What Is Literary Style?

• It is the way in which language is used.

• Author’s own individuality and
originality
 The term style has a variety of different
meanings but in general one can say that it
refers to the kind of language the author
employs. In order to analyze the style of a
text, look at the following aspects/features:
 Diction
• Word choice
• The analysis of how a writer uses language for a
distinct purpose and effect.
 Diction

• Is the language formal, familiar, colloquial,

slang or neutral?
– Colloquial words (the style of everyday
speech
– Slang- highly informal
– Jargon- the special language of a profession
or group
 Diction

• For example, does the author refer to a character

as “gentleman”, “man” or “guy”?
 “As the price of five
dollars was “It was, like, five
reasonable, I decided bucks, so I was
to make the purchase like “okay”
without further
thought.”

Formal Language Informal Language

 Diction

“What’s the use you learning to do right, when it’s

troublesome to do right and it ain’t no trouble to
do wrong, and the wages is just the same?”

(The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark

Twain)
 Diction

Mark Twain’s book The Adventures of

Huckleberry Finn is renowned for its use of
colloquialisms. Twain used plenty of accents,
slang, and vernacular to make his characters
sound like real Americans of the time. This
excerpt contains the double-negative “ain’t no
trouble” and the colloquial usage of “just the
same.”
 Diction

• Word choice
• The analysis of how a writer uses language for a
distinct purpose and effect.
• Vocabulary and choice of fitting words
– Imagery and symbolism
– abstract or concrete
– general or specific
– literal or metaphorical
 DICTION- Shakespeare

• HAMLET
–Throughout the play, the audience is
reminded that birth, death, lust and
gossip are all natural aspect of human
life. Shakespeare uses the word “nature”
multiple times to reinforce these ideas.
 DICTION- Shakespeare

“(Since nature cannot choose his

origin)” (1.4.26).
 DICTION- Shakespeare

• “Nature” is used to remind the

audience that birth is another part of
life.
 DICTION- Shakespeare

• “Thou know’st ’tis common; all that

lives must die, passing through nature
to eternity” (1.2.73.).
 DICTION- Shakespeare

• Death, on the other hand, is also a part

of life.
 DICTION- Shakespeare

“A violet in the youth of primy nature,”

(1. 3. 7.).
 DICTION- Shakespeare

• The word “nature” is also used by

Shakespeare to emphasize the theme
of lust. Ophelia is Hamlet’s girlfriend,
but she is warned by her brother,
Laertes, that she should not be seeing
Hamlet.
 DICTION- Shakespeare

• The word “nature” is also used by

Shakespeare to emphasize the theme
of lust. Ophelia is Hamlet’s girlfriend,
but she is warned by her brother,
Laertes, that she should not be seeing
Hamlet.
 DICTION- Shakespeare

• Shakespeare ties in his themes of birth,

death, lust, and gossip by using the word
“nature” throughout his play.
 Syntax

• Within the boundaries of the rules of

grammar, there is still room for writers to
play with word order. This helps avoid
monotony and also can help indicate what
era the literature is from.
• Writers from the Age of Enlightenment
liked balanced sentences while modern
writers favor a loose sentence structure.
 Syntax

• Syntax, which focuses on how words and

phrases are arranged to create sentences,
and punctuation, which is the system of
marks used to separate sentences or
clauses to clarify meaning.
• It gives meaning, emotion, and emphasis
 Syntax

“True!—nervous—very, very dreadfully

nervous I had been and am; but why will
you say that I am mad?”

( “The Tell-Tale Heart”)

by Edgar Allan Poe
 Syntax

Here, the dashes take the place of a comma

to create the tension of the story on the
first line. It draws the reader in, so that
the reader has to determine whether or
not the narrator is sane. Also, he uses
semicolons to lengthen and support a
sentence, usually by joining multiple
phrases together.
 Syntax

With a period instead of a semicolon, the

relationship between the first clause and
second isn’t emphasized as much as it
could be. A semicolon stresses the
narrator’s insistence in his sanity. Last of
all, his use of exclamation marks shows
the narrator's state of mind, thoughts,
and emotions.
 Rhetorical Devices

• A number of rhetorical devices are worth

considering in any analysis of style.
• Rhetorical devices are important
generators and qualifiers of meaning and
effect in any literary text.
 Rhetorical Devices

• The forms of figurative languages are

divided into two main
groups: schemes and tropes
 A few light taps upon the pane made him
turn to the window. It had begun to snow again.
He watched sleepily the flakes, silver and dark,
falling obliquely against the lamplight. The time
had come for him to set out on his journey
westward. Yes, the newspapers were right: snow
was general all over Ireland.

(“The Dead” from Dubliners by James Joyce)

 riverrun, past Eve and Adam’s, from
swerve of shore to bend of bay, brings us
by a commodius vicus of recirculation
back to Howth Castle and Environs.

(Finnegan’s Wake by James Joyce)

 In these two contrasting examples of style,
we can see a great leap from James Joyce’s
earlier works to his later works.
His writing style in Dubliners is descriptive
yet quite direct. However, in Finnegan’s Wake,
Joyce’s writing is almost unintelligible. This
line is the first in the novel—note that it doesn’t
even start with a capital letter—and already
Joyce has used several barely understandable
words.
 He was completely integrated now and
he took a good long look at everything.
Then he looked up at the sky. There were
big white clouds in it. He touched the palm
of his hand against the pine needles where
he lay and he touched the bark of the pine
trunk that he lay behind.

(For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest

Hemingway)
 Ernest Hemingway was particularly
famous for his straightforward style. In
this passage from the end of For Whom
the Bell Tolls, we see hardly any adjectives
even though it is a descriptive excerpt.
Hemingway’s style was to describe
scenery only in the briefest way and
without any unnecessary adornment.
 'The Golden Cage’ 'The Golden Cage'

The bird wept in the golden Wept the bird, in the golden
cage, cage,
The queen asked, 'What pain Asked, the queen, 'Thou have
thou have?' what pain?
A golden place, a royal life, A golden place, a royal life',
The bird said, "What pain Said the bird, 'Thou have
thou have?' what pain?'
A golden palace, a royal life A golden palace, a royal life',
I see tears, Tears I see, when
when you gaze out of your gaze you, out of your cage
cage
Normal Structure Inverted Structure
 The difference in the sentence
formation of the normal format and
inverted format, is clearly visible. The
dramatic effect which is created in the
inverted format, beautifies the poem and
displays the plight of the bird as well as
the queen in a more effective manner.
 Both are pampered and spoiled in
riches. However, nothing can buy the taste
of freedom in this world, is what the poem
tries to say. The message has a greater
impact because of the use of inverted
syntax. Thus, we see how a change in the
sentence formation can actually make the
message conveyed by the sentence, more
effective.
'Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening'
by Robert Frost

Inverted Syntax : Whose woods these are I

think I know

Normal Syntax : I think I know whose

woods these are.
Why did Robert Frost use the inverted
syntax?
I think I know whose woods these are.
His house is in the village, though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

Whose woods these are I think I know.

His house is in the village, though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.
 Inverted syntax is commonly used in
poetry to create a rhythmic effect.
References:

https://owlcation.com/humanities/Writing-
Styles-of-English-Literature

http://www.literarydevices.com/style/

https://literarycriticismjohn.blogspot.com/201
1/11/00088-what-are-salient-features-of-
good.html?m=1
Prepared by:

Elvie R. Salazar
Camille M. Reyes