Stylistics and Projection of Motifs in a Short Narrative's Beginning with particular reference to Katherine Mansfield's Miss Brill (original) (raw)

2020, International Journal of Innovation, Creativity and Change

This paper aims to examine the fact that stylistics analysis of particularly the introductory part, at the beginning of any short narrative, can yield substantial projections about the narrative’s central idea. The author encodes subtle clues in contextualising the story that may lead the readers or students of literature to construct a probability check to unlock the story’s key message. The exactitude of these predictions depends upon the purpose of the author. Often the ending of the story may contrast the predictions made. This juxtaposition between expectations and reality may be a conscious effort of the author. The author may intentionally try to push the swing of the readers' expectations to the other side of the arc to create a degree of suspense so that when the readers sway back to the reality, the intensity of climax may fully be experienced, thereby culminating into a cathartic effect. In any case, the predictions are necessary to align the readers' expectations and keep them sufficiently engrossed. This research paper deploys stylistic means zooming to examine only the first and the last paragraphs of the short narrative of Katherine Mansfield's famous short story Miss Brill to investigate the predictability of the underlying idea in the story. An analysis of this kind may be helpful in contextualisation, specifically in literature and ELT classrooms, where students can be trained to focus on the use of language and study the use of literary devices that bind a literary work of art and form trenchant views on the use of language in doing so.