МИСТЕЦТВО ПЕРЕКЛАДУ ТА ТЕОРІЯ ІНТЕРПРЕТАЦІЇ

LECTURE 1
Literary Text Interpretation as a Branch of Linguistics
Why do we read stories? Because they give us pleasure, because we enjoy them. When we tell a story we
expect our listeners to respond to it. When we listen to a story we are expected to react - to laugh, smile, nod our heads,
to be surprised, shocked. A listener's interest is based on the way the story is told, on the voice and manner of its telling.
When we interpret a story we explain it to ourselves, and try to make sense of it. We form subjective
impressions as we read it but we have relatively objective considerations in mind when we interpret it. We must keep
in mind that no reading of a story is entirely objective: every interpretation is one way of understanding the text among
many; every interpretation is influenced by our particular language, culture and experience. What do we mean by
interpretation? - Understanding.
An interpretation is an argument about a story's meaning as we understand it. It is our way of stating and
supporting with arguments based on analysis what the story means. Hence, interpretation relies on our intellectual
comprehension rather than on our emotional response of the literary work.
Interpretation involves four related intellectual acts: observing, connecting, inferring and avaluating. То
understand a fictional work we first observe its details. We notice descriptive details about the time and place, we listen
to what the characters say, to their manner of saying it; we note how the characters interact. As we observe all these
things we make connections among the details and try to formulate a sense of the story. On the basis of these
connections we develop inferences or interpretive hypotheses. Then we come to some conclusion about the message of
the story based on our observations, connections and inferences.
Then we move to the final stage of the reading process, that is evaluation. An evaluation is judgement, an
opinion about a literary work formulated as a conclusion.
Our evaluation of a story depends upon interpretation; our judgement of a story depends on how we understand
it. When we evaluate a story, we appraise it according to our special combination of cultural, moral and aesthetic
values.
"I think the way to read a book is always to see what happens, but in a good novel, more always happens than
meets the eye. The mind is led on into the greater depths by the book's symbols, that is to say the book operates on
several levels. The true the symbol the deeper it leads you: the more meaning it opens up. The reader may not see them,
but they have their effect on him nonetheless. That is the way modern writers hide their theme, i.e. the ability to see
different levels of reality in one image or situation".
People have a habit of saying "What is the theme of the story". And when they have got a definite statement
they got off happy and feel it is no longer necessary to read the story» (Flannery O’Connor).
Literary Text Interpretation is primarily engaged in the analysis, evaluation, and text production. Where there
are texts - there are rules of governing text production and interpretation. These sets of rules, which are variously
described as codes, genres, discourses, and styles are the object of Text Interpretation.
In the process of their development different active schools of literary criticism tend to privilege one of the
elements of the reading process (the author, the reader or the text). Let's start with the extremes.
At present we have both author-oriented and reader-oriented criticism. By author-oriented criticism we mean
interpretation that privileges the role of the author in the text processing and seeks to recover the authorial intention as
the key to a text's meaning. It is the most conservative way of arriving at the meaning of a text which takes its roots
from the Bible, tending to regard the author as God. The burden is on the reader who must recover the author's
intentions.
At the other extreme we have a critical school that emphasises the reader and privileges the reader's response to
the text. The reader is free to make any meaning he wants and the possibility of misreading and misunderstanding is
ignored.
In teaching Text Interpretation we'll stick to some middle ground (American New Criticism), namely a literary
approach criticism that emphasises the text itself postulating both the relevance of the author's intention to the
interpretation of a text and the reader's freedom to make any kind of interpretative gesture. This critical school serves
the reader from passivity by assuming that virtually every text has "areas of blindness" that are crucial to its
interpretation. Text is treated as open, incomplete, insufficient. Text as a piece of writing is understood as a product of a
person, at a given point of human history, in a given form of discourse, taking its meaning from the interpretive skills of
individual readers using the grammatical, semantic and cultural codes. The major task of this course is to teach students
to acquire the interpretative skills of a definite culture and also to see different texts as codes, so that they can be
properly read and appreciated. "A text is always a result of an arbitrary decision to stop writing at a particular point."
In the course of Text Interpretation we'll stick to a semiotic approach, which was developed by the Chicago
school of rhetorical critics and popularised by R.Jakobson. They treat texts as cultural and historical codes
distinguishing the following elements in the process of communication (reading):
1) the sender of a message (the author);
2) the message (text);
3) the coding appliance (words);
4) the channel of communication;
5) the signal;
6) the decoding appliance;
7) the receiver of information (the reader);
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 8) the message (text).
The sender of a message is any object which is able to receive, preserve and use information (a man, a
computer). The message - is thoughts and feelings the sender of a message conveys to the receiver of information. To
make it possible for the receiver to understand it one should materialise a message, i.e. to express it in the form of a
word, a statement, a gesture, a mime, a picture, a work of art. The coding appliance is defined as a means of realisation
a message and transforming it into a signal, into an object or into an action which can be perceived by a man. The
human language is the most widely spread code on the basis of which semiotic systems of the second level are formed:
the language of fiction, the language of poetry, the language of music. Under the channel of communication we
understand the human voice, writing or the environment in which the signal functions: social, historical, cultural. The
signal is always influenced by the environment. A polish writer S.Lerri said: "A literary text as any other texts is not
independent as stones and trees are; they exist objectively. The signal systems conveying information are influenced by
the men using them. One and the same book in different spheres of culture, in different historical formations has not
one and the same meaning, as its semantics depends on the given number of readers."

LECTURE 2
Plot and Plot Structure of a Literary Work
The impact of a literary work depends to a great extend upon its plot and plot structure.
Plot is a series of interlinked events in which the characters of the story participate. The events are arranged
in a definite sequence (not necessary in chronological order) to catch and hold the reader's interest.
Every plot is a series of meaningful events. They are meaningful in the sense that the writer does not follow all
the events in which the characters of this story would participate in real life during the span of time coveted by the
story. He selects the events which are meaningful to the message of the story: which reveal certain features of the
characters, their motives and morals.
We appear to understand an event as having its own "internal structure". It can be punctual or drawn out; single
or repeating; closed or open; preserving creating or destroying entities; cyclic or not cyclic.
Each event of the story is always logically related to the message, the theme, the conflict and is
psychologically related to the development of the characters within a story. Sometimes the logical and sometimes the
psychological aspects may be the more obvious.
The event of the plot do not always involve physical movement, but psychological as well. In this case the plot
reveals the dynamics in the psychological state of a character. Hence, the reader should keep in mind that every event in
the plot is always suggestive, and to interpret a story he should discover the role the events of the story play in
characterisation and in conveying the message of the story.
Most stories have plots. But there are some which have no plots. To these belong stories describing nature,
"novels of ideals", stories presenting stream of consciousness, where the thoughts of the character are presented as they
occur, regardless of their logic.
And plot involves repetition, but not mechanical. A plot is comprised of a variety of events, each of which
recalls the reader (directly or indirectly) to the central problem.
Plot may be an artificial arrangement of life, but it is the plot that gives a narrative its power, uniqueness, and
excellence. It is the basis of the narrative art; the shaping of human experience so that we can understand it; the vehicle
through which the artist offers his\her vision of life arid the world. It is plot that gives a story its charm and beauty
(E.Froster).
Plot is the planned arrangement of actions and events. They do not occur in a haphazard way. Actions and
events are causally related, and they progress through a variety of conflicts and opposing forces to a climax and resolution.
The arrangement and interplay of elements of plot structure may assume numerous patterns in fiction, but modern
critics have focused on a five-part sequence of plot elements:
exposition introduces the characters and describes the setting. It contains the necessary preliminaries to the
events of the plot and an unstable element that sets the plot in motion.
rising actions (complications) - a series of events (each event causes the one which follows), which heighten
the conflict.
Climax - the most important moment (event) in the narrative.
Falling actions - a typically brief period in which these is less intensity of effect of the conflict; (denouement)
Resolution - the ending of the conflict.
We can visualise this conventional plot pattern in terms of the pyramid - a diagram first was proposed by German
critic Gustav Freytag (19 C).

