Stylistic Analysis of the Selected Short Stories by

Mary Flannery O'Connor and William Sydney Porter

‫تحليل االسلوبية في القصص القصيرة المختارة لدى المؤلفين ماري فالنرى‬

‫او كونر ووليم سيدني بورتر‬

Prepared by
Zainab Ali Abed
Supervised by
Dr. Mohammed Mahameed

A Thesis Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the

Requirement for the Degree of Master in English Literature

Faculty of Arts and Sciences

Department of English and Literature
Middle East University

May, 2019
 II

Authorization
 III

Thesis Committee Decision

 IV

Acknowledgement

First and foremost, my thanks go to the Almighty God for providing me

with everything I needed for this research.

I would like to thank my supervisor Dr. Mohammed Mahameed for his

guidance and support to get this thesis.

My gratitude goes to the faculty members for their kindness,

encouragement and understanding.

My love and respect go to all those who offered me help and for their

brotherly assistance, I say thank you.

The Researcher
 V

Dedication

This thesis is dedicated to my beloved sister Dr. Kawthar who always

supported me and encouraged me to achieve my goals.

To my beloved brother who stood by my side whenever I needed him.

To my family and to all those who supported me in one way or another

with their cooperation and courtesy.

The Researcher
 VI

Table of Contents
Subject Page
Title ……………………………………………………………………………. I
Authorization ………………………………………………………………….. II
Committee Decision …………………………………………………………... III
Acknowledgement …………………………………………………………….. IV
Dedication ……………………………………………………………………... V
Table of Contents ……………………………………………………………… VI
English abstract ………………………………………………………………... IX
Arabic abstract ………………………………………………………………… X
Chapter One
1.1 Introduction …………………………………………………………... 1
1.2 Biography of the authors ……………………………………………... 4
1.3 Statement of the problem ……………………………………………... 6
1.4 Questions of the study ……………………………………………....... 7
1.5 Objectives of the study ……………………………………………...... 7
1.6 Significance of the study ……………………………………………... 8
1.7 Limits of the study ……………………………………………............. 8
1.8 Limitation of the study ……………………………………………...... 8
1.9 Definition of terms ……………………………………………............ 9
Chapter Two
2.1 Review of related literature (The empirical study) …………………… 13
2.2 Theoretical framework and concepts in focus ………………………... 17
2.2.1 The concept of style ……………………………………………........... 17
2.2.2 The concept of stylistics …………………………………………….... 18
2.3 Theoretical framework ……………………………………………...... 21
2.3.1 Review of stylistic categories ………………………………………… 24
Chapter Three: Methodology and Procedures
3.0 Introduction ……………………………………………....................... 26
3.1 Population and samples of the study …………………………………. 26
3.2 Instrument of the study ……………………………………………...... 26
3.3 Procedures of the study ……………………………………………... 27
 VII

Chapter Four: Analysis of the study

4.1 Stylistic analysis of "The Green Door" …………………………….… 28
4.1.1 Figures of speech / Grammatical and lexical schemes …………….…. 29
4.1.2 Phonological scheme ……………………………………………..…... 32
4.1.3 Tropes …………………………………………………………….…... 33
4.1.4 Irony ……………………………………………………………...…... 36
4.2 Stylistic analysis of "The Last Leaf" ………………………………… 37
4.2.1 Figures of speech / Grammatical and lexical schemes ……………….. 38
4.2.2 Phonological scheme ………………………………………………..... 40
4.2.3 Tropes ……………………………………………………………….... 40
4.2.4 Irony …………………………………………………………...……... 45
4.3 Stylistic analysis of "Good Country People" ………………………… 47
4.3.1 Figures of speech / Grammatical and lexical schemes ……………….. 49
4.3.2 Phonological scheme …………………………………………..……... 50
4.3.3 Tropes ……………………………………………………………….... 51
4.3.4 Irony …………………………………………….................................. 59
4.4 Stylistic analysis of "Judgement Day" ……………………………….. 62
4.4.1 Figures of speech / Grammatical and lexical schemes ……………….. 63
4.4.2 Phonological scheme …………………………………………..……... 65
4.4.3 Tropes ……………………………………………................................ 65
4.4.4 Irony …………………………………………….................................. 71
Chapter Five: Findings and recommendations
5.1 Conclusion and discussion …………………………………………… 74
5.2 Recommendation of the study ……………………………………….. 77
References …………………………………………………………………….. 79
 VIII

Stylistic Analysis of the Selected Short Stories by Mary

Flannery O’Connor and William Sydney Porter
By
Zainab Ali Abed
Supervisor
Dr. Mohammed Mahameed
Abstract

This study is mainly devoted to making a stylistic analysis of four selected short
stories by two American authors. They are "Good Country People" (1955) and
"Judgement Day" (1965) by Mary Flannery O’Connor: "The Green Door" (1907) and
"The Last Leaf" (1906) by William Sydney Porter known by his pen name as O.
Henry. The essential purpose of this study is to discover the figurative use of the
language through the language choice to understand its effect on readers. This study
is theoretical, analytical and descriptive in nature. It is divided into five chapters.
chapter one includes the preliminaries of this research like the introduction, the
problem, the objectives and the significance. Chapter two, a review of related studies
and a theoretical framework are embraced. The greater part of the study that has been
selected for analysis is in chapter four. Chapter five sums up the findings of the
research as well as the recommendations. Through the analysis, the researcher has
found out that both of the authors have chosen approximately similar stylistic devices
but convey different meanings each according to his/her own beliefs in spite of some
similarities in the background. The analysis has confirmed that both of them are
distinctive in a certain way in revealing meanings and reinforcing the aesthetic value
showing a different impact on literature for many years.

Keywords: Stylistics, Style, Criticism, Figures of speech, Slang language, Gothic.

