Peculiar use of set expressions

STYLISTIC PHRASEOLOGY

A phraseological unit (PU) is “a block longer one word, yet functioning as a whole. It is a semantically and structurally integral lexical collocation, partially or completely different from the meaning of its components”. (A. Kunin) Its main characteristic feature is that its meaning can’t infer from the sum of its components because each PU is characterized by a certain degree of cohesion(сплоченность) or semantic integrity. The main features of PU are stability, semantic integrity and ready- made nature.

There exist different classifications of PU. According to I.R. Galperin’s classification of the English vocabulary all the PU can be subdivided into neutral, literary and non- literary PU.

Neutral PU:

Ex.: “to let the cat out of the dog”, “ups and down,” “at the eleventh hour”.

Idioms and set expressions impart local coloring to the text and make it sound more expressive.

Ex.: Come, Roy, let’s go and shake the dust of this place for good… (Aldridge)- Cf. … let us go leave this place for ever. (Skrebnev, 2000)Some of them are elevated: an earthly paradise, to breath one’s last; to play fiddle while Rome burns.

Among the elevated PU we can discern:

a) Archaisms- to play upon advantage (to swindle), the iron in one’s soul (the permament embitterment).

b) Bookish phrases- Formal (bookish PU): “to breathe one’s last (to die); “The debt of Nature” (death), Gordian knot (a complicated problem);

c) Foreign PU- a propos de bottes (unconnected with the preceding remark, bon mot (a witty word).

Some are:

a) Subneutral or familiar colloquial PU: to rain cats and dogs, to be in one’s cups (=to be drunk), big bug, small fry, alive and kicking, a pretty kettle of fish.

b) Jargon PU – a loss leader (an article sold below cost).

c) Old slang PU- to be nuts about, to kick the bucket, to hop the twig (to die).

Occasional PU are based on the following cases of violation of the fixed structure of a PU:

a) Prolongation: “He was born with a silver spoon in a mouth which was rather curly and large”. (Galsworthy)

b) Insertion: “he had been standing there nearly two hours, shifting from foot to unaccustomedfoot”. (Galsworthy)

c) Substitution: “to talk pig (shop).”

d) Prolongation and substitution: “They spoiled their rods, spared their children and anticipated the results in enthusiasm”. (Galsworthy)

e) The author’s PU: “Oh, my ears and whiskers” (L. Carroll); “Too true to be good” (B. Shaw), The Gilded Age (The Golden Age).

Peculiar use of set expressions

A cliché is generally defined as an expression that has become hackneyed and trite. It has lots its precise meaning by constant reiteration: in other words it has become stereotyped. Cliché is a kind of stable word combination which has become familiar and which has been accepted as a unit of a language: e.g. rosy dreams of youth, growing awareness.

Proverbs are short, we;;-known, supposedly wise sayings, usually in simple language. E.g. Never say never. You can’t get bloom of a stone.

Proverbs are expressions of culture that are passed from generation to generation. They are words of wisdom of culture- lessons that people of that want their children to learn and to live by. They are served as symbols, abstract ideas. Proverbs are usually dedicated and involve imagery. E.g. Out of sight, out of mind.

Epigram is a short clever amusing saying or poem. E.g. A thing of beauty is a joy forever.

Quotation is a phrase or sentence taken from a work of literature or other piece of writing and repeated in order to prove a point or support an idea. They are marked graphically: by inverted commas: dashes, italics: All hope abandon, ye who enter (Dante)

Allusion is an indirect reference, by word or phrase, to a historical, literary, mythological fact or to a fact of everyday life made in the course of speaking or writing. The use of allusion presupposes knowledge of the fact, thing or person alluded to on the part of the reader or listener. “You too, Brutus?” (Shakespeare)

Proverbs, sayings, quotations, allusions and paradoxes are based on the interplay of primary and secondary meanings being also a variety of occasional PU: “to drop a handkerchief and relations”.

Paradox is a statement which though it appears to be self- contradictory, nevertheless involves truth or at least an element of truth. – O. Wilde’s paradoxes: “It’s simply washing one’s clean linen in public”.

Occasional PU are often used in the language of advertising- Our love is blind(Love is blind); Sofa, So Good! (So far, so good); Smirnoff’s Silver is for people who want a silver lining without the cloud. (Every cloud has a silver lining).

Stylistic functions of PU:

a) Compressing information; “The Moon and Sixpence”, a bird in the hand, birds of feather.

b) Foregrounding some elements, creating a comic effect: to drop a handkerchief and relations.

c) Expressing the message of the book; “In Chancery”, “ To Let”, “The silver spoon”.

d) Motivating the events: “Murder is out” in Jolion’s letter to his son.

e) Characterizing personages , events, etc.: “He was a jolly good fellow: no side or anything like that, he could never set the Thames on the fire… they were quite content to give a leg up to a man who would never climb as high as to be an obstacle to themselves”. (S. Mau occasional gham)

f) Creating a comic, ironical, satirical effect: “Ashes to ashes, and clay to clay, if your enemy doesn’t get at you, your own folk may”. (J.Thurber)