Stylistic Analysis "Three Men in a Boat" Chapter 14

Analysis

Three Men in a Boat

Chapter 14

The text is a chapter from the novel “Three Men in a Boat” written by Jerome Klapka Jerome. He is a well- known English writer who is famous for his art of story-telling. His stories are always full of humour which is expressed in provoking situations based on misunderstanding. With a help of sparkling humour the writer emphasized all the weaknesses of human character features. The theme of the text is as follows: holiday-making during the river-trip. The given passage tells us about three men who decided to leave their boat and went walking around the village called Sonning. The views were really picturesque there and the atmosphere was authentic.

They couldn’t wander over the village more because it was late, so they came back to one of the Shiplake Islands for spending a night there. Then George offered to cook an Irish stew. Harris and the narrator tried to peel potato but they failed. In the end the characters added to the stew all the ingredients they had, all the meal- leavings.

The Irish stew tasted great. Everybody liked it very much in spite of its over caloricity and the mix of random products.

This chapter and the whole novel is a humorous story. Humour has two principal types: humour of situation (the author makes us laugh at definite funny or absurd facts, ridiculous situations which are contrary to common sense, for instance, the characters combined the ingredients which absolutely couldn’t be put in a pot together) and humour of words (the reader doesn’t laugh at what is going on in the story but how it is put by the author, for example: “If you never try a new thing how can you tell what it’s like? It’s men such as you that hamper the world’s progress. Think of the man who first tried German sausage!”. Both of the types are represented in the text. Humour is achieved by different stylistic devices, the main device in the text is irony that is based on the contrast between what is said and what is meant. “It’s men such you that hamper the world’s ; (indeed, such a trifle- cooking the Irish stew, a priori can not make an obstacle for development of humanity). Also we may find one more stylistic device, it’s anticlimax. This notion implies a sudden drop from something strong, significant, important to something trivial, funny. “We worked steadily for five-and-twenty minutes, and did four ;- this sentence presents a notable pattern of using anticlimax. The author can choose to use anticlimax strategically. The main reason is comedic purpose, creation of “humoristic veil”. Exaggeration (hyperbole) can be found rather frequently in the text. The definition of this notion is as follows: a way of speaking or writing that someone or something sound much bigger, better, smaller, worse, more unusual, etc; a figure of speech not intended to be taken literally. “The job turned out to be the biggest thing of its kind that I had ever been ; (the readers understand, for sure, that peeling potato can not be the most significant thing in one’s life); “…we would require the rest of the evening for scraping ; (we realize that process of cleaning clothes from just potatoes peel-off doesn’t demand so much time); “We had a discussion as to whether the rat should go in or ; (here the word “discussion” stands out, it implies rather long intelligent conversation with arguments suggesting in favour of one’s point of view; so it appears to be ridiculous to have this type of conversation on the question concerning ordinary cooking); “I don’t think I ever enjoyed a meal ;; “…a dish with a taste like nothing else on ; (the readers know a dish having made out of the hash of different products can not taste great). All these exaggerations serve to accentuate a specific point, hyperbole is used for the purpose of humour, for emphasizing the absurdity of what was going on. Such stylistic device as antithesis serves for achieving a contrasting effect, exempli gratia: “The more we peeled, the more peel there seemed to be left on”; “…it was about the size of pea-nut”. Here the author also intended to reach humoristic effect.

However, there is one more stylistic device that is used not for making the readers laugh but for enriching the writing style, it is an epithet (a descriptive literary device that describes something or someone in such a way that it helps in making its characteristics more prominent than they actually are). The exposition is full of epithets which set the tone for further narrating. For instance: “the most fairy- like nook”, “dainty splendour”, “a veritable picture”, “quaint rooms”, “latticed windows”, “awkward stairs”, “winding passages” and others: “a splendid opportunity”, “a slap-up supper”, “a fascinating idea”, “something so fresh and piquant”, “the old hackneyed things”, “an earnest and thoughtful air”. The usage of so many attributes helps the readers to immerse in the atmosphere and situations which are described more deeply and to “adopt” all the feelings which were experienced by the characters.

Moreover, we can pay attention to polysyndeton that serves not only for joining words, phrases, clauses, but it also acts as a stylistic device that brings rhythm to the text with the repetition of a conjunction in quick succession. Example: “…with low quaint rooms and latticed windows and awkward stairs and winding passages” (in this case the author draws the readers’ attention to the diversity of different ancient and authentic pieces of an old country inn interior); “…all bumps and warts and hollows” (here it is the repetition of the conjunction “and” that helps us to imagine what an extraordinary shape those potatoes had indeed). Polysyndeton is also applied to the part of the text where the narrator spoke about the ingredients added to the stew; the conjunction “and” there joins not only nouns (direct objects), but also verbs (which perform the function of predicate).

The text contains a lot of stylistic devices which make the author’s style of writing really vivid and bright. Having analyzed all of them, we may observe the author’s tendency to make us laugh, that is the main reason of using a great number of them.

The readers notice other interesting features in the text. These are some speech patterns which have a definite way of translation into Russian and a set grammatical structure. “It is more like a stage village than one built of bricks and ; (Это больше похоже на сценические декорации, чем на реальную деревню, дома которой построены из кирпичей и извёстки.). “We roamed about sweet Sonning for an hour or ; (Мы бродили по прекрасной деревушке Соннинг где- то около часа.). “George said that… it would be a splendid opportunity to try a good, slap-up ; (… это была бы прекрасная возможность…). “I should never have thought that peeling potatoes was such an ; (Никогда бы и не подумал…). “The more we peeled, the more peel there seemed to be left ; (Чем больше мы чистили картофель, тем больше, казалось, на нём оставалось кожуры.). “There was no potato ; (Картошки и не осталось.). “That won’t ; (Так не годится.). “…he would rather on the safe side… (Он бы лучше не стал рисковать.).

As for the syntax and grammatical peculiarities. The given story describes the actions happened in the past, however not only The Past Simple Tense is used, but also The Present simple (in the direct speech and the village description), The Past Perfect Tense (“The job turned out to be the biggest thing of its kind that I had ever been ;). There are both complex (“It was still early when we got settled…”) and compound sentences (“George stirred it all up, and then he said…”). There are not so many contracted forms: “That won’t do”; “…how can you tell what it’s like?”; “I don’t think I ever enjoyed a meal ;.

We can observe a usage of synonyms, it helps to vary the writing style and to avoid numerous words repetitions, for instance: to put up at- to get settled, to go for a walk round the village- to roam about the village, remains- odds and ends- remnants, bumps- warts, nourishing- nutritious- rich, to be on the safe side- not to try experiments, to make- to cook, cheerfully- skittishly.

The emotive key of the text is humorous, the general slant is realistic.

The story may be divided into several parts. The exposition starts with the description of a village that the characters were passing by during their river-trip. The main part is about preparations for cooking an Irish stew (peeling potatoes, putting different ingredients into a pot, Montmorency’s contribution, a discussion to put a water-rat in an Irish stew or not. The climax is expressed in the sentence: “It was a great success, that Irish ;. The denouement is about the further description of tasting the Irish stew.

It is noticeable, the sentence: “It was a great success, that Irish ; has an emphatic structure that is based on redundancy, therefore, it becomes clear for the readers that here the climax is. There is one more sentence with the emphatic structure: ‘It’s men such as you that hamper the world’s ;.

The story is full of funny and ridiculous moments, nevertheless, it allows us not only to laugh at, but to think about our attitude to a deal. If treat the deal in the right spirit, with humour and enthusiasm, it is possible to overcome all the obstacles.