A great part of the pleasure we experience in the reading of fiction derives from our discovering how conflicts
arise and develop; how one event causes another in a heightening series of conflicts, how-characters are caught in these

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conflicts, engaged in choices that makes the climax. Finally, if the ending is a successful one, we gain satisfaction from
the stable situation that emerges - whether it is happy, tragic, mysterious, or whatever.
How to begin these conflicts and how to end them are always twin agonies (George Eliot). "Beginnings are
always troublesome. Conclusions are the weak points of most authors. And between the beginning and conclusion there
is the very large business of organising and resolving main and minor conflicts, placing protagonists and antagonists
incorrect relationships, selecting episodes and scenes to dramatise the conflicts."
It should be stressed that characters, actions, conflict and setting work together to accomplish the author's
purpose. The setting is generally established at the beginning of the story, in the exposition.
In the exposition the writer introduces the theme, the characters and contains the necessary preliminaries to the
events of the plot, casts light on the circumstances influencing the development of the characters. It may be compressed
into one sentence or extended into several paragraphs.
The exposition may be compressed into one sentence or extended into several paragraphs. Extended exposition
provide the reader with information about when and where the events take place, who the characters are and what the
story is about. If the characters and backgrounds are not special not much exposition is required.
The events of the plot are set in a particular place and time. The place and time of the actions of a story form
the setting is scarcely noticeable, in others it plays a very important role. Eudora Weity wrote about setting: "I think the
scene of place is as essential in good and honest writing as a logical mind. It is by knowing where you stand that you
are able to judge where you are. It preserves in bringing us back to earth when we fly too high. It never really stops
informing us, for it is changing, reflecting like the mind of man itself.
Setting is the place and time of a story. Real or imaginary, concrete or symbolic, "a slice of life" or a cultural
panorama, a moment or an eternity, setting is a wellspring of a story's mood and atmosphere, the sharper of characters'
actions and emotions and a prompter of events.
Setting can be dark or light, melancholy or gay, but it cannot exist without description. The functions of the
setting are:
 the setting (description of nature) helps to evoke the necessary atmosphere (mood);
 it may reinforce characterisation by either paralleling or contrasting the actions;
 the setting may be a reflection of the inner state of a character;
 it may place the character in a recognisable realistic environment, including geographical
names and allusions to historical events.
"Domestic interiors may serve to reveal certain features of the character." "A man's house is an extension of
himself". Such setting are metonymic/metaphoric expressions of character.
When the main conflict is between man and nature the selling becomes the chief antagonist whom the hero
must overcome.
The second structural component which follows exposition is complications involve actions, thoughts or
feelings which moves the plot towards the moment of decision - the climax.
Plot of any story involves characters and conflict. They imply each other. The Contemporary American poet,
novelist, critic Robert Perm Warren said: "No conflict, no story". Conflict is at the root of the unstable situation at the
start of the plot. Plot itself will pattern this conflict, but it is conflict that translates characters and ideas into action.
Without conflict plot cannot exist.
Conflict in fiction is the opposition (struggle) between forces or characters.
«When the main character (the protagonist) is fighting against someone (the antagonist) or something (a
nonhuman force can also be the antagonist) outside himself we term this variety of conflict external. When the
opposition of forces takes place inside minds of characters this type of conflict is internal, (e.g. against, opposing forces
within themselves; against fate and destiny). Different types of external conflicts arc usually termed as follows:
 man against man;
 man against nature (the sea, the desert, the frozen North, wild beasts);
 man against society, the established order in the society (a conflict with poverty, racial hostility, injustice,
exploitation, inequality).
 between one set of the values against another set of values.
Infernal conflicts are termed as "man against himself, take place with the character and are localised in the
inner world of the character and are rendered through his thoughts, feelings, intellectual processes. Here the character is
torn between opposing features of his personality.
Seldom do we find a single type of conflict in a good story. Usually it is based on several conflicts of different
types, as conflicts in fiction are suggested by contradictions in reality.
Conflicts in fiction are affected by the writer's outlook, by his view of certain types of people, problems, social
phenomena. It's reality that he reflects in his work from his own point of view. From the point of view of the author plot
can be artificial and formulaic or aesthetically valuable. Writers of detectives stories, mysteries of plot formulas.
The climax is, the key event, the crucial moment of the story. It is often referred to as the moment of
illumination for the whole story because it is the moment when the relationship between the events becomes clear, their
role in the development of characters is clarified.
The denouement is the unwinding of the actions; it includes the events immediately following the climax that
bring the actions to the end. It is the point at which the fate of the main character is clarified.
A story may have no denouement ("open texts"). By leaving it out the author invites the reader to sum up all
the events and circumstances that accompanied the character of the story and imagine the outcome himself.

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 The usual order in which the components of plot structure occur is: exposition, complications, climax,
denouement. Novels may have 2, more components: the prologue (which contains facts from beyond the past of the
story) the epilogue (which contains additional facts about the future of the characters).
Any rearrangement of the components of the plot structure is meaningful. It may affect the atmosphere and
introduce the necessary mood, increase the tension and the reader's suspense. We may generalise by saying that there is
a variety of plot structure techniques. A story may have:
 a straight line narrative presentation, when the events are arranged as they occur, in chronological order;
 a complex narrative structure, when the events are not arranged in chronological order, when there are a lot
of flashbacks and foreshadowings;
 a circular pattern when the closing event in the story returns the reader to the introductory story;
 a flame structure when there is a story within a story. The two stories contrast or parallel.
Hence, the intensity of the impression depends on presentational sequencing i.e. the order in which the writer
presents the information included into the story. One can distinguish the following devices of presentational
sequencing:
 retardation - the with holding information until the appropriate time of questions may arise the answers to
which may either follow rapidly or emerge gradually in the course of the narrative.
 flashback is a scene of the past inserted into the narrative.
 the subplots, double plots and multiple plots;
 foreshadowing is a look towards the future, remark or hint that prepares the reader for what is to follow.
Any shift in the organisation of the plot structure affects the total response of the reader. "Cut a good story
anywhere and it will bleed". (Anton Chekhov). His observation reflects brilliantly the organic connection between all
the components of plot structure, (e.g. the denouement placed at the beginning of the story creates a certain atmosphere,
increases suspense, sharpens the reader's interest.

