Integration of verbal units of personified poetical silence images in literary discourse

Key words: verbal unit, Nature Silence, silence, personification, poetical text, silent effect.

Анотація

У статті досліджуються персоніфіковані образи мовчання у поетичних творах англомовних авторів на матеріалі художнього дискурсу. Описано валідність персоніфікації як релевантного стилістичного засобу в передачі образів мовчання. Проаналізовано основні (домінантні та периферійні) вербалізатори поетичного мовчання у поезії та наведено їх кількісно-відсоткову характеристику застосування.

Ключові слова: вербалізатор, Nature Silence, мовчання, персоніфікація, поетичний текст, силенціальний ефект.

Ключевые слова: вербализатор, Nature Silence, молчание, персонификация, поэтический текст, силенциальный эффект.

Poetical texts (PT) are the specific type of communicative units. PTs are subject to language modi and speech behavior, particularly, silence. Silence is a polyaspect, polymodal and polyfunctional phenomenon. As a polyfunctional phenomenon, silence performs the following functions: communicative, phatic, connotative, metalinguistic, referential, figurative and emphatic functions. Figurative (poetical/metaphorical) silence is marked with verbal and nonverbal means. Verbal means of silent effect include monolexemic, polylexemic, syntactic and phraseological units. Silence is also personified in figurative representation. Quite prevailing verbal mean of silent effect imagery which adds the special expressiveness to the expression is personification. An important attribute of poetical text is the representation of the landscape, as an artistic image that is connected with the personification phenomenon of its thinking. It definitiates the world from the side of personal human experience and exteriorizes nature processes and human attitude to the nature. Nature is polyfunctional in the poetry. It creates the space-and-time continuum of poetical work, conveys dominant ideas of work and actualizes the text category of anthropocentrism.

Due to personification inanimate elements transform into animate ones and nature phenomena become main characters and acting persons of works which are capable of singing, dancing, sleeping, melancholy and thoughtfulness and play the important role in poetical discourse. The Nature Silence image is used by authors as the main motive, the background for the unfolding of physical events and representation of emotional state of the author and his lyric character [1].

The relevance of the chosen topic is defined by the necessity of performing the poetical silence study taking into consideration its individual and psychological, social and cultural nature, by the tendency of extended examination of verbal and non-verbal communication means.

Scientific contribution of the results is explained by integration discourse and communicative approaches to the studying of peculiarities of poetical silence actualization and consists in the fact that there are still some gaps in this domain and, thus, the comprehension of verbal units marking the silent effect will expand the scientific knowledge in this field.

The issue of communicative silence is valid in scientific works of modern phylologists: T. О. Anohina, N. D. Arutyunova, А. D. Belova, І. К. Kobiakova, V. S. Kulish, V. Soloshchuc, S. О. Shvachko.

The aim of the article consists in the verification of markers of personified poetical silence images in the English literary discourse.

This aim implies the following tasks of the research:

1) to explicate the notion “personification”;

2) to analyze the poetical silence;

3) to separate dominant and peripheral verbal units of poetical silence of English discourse;

4) to determine the degree of verbal units, using in poetical images of silent exteriorization.

The object of the article is figurative artistic markers of English-speaking poetical texts. The Subject matter consists in dominant and peripheral verbal units of poetical silence. The material for the study contains texts by English authors united with the common thematic unit, landscape lyric.

It is well known that stylistics is the branch of linguistics that studies principles and the effect of choice and usage of lexical, grammatical, phonetic and linguistic means for the conveying of thoughts and emotions in various communicative conditions [2]. Poetical silence image makes it possible to convey the individual conception of the world of the lyric character and his personality. The latter one plays important role in the creation of ideas and themes of works and in the interpretation of the most important motives. Expressive stylistic devices (tropes) are the separate kind of linguistic embodiment of imagery. Personification is located in their center, as the nature and its symbols are imparted with human features and abilities. poetical silence author verbal

Personification is the concession of human and animal qualities and their personification to nature phenomena or notions [3, c. 332]. Personification is a stylistically marked displacement that has qualities of nonce words, which transform into stable socially canonized linguistic units. Personification is a pellucid successivity human behaviour toward the appropriate hature phenomenon [4, p. 177]. "This prevailing way of artistic reinterpretation is considered to be so easy, that the conversation about it, is limited only by short definition and few examples for illustration" [5, p. 61]. Personification does not function only as a decorative mean, as such that functions as a way of linguistication of actual meaning, charm and decoration for landscape images. This creative step is adherently valid. А. S. Lebedevsky defines three main conditions of personification: 1) object that is personified has to be considered as independently existing regardless of speaker's perception; 2) object that is personified has to be able to control the dimensional form which would be simple for understanding by the recipient; 3) object that is personified has to be imparted with typical for humans and animals qualities and ability to perform actions [5, p. 62].

