Epithets. Simple, compound and hyphenated epithets

Some rhetorical figures commonly used in literary texts are neither tropes they nor are based on repetition.

Epithets are words, phrases or clauses which in their attributive use disclose the individual, emotionally coloured attitude of the author towards the object he describes by emphasizing a certain property or feature. The choice of epithets is supposed to be one of the primary characteristics of a writer’s style;is a stylistic device based on the interaction of the logical and emotive meanings.

It should, however, be pointed out that epithet is a somewhat controversial term because it is generally maintained that a distinction should be drawn between this figure, as all artists detail, and a logical attribute. According to I.R. Galperin, the epithet is markedly subjective and evaluative while the logical attribute is purely objective, non-evaluative (53, 157). But often it is difficult to draw a clear line of demarcation between them because it is a matter of radiance. One would have no hesitation in dubbing the collocation damp smile as subjective and (which is much the same) deviant, but is would have to be placed on a scale of lesser-to-greater subjectiveness (deviation) on the lines of

(i) broad smile (most normal)

(ii) free smile

(iii) damp smile

(iv) high smile (most deviant) (66, 143)

E: - have an attributive use

-disclose an individual emotionally coloured attitude towards the obj. described

-emphasize a certain property

-are subjective and evaluative

Semantically(L.R.Galperin)

1.associated: the idea expressed in the E. is to a certain extent inherent in the concept of the obj.(long time,white snow)

2.unassociated: the adj-s don’t indicate any property inherent in the concept of the obj. It strikes the reader by its novelty and may seem strange, accidental.(heart-burning smile)

Semantically(V.A.Kukharenko)

1.affective(emotive proper): serve to convey the emotional evaluation of the object by the speaker; most of the qualifying words in the dictionary(dim enchantment, hazardous life)

2. transferred (metonymical) or hypallage (ordinary adjectives generally describing the state of a human being, but made to refer to an inanimate object; may be formed of metaphors, metonymies and similes, thus being based on similarity, nearness or comparison of the qualities of two objects)(the sleepless pillow, a ghost-like face)

Indisputable epithets are all adjective metaphors (See p. 108) and transferred attributes (See p. 119). What other attributive elements should be treated, as epithets are still open to discussion.

Strictly speaking, metaphorical and metonymical epithets are tropes while non-metaphorical and non-metonymical epithets are not. What binds them together is their common syntactic function – that of attribute which affords to treat epithet as a distinctive figure of rhetoric. The traditional treatment of epithet as a trope has been subjected to a strong criticism by Yu. M. Skrebnev who justly points out that epithet as a specific syntactic category only borders on the syntactically limitless system of tropes (33, 119).

Structurally, epithets fall out into simple, compound and hyphenated. Simple epithets are adjectives, nouns or participles used attributively (silvery laugh, meteor eyes, burning plumes). Compound epithets are compound adjectives (apple-faced woman, silver-sandalled feet). In hyphenated epithets whole phrases or even sentences are used attributively; the formal indication of this use is the fact that the words of such phrases or sentences are linked with hyphens – hence the name of the epithet.

The hyphenated epithet with its complex syntactic structure and built-in predication is capable of conveying a large amount of expressive information in a concise way. I.R. Galperin notes that such epithets are generally followed by the words expression, air, attitude and others which describe behavior or facial expression, i.e. such epithets “seem to transcribe into language symbols a communication usually conveyed by non-linguistic means” (53, 160). Another structural feature of the hyphenated epithet also pointed out by I.R. Galperin, is that after the nouns they refer to there often comes a subordinate attributive clause beginning with which serves the purpose of decoding the effect of communication (ibid.)

English folklore has its own stock of traditional epithets sometimes called conventional (standing, fixed) epithets, each appearing with a strictly definite noun from which it is practically inseparable (the merry month of May, dark forest, true love, green wood, fair maid). They can be found in any popular ballad: -

There are twelve months in all the year,

As I hear many men say,

But the merriest month in all the year

Is the merry month of May.

An interesting semantic classification of metaphorical epithets is offered by T.A. Lavysh in her thesis (21). This author divides them into thematic groups, such as “fauna”, “flora”, “minerals”, “foodstuffs”, etc. Thus, epithets belonging to the “fauna” thematic group are used for characterization: -

He was a tall, thin man, with a rather foxy face, the kind of face that seems to lack eyelashes… His nature was cold and shrewd. (Lawrence)

Epithets of the “flora” group are used to describe appearance (blooming fase, violet eyes): -

… his face was melon-round, melon smooth… his high forehead melon-bulged… There was a blondish fuzz on the top of the melony forehead and a small watermelon of a paunch. (I. Show)

Epithets belonging to the thematic group of minerals foreground (i) such qualities as firmness, steadfastness bordering on cruelty, (marble face, stony heart), (ii) human appearance: the colour of eyes, hair, skin (amber hair, coral lips), (iii) qualities of natural materials and phenomena (crystal water, pearly mist).

On the whole it should be emphasized that a genuine artistic epithet has a great coefficient of predicativity, i.e. it states something new and important about the object, as in the following stanza from Shelley’s Liberty: -

The fiery mountains answer each other,

Their thundering are echoed from zone to zone;

The tempestuous oceans awake one another,

And the ice-rocks are shaken round Winter’s zone,

When the clarion of the Typhoon is blown.

Structurally

- simple (resemble simple ordinary adjectives)hazardous live

- compound (resemble compound adjectives) cloud-shapen giant

- hyphenated (phrase) (a phrase or a whole sentence mar be used attributively in pre-position to a noun, the members of the phrase joined by a hyphen)

- reversed (composed of two nouns linked in an of-phrase. the subjective, evaluating, emotional element is embodied not in the noun attribute, but in the noun structurally described) the devil of a woman = the devilish woman

based on the contradiction btw the logical and and the syntactical; such epithets are metaphorical. Attributive relations between the members show that this SD is an epithet.

Distribution of epithets

- single

- used in pairs (joined by a conjunction or asyndetically)

- two-step (adverb+adjective) (the process of qualifying passes two steps: the qualification of the object and the qualification of the qualification itself) a pompously majestic female

-a chain or a srting (a group of homogeneous attributes from 3 to 20 or more)