LECTURE 3
The System of Images. Means of Characterisation.
An image in fiction is a subjective reflection of reality as it is inspired by the writer's power of imagination.
An image is on the one hand, a generalisation and is never a complete identity of a person, thing or
phenomenon. There is always something left out by the writer, emphasised or exaggerated. On the other hand an image
is concrete with its individual peculiarities.
Images are always emotive. In the reader's mind they call up not only visual pictures, they also arouse feelings.
As our emotional responses are directed by the words writers are so particular about the choice of words. However,
when we read fiction, it is not the words that we actually respond to, it is the images which these words create that arose
the reader's response.
The images in a literary work form a system, which comprises a hierarchy of images, beginning with micro-
images (formed by a word/ word combination) and ending with synthetic images "extended images" (formed by the
whole literary work). In literature great attention is paid to human characters (character-image) but there are also
landscape-images, animal-images. (The Jungle Book by R.Kipling)
Yet character is also a way of being; it determines how a person act, In real life people tend to hide their
essentials beings, to be unpredictable at times. Here is the difference between actual people and invented characters, for
the purpose of the author is not to conceal, but to reveal his inner development, the mental and emotional suites. Eudora
Welty observes: "Characters in the plot connect us with the vastness of our secret life, which is endlessly explorable ".
Nevertheless, there are similarities in the ways we attempt to understand real and fictional characters.
We do talk about people on an everyday basis, analysing, criticising and comparing them. We try to discover
what lies beneath their looks, speech, dress, actions, and viewpoints. In a sense we know how to "create" people, and in
doing so we come close to the greatest mystery in the art of fiction - the ability of the author to breathe life into
characters who are after all mere constructs of words.
Character-images are both real and unreal. They are real in the sense that they can b visualised, you can see
them act, you can hear them talk. They are unreal in the sense that they are imaginary. Even if they are drawn from life
and embody the most typical features of human nature, even if they are images of historical people, they are not
identical with them, they are products of the writer's imagination.
According to their importance in a literary text characters can be divided into: major and minor. A character
that dominates the story from the beginning up to end is called main, protagonist, central, major or a hero/heroine. The
antagonist s the personage opposing the protagonist. The villain is the character with marked negative features. The foil
is a character with distinctly opposing features to the protagonist through which his positive features are sharply
accentuated.
When a character expresses the author's viewpoint directly he is said to be the author’s mouthpiece. If a
character is developed round one or several features he becomes a type (characterised by qualities that are typical of a
certain social group or class) or a caricature (when a character is so exaggerated that he appears ridiculous, yet
recognisable).
According to the specific way they are presented in a story characters can be simple/complex; static/dynamic;
flat/well-rounded. A static character, one who does not change in the course of the narrative is usually flat, while
dynamic character who does change is complex, well-rounded.

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 The term "flat" and "well-rounded" were proposed by F.M. Forster (1927). "The lest of round character is
whether it is capable of surprising in a convincing way. If it never surprises it is flat. If it does not convince, it is flat
pretending to be round". Simple characters are constructed round a single trait. Hamlet is a complex character.
Complete description of absolutely all the actions and thoughts of the characters in fiction are impossible and
unnecessary. Moreover a full description is substituted by a detail. Depending on the value which details have in fiction
one should distinguish between artistic details and particularities:
The artistic detail is always suggestive and has a large meaning and implies a great deal more than is directly
expressed. An artistic detail acquires expressive force and has both direct and indirect meaning. It is a poetic
representation of a whole scene, it is very stimulating to the imagination.
In fiction not all details are artistic details. Some of them just serve and add something new about a character,
or a place, or event. Such details are called patricularies. They are incidental (in the sense that it is difficult to explain
the writer's choice), but they are used for representing reality in a concrete form.
The difference between artistic detail and particularises is as follows: an artistic detail is significant beyond its
literal meaning and has expressive force, where as a particularity signifies only what is directly expressed by it and has
no implication.
The characters may be described from different aspects: physical. emotional, moral, spiritual, social.
Characterisation is the creation, presentation and development of character in fiction.
Basically we learn about people in the fiction through direct and indirect characterization. With direct
characterisation, the author literally tells us what character is like - the outer and inner qualities of his /her being. This
procedure is far more common the 18-19th C. More typically, however, modern writers explore characters through
indirect methods: what characters do, what they say, how they dress, what they look like, what they think about one
another.
When presented with indirect characterisation, readers must catch and discover character's inner motivations
"Character is action". (F.Scott Fitzgerald). We become interested in action and plot only to the extend that we are
absorbed by character - by those figures drawn from "reality" who speak to us about the conflicts, problems, pleasures,
possibilities and mysteries of existence.
There are various means of characterisation. Presentation of the character through action. People are generally
judged by their deeds. Actions may reveal the character from different aspects. Actions include small gestures, a
thought, a word, a decision, an impulse and a whole event.
Speech characteristics. Analysing speech characteristic one should be alert for: style markers (markers of
official style; markers of informal conversational style; initiating signals; hesitation pauses; false starts. Markers of the
emotional state of character (the use of emphatic inversion; emotionally coloured words, the use of breaks-in-the—
narrative; the use of the tailing off into silence which reflect deep emotions or doubt. Attitudinal markers (words
denoting attitudes, intensifies). Markers of the character's educational level: bookish words, rough words, slang,
deviations from the standard; markers of regional (and dialectal speech, which define the speaker as to his origin,
nationality, social standing; markers оf thе characters. occupation; markers of the speaker's idiolect (his individual
speech peculiarities). Psychological portrayal and analysis of motive the penetration into the mind of the character,
description of his mental processes and some psychological changes that motivate his actions. It is generally revealed
by means of inner represented speech in the form of either free indirect speech or free direct speech.
The portrayal of a character (the relationship between the character and his appearance).
Description of the world of things that surround the character. Dornestic interiors of the setting are sometimes
treated a metonymic/metaphoric expressions of the character. "These houses express their owners". The use of a foil
which accentuates the opposed features of the character he is contrasted to.
The патіпg of characters. The name may be deliberately chosen to fit a certain character. (Mrs.Murdstone =
murder + stone) Shark Dodson, shark= a person clever at getting money from others in dishonest or merciless ways.
Such names are suggestive, as they bring into play the associations which the words they are composed of have.
All the means of characterisation the writer resort to, enable the reader to visualise and understand the
characters, to think, feel and worry with them as they face their problems, to trace the changes and growth in their
personalities.

LECTURE 4
Narrative Methods and Types of Narrative. Point of View
The narrative method involves such aspects as:
1) who narrates the story;
2) the way how narrator stands in relation to the events and to other characters of the story.
We are all well aware of the fact that the same people and events may be seem quite different when seen by
various people or from different angles. In the same way the author can vary the narrative method depending on what he
wants his readers to concentrate on.
Point of view is the position or vantage point from which the author presents the action of the story. It is the
point from which the writer decides to tell the story, as through it we are permitted to see from a special narrative
perspective the actions, events, characters that an author creates.
The history of the fiction reveals numerous ways of disclosing information through different narrative
perspectives but criticism traditionally has focused on three major types of point of view:

