Курсовая работа: Stylistic Classification of the English Vocabulary
A good illustration of the use of poetic words the bulk of which are archaic is the following stanza from Byron’s Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage.
Whilome (at some past time) in Albion’s isle (the oldest name of the island of Britain) there dwelt (lived) a youth,
Who ne (not) in virtu’s ways did take delight:
But spend his days in riot (wasteful living) most uncouth (unusual, strange).
And vex’d (disturbed) with mirth (fun) the drowsy ear of Night.
Ah me! (interjection expressing regret, sorrow) in sooth (truly he was a shameless wight (a human being).
Sore (severely, harshly) given to revel (noisy festivity) and ungodly (wicked) glee (entertainment);
Few earthly things found favor in his sight.
Save concubines (prostitutes) and carnal (not spiritual) company,
And flaunting (impudent) wassailers (drunkards; revelers) of high and low degree.
The use of poetic words does not as a rule create the atmosphere of poetry in the true sense; it is a substitute for real art.
Poetic words are not freely built in contrast to neutral, colloquial and common literary words, or terms. The commonest means is by compounding, e.g. ‘young-eyed’, ‘rosy-fingered’.
Some writers make abundant use of this word-building means. Thus Arthur Hailey in his novel «In High Places» has ‘serious-faced’, ‘high ceilinged’, ‘beige-carpeted’, ‘tall backed’, ‘horn-rimmed’ in almost close proximity.
There is, however, one means of creating new poetic words still recognized as productive even in present-day English, viz. the use of a contracted form of a word instead of the full one, e.g. ‘dear’ instead of dreary, ‘scant’ (=scanty).
Sometimes the reverse process leads to the birth of a poeticism, e.g. ‘vasty’ (=vast. ‘The vasty deep’, i.e. the ocean); ‘steepy’ (=steep), ‘paly’ (=pale).
These two conventional devices are called forth by the requirements of the metre of the poem, to add or remove a syllable, and are generally avoided by modern English poets.
Poetical words and set expressions make the utterance understandable only to a limited member of readers. It is mainly due to poeticisms that poetical language is sometimes called poetical jargon.
In modern English poetry there is a strong tendency to use words in strange combinations. It manifests itself in the coinage of new words and, most of all, in combining old and familiar words in a way that hinders understanding and forces the reader to stoop and try to decipher the message so encoded.
The following may serve as examples;
‘The sound of shape’, ‘night-long ages’, ‘to utter ponds of dream’, ‘wings of because’, ‘to reap one’s same’, ‘goldenly whole, prodigiously’ keen star whom she-and he-, – like its of am perceive… (E.E. Cummings).
All these combinations are considered ungrammatical inasmuch as they violate the rules of encoding a message. But in search of new modes of expression modern poets, particularly those who may be called «modernists», have a strong bias for all kinds of innovation. They experiment with language means and are ready to approve of any deviation from the normal. So also are literary critics belonging to what is called the avant-garde movement in art, the essence of which is the use of unorthodox and experimental methods? There usually lead both the poet and the critic to extremes, examples of which are given above.
2.4 Archaic, Obsolescent and Obsolete Words
The word-stock of a language is in an increasing state of change. Words change their meaning and sometimes drop out of the language altogether. New words sprig up and replace the old ones. Some words stay in the language a vey long time and do not lose their faculty of gaining new meanings and becoming richer and richer polysemantically. Other words live but a short time are like bubbles on the surface of water they disappear leaving no trace of their existence.
In registering these processes the role of dictionaries can hardly be over-estimated. Dictionaries serve to retain this or that word in a language either as a relic of ancient times, where it lived and circulated, or as a still living unit of the system, though it may have lost some of its meaning. They may also preserve certain nonce-creations which were never intended for general use.
In every period in the development of a literary language one can find words which will show more or less apparent changes in their meaning or usage, from full vigour, though a moribund state to death, i.e. complete disappearance of the unite from the language.
We shall distinguish three stages in the aging process of words:
The beginning of the aging process when the word becomes rarely used. Such words are called obsolescent, i.e. they are in the stage of gradually passing out of general use. To this category first of all belong morphological forms belonging to the earlier stages in the development of the language. In the English language these are the pronouns thou and its forms thee, thy and thine: the corresponding verbal ending – est and the verb-forms art, wilt (thou makest, thou wilt); the ending – (e) th instead of – (e) s (he maketh) and the pronoun ye.
To the category of obsolescent words belong many French borrowings which have been kept in the literary language as a means of preserving the spirit of earlier periods, e.g. a pallet (a straw mattress), a palfrey (a small horse); garniture (furniture); to emplume (to adorn with feathers of plumes).
The second group of archaic words are those that have already gone completely out of use but are still recognized by the English speaking community: e.g. methinks (it seems to me); nay (no). These words are called obsolete.