B) to impart brevity, a quick tempo and emotional tension to the
narrative;
C) as a means of dynamic description.
Emphatic construction “It is he...who” is a syntactical device of turning the
Simple sentence into a complex one.
e.g.: It was on Friday that we met him.
Emphatic construction with “do”reveals a certain degree of logical and
Emotional emphasis.
e.g.: We do worry about her, really.
Enumerationis a stylistic device built up by means of the repetition of
homogeneous syntactical units.
e.g.: She had lived through and noticed a certain amount of history. A war, a welfare state, the rise of meritocracy, European unity, little England, equality of opportunity, women liberation, the death of the individual.
Epiphora is the repetition of the same unit at the end of two or more successive
clauses or sentences.
e.g.: She went to have coffee because of the music. She felt particularly warm to Conrad because of the music.
Epithet is a word or a group of words giving an expressive characterization of the
object described. It shows individual attitude of the speaker towards the
person or thing described.
e.g.: Tobacco-stained smile.
Trite: true love, dead silence, etc.
Genuine: watery eyes, elephantine body;
Structurally E. may be subdivided into:
a) simple (sleepless pillow);
b) compound (sun-kissed fruit);
c) phrase E. (much-to-long-and-tight-under-the arms dress);
d) sentence (she said it in an I-don't-think-you're-being-very-sensitive sort of voice);
e) reversed (the tiny box of a kitchen);
f) two step (extremely unattractive person).
Euphemism is a word that replaces another word of similar but stronger meaning.
e.g.: Effing. A social disease. To join the majority (to die).
Hyperbole is an exaggerated statement.
e.g.: Dr. Johnson drank his tea in oceans.
Inversion consists in unusual arrangement of words for the purpose of making one
of them more emphatic.
e.g.: My account you can trust.
Secondary inversion is inversion of inversion, it is rearranging the question in direct word order.
e.g.: The Ark was more than just a single ship?
Irony is using a word in a sense that is opposite of its usual meaning for a
humorous effect or for emphasis. There is always a contrast between the notion named and the notion meant.
e.g.: Why do you come so soon? You used to come at 10 o'clock and now you come at noon.
There are two kinds of irony:
a) verbal(it is always possible to indicate the word responsible for
creating stylistic effect);
b) sustained (we can not point out the word).
Stylistic Ironymeans using high-flown linguistic units with reference to insignificant socially low topics.
e.g.: Sir Cur. Pooch primed for oblivion.
Litotes is expressing an idea by means of negating the opposite idea.
e.g.: She's not unattractive. She's not without taste.
Sometimes L. is used synonymously with understatement as their main function (weakening the effect of the utterance) is the same. The distinction is that L. has its specific double-negative structure and weakens mainly the positive evaluations.