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 - omniscient, where the author sees and knows everything, moving across space and time, commenting on
character and action, an all knowing godlike creator;
- first person, in which the author allows one character to tell the story, thus limiting himself to what can be
seen, heard, felt, though or known by that single character;
- third person, in which actions, thoughts and perceptions are filtered through the mind of one character or the
minds of several characters.
By selecting one point of view or by combining points of view the author attempts to persuade the reader, who
hears a special "voice" operating in the story, to accept the world that is being created in fiction Writers by fiction
always wanted to create (invert) a special angle of vision in order to produce an authentic, or believable world and to
illuminate this world. The form of omniscience is one of the oldest point of view, stemming from the oral tradition.
However, as fiction moved towards the 20th C. We do not see and hear the author as directly as we once did. "The
artist, like God of creation, remains within, or behind his handwork invisible" (James Joyce)
The common aim of many modem fiction writers is to achieve invisibility by utilising a variety of points of
view which can be corresponding to different lenses for a camera. Each change of lens alters the relationship between
form and the subject. Typically the storyteller will be behind one of the several first-person or third person lenses or
points of view. Speaking from the "I vantage point, the imaginary author can project himself as a participant in the
action, an observer of the action or both.
The advantage, of the first person point of view is that it helps to create special kind of intimacy and there are
no significant limitations to it (but the narrator cannot see into the minds of others). If a story is a first person narrative,
(it is told from the narrator's point of view) the reader gets a biased understanding of the events and characters, because
he sees them through the perception of the character who narrates. At the same time any story always reveals the
author's point of view even if it is implied. The narrator's statements gain in weight and are more readily accepted by the
reader as he relates what he himself had seen. The first-person narrator tends to be more confiding. The narrator
assumes the informal tone, addresses the reader directly, confiding his personal impressions and thoughts.
One of the basic limitations is that a story is told by a character (that is by the first-person narrator) who is a
person and he can see and hear in this situation as a person can. The first-person narrator may be reliable and
unreliable. He may misinterpret some events. He relates his subjective point of view. But this limitation may turn into
an advantage; the reader is stimulated to pronounce his own judgement.
The third-person point of view can be limited or unlimited. With the limited third person point of view the
action is filtered through the mind or consciousness of only one character. As readers we know only what the central
character thinks and does; we cannot enter into the mind of one individual. From this narrative perspective the illusion
is created that we are sharing the thoughts, feeling and perceptions of a character who is confronting the world from a
clear angle of vision.
If authors desire a greater perspective of action and events they can resort to unlimited point of view. Here we
enter the minds of two or more characters. The scope of lens is broad. Thus, a writer must possess considerable skill in
order to move successfully from one consciousness to another without destroying either the unity of the story or the
impression that is described in a text a real, not artificial.
Another variety of third-person pint of view is objective (dramatic when author refuses to enter the mind of
any character. In this case, the writer views characters as we would view other people in normal life. We can interpret
them only through their actions and words, their behaviour and dress.
Each type of the above mentioned point of view has its special functions, powers, limitations. Great writers can
either stay within the limits of these modes or combine different modes. Some writers invert new techniques to enrich
point of view.
e.g. "Stream of consciousness" that puts us next to the highly associative thought processes of their
characters; "experimental second-person" or "you" point of view.
According to the above mentioned narrative methods one can distinguish the following four types of narrators:
- the main character when the author places himself in the position of the main character;
- a minor character the author gives this character his version of the events and personages;
- the omniscient author who narrates the story anonymously;
- the observer-author who records the speech and actions of the characters without analysing them. The stories
told by the observer-author may be presented in either of the following two forms: the dramatic or the pictorial.
The narrative method determines the dominant point of view. Depending on who tells the story it may be either
that of the character of that of the author. But it doesn't rule out the possibility of introducing other viewpoints into the
story. If the viewpoints are presented as independent the story is said to be "polyphonic". However, the dominant point
of view subordinates other viewpoints.
The narrative method conditions the language of the story, if the story is told by an omniscient author the
language is always literary. When the story is told by a character the language becomes a means of characterisation. It
reflects the narrator's education, occupation, emotional state and his attitude.
The narrative method may also affect the presentational sequencing of events. Thus the omniscient author will
arrange the events of the story as they occur, in chronological order. A first-person narrative is interrupted by
digressions, or may have haphazard flashbacks or foreshadowings.
Apart of that the narrative method may also affect the sequencing (or the choice) of literary representational
forms, such as narration, description, explanation. Various as they are all of them present different kinds of prose
writing. If the guiding purpose of the writer is to tell a story, to tell merely what happened, then the writing is a

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narrative. If the writer trends to tell how something looks, to re-create the thing in words we call it description. The
purpose of explanation is to explain by logic and to show relationships.
A narration arranges its material in time. Description organises it in space. Explanation organises its subject
not in time and .space, but by logic.
The purpose of narration is to present to the reader an account of an event or a succession of events arranged in
time. Narration organises the story into the beginning, the middle and the end. The beginning is to introduce the body of
narration and to catch the reader's interest, to puzzle him, thus stimulating to go on reading. The number of words to do
it will very according to the length and complexity of the story. The beginning only introduces the subject, but doesn't
develop it.
The middle of narration gives the development of events which are selected and arranged on the basis of many
reasons according to the problems raised, thus forming its plot.
The closing has one essential function - to signal the end of narration. The turn to the beginning is an effective
way of ending. Figurative closing means simply including in the final paragraph a figure of speech (simile or
metaphor).
Description is the art of translating perceptions into words. It involves two elements: the object which is seen
or heard and the observer a person who sees or hears it. Hence, description can be of two types: objective and
subjective.
Objective description is a factual account, the purpose of which is to inform the reader, the record and
reproduce in words a true picture of reality. It is usually organised in a clear plan based upon space, time, or function, or
a combination of these.
Subjective description doesn't seek to inform but to arouse emotion, focusing on the mood or feelings the
subject evokes in the 'observer. It can be achieved in two ways: directly or indirectly.
Explanation is writing that explains answering the question how? and why? Its object may be people, things,
ideas, some combination of these. The writer develops his material by offering examples as evidence, by comparing and
contrasting, by making analogies, by giving reasons, by classifying and dividing his subject, by showing cause and
effect.
Argumentative writing is designed to persuade by appealing to reason. Its task is by the use of reason to defend
what is true and to attack what is false. The essence of argument is reason and it. may work in two ways: by deduction
and by induction.
Deductive argumentation begins with true general premises to particular conclusion.
Inductive argumentation begins with facts: sometimes the writer finds it more convenient to indicate his
conclusion first and then bring forward the evidence which supports it. The evidence itself may take different forms.
The most frequent are: common knowledge, specific examples, statistical data. To additional specific evidence refer
examples, illustrations, analogy, comparison. Analogies are of two kinds: figurative (a comparison between things
belonging to different classes) and literal (a comparison of elements belonging to the same class.)
Definition is a form of classification. In the first part we say what general group the word belong to. In the
second part we say something about this particular member of the group and how it differs from the other members. We
classify things according to their functions or their appearance.