It is valid to study the personification taking into consideration the final disposition sphere: living beings or human. On the basis of it three types are separated: personification, anthroponimization and spiritualization. Personification is an attribution of specific characteristics and human qualities to inanimate objects and phenomena [6]. Anthroponimization is an attribution of specific human features to fauna representatives. Spiritualization is an attribution of specific human and fauna representatives' features to inanimate objects and phenomena.

The usage of this verbal unit with the capital letter is valid on the pages of poetical works, e.g.: THOU still unravish'd bride of quietness, / Thou foster-child of Silence and slow Time [7, p. 878]; But still let Silence trew night-watches keepe, / That sacred Peace may in assurance rayne [7, p. 243]. In this example the phenomenon of silence is subjected to personification or impersonating. Such a writing style transforms this notion into the proper name spiritualizing it and imparting it with features of an animate being at the same time.

Nature Silence also shows personified features, though in this case it is valid to observe the personification taking into consideration the final disposition sphere: animate beings or human. The narrower disposition sphere is represented by personified elements demonstrating the assimilation either to human or to animate beings in general, e.g.: Which the wild sea-murmur fills, / And soft sunshine, and the sound [7, p. 840-841]. The verbal units murmur represents dominant features of human demesne, but in poetry this capacity is also submitted to fauna objects, e.g.: A FLOCK of sheep that leisurely pass by / One after one; the sound of rain, and bees / Murmuring; the fall of rivers, winds and seas [7, p. 680]. Moreover, only those elements which characterize the soft sounding of nature phenomena become personified.

The narrower disposition sphere is formed by elements belonging to the human category only, e.g.: And now 'twas like all instruments, / Now like a lonely flute; / And now it is an angel's song, / That makes the heavens be mute [7, p. 693].The verbal unit mute belongs only to human sphere, as it characterizes beings capable of pronouncing distinct and understandable phrases. Personified element heaven acquires human features which leads to the creation of the unique Nature Silence.

As a result of personification that is implemented by lexical means which belong to human sphere, namely: voiceless, e.g.: Lost Echo sits amid the voiceless mountains [7, p. 860], soundless, e.g.: Spirit of a winter's night; / When the soundless earth is muffled [7, p. 871]; noiseless, e.g.: Again the deathless grass, so noiseless, soft and green, /Again the blood-red roses blooming [8, p. 85], Nature Silence is assimilated to Human Silence.

Thus, personification is the concession of human and living beings' qualities to inanimate objects. Namely personification is the most used and widely spread stylistic device meant to convey the poetic silence image.

Poets have always resorted to creation of associations between human and nature. Mostly, it is observed in landscape lyric poetry. Inanimate objects (plants, celestial or even nature phenomena) are empowered to perform thinking processes and actions that belong to human endozone . In other words, they get anthropocentric features [9, p. 313-315].

All the verbal units of poetical silence image are divided into dominants and peripheral ones. The degree of their integration into the poetical scope is presented in the Table 1.

Table 1 - Quantitative and percentage characteristic of dominant and peripheral verbal units

The word silence is the first one coming to mind after reminding about silence and mute. This lexeme is used either as a noun or other morphological variations: Slowly, silently, now the moon / Walks the night in her silver shoon; / This way, and that, she peers, and sees, / Silver fruit upon silver trees [10, p. 23]; Lie still, sleep becalmed, sufferer with the wound /In the throat, burning and turning. All night afloat / On the silent sea we have heard the sound / That came from the wound wrapped in the salt sheet [8, p. 34]; Never until the mankind making / Bird beast and flower / Fathering and all humbling darkness /

Tells with silence the last light breaking / And the still hour / Is come of the sea tumbling in harness [8, p. 48]; All silent are her poppied vales / And all her long Arcadian dales, / Where idleness is gathered up / A magic draught in summer's cup [11, p. 98]; A silent smithy, a silent inn, nor fails / In the bare moonlight or the thick-furred gloom, / In tempest or the night of nightingales, / To turn the cross-roads to a ghostly room [12, p. 78].

In given examples nature symbols are personified. Nature phenomena and its symbols cannot really talk, as the speaking process is inherent only for human. Speaking is possible only when there are any sounds, this is why given expressions have the figurative (metaphorical) nature.

Authors exteriorize the Nature Silence image using the silence itself as an active person. The fact that silence has a direct relation to Nature becomes clear from the context of poetical work, e.g.: And the lightnings of adoration / Back to black silence melt and mourn [8, p. 56]; Wash on, O waves of time! / Melt, noons, the frosty rime! / Welcome the shadow vast, / The silence that shall last! [13, p. 23].

Possessive case is used in poetical discourse in order to mark the Nature Silence, e.g.: In a cavernous, swung / Wave's silence, wept white angelus knells [8, p. 41].

Lexeme still is often used in the representation of the poetical silence image, e.g.: Never until the mankind making / Bird beast and flower / Fathering and all humbling darkness / Tells with silence the last light breaking / And the still hour / Is come of the sea tumbling in harness [8, p. 58]; The winds are still, or the dry church-tower grass / Knows not their gentle motions as they pass [14, p. 67].