 ‫‪IX‬‬

‫تحليل األسلوبية في القصص القصيرة المختارة لدى المؤلفين ماري فلنرى اوكنر‬
‫ووليم سدني بورتر‬
‫اعداد‬
‫زينب على عبد‬
‫اشراف‬
‫د‪ .‬محمد محاميد‬
‫الملخص‬

‫كرست هذه الدراسة إلجراء التحليل األدبي باستخدام طرق األسلوبية ألربعة من القصص المختارة‬

‫من قبل اثنين من المؤلفين االمريكيين‪ ،‬وهى كل من قصه "اناس صالحون"(‪ ،)1955‬و"يوم‬

‫القيامة" (‪ )1965‬للمؤلفة ماري فلنرى اوكنر وقصه "الباب الخضراء"(‪ ،)1906‬و"الورقة األخيرة"‬

‫(‪ ) 1907‬للمؤلف وليم سدني بورتر‪ .‬ان الغرض األساسي من هذه الدراسة هو اكتشاف المعنى‬

‫المجازي للغة من خالل نوع اللغة المستخدمة لفهم كيفية تأثيرها على القراء‪ .‬هذه الدراسة هي‬

‫نظريه‪ ،‬تحليليه‪ ،‬وصفيه بطبيعتها‪ ،‬وهي مقسمه الى خمس فصول‪ .‬الفصل االول يتناول اساسيات‬

‫البحث متضمنه المقدمة‪ ،‬مشكله الدراسة‪ ،‬االهداف واألهمية اما الفصل الثاني يشمل عرض‬

‫للدراسات السابقة واإلطار النظري‪ .‬الجزء االكبر من الدراسة التي تم اختيارها للتحليل فهي في‬

‫الفصل الرابع‪ .‬الفصل الخامس يلخص نتائج البحث وكذلك التوصيات‪ .‬وقد وجد الباحث من‬

‫خالل التحليل ان كال المؤلفين استخدما نفس االساليب األدبية تقريبا ولكنهم نقال معاني مختلفة‬

‫كل حسب معتقداته على الرغم من بعض التشابه في الخلفية العامة‪ .‬وخاللها أكد التحليل ان كال‬

‫منهما متميز بطريقه معينه في الكشف عن المعاني وتعزيز القيمة الجمالية التي تظهر تأثي ار‬

‫مختلفا على االدب لسنوات عديده‪.‬‬

‫الكلمات المفتاحية‪ :‬األسلوبية‪ ،‬االسلوب‪ ،‬النقد‪ ،‬الصور البالغية‪ ،‬اللغة العامة‪ ،‬القوطى‪.‬‬
 1

Chapter One
Introduction

1.1 Background of the study

Different views and recent approaches have emerged as an extension to literary

criticism. According to the stylistic approach, literary texts are analyzed depending on

linguistic, contextual features. According to the development that occurred to literary

analysis, this attention has been shifted to the new analysis of literary work which is the

study of literary text from linguistic point of view (Widdowson: 1975).Stylistics is a

field which has been approached differently from different points of view. The meaning

conveyed is different, based on theories which belong to different activities in areas of

business, whether spoken or written, different devices of thought and rules of language

that both create variations in meaning having different ways. This is how the concept

of style is conveyed by using the language in different ways to achieve a certain

purpose aiming at capturing meaning in a different way. Style, in general, is how to

make use of different linguistic forms in actual language use. Anyhow, this study

endeavors to concentrate on the metaphorical use of language. It is clear that the most

effective devices for achieving clarity, diction and presence are the use of adapted form

of words as mentioned by Leech (1969). The different use of words in everyday

utterances is the main issue in stylistics. Understanding the texts and utterances can only

be helped by stylistics, subsequently maximizing the enjoyment in these texts. Stylistics

deals with different literary texts, spoken or written, dialogue or monologue, formal or

informal, scientific or literary. The language of literature and the language habits by

particular authors and their writing patterns are being studied and investigated by

stylistics which is more concerned with language function and aims at understanding
 2

the intent of the author as well as the significance of the function chosen by a certain

style.

Contemporary stylistics falls under different topics ranging from literary, cognitive to

pedagogical stylistics, the core of stylistic scholarship. It goes beyond the rhetoric,

poetic, formalism, structuralism of the past to include, critical, pragmatic, corpus,

gender, cognitive and lately neuroscience approaches.

The modern types of stylistics did not figure out until the Twentieth Century. It was the

Russian formalists represented by Roman Jacobson and Vladimir Propp whom their

theories had emerged and affected literature analyses later on. Jacobson was keen on the

poetic function of language, which is a motivation to make literary scholarship more

scientific.

Stylistics belongs to the western traditional rhetorics and poetics of Europe. Style was a

concept in the field of rhetoric in ancient Greece. It is regarded as a technique and art

for producing persuasive texts. Ancient Greek philosophers like Socrates, Plato and

Aristotle did writing scripts on rhetoric. The concept of style comes from the use of

rhetorical devices to capture certain effects in discourse. Nevertheless, stylistics didn't

emerge as a discipline until modern times. The study of stylistics has been studied in the

West by scholars from different attitudes. There are five schools with various points of

view that have contributed greatly to the progress of stylistic studies: The Geneva

School, The Russian Formalism, The French Structuralism, Psychological Stylistics,

The English School, and the Prague School. The English School represented by Firth

and Halliday focuses on connecting stylistics analyses with social factors. The Russian

Formalism and The Prague School represented subsequently by Viktor Shklovsky and

Roman Jacobson focus on the analyses of literary texts and poetic language specially
 3

those which meets the focus of this paper. They are greatly well-known for submitting

the term foregrounding in the year1930 which differs from the backdrop of the common

language. (Li & Shi: 2015)

The research focuses on four short stories written by two American authors: William

Sydney Porter and Mary Flannery O'Connor. Regarding the two authors, they were

pioneers in their writing during their life time. Their work has inspired and attracted

several critics by different authors due to their eccentric use of language.

With regard to O. Henry, the technique is something that he is perfect at using. He uses

many techniques and different styles in his writing. One of them is the use of local

color. Being born in North Carolina as a cultural tradition brought deep influence in

his literary career as a result of his southern background. He is one of the most notable

writers of the earlier twentieth century. Previous studies judged his work from the

literary point of view and showed little attention to the level of stylistics. The use of

unexpected ending in his short stories is O. Henry’s most famous technique; for

example in "The Gift of Magi", the reader never expects the husband to sell his watch

when the wife brings him a chain for it and the wife to cut her hair when her husband is

buying her combs. His stories are mainly distinguished for being ingenious, humorous,

ironic, as a result of unexpected endings. (Cerf and Cartmell: 2010)

On the other hand, O'Connor’s writing style has different characteristics. She is a writer

of Southern Gothic style which separates her from other writers in different ways. Her

style has been termed as a morbidly Catholic mindset by which she considers violence

as a means for redemption in most of her short stories. "Judgment Day" (1965), and

"Good Country People" (1955) are some of the best among her short stories, which the

researcher has chosen for analysis due to their deep meaning and distinguished style.
 4

These stories have received several critical views. Frederick Hoffmann (1966)

mentions that O’Connor’s short stories portray images of the horror of the self-love and

for her , she is being seen as a writer who astonishes readers admitting her opinion in

religion (Bloom: 1999). In "Good Country People", O'Connor’s short story is seen from

a feminist perspective by the author Jeanne Campbell Reesman (1996). Others like

Robert Drake (1966) sees it as a complaint against modernism.