LECTURE 5
The Tonal System of a Literary Work
Tone is the writer's "voice" that we listen to in a work of fiction -his/her attitude toward the subject, Though
tone we enter the author's state of mind, sensing the anger, sadness, sympathy, joy, irony. Tone not only illuminates
theme, but also reinforces mood, and creates its own levels of tension and conflicting among characters.
Atmosphere is the general mood of a literary work. It is affected by such components of a literary work as:
plot, setting, characters, details, symbols and stylistic means. Let's take setting. Setting, real or imaginary, concrete pr
symbolic, "a slice of life" or a cultural panorama is the well spring of a story's mood or atmosphere, the shaper of
character's actions arid emotional responses, the prompter of events. Although characterisation, plot, and style are also
components of mood, setting (place, time, weather) situates us emotionally in the universe of fiction. Setting can be
dark or light, melancholy or gay but. it cannot exist without description (e.g. E.Hemingway "In our Time")
"They shot the six ministers at half-past six in the morning against the wall of the hospital. There were pools of
water in the country-yard. There were wet leaves on the paving of the country-yard".
We are introduced to an execution at sunrise, a harrowing moment that seems to stretch for us as if we are
tracking it with a slow-motion camera. The atmosphere is gloomy; the time is autumn, the ground is wet, the dead
leaves point us to the inevitable execution of the cabinet ministers.
e.g. Longston Hughes "On the Board". The opening paragraphs of the story establish the mood immediately,
one of cold, wet, discomfort.
"... he was not interested in snow. He was too hungry, too sleepy, too tired... He saw the snow when he
switched on his porch light and found standing there before him a big black man with snow on his face - obviously
unemployed".
Hughes established not only mood, but the possibility of conflict in the story.
The author s attitude is his/her view (judgement) of the characters and actions. It establishes the moral
standards according to which the reader is to make his judgements about the problems raised in the story. The attitude

7
of the writer to his subject matter determines the tone of the story. The tone is the light in which the characters and
events are depicted; It is closely related to atmosphere and attitude.
Tone in oral speech is a component of intonation and is one of the prosodic means of expressing the speaker's
attitude to the subject matter. (e.g. "Yes" with a falling tone means "It is so"; "Yes" pronounced with a falling-raising
tone means "It may be so").
In a literary text tone expresses the relationship between:
1) the author and the subject matter. Hence, the tone may be sympathetic or impassive, cheerful or serious,
humorous or melancholy;
2) the author and the reader. Hence, the tone may be familiar or official.
3) the narrator and the reader. The narrator may establish an intimate, personal, formal relationship with the
reader. Hence, he may assume a familiar tone, or he may retain a relative distance and narrate in an official tone.
The official tone is set up by words and idioms that have an official ring "Permit me to inform you" (= Let me
tell you). The familiar tone is established by features of the spoken language, the conversational style in particular.
There are scales in the variations of tone: casual, familiar, impolite, offensive, sarcastic, ironical, bitten In oral speech
tone is conveyed by modulations of the voice pitch, where as in written speech it is conveyed verbally, by emotionally
coloured words, an extensive use of similes, epithets, metaphors, poetic structures, intensifiers.
One notable aspect of tone is the creation of irony and satire. Irony is used to convey meanings and ideas that
differ from or are opposite to the apparent sense of certain words and images. It is the congruity between appearance
and reality. Satire is a comic attack on or criticism of the weaknesses and sheer stupidity of human kind. Both irony and
satire invite us to pierce the veil of appearance and understand the truth of the human condition. There are two kinds of
irony:
- dramatic (tragic) irony when the protagonist gets what he deserves or what the gods or fate believes he
deserves ("irony of fate");
- verbal irony where the words, by design or not conceal the real meaning and produce incongruity. Mockery is
another form of irony. Both are forms of wordplay, which is used to move action. Some other forms of irony are: self-
effacement; understatement; low-rating.
Fiction lends itself to the use of irony in all its forms. Irony finds for us another reality, one we can live with
but it also serves the purpose of pointing up the reality from which we so often flee. But careful readers will always be
alert to what the writer's implied attitude toward characters and subject, as through it he can sense the message of the
story, A humorous tone is created by the usage of exaggerations, a round-about naming things, unexpected comparison,
words that sound amusing in the particular situations. But humour may be achieved even when the tone is not
humorous. Some writers develop humour using a mock-situation and character or by unexpected turns of events which
catch the reader off-guard, amazing and amusing him.
The object of humour is generally a funny incident or an odd feature of human character. When the writer
describes social vices and weakness of human nature that are typical of social groups or classes the humour is then
ironical or satirical. Humour is intended to improve imperfection by means of laughter, whereas always conveys an
obviously negative attitude and is intended to mock.
Irony may be extended over a whole story and may be created extralinguistically by the contrast between what
the character seeks and what he obtains. This is called "irony of life".
Tone-shifts often occur in fiction and many accompany not only a change in the subject, but also a change in
the narrative method or in the style. One should distinguish between the prevailing tone of a literary work and
emotional overtones, witch accompany particular scenes of the story. Prevailing tone of the story plays the dominant
role and determines to a great extent the message of the literary work.
Howard Moss wrote: "Tone is the most important quality of good writing and the hardest to define. It is that
very quality in the use of words which doesn't depend on meaning of the words (like the sound of voice or the
expression on the face). Tone is like the colour of water in the sea or lake: as one takes up a handful of it to examine, it
disappears in the very process of being isolated and analysed".

