MUSICAL TECHNIQUES IN OUR MUTUAL FRIEND BY CHARLES DICKENS
https://doi.org/10.31425/0042-8795-2018-1-225-246
Abstract
The article is concerned with the musical speech techniques used by Charles Dickens, particularly in Our Mutual Friend, and brings up the problem of Dickens’ unique sense of language in the fragments where speech reveals musical qualities, or a focus on how it would be heard. Based on Sher’s intermediality theory, the analysis takes into consideration the sounds of words, rhythm, ‘volume’, length, and the pace of sentences. Special attention is given to the technique of repetition and accompaniment, used to intensify the musical effect of speech. The findings reveal new aspects of the correlation between speech structure and semantics, their union a proof of the writer’s sensitive ear. The article points out the significance of the musical, i. e. ‘non-semantic’ elements in the creation of the book’s atmosphere and semantic emphases. The paper goes on to give a new interpretation to speech intonation, suggesting it should be treated as a musical concept. Finally, the author argues that, rather than ‘imitating’ languages (according to M. Bakhtin), Dickens invents new ones through his masterful use of various techniques.
About the Author
E. Shevchenko
Institute for Philology and History of the Russian State University for the Humanities
Russian Federation
Russian Federation
Elizaveta Aleksandrovna Shevchenko, a philologist, post-graduate student at the Department of Comparative Literary Studies
Academic interests include the history of English literature, Western European literature and art in the 17th-19th centuries, historical poetics.
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Review
For citations:
Shevchenko E. MUSICAL TECHNIQUES IN OUR MUTUAL FRIEND BY CHARLES DICKENS. Voprosy literatury. 2018;(1):225-246. (In Russ.) https://doi.org/10.31425/0042-8795-2018-1-225-246
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