The usefulness of the stylistic approach can be seen in giving a detailed analysis of

literary texts. Thus literary criticism works as stylistics in revealing meanings and

appreciating literary texts values through their different styles by understanding the

ways and techniques they try to use in their language.

1.2 Biography of the Authors:

Mary Flannery O' Connor (1925-1964) was born in Georgia, the United States. When

she was five years old, the distinguished O'Connor attended St.Vincent's, a Catholic

parochial school in Savannah. She got an interest in art and showed a lot of sense of

humor that is reflected in her writing style. But unfortunately, she died of a benign

tumor. Bloom (1999) has plot summary of different stories of O'Connor's and having

critical views, characterizing her short stories by the clarity of vision, grotesque,

redemption, range of vision, asceticism, the imaginative vision of O'Connor's. Some of

the most famous short stories are "The Geranium", "A Good man is Hard to Find",

"Revelation". O'Connor short stories are known as gnostic inspite of her religious

beliefs. Her art has been misunderstood as being away from faith. Compassion is not

her ultimate aim but pride is the reason for her grotesque and unsympathetic secular

characters. They are freed by her for their association with the violence of prophetic

concern. She graduated from Georgian State College for women in 1945. In spite of her
 5

serious illness, she stayed mentally healthy. In her life and work on short stories, she got

different awards including Ford Foundation Grant in1959 and an honor degree.

Even though O'Connor's vision seems to appear essentially religious, she tried to

present it from a primary grotesque or comic idea (Dibble: 1986). She is an American

writer who has written about thirty-two short stories and two novels besides a number

of reviews and comments. O’Connor finished the collection during her final battle with

Lupus.

As for O. Henry, his real name is William Sydney Porter (1862-1910), well known by

his pen name O. Henry, is an American author of short stories. His stories are

distinguished for their witty approach, use of words, effects of coincidence on their

characters and most often for their unexpected endings, known as a playful writer. His

short stories often depict the commonplace, especially the life of commoners of New

York City. After later coming news of his wife serious illness, he was disappointed.

While he was at the prison, many of his stories were published (Cerf and Cartmell:

2010). His most famous stories include "The Gift of the Magi", "The Ransom of Red

Chief", "The Cop and the Anthem", and others. During his lifetime, some of his stories

such as The Sacrifice, His Duty and Trying to Get Arrested were altered as silent films.

He was born in North Carolina (Arnett: 1963). His mother died of tuberculosis when he

was just three after that he and his father had gone on to live with his grandmother. His

father is a physician. The positions he had taken were a lot in society working for a

period as a reporter, a musician, a columnist, and a teller in a bank. He was reassigned

in New York in 1902 and became a famous writer, presenting around 381 short stories.

He submitted one story every week for over a year to the New York World Sydney

Magazine (Cerf and Cartmell: 2010). Unluckily too, he died of several illnesses

including an enlarged heart of cirrhosis of liver and diabetes.

 6

1.3 Statement of the problem

The researcher feels that there has not been enough attention given to stylistics analysis

of the short stories. Besides, none of these analyses has dealt specifically with any of

O'Connor's based on others’ findings. Both O. Henry and O'Connor were terrific writers

that they deserve to attract attention and to emphasize the importance of stylistic

analysis. It is an interdisciplinary branch between linguistic and literary criticism (Leech

and Short: 2007). Before, much attention was paid to literary criticism, and nowadays

much emphasis is being given to the stylistic approach for being objective together with

the subjective literary criticism. Literary criticism can allow for different interpretations,

while stylistically, means how the writer has manipulated the language. Applying the

stylistic approach can help understand how much agreement there is between literary

criticism and the way linguistic forms are used to interpret literary texts.

Sometimes we have certain ideas but we do not know how to express ourselves through

the use the language. We can see many inscriptions in the advertisements as well as

many writings and literary texts in newspapers but we don’t know the figurative

meaning of these texts or what the author implies, using the language in a certain way.

This explains the reason why the researcher chooses this topic to negotiate a problem

that has been suffered by many. O'Connor has written over thirty short stories and for O.

Henry, over one hundred. So the researcher thinks that there are limited researches of

stylistic analysis on short stories. O. Henry is the other author that the researcher

suggests to compare with because his stories usually have the advantage of using

stylistic devices. Hence, the researcher decides to apply a stylistic approach, because it

is considered descriptive to understand the language in an objective way and focuses

mainly on the literary text under study.

 7

1.4Questions of the study

The research intends to answer the following questions:

1. What do the concepts style and stylistics mean?

2. What theoretical framework the researcher will depend upon to perform the analytical

approach?

3. What are the selected short stories, and why are they specifically chosen by the

researcher?

4. What are the procedures that the researcher is going to follow so as to perform the

analytical approach?

1.5 Objectives of the Study

This study is mainly devoted to analyzing short stories written by Flannery O'Connor

and William Porter, using stylistic analyses. These analyses depend on certain features

devised by the writer. These features contribute to meaning-making and raising the

aesthetic or artistic value of the short stories. Exploring the rhetorical devices can

motivate other researchers to understand and evaluate literary texts. It also explores the

effectiveness of the stylistic approach to literary works. As Leech and Short (2007)

assert, the aesthetic value cannot be split up from the linguistic code. Thus whatever the

writer writes, it can be exposed through the stylistic approach. Hence, this study intends

to emphasize the role of stylistic approach along with the help of literary criticism so as

to interpret the meanings and explore the stylistic features of four selected short stories;

The Green door and "The Last Leaf" by O. Henry; "The Judgment Day", "Good

Country people" by O’Connor. By using the stylistic approach, it further helps

appreciate literary texts.

The conducted research aims at achieving the following research objectives:

 8

1. What stylistic features largely prevail in the selected short stories?

2. How do these features take part in supporting meaning and enriching the aesthetic

value or artistic function of the selected short stories?

3. What does analysis reveal about key stylistic features?

4. How can both of the authors be distinguished? Are there any similarities between the

two styles of these two authors?