LECTURE 6
The Message of a Literary Work
A literary work is an artistic whole which is created by the interaction of all its elements; the characters,
setting, plot, language, literary techniques. The employs all the different linguistic means, carefully plans them to fit one
another in order to convey the message and impress the readers.
It should be stressed that all the elements which make up a literary work are relevant to its message and the
theme of a literary work, unify all its elements into an artistic whole,
The plot with its characters, actions and setting forms the so called "surface contents" of a literary work. Some
read only to learn what happens next. But a skilled reader discovers what lies beyond the surface contents. In a literary
work he looks for the theme. He understands all the implications encoded in the story. In other words, he looks for and
understands what is known as "the underlying thought contents" of the literary work, which convey its message.
The theme of the story is the main area of interest treated in the story. There are books on the theme of family
relations, anti-war theme, of love.
The message is the most important idea that the author expresses in the process of developing the theme.
The theme performs a unifying function. The plots of different stories on one and the same theme may be
based on an identical type of conflict.
8
 The theme is a distillation of everything that happens in a story's human drama: Our understanding of the
theme grows from our perception and evaluation of the story. Each new subject - love, war, youth, marriage, revenge
dictates the correct strategies and approaches. Each aspect of style and techniques - imagery, plot, characterization,
point of view, symbolism, mood, tone, - is a way of getting at the and shaping its meaning. Some stories handle theme
intensively, while others blur theme, create multiple themes, or ignore theme entirely. Stories, after all, come in many
shapes and sizes. In shaping the materials of their art writers of fiction understand both: the tradition behind their craft
and the need to "make it new". Writers, however, do riot reduce their stories to single themes, nor do they necessarily
provide message or answers.
As Chekhov declared, the artist "must set the question, not solve it." Modern authors do not ask one question
but many questions. In some cases the message of the story will not suggest and solution. On account of ail that
L.Timofeyev distinguishes the following types of massages:
a) message that suggest definite solutions; b) messages that raise a problem;
c) messages in which the solution of the problem is not adequate.
While reading a literary text one gradually moves from the first word of it on to the last. The words one reads
combine into phrases, phrases into sentences, sentences into paragraphs, paragraphs making up larger passages:
chapters, sections, parts. All these representing verbal layer of the literary text.
At the same time when one reads a literary text one cannot but see another layer gradually emerging out these
verbal sequences, which represent a series of events, conflicts and circumstances in which characters of the literary
work happen to find themselves.
One also see that all these word-sequences make a composition, a plot, a genre, a style, that they all go to
create an image of reality and through this image the author conveys his message, his vision of the world.
Plot, theme, composition, genre, style, image make the supraverbal (poetic) laver. These two layers of the text
from each other. The fact that all the above mentioned elements of a literary text materialized in word sequences make
the latter acquire a concrete meaning.
When we substitute some part of a literary text (some word sequence) we simultaneously change the content. It
is in the literary text that the etymological meaning of the word text/form the Latin "textum", "texo"= to weave is
completely motivated.
The cohesion of the two layers is known as the poetic structure of the literary text. There is nothing in the
literary work that is not expressed in its poetic structure. It is the whole of the poetic structure that conveys the author's
message. The basic unit of the poetic structure is the word. All the various layers of the structure (the syntactic,
semantic, rhythmical, compositional, stylistic) are expresses in words (see the scheme),
The message is generally expresses implicity, i.e. indirectly and has a complete analytical character. It is
created by the interaction of numerous implications. Implicating is the suggestion that is not expressed directly but
understood. It may be conveyed by different techniques: parallelism, contrast, recurrence of events or situations, artistic
details, symbols, arrangement of plot structure.
Parallelism may be deeply suggestive (e.g. parallel actions of the dream and reality). The events that begins
and the story are parallel. This circling of the action implies that nothing has changed, nothing has improved.
Implication may be conveyed by contrast on different levels: linguistic and extralinguistic. Recurrence is
another means of conveying implication. Among the repeated linguistic elements there may be stylistic devices,
emotionally coloured words, neutral words, but when repeated the latter may acquire special semantic relevance and
become a key-word important for the understanding of the message of the story. Reacurrence may be traced in the plot
of any story thus fulfilling contradictory demands: the demand for variation and the demand of recurrence. If a writer
fails to fulfil the former, his story will be monotonous and uninteresting. If he fails to fulfil the latter, it will seem
aimless, and not directed at any definite message.
Among many examples of recurrence with implication one often finds details. In J.Cheever's story "The
Pleasure of Solitude" the coldness of the wind, the boys shaking with cold are artistic details, which depict the world
that Ellen was afraid of. When an artistic detail is repeated several times and is associated with a broader concept than
the original it develops into a symbol.
A symbol is a word (or an object the word stands for) which represent something concrete and material
standing for something immaterial that has a more significant sense. The word "symbol'' from the Greek "symbolaeon"
was originally political, not literal. Symbolaeon described a group of words that make up a contract. The problem was
that each of the contractees attached different ideas to the words they agreed to approve. Inasmuch as the symbols a
writer uses may mean different things to different people and the problem of understanding symbols still exists.
D.H.Lawrence defines symbols as "organic units of consciousness with a life of their own, you can never explain them
away, because their value is dynamic and emotional". Plato wrote: "It is easier to say what a thing is like than what it
is; so we think of someone running like the wind, which is only to say very fast".
The major symbol of the story can be often found in the title, which may also supply the theme. We recognise
symbols by the position of importance they hold in a story or by their frequent recurrence as they are the clue to
understanding the story itself.
All of us understand certain common (traditional) symbols: a rainbow, a rose, a cross, a daybreak or personal,
which belong to a definite writer. But some symbols which are drawn from different sources and cultures and at
different times can be misunderstood or understood only by a narrow circle of people. E.g. The Lotus flower may
symbolise perfect forms or perfect state of being to Asian readers, but not for British. Steel may symbolise automobiles
to a reader in Detroit, but may symbolise an axe to a reader in central Africa. In addition to the widely understood
symbols there are cultural, national, religious, psychological symbols.
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 To use a symbol in a literary text is to represent an idea by suggestion rather than by direct expression. The
symbol is generally recognised only after the story is read. That is the so called "the shock of recognition".
Presupposition is also another means of conveying special implication when a story begins at a point here
certain things are already taken for granted (e.g. the usage of definite article at the very beginning of the story).
As it was stated above the author's message does not lie on the surface. It is usually expressed implicitly and
may be suggested by a variety of means: parallelism., contrast, repetition, artistic details, symbols, which can be found
not only in the text itself, but in the title as well.
The tide is the first element to catch our eye, but its meaning and function may be determined only
retrospectively. It acquires its precise meaning when related to the whole story. Then it may acquire a totally different
meaning, or the story itself may clarify the meaning of the title (e.g. "The Quiet: American" by G.Green). The title may
perform different functions in a literary text. It may be:
1) as a means of conveying the author's message; 2) as a means of cohesion, i.e. it unites the components of a
story to form an artistic whole;
3) as a means of focussing the reader's attention on the most relevant characters/details;
4) it may characterise the protagonist;
5) it orients/disorients the reader towards the story.
On revealing the author's message the reader analyses his own rational and emotional response to the story and
draws his own conclusions. These conclusions may not necessarily coincide with the author's message. That's why in a
literary text we can distinguish objective message and the author's message. The objective message is the final
conclusion, that the reader draws from the analysis of his own response to the story and from the author's message
contained in the story.
Appreciation and interpretation of a literary text depend on: the reader's imaginative power; on the writer's
skills and style; specific connotations in the specific context of a story; comprehension of a literary text.

