A Relevance-Theoretic Approach to Faulkner's Style and Stylization in his Major Works

Abstract

Definitions of style, as an authentic representation of a writer, the sum total of atypical and recurrent expressive and formal devices that constitute his manner of expression, remain vague and lacking in effective systemization. Resting on Relevance Theory, this thesis addresses lexical, syntactic and rhetorical features in Faulkner’s major works, accounts for intentions underlying Style and Stylization and suggests redefinitions: Style is the writer’s decision to foreground/background; it can be more or less stylized based on this decision, on his relationship and complicity (Mutual Cognitive Environment) with his reader and on pragmatic and stylistic effects while Stylization is an artistically motivated deviation exhibited through qualitative and quantitative foregrounding. The foregrounded stylistic devices equate foregrounded implicatures and stylistic differences are just differences in the way relevance is achieved.