1.6 Significance of the study

Stylistics naturally combines between linguistics and literary studies, which is very

interesting and specifically important for those who have a general interest in English

language and literature and also those who have a special interest in stylistics. It will be

encouraging for those who would like to do stylistic analysis on different kinds of

literary texts, and those who would like to go further investigating the work of O'

Connor and O. Henry.

1.7 Limits of the study

The study will include the limits of the topic and according to the limits of time, the

selected short stories are found in different periods of time, no limited time. The limits

of human beings would be about certain stylistic approaches and O’Connor’s short

stories: "Judgment Day" (1965), "Good Country People" (1955).As for O. Henry's, "The

Green Door" (1906), "The Last Leaf" (1907). There is no certain place according to the

limits of place.

1.8 Limitations of the study:

This research paper will be limited to a certain type of analyses. It will be confined to

analyze certain stylistic tactics and to some selected short stories because they are only

representative of a large number of books which had been written by those authors in
 9

their lifetime. However, there is still uncertainty whether this research will discuss the

subject comprehensively or not. Future researches may have the interest to broaden the

area, putting all possible materials related under discussion as well as other pieces of

evidence that can help a lot in analyzing and producing for better results. The research

will not take account of most stylistic feature sunder analyses but only those most

prominent for aesthetic value and those most cater to enhance meaning.

1.9 Definition of Terms:

There are different stylistic devices the author uses to enrich meaning and raise the

aesthetic value of his text. Without the figurative language, writing would be plain and

shallow. The more stylistic devices used, the more unique, writing can be. Perhaps

someone knows a dozen or might have lists that never heard of. There are about 31

stylistic devices. The researcher is going to mention some of these most important and

widely used devices. Some of these features are not possibly found in the selected short

stories:

1. Allegory: It is the representation of ideas through a character or an event. It can

convey hidden meaning through symbolic figures and imagery and the best example for

allegory is the Animal Farm by the novelist George Orwell. It is an autobiographical

novel. (Lansing: 2003)

2. Alliteration: It is the repetition of the same sounds with in words whether

consonants or vowels at the beginning or at the end usually to show emphasis or to

create a rhythmical and musical effect, like: The snake slithers across the sands. (Arp

and Johnson: 2009)

 10

3. Allusion: An indirect reference to a person or a thing or an idea that has a certain

cultural, historical or literary significance by just passing comment like, stop acting like

Romeo in front of her. (This gives a reference to Shakespeare’s Romeo, the passionate

lover of Juliet). (Hinds: 1998)

4. Anaphora: It is the recursive use or repetition of certain words at the beginning of

sentences or in the middle in order to emphasize them. It is perhaps the oldest device.

Its origin belongs to Bilabial psalms later brought by the romantic writers to the public.

like: Who is to blame, who is to look to, who is to turn to, in a tough situation like this.

(Kulas and Hintika: 1929)

5. Antithesis: It is emphasizing contrasts between two things or fictional characters.

Love is an ideal thing. Marriage is a real thing. This confusion of the real with the ideal

can be misunderstood.

6. Climax: Organizing the events of a text in such a way that struggle and step by step

rise up, such as: He was not a bad listener, a good speaker, and an amazing performer.

7. Deviation: It is a stylistic notion, a way in which foregrounding is produced. The

notion of deviation is very important as it is a way of creating abnormal patterns of

language so as to represent a distinct reality from the established norm. This way gives

rise to foregrounding and to reader's awareness. It should be noticed that even in

ordinary speeches, the deviation can occur. Poetry is distinctively characterized by

departure from the normal use of language. (Paul Simpson: 2004)

8. Foregrounding: It is "a form of textual patterning” found by Prague School in

1930which is prompted specifically for literally aesthetic purposes, compared to work
out any level. It usually includes a stylistic distortion either through a case, which
deviates from the norm or a state of a text, which is brought ahead through repetition or
 11

parallelism. It comes as a deviation from the norm or as something similar. It is a sort of

defamiliarization. In a poem like, 'one perfect rose', is so apparent:

A single flower he sent me since we met

All tenderly, his messenger he chose deep
-hearted, pure, with scented dew still wet
One perfect rose
(Simpson: 2004, 99)
Foregrounding is clear in the first and in the second line. In the second line is “ fronted

by” two elements (an adjunct and a complement) which usually occur in final position

as it supposed to be, he chose his messenger all tenderly (Simpson: 2004, 50). The poet

here expresses his emotional state through a symbol of a rose. The use of foregrounding

in an attempt to create a semantic equivalence and rhyme scheme is to attract reader's

attention. The deviation is one good feature in literature, which marks oddity.

9. Hyperbole : A sort of exaggeration in someone's speech when giving statements like:

His brain is the size of a pea.

10. Irony: It is a situation created by the author in novels or stories, which is

incongruent to reality. They often disrupt individual purposes and social expectations

e.g. Peter is a policeman however, he does drugs, known for abuse and violence.

(Simpson: 2004)

11. Metaphor: A figure of speech by which something or someone is compared to

another one without using the words like or similar to that seems like implied meaning.

It is “a process of mapping between two different domains of concepts". (Simpson:

2004, 41). The target domain means the ideas that you intend to create the metaphorical

construction through. In the following sentence, she usually blew her lid, the basic

domain is our understanding of the idea of anger because it is the one we aim to

illustrate through the metaphor.

 12

12. Parallelism: It happens when words or structures are re-utilized in different forms

in a given text to make meaning cohesion. Thus, Parallelism is the patterning of extra

elements of the language regularly. When certain elements found in a text, they become

regular and their extra usage appears beyond the normal usage of the language. The

deviation can make regular language irregular, but parallelism creates highly regular

patterns. In parallelism, the writer's linguistic choice is specific to certain features in

language thus considered a sort of foregrounding (Leech: 1969) It is not a quality of

only literary works. It happens in our communication every day in public speeches, like

political speeches, oral narratives, nursery rhymes, advertising which can create a deep

effect. It is arranging a sentence in such a manner that it has a parallel structure. e.g.

Tell me and I forget, teach me and I may remember, involve me and I will learn.