LECTURE 7
The Addressee Orientation as an Immanent Characteristics of Literary Text
In the broad sense the addressee orientation is an integral part of literary communication. "Any speech is sure
to have its addressee, as well as its producer, even if this addressee is an assumed reader, absolutely unknown to the
author." In the narrow sense the addressee orientation is an immanent characteristic of literary text which can be
regarded as a linguistic bases of the reader's reception and interpretation. From this point of view the addressee
orientation can be regarded as one of the aspects of the author's presence in a text; as a correlation of the author's and
supposed reader's point of view verbally reflected in a text; as a text-enclosed program of its interpretation by an
assumed reader.
The image of the reader is a complex of linguistic means which form the interpretation program inscribed in
text. In this lecture we'll
• structuralise the image of the reader;
• analyse the typology of the reader;
• suggest the typology of symbols as components of the addressee orientation
• define different stylistic means the addressee orientation can be expressed by.
Growing interest to the linguistic description of the addressee orientation of literary text can be explained by
the fact that in the centre of modern approaches is man with his psychology, culture etc.
Though the concept of the reader's image is new in linguistics, the investigation of the relations between
literary text and its addressee - the real reader (empirical) or potential (hypothetical) has a long history, ft dates back to
the principle of dialogue introduced by V.Gumbold. Later on a dialogical character between text and its interpreter was
worked out by M.Bakhtin. Nowadays different aspects between the demands of the interpretation program inscribed in
literary text. This textual phenomenon can be regarded as a fictitious personality whose profile can be traced in a text by
certain linguistic signals.
The implied reader can be regarded as a role offered to the reader of the text. This role may be identified by the
real reader in full or partially or it may remain unrecognised by him.
Such complex typology of the reader's image in literary text predetermines the variety and flexibility of the
interpretation program inherent in literary text. Besides the reader's image can be regarded as a multilevel structure
where the addressee orientation is marked by linguistic signals which referring to homogeneous semantic, structural or
compositional group of textual elements. These signals serve as contact points in the dialogue of the author and the
reader through literary text.
It is necessary to stress that all non-literary texts are mostly oriented to a concrete audience, a concrete reader,
which, as a rule, is expressed in a text itself and moreover perceived by those to whom they were addressed. But for
many kind of literary texts it's also important to find certain difference between the formal and real addressee. Thus
literary text always not taken by those, whom it was really addressed to. Therefore the question arises : which factors
are dominant in the reader's choice of this or that literary text and what has it to do with the author's intentions. Having
analysed a number of different literary texts we can assume that to these factors we cam refer as structural components
and semantic ones as well. In this chapter special attention will be paid to the structural components of literary text that
to a great extant can influence the reader's choice.
Any literary text possesses series for external structural peculiarities which can be recognised by the reader as
special kind of prompts long before the very process of reading. They are:
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 1. The indication of the edition, series and year of publication.
2. The author's suggestions of the textual character.
3. The genre indication.
4. Preface, dedication, introduction and others author's remarks.
5. The title.
6. The epigraph.
Let's provide a short explanation of the suggested above external structural components of literary text, which
help the reader to choose a text to his liking.
The indication of the edition very often shows the reader definite peculiarities of the hypothetical reader, to
whom the author of this or that text is oriented. This kind of author's prompt to a great deal helps the reader to chose the
right book for him. Thus, among series of well-known British editions one can mark out the following :
children editions : «Advisory Centre for Education», «Armada books»; sports editions: «Adlard Coles»,
«English Association»; religious: «Allenson and Co, LTD», «Baha'i Publishing»: belles-letters editions for adults:
«Rlond and Briggs», «Carcanet Press». So, keeping this in mind a competent reader having just a look at a book cover
can presuppose its genre and even some aspects of the plot.
The author's suggestions of the textual character can also help a lot long before the very process of reading in
distinguishing its principal textual peculiarities, saying how the author himself treats his literary work. For example,
R.Aldington named his novel «Jazz novel» drawing the analogy with his famous poem «A Man in the Forest». This
piece of poetry was once called «a jazz poetry». Therefore the author ironically correlate his previous literary works
with the novel «Death of a Hero» which is considered to have nothing to do with fun or music, but is full of sarcasm
and sorrow.
It's very interesting to note that in a number of cases the title of literary text cannot only show the beginning of
the text, but also be at the same time the author's indication of the textual character of the narrative. Theodore Dreiser
having titled his novel «An American Tragedy», at the very beginning oriented his hypothetical readers for something
serious and tragic. This title helps the reader to state «a tuning» of literary text before the process of reading.
The genre indication also helps a reader to learn new additional information about the structural peculiarities
and scheme of literary text. Having named a literary work as «a novel» or «a fairy-tale» or «a story» the author
underlines the general features of a particular literary text or any other texts of its genre.
It is also of a great interest to take into account that the author's genre indication -can be seen in the title of the
text, for example: «No Story» by O'Henry or in its subtitle: «The Canterville Ghost» - a Hylo-Idealistic Romance, in the
introduction:
«It was a short story and not a very long one either, that I first thought of this Novel» by S.Maugham. Making
indications on the genre of literary text the author can meet a reader's expectations (as in the particular examples) or
ruin them (as in the novel in verse «Yevgeny Onegin» by A.Pushkin).
In terms of presentation of structural components of literary texts that influence the reader's choice interesting
also is that with the help of preface, introduction or others author's remarks a reader first draws a certain analogy, with
the other literary works written by this author. He also takes into consideration the mood, the aim of writing of this very
literary text. Let's analyse the preface of the novel «Death of a Hero «by R.Aldington:
«My dear Hal, - Remembering George Moor's denunciation of prefaces I felt, that what I wanted to say here
could be best expressed in a letter to you... Although you are a little older then /, you belong essentially to the same
generation - those, who spent their childhood struggling like young Samsons, in the toils of the Victorians, whose early
manhood coincided with the European War.
«This preface is written in the form of the letter to Alcot Glower, who is an English novelist, a participant in
the First World War, It goes without saying that R.Aldington expected the letter to be read by lots of readers. The
addressee is not only Glower, but the whole dost generation» the author and his friend Glower belonged to.
Mark Twain has other intentions, writing «Notice» to his novel «The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn»:
«Persons attempting to find a motive in this narrative will be prosecuted, persons attempting to find a moral in
it will be banished, text. Having named a literary work as «a novel» or «a fairy-tale» or «a story» the author underlines
the general features of a particular literary text or any other texts of its genre.
It is also of a great interest to take into account that the author's genre indication -can be seen in the title of the
text, for example: «No Story» by O'Henry or in its subtitle: «The Canterville Ghost» - a Hylo-Idealistic Romance, in the
introduction:
«It was a short story and not a very long one either, that I first thought of this Novel» by S.Maugham. Making
indications on the genre of literary text the author can meet a reader's expectations (as in the particular examples) or
ruin them (as in the novel in verse «Yevgeny Onegin» by A.Pushkin).
In terms of presentation of structural components of literary texts that influence the reader's choice interesting
also is that with the help of preface, introduction or others author's remarks a reader first draws a certain analogy, with
the other literary works written by this author. He also takes into consideration the mood, the aim of writing of this very
literary text. Let's analyse the preface of the novel «Death of a Hero» by R.Aldington:
«My dear Hal, - Remembering George Moor's denunciation of prefaces I felt, that what I wanted to say here
could be best expressed in a letter to you... Although you are a little older then/, you belong essentially to the same
generation - those, who spent their childhood struggling like young Samsons, in the toils of the Victorians, whose early
manhood coincided with the European War.

