Synecdoche is the simplest kind of metonymy and means using the name or a part to denote the whole
or vice versa:

A hundred head of cattle;

Stop torturing a poor animal! (dog)

20,000 hungry mouths to feed.

Irony

Irony is a stylistic device also based on the simultaneous realization of two logical meanings - dictionary
and contextual but the two meanings stand in opposition to each other:

It must be delightful to find oneself in a foreign country without a penny in one’s pocket.

Usually the direct meaning in such cases expresses a positive evaluation of the situation, which the
context contains the opposite, negative evaluation.

The word containing the irony is strongly marked by intonation. In has an emphatic stress and is
generally supplied with a special melody design.

Irony must not be confused with humour. Humour always causes laughter. But the function of the irony
is not confined to producing a humorous effect. It rather expresses a feeling of irritation, displeasure,
pity or regret.

Irony is generally used to convey a negative meaning. Therefore only positive concepts may be used in
their logical dictionary meanings: eg.
Today was a very cold and bitter day, as cold and bitter as a cup of hot chocolate; if the cup of hot
chocolate had vinegar added to it and were placed in a refrigerator for several hours.