13. Personification: Talking about non-human words as if they were alive or assigning

human qualities to the nonhuman. It is widely used to enrich the figurative use of

language: The rundown house appears depressed. The house is given human quality by

being depressed. (paxson: 1994)

14. Oxymoron: It is the use of adjacent opposite terms as in these examples, terribly

good or real magic. (Golteland: 2016)

15. Synecdoche: When a part is used to act for the whole e. g if someone says,check out

my new wheels. (Wheels) here signifies the car. It is part of the car. (Simpson: 2004)

(Whitsitt: 2013)
 13

Chapter Two

2.1 Review of related literature (The empirical study)

O' Henry and O' Connor's short stories have been tackled by other researches, using

different ways in their analyses. Thus a review of related literature and theoretical

framework will be considered a workable option to do these stylistic analyses; part of it

basically is related to the theoretical framework, and the other part will be done in

relation to style and stylistics:

Current-Garcia (1965) in her book entitled O. Henry, analyzes his literary texts of short

stories talking mostly about his style in writing and about his ideas. In her study, she

mentions, “Technique was something he [O. Henry] was good at using and that he used

many different techniques of local color.” (Garcia, 142). He extracts the patterns of the

common people around him. While in her book (1993) entitled A Study of the Short

Fiction, she mentions that most of O. Henry’s short stories life style is of the south. His

models of characters are people who were around him. She also talks about the way he

puts the words together so that common people can understand him and that his

vocabulary has a lot of slang words and phrases that is why he gains interest by the

public until his language shifts down academic facts of speech. This study agrees with

the previous one in that they both has criticized O. Henry's work in fiction. But the

difference is that this research follows the stylistic approach, while the other analyzes

his work through the traditional approach.

Dibble (1986) argues that some critical commentaries and review questions on

O'Connor’s stories. He has given some introduction with background about O’Connor’s

life and work and also providing summaries to some of her short stories and analyzing

them by making use of literary criticism through the traditional approach. The
 14

researcher might make use of these commentaries to interpret the meaning and uncover

the artistic function.

Matthews (1994) in his dissertation entitled English Poetry in Ethiopia, begins by

providing confirmations for the teaching of literature. He then tries to establish the ways

and procedures of contemporary stylistics for the teaching of literature. The research

aims at finding an approach to literature that can offer possibilities for introducing an

integrated literature-teaching programmer, which can assist the development of literary

understanding and linguistic competence in students in the EFL context at University

(AAU). Finally, he concludes his study by showing how the stylistic analysis approach

supplies better possibilities than the literary criticism technique for including the

students in self-exploration of literary texts.

Zeru (1996) in his thesis entitled, A Study of Three Amharic Historical Novels, submits

an analysis of style on three Amharic historical novels written by two authors: Johannes

and Alula AbaNega by MamoWudneh; Aba Kostir by Aberra Jembere. In his analysis,

he deals with language use such as a rhetorical question, dialogue, and repetition;

figures of speech like simile and metaphor; narrative techniques particularly third

person point of view, foreshadowing and flashback.

Getaneh (1997) starts with a concern for the English major’s inability to understand and

analyze literary texts at AAU. The researcher mentions that they cannot do so because

they are not taught to use a particular and systematic framework of literary analysis and

objecting to the idea that teaching literature does not improve learners’ communicative

competence. The researcher says that the result got from the study signify that the

students taught by using the stylistic approach work better than those taught depending

on the traditional practical criticism approach in the end-of-course test. The researcher
 15

finally recommends following the stylistic systematic approach for the learners in the

teaching of drama rather than literary criticism.

Hurtubise (1998) does the stylistic analysis to the two narratives by J.R.Tolkien's style,

discussing the techniques of the English poetic verse. His analysis is done through

speech act, implicature; face devised by Searle and Grice and explores the evaluation

by Labov in The Lord of Rings. The Hobbit is depicting comic conversation balanced

with tragic constraint.

Bloom(1999) in his book, Flannery O'Connor's Major Short Story Writers, has argued

some of the critical views by some authors on O'Connor's literary texts by which they

discuss different features in O'Connor's short stories that most of his stories

distinguished for their clarity of vision, redemption, asceticism, violence of metaphor,

black and white roles. He is the author of over 20 books and the editor of more than 30

anthologies of literary criticism.

A study by Amare (2002), sets out to interpret some selected English poems of

TsegayeG /Meehan, Solomon Deressa and Eyasu Gorfu, with the framework of stylistic

analysis. She argues that the core objective of her thesis is to explore the language use

of the poets and discovers how the language communicate meanings in each poem and

discloses the repeated themes in each poet's performance. Amare further states that the

other purpose is to show the effectiveness of the stylistic analysis approach in exposing

the meaning of the poems to arrive at a reliable explanation of literary texts. In her

study, she adopts the revised method by Goeffrey Leech (1969) in his book, A

Linguistic Guide to English Poetry; however, she makes use of other references.
 16

Adane (2012) chooses to analyze three selected chapters (1, 7, 16) are regarded as

stylistically head chapters in the novel, despite the novel has 16 chapters. He uses

lexical categories and figures of speech as a theoretical framework for his analysis. This

study shares the current one in that they both follow the stylistic approach and using

figures of speech in their analyses.

Diribu (2012) in his thesis, aims to stylistically analyze four of Edgar Allen Poe's short

stories: The Shadow, The Black cat, ATale of Jerusalem and Three Sundays in a Week.

He applies only Foregrounding as a theoretical framework for his analysis. This study

shares the current one in that they both have considered 'foregrounding ' in the analysis

but it differs with it in that this study is using foregrounding only in larger space while

the current is taking other stylistic devices in the analysis.

Li &Shi (2015) provide a profound study using the stylistic approach to E.E.

Cumming's poetry who is considered a pioneer of experimental poetry. His work has

attracted the most famous linguists by attempting to analyze the stylistic features and

creativity in his poems. In this study, analysis has been made to figure out the patterns

of foregrounding in his poetry and kinds of deviation on some selected poems that have

major themes on death, life, nature, and love.

The current research shares common characteristics with the previous ones in depending

the stylistic approach and others in making use of literary criticism to enhance

interpretation. It differs with them in limiting the study to certain aspects concerning the

stylistic literary devices that are put for analysis. However, it agrees with the previous

ones in bringing out the suggested meaning and enhancing the aesthetic value.
 17

2.2 Theoretical framework and concepts in focus (The theoretical

study)

In this part of the paper, general understanding should be taken on concepts of style and

stylistics that associate with the theoretical framework, which analyses based upon:

2.2.1 The concept of style

Leech (1969) mentions that style is the manner in which something is written or spoken.

The style is regarded to be an identification of the person speaking or writing. It can

refer to the figures of speech, word use, or sentence structures. It can also refer to a

Latin term as elocutio which means a style that means lexis in Greek. Elocutio is the

diction and the style of a language.