11
 «This preface is written in the form of the letter to Alcot Glower, who is an English novelist, a participant in
the First World War, It goes without saying that R.Aldington expected the letter to be read by lots of readers. The
addressee is not only Glower, but the whole dost generation» the author and his friend Glower belonged to.
Mark Twain has other intentions, writing «Notice» to his novel «The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn»:
«Persons attempting to find a motive in this narrative will be prosecuted, persons attempting to find a moral in
it will be banished, persons attempting to find a plot in it will be shot...»
The author account on the reader's ability to understand his irony towards very exacting readers. In the
provided example he uses parallelism and repetitions in order to emphasise his irony.
In this connection one can also lake into consideration the peculiarities of the title formulation. It happens as it
has been already mentioned above that the title itself indicates the genre of a narrative, its orientation on a definite age-
group, nationality and even social status of the hypothetical reader. With this perspective in mind it is reasonable to
classify titles according to the character of information they present:
a) titles, oriented to readers of a certain age-group;
b) titles, which take into account an emotional or rational peculiarities of the hypothetical reader;
c) titles, which consider reader's competence.
To the first type belong titles which comprise the main idea of a narration and finally is aimed at making the
understanding of literary text easier for the reader. This type of the title can be understood only when literary text is
taken as a whole (as a structural and semantic integrity).
The title of literary text oriented on a child as a hypothetical reader should be simple and laconic and contain
some interesting, information for the reader to grasp his attention before the very process of reading. For example:
«Alice in the Wonderland» by Luis Carol, «Winnie - the – Pooh» by A. A. Milne. On the contrary, the title of a literary
work orientated on a hypothetical reader-adult very often becomes a symbol, an allusion which stir the reader's
imagination, as in «Jane Eyre» by Ch.Bronte and «An American Tragedy» by T.Dreiser.
That is but natural for literary text that any title, on the one hand, comprises its compressed content and
therefore it may be considered to be as the first and one of the primary components of textual content. On the other
hand, the literary text title also has some contextual and structural features, because it serves for better understanding of
literary text in question in the process of text interpretation or is in use for a concrete reader's choice.
Let's dwell in greater detail on some of the above manifestations of the title in literary text. It's clearly seen that
the title «The Mystery of Mr. Brown» is oriented at an emotional reader because it contains a stylistically marked word
«mystery». Thus, the following titles «A Cup of Tea», «David Copperfield» are sure to be read by a rational
hypothetical reader as they have stylistically neutral words and proper names. Sometimes it is also difficult to guess
what a narrative is about before the process of reading, as its title is to a great extend ambiguous. For example, only
some definite layer of the hypothetical readers know that the temperature in the title «451°F» by R.Bradberry means the
temperature level a paper starts to burn.
The titles ability of helping the reader in choosing a particular literary text is often used by the author while
orienting on the reader's competence. Here the author takes into consideration the reader's intelligence background
knowledge or the lack of it. For example, in order to understand the analogy drown by Bernard Show in his
«Pygmalion» between the main character and ancient sculptor Pygmalion the hypothetical reader should be acquainted
with classical history and classical literature.
Coming back to the functional peculiarities of the title it should be mentioned that serving as «a visiting card»
of literary text these structural components can be regarded as a very important means of textual arrangement of literary
text and thus stimulating intellectual and emotional activity of the hypothetical reader «both in his choice of a narrative
arid in the very process of its readings.
The final external structural components of literary text suggested in this paper is the epigraph. The epigraph,
as a rule, is used to bring to the hypothetical reader series of associations at the very beginning of the reading process. It
has an autonomous position and helps the author to express his own intentions and to fulfil the pragmatic orientation of
the text. As well as the preface, the epigraph can be interpreted in many ways. The scrupulous attention to this structural
component of literary text allows to suppose that there exist certain functional ties between a text and its epigraph. They
are:
• the epigraph discloses an internal structure of the text, thus aiming at better understanding of the text in
question;
• it calls on different up-to-date associations, appealing to the reader's experience;
• the epigraph serves also to stir up various ideas and suggestions in a reader's imagination in the process of
text interpretation.
Taking into account the defined functional peculiarities, of epigraphs one can distinguish different groups of
epigraphs, which help the author to orient a particular literary text at a certain type of the hypothetical reader.
To the first group of epigraphs we can refer such epigraphs the right interpretation of which is based on the
reader's awareness of its primary source, as for example:
«You will answer
The slaver are ours.»
(W.Shakespeare, «The Merchant of Venice»)
In the epigraph to his novel «The Man of Property» John Golsworthy reflects the main idea of the narrative
accounting on a reader's awareness of source of the epigraph in question, therefore drawing a parallel between the
Shakespeare's literary characters and those in the novel.

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 The second group of epigraphs contains such epigraphs which are oriented at the emotional or rational
hypothetical reader. In this connection let us analyse the epigraph to the story "The Story of Muchammed Dik» by
R.Kipling:
«Who is the happy man. He that sees in his own house at home, little children crown with dust, leaping and
falling and crying.»
The Epigraph begins with a rhetorical question to which at once can be found the appropriate answer. It is
considered that every hypothetical reader has his own idea of happiness, children and family. Writing these lines as the
epigraph of the book the author appeals to an emotional nature of his reader, wants him to think over this question and
to compare his own idea of happiness with the author's one.
Summing it up we can say that this is always the reader who makes the right choice, choosing the book he
wants to read. But sometimes “unexpectancy" of literary text or its structure that decides for the reader. In this case a
book itself finds its reader.
While orienting his/her text on the hypothetical reader the author consider different aspects of readers
personality: his age, nationality, life-time, competence, profession and social status.
Let's dwell in. greater detail on some of the above-mentioned social peculiarities of the hypothetical reader.
One of me most prominent features of hypothetical reader's personality is his age. The whole belles-lettres literature
may .be divided in two big parts: literature for children and literature for adults. This division is a kind of opposition,
where children literature being a part of any national literature fulfils just the same functions as literature for adults. But
the primary functions of children literature are those of cognitive and educational character. Being rather simple in a
way, literature for children also treats burning problems of humanity but does it in her own way. It accounts on the
psychology of young readers, their age peculiarities and different ways of comprehending the world.
The author of children literature plays, as a rule, two roles in the process of reading. First of al! he is a teacher
with rich life experience and broad interests. The second, very important thing is that the author must play the role of a
child while writing the text. In other words, he combines two points of view - that of a child and that of a grown-up
person.
Hence, we presume that literary text, oriented to a child-reader must be, on the one hand, informative enough
for this type of the reader, simple, objective, comprehensible and laconic. On the other hand, it must stir children's
imagination, educate them, serve as a positive example and draw their attention from the first lines of literary text. Let's
take a vivid example from one of the most favourite children books written by A.A.Milne «The World of Winnie-the-
Pooh» where the author just from the very beginning of his story orients the hypothetical child-reader on a joyful
manner of narration:
«It was going to be one of Rabbit's busy days. As soon as he woke up he felt important, as if everything
depended upon him. It was just the day for organising some thing, or for writing a Notice Signed Subbel, or for seeing.
What everybody Else Thought About It. « (Milne A., 172)
The age peculiarities of the reader is also considered in chapter titles.
Charter I,
«In which we are introduced to Winnie-the-Pooh and some beers, and the story begins.»
Here the title of a chapter can be at the same time a short introduction to the main character of the book. Due to
stylistic peculiarities (repetitions and onomatopoeia) children can even hear his voice and recognise his steps and
movements, such as in the following lines:
«Here is Edward Bear, coming downstairs now, bump, bump, bump, on the back of his head, behind
Christopher Robin, « (Milne A, 12)
Sometimes the author wants to penetrate into a child's own world. He is eager to become his sincere, who is
not at all so perfect in his behaviour and deeds. The author can even address to his hypothetical child-reader directly:
««Ah, yes, now I do, «I said quickly, and I hope you do too, because it is all the explanation you are going to
get». (Milne A., 28)
Speaking about the literature for adults it's not, of course, of any particular interest to a child while nearly
every grown-up person this or that way has something to do with children literature, likes it very much, reads and
admires it. That's why in literature for children very often we can come across different stylistic devices oriented not
only to a child-reader, but to the hypothetical adult- reader, as in the following example from «Winnie-the-Pooh» by
A.Milne.
«Owl lived at the Chestnuts, an old-world residence of great charm, which was grander than anybody else's...»
(Milne A.,82)
Here the author describes the hollow of an owl in such a sophisticated manner (calling it «an owl old-world
residence») that it should be a hypothetical adult-reader with his life experience to be able to make a vivid sense-picture
of the statement.
Another feature of a reader's personality, which should be considered by the author, is a reader's nationality,
that presupposed the reader's awareness of the culture, traditions, language history of the country he lives in and
psychological peculiarities of its inhabitants. In his connection we can trace two kinds of readers: a world reader who
has a world-wide knowledge of different cultures, traditions, customs and one who speaks two or more foreign
languages; and a national reader the one who is acquainted only with the traditions of his/her native country. There
barely exist such literary text where an author does not use some dialectical words or expressions, when he does not
take into account the psychology of a certain nation, his hypothetical reader belongs to. Nearly every text certain group
of readers. For example in his novel «Death of a Hero» R.Aldington writes about Fleet Street, not giving exact

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explanation of the place. The author accounts on the reader's awareness of English culture: Fleet street was the centre of
publication of the most popular British newspapers
«Thomas had some sort of nub-editorship in Fleet street...» (Aldington R., 90)
The author may also consider his hypothetical reader to be good at knowing some language peculiarities,
proverbs, sayings and idioms.

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