Silence concerns inanimate objects “hour” and“winds”. Physically they are not able to create any sounds. That demonstrates that the metaphorization exists. Still hour means the calmness in the environment, the absence of the strong wind. The winds are still means not absolute absence of sounds and wind, but their obscurity.

Other dominant lexemes which convey the silence image are not widely used. They are synonymous and relevant with the topic. Mostly, they are represented by adjectives, e.g.: Save me from curious conscience, that still hoards / Its strength for darkness, burrowing like a mole; / Turn the key deftly in the oiled wards, / And seal the hushed casket of my soul [15, с. 324]; A calm wind blows that raised the trees like hair / Once where the soft snow's blood was turned to ice [8, p. 63].

Authors often use the method of indirect metaphorical silence exteriorization, e.g.:

Music, when soft voices die, / Vibrates in the memory; / Odours, when sweet violets sicken, /Live within the sense they quicken [14, p. 58].

The full silence is conveyed by lexemes silence, quiet, still, calm and their derivatives. Given lexemes can be presented in various parts of speech and word-combinations. The descriptive conveying of silence nominates the silent effect indirectly.

Among peripheral verbal units of poetical Nature Silence images the lexeme whisper is separated, e.g.: Ever they watched it hovering near - / A mystery beyond thought to plumb - / And often, in loathing and in fear, / They heard cold danger whisper. Come! [10, p. 31]; And - but I must not blame her--in my ear / Death whispers! / and the end, / thank God! draws near!” [16, p. 75]; I know the solemn monotone / Of waters calling unto me; /1 know from whence the airs have blown / That whisper of the Eternal Sea [13, p. 14].

The lexeme whisper performs the subject function and works as an acting person, e.g.: As down in lowly reverence I knelt, /Its very breath has kissed my burning cheek; / But I in vain have hushed my own to hear /A wing or whisper stir the silent air!” [16, p. 65]; The whisper of the aspens is not drowned, / And over lightless pane and footless road, / Empty as sky, with every other sound / Not ceasing, calls their ghosts from their abode [12, p. 43];

In many cases whisper is used concerning wind semantizing the attributes of strong, slow, low and calm, e.g.: The leaves they dance, the leaves they fall. The whisper of the wind. / One more season, one more year. The change, it now begins. / For many years, your presence felt. The trees prepare to sleep / As I wonder at your work, your voice begins to speak [17, p. 3]; Awake, awake! hark how th ' wood rings; / Winds whisper, and the busy springs /A concert make; /Awake! Awake! [18, p. 51].

The lexeme “mutter” that also represents not absolute but a relative silence, when sounds exist, but they are muted, e.g.: Rain comes down through the alders, / Its low conducive voices / Mutter about let-downs and erosions / And yet each drop recalls / The diamond absolutes [19, p. 126].

The synonymous lexeme with the previous one is to mute, e.g.: “The wooing kestrel, ” I said, “mutes his mating-note / To please the harmony of this sweet silence. ” [20, p. 218]. The given extract is a bright example of anthroponimization, as “kestrel” is the kind of birds that is imparted with the human ability to make the voice sound less loud.

Verbal units lisping and dull-sounding gravitate toward rarities, e.g.: Come, let us give ourselves to dreams / By lisping margins of her streams [11, p. 48]; Find a few important words, and a lot of low-keyed, / Dull-sounding ones. She approached me / About buying her desk. Suddenly the street was /Bananas and the clangor of Japanese instruments [7, p. 519-520].

Non-absolute silence is marked with verbal units which indicate the silence image indirectly, e.g.: A tap at the pane, the quick sharp scratch / And blue spurt of a lighted match, / And a voice less loud, through its joys and fears, / Than the two hearts beating each to each! (RobertBrowning) [21, p. 174].

By quantitative calculation of the degree of integration of Nature Silence lexical verbal units, we came to conclusion that not all the units have the same usage frequency. Mentioned characteristics are evident in the Table 2.

Table 2 - Quantitative and percentage characteristic of Nature Silence verbal units

Therefore, not all the verbal units are used for the conveying of personified poetical silence images with the same integration degree. Dominant verbal units (silence, quiet, still, calm) are the most widely spread, while peripheral ones (noiseless, soundless, to mute, to hush, peaceful, to murmur, to whisper) are rare. Their derivatives explicate the semi-silence of nature referents and are characterized by stable generic belonging.

Conclusions. Artistic (literary) discourse is the auspicious environment for the forming and functioning of silence image as creative self-expression of the author. The literary discourse lends the free discretion not only human, but also nature providing it with human features, characteristics and abilities, which means that perception vector shifts from human to nature. Personification as stylistic device of poetical silence representation is the most efficient taking into consideration the ability to convey the inner world and ideas of the author to his recipients.

We consider the study of poetical silence to be perspective in heterogeneous discourses.

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