According to Leech and Short (2007), the word style has a definite meaning; it refers to

the way in which language is used in a given context, by a given person, for a given

purpose, and so on. However, they feel that to be on the safest ground, it is better to

think of style as “the linguistic characteristics of a particular text”. (Leech and Short,

11) Style can refer to both spoken and written, both literary and non-literary varieties of

language but by origin, it specifically refers to written literary texts. Leech and Short

further mention that style is as the “dress of thought", adding that although this

metaphor of style as some kind of “adornment” or “covering” (Leech and Short, 15)of

thought or meaning is no longer available, it is implicit. The devices of style, which

prevailed throughout the Renaissance period by which the essayist or orator supposes to

frame his thoughts with kinds of (figures) that match his mode of discourse.

Berel Lang (1979) argues that the theory of style and the study of the style are not

dependent on the results of this discussion because the style has certain features that
 18

associate with meanings. So the styles of the texts can’t be similar. There are texts

which differ in the linguistic forms however, they are similar.

Cudden notes, “Style is the characteristic manner of expression in prose or verse: How a

particular writer says things.” (Zeru: 1996, 7) The investigation and analysis of style

include tests of the writer’s choice concerning his selection of words, paragraphs,

rhetorical devices, and the way he uses them.

M. H Abrams (1999) states that traditionally, the style can be defined as the mode of

linguistic expression in verse or prose concerning writers or speakers who speak or say

the language The analyzing of specific style for a specific writer can be done in terms of

aims, kinds of sentence patterns, choice of words, and the type of the figurative

language.. etc.

According to Lehman (1996),The idea of style can be ascribed to genres to individuals,

to periods or to languages. Dealing with Shakespeare writings by scholars, ascribe them

to him because of his style. The style can be identified for the period of renaissance and

the other for the enlightenment. In terms of language, German is often said to be

identified by obscurity while French is judged to convey clarity in style, so according to

this idea, style can have different kinds of applications.

2.2.2 The concept of stylistics:

Stylistics is defined differently by different scholars but having somewhat similar

concepts: Widdowson (1975) identifies stylistics as dealing with literary discoursein a

linguistic way. According to him, stylistics differs from literary criticism as well as

from linguistics and that there exists a middle ground position between linguistics and

literary criticism. The function of this middle ground is to mediate between the two. It
 19

connects between the two disciplines thus it has an interdisciplinary function. He further

states that "stylistics as an area of mediation between two disciplines" (Widdowson, 3 –

4).It is an attempt to show that stylistics is a mixture of the two schools of literary

criticism which involves the reader's subjective, intuitive judgement and linguistics

which offers the ways of description that help in supporting the reader’s response.

Short (1996) states that Stylistics interprets the connection between language and

aesthetic function. Therefore, the analysis of the style is an attempt to explore or extract

the artistic elements based on writer's choice of language so awareness for each text of

the artistic effect of the whole and the way how fitting details into the whole should be

considered.

Culpeper, Short and Verdonk (2002) in their book entitled Exploring the Language of

Drama, consider the stylistic analysis as ''the toolkit'' for the analysis of poetry and it is

well designed to help, explore the language of dramatic texts. It shows also how much

stylistic analysis of drama differs from poetry or prose like examining foregrounding in

poetry when analyzing it.It happens through manipulation of grammar, lexis area and

phonology in syntactic parallelism through the linguistic organization and this is

regarded as the essence of linguistics. Stylistic Analysis has a significant role in the

identification of linguistic features.

Paul Simpson (2004) says that Stylistics is a way of textual explanation in which

priority is given to language. The reason why language is so important to stylisticians is

that the various forms, patterns, and levels that constitute linguistic structure are an

important index of the function of the text. Texts functional significance of the text as

discourse acts in turn as agate way to its interpretation. Text meaning is not always

assisted by linguistic features though sometimes help discover special types of meaning.
 20

Stylistics much favorable branch for analysis is literature as high art of widely known

forms of writing and for creativity and innovation in language use in literary texts by

authors as regarded as "non-canonical" because it's not right to think that skillfulness in

the language is only from canonical literature. The techniques of stylistic analysis can

help understand language structure as well as function.

Donald Hardy(2007) argues how the relation between computation and stylistics and the

way to approach linguistic and stylistic theory through the use of linguistic and literary

devices which shows the interactive nature between spirit and matter, the interaction

between ''the grammatical voice and the physical bodies in her texts''. A productive

approach to understanding O 'Connors manipulation parts of its characters in her

exploration of the sacramental and the grotesque to understand O' Connors stylistic

manipulation of the body coupled by the quantitative analysis of the body- part words.

Computational literary stylistics makes it very easy for analysis is otherwise very

difficult to perform. The analysis gives a vision in an ideal way to understand literary

meaning partly at the formal level.

According to Leech and Short (2007), Stylistics is simply defined as the (linguistic)

study of style, which means the language use. They mention that styleis usually studied

to interpret something, but generally speaking, literary stylistics reveals the relation

between language and artistic function covert or overt, which is the aim of the

interpretation.

As for (Isidore 2010), he suggests that the idea of linguistic stylistics relies heavily in its

analysis on scientific rules. These rules include the lexical, grammatical, context and

cohesion and figures of speech. But literary stylistics is different from linguistic

stylistics in that the latter deals with elements of language while the former associates
 21

with external elements like history, philosophy, and source of inspiration to explain a

text with infrequent leaps on language elements.

Michael Burke (2017) in his book entitled The Routledge Handbook moves further the

limit of the rhetoric, poetic formalism, structuralism and functionalism of the past to

contain corpus, critical, cognitive, pedagogical, pragmatic, gender, neuroscience

approaches however, stylistics is designed to do as interdisciplinary study which is the

truth of how stylistics works.

It is assumed through this research that stylistics is relatively a new subject and is

submitted as a discipline in the 1960s.It has a close relationship with Russian

Formalism and New Criticism. But one of the arguments inflicted by literary critics

against stylistics is that it is rather mechanical and lifeless. These arguments may be

acceptable. This is because even though the objective and scientific techniques are

helpful in describing the formal elements of the texts, the literary expression is

subjective. Those subjective emotions or thoughts and feelings cannot always be

replaced by an objective approach. Nevertheless, the stylistic approach doesn’t intend to

make criticism completely scientific; rather its aim is to put criticism in a systematic

way. (Amare: 2002)

2.3 Theoretical Framework

It is very important to identify a certain kind of theoretical framework so as to be able to

work accordingly. Regarding this research, it should be noticed that there are personal

and literary qualities, which differ stylistically so when doing the analysis there should

be a suitable technique that can be applied for the analysis of styles of all writers.
 22

Artistic principles are the best representative underlying the writer's choice. (Leech and

Short: 2007)

In the past, "the orator used to frame his ideas with the help of models (styles) with

figures suitable to his model of discourse." (Leech and Short,11). Most writers, and

actually, all texts, have individual qualities. Therefore the features which attract our

attention in one text will not necessarily be important in another text whether the same

or a different author. There is no exclusive or determinate technique for selecting what

is significant. It should be newly aware of the artistic effect of each text and the whole

and the way linguistic details suitable to this whole.

Short (1996: 9) agrees on the notion that interpretation could be performed "starting

from both levels i.e. either from the linguistic description or intuitive interpretation"

since stylistics is a mixture of the two schools that is literary criticism and linguistics.

However, they think that starting from both levels is not the issue but the essential thing

is to make interpretation systematic and cater for descriptive and explanatory purpose.

The description of linguistic features is more important in making explicit meaning of

the artistry. According to them, there is no strict, firm procedure to follow in the

stylistic analysis.

Leech and Short (1981: 13) state that there is a recurring motion "through linguistic

observation that motivates literary insight." There are more prominent features than

others, so the focus can be on those features that appeal to our perception. These

features that attract our attention are the results of linguistic choice. Therefore, there is

no fixed formula for identifying and describing the linguistic elements but, the method

is just to specify those features and examine them so as to find their significance for the
 23

production of meaning of the artistic material. Those linguistic features are stylistic

devices which help to understand the meaning of the text.

Widdowson (1996, 145) agrees with other scholars that "there is no rigid order of

procedure, the technique is to pick on features in the text which appeal to first"

This frame work has been approved by the researcher for its availability and its

interesting nature as well as suitability to the limitation of time. It has been also

approved by several theses. It includes the core of stylistic analysis that is basically

focus on revealing meanings. In Simpson's (2004: 11), there is a basic overview on

several analyses by exploring levels of language on some selected passages from

famous authors by phonology, graphology, morphology, lexicology and semantics.

Different rhetorical devices like metaphor and metanomy and satire (Simpson: 42)

besides some major models like foregrounding concept are investigated in several texts

(Simpson: 60-63). Other authors like Leech and Short (2007: 11) (1981) in their book

Style in fiction, suggest that stylicians are interested in the form of a text as well as its

artistic function. Aurelius, Helgason, and Gunneng (2012: 35) mention that (with

reference to Style in Fiction) there are a large number of figures of speech which can

have "more possibilities on the lexical and the syntactic levels" as a result of ample

preferences of choice by language users due to several distinctions in their style. In

Mahlberg (2013: 8) in his book, Corpus stylistics mentions that choices of language

have properties that can be "characterized according to norms or deviation from the

norm of the language use." So to describe a certain style is to describe the features that

make a text different and that Corpus stylistics can further add a Quantitative data to

certain features under analyses.

 24

2.3.1 Review of stylistic categories

The aim behind using stylistic categories suggested by Leech and Short (1981-2007)

and Simpson (2004) is to help, collect a range of data which may be examined in

relation to the literary effect of each passage. The categories are placed under four

general headings: lexical categories, grammatical categories, figures of speech, and

cohesion and context. This study mainly focuses on figures of speech besides other

artistic elements thus it should be considered whether there's any kind of deviation from

the norm by foregrounding or departure from it by means of language code depending

on certain features. These features (schemes or tropes) (Leach and Short:1981, 78-79),

on the other hand, are grammatical and lexical. They are found to see if there is any

case of repetition (anaphora, parallelism, etc.) or any rhetorical effect as one of

antithesis, reinforcement climax, anticlimax while on the phonological scheme is to see

whether any kind of alliteration, assonance, rhyme or any vowel or consonant cluster in

a particular way and how these features may interact with meaning. Also if there is any

kind of tropes like simile, metaphor or personification, irony or if there are any kinds

of neologisms (like sunny, American, westerly …); any deviant lexical collocations like

portentous infants or any graphological deviation like capitalizations that will give a

clue to certain kinds of poetic forms. There's no essential technique for selecting what is

significant. Most important is the artistic effect of the whole. The metaphorical use of

language can be very difficult to understand sometimes unless knowledge is oriented to

understand the different styles and the ways of producing the language to convey

meanings. The greater part of the analysis would be to interpret the meaning and

uncover the intent of the author's literary texts through literary criticism with the help of

the stylistic approach that focuses on the exploring the aesthetic value in the texture of

literary text through stylistic categories.

 25

Based on the previous discussion, the researcher builds his analysis mostly on figures of

speech, parallelism, foregrounding, repetition and any variation or deviation from the

norm. The selected short stories that will put for analysis are "The Judgment Day'

(1965), "Good Country People" (1955) by Mary Flannery O'Connor and "The Green

Door "(1906), "The last leaf" (1907) by William Sydney Porter.

 26

Chapter Three

Methodology and procedures

3. 0 Introduction

The selected short stories for analysis have been chosen from O'Connor's and O.

Henry's written at different times. They are multiple under different titles. These stories

are characterized having certain features and for different purposes. As for the research,

it is theoretical, analytical, descriptive in nature, and based on different sources of

materials. So it is suggested that this thesis is quantitative by having several short

stories found in script from the net and qualitative by identifying certain features that

qualify these four short stories The main concepts in this research are defining style,

stylistics and the frameworks of stylistic analysis. The procedure of data analysis is

characterized by close reading and text-based. In order to perform stylistic analysis on

the selected short stories, theoretical framework has been used based on stylistic

categories suggested by Leech and Short (2007) and others like Simpson (2004).

3.1 Population and sample of the study:

The population of the study consists of four selected short stories of the author

O'Connor and O. Henry that the researcher will put under analysis in different periods.

3.2 Instrument of the study

The study is both theoretical and analytical so the researcher will first apply a suitable

theoretical framework by seeing which stylistic features that best match the selected

short stories. Second the researcher will make use of literary criticism to enhance

meaning. Later the result will reveal how stylistic features of both of the authors are

significant or distinctive in conveying subject matters as well as implementing the

 27

artistic function in an effective way like the idea of death or the idea racism ,illness

,etc…by using different stylistic features.

3.3 Procedures

To achieve the requirements of this study, the researcher will try to fellow certain

procedures to conduct the study:

1. Read specifically samples of O.Henry and O’Connor short stories carefully (the

selected short stories).

2. Collect references related to the study.

3. Have an idea about previous studies and about the literature.

4. Identify the Questions of the study as well as the objectives.

5. Review the related literature including both the theoretical and the empirical studies.

6. Analyze the selected short stories depending on the theoretical framework taken from

the theoretical and the analytical approach and making use of earlier studies as well as

the opinions and judgments of specialist teaching staff.

7. Giving a short Summary for each of the short stories under analysis.

8. Connecting the results of the study with the analyses showing certain distinctions

between the two authors.

9. Providing the necessary recommendations.

10.Presenting a list of references according to APA style, 5th edition.

 28

Chapter Four
Analysis of the study

In this chapter, four short stories are reviewed and investigated by the researcher. The

first two short stories are "The Last Leaf' and 'The Green Door" by William Sydney

Porter. The researcher tries to answer the questions of the study by analyzing the use of

literary devices working through most distinctive points supported by literary criticism.

Later, the researcher tries to find whether any similarities between the two styles of the

two writers.

The two short stories that the study deals with by William Sydney Porter, known by O.

Henry, use varied literary devices in the narration that describe his tendency in dealing

with short stories to achieve the desired effect. Much of what O. Henry narrated is

distinguished for using slang style, maybe more than any other writer uses. He has been

compared to several of his predecessors and contemporaries from whom he may have

learned something about story writing.

4.1 Stylistic analysis of "The Green Door"

The story revolves around a man whom the writer calls a true adventurer, named Rudolf

Steiner. He is a young, attractive man who works in a music shop. He is walking home,

as others are out and about in the city. He notices a large, black man handing out pieces

of paper near a doctor's office and figures the paper contains the doctor's information.

He takes the paper from the man which reads, The Green Door. As a man is passing by,

he tosses his paper to the ground; Rudolf grabs it and reads a doctor's name and address.

Puzzled, he circles back to the street where he got the paper. When Rudolf realizes his

paper is different from what others are receiving, he decides to accept the call from

Adventure. He passes the black man again, and again he receives a paper with The
 29

Green Door on it. He also sees more discarded papers in the street that only give the

doctor's name and contact information. He decides to accept Adventure's cue. He goes

to the man again, but this time no paper. He looks at Rudolf with a cold expression, and

Rudolf is convinced that he fails, and then begins to walk away. However, he can't resist

the mystery of the message and decides to enter the building that houses the doctor's

office. He walks up to the second floor, searching for clues. He finds the green door and

knocks loudly. A girl, no more than twenty, answers and immediately passes out into

his arms.

In writing "The Green Door", the writer demonstrates his ideas by using multiple

devices that draw a well-defined picture in the reader’s mind of one’s adventure and

fate.

The literary effect of each passage will be checked based on the theoretical framework

and the impact on interpretation and meaning:

Figures of Speech
4.1.1 Grammatical and lexical schemes

In "The Green Door", O. Henry successfully uses foregrounding in many sentences for

aesthetic effect and parallelism as in the following examples:

“Without knowing why, we look up suddenly to see in a window a face that seems to

belong to our gallery of intimate portraits” (O. Henry: 1992, 35)

“Ten steps away he inspected it” (O. Henry, The Green Door,35)

“Twice he spent the night” (O. Henry, The Green Door, 33)

All the above examples have the same features in common and for the same purpose.
 30

Here sentences are fronted by adverbial phrases that are supposed to at the end of these

sentences or in the middle in case of "twice" for parallelism and asthetic effect and this

is known as anticipatory kind of foregrounding. In most of them depicts the meaning of

coincidence as in the first and in the second example and adventure as in the third

example. Other examples, on the other hand, the researcher notices another rhetorical

device in which repetition occurs to attract the reader’s attention to the fact of

coincidence and fate by drawing a picture in the reader’s mind through the quotation

which starts with “again and again he had found himself the dupe of…” (O. Henry, The

Green Door, 33). According to O. Henry, some people think that their lives are a

journey and every step is meant to happen while others feel coincidence takes the reins

as they walk their path even if their path is full of trickery and the shrewd.

In the short story, "The Green Door" by O. Henry, the readers are witnessing a man who

loves adventure, but the idea of fate is brought to his attention in a way he cannot deny

as it is narrated in the first quotation. The story begins in the second person which is

significant. It shows how (I) and (you) can perform a unit by strengthening the

understanding between the addressee and the addresser about what not been explicitly

said, which serve to foster the inside feelings between them (Halliday: 1985), as the

narrator gives the reader a hypothetical situation about a woman coming up to someone

on the side of the road, handing him bread, and cutting off a piece of his coat. How

would he react? The narrator says he probably wouldn't do a thing and that your sense

of adventure has died out.

The researcher finds that the narrator differentiates between the adventurers in stories

that go after land, women, or money and a real adventurer - a person who is not seeking

a thing; they have no intentions in their travels. This person is simply up for anything.
 31

The quotation “From the Crusades to the Palisades” (O. Henry, The Green Door, 32) is

another scene of foregrounding which is marked by parallel elements that shows a

literary effect by which O. Henry tries to emphasize the idea that the world never

neglects the achievements of true adventurers who enriched the history of fiction and art

by mentioning the crusaders' campaigns that happened in the past. These phrases can

provide allusions to a certain kind of adventures and that is one technique showing O.

Henry’s ability in using allusions through his "artistry" with words. (Current-Garcia:

1965, O. Henry)

O. Henry draws a comparison between true adventurers and half adventurers. He

believes that true adventurers are aimless, who never seek benefits or prizes but those

who accept their fate as it is, seek for nothing. They are more like the prodigal son,

Rudolf Steiner. Contrary to the half adventurers who seek rewards and benefits. This

creation of paradoxical elements is helpful to understand O. Henry’s intention to convey

his idea. While in the quotation which begins with “ in the big city,… “(O. Henry, The

Green Door, 32) O. Henry shifts to the concepts “of Romance and Adventure”,(O.

Henry, 32) giving an additional example of foregrounding and parallelism to get the

reader’s attention by imagining how they are waiting at every turn in NYC. However,

no one seems to be brave enough to embrace the journey, to embrace the unknown of a

real adventure. Rollins in Garcia's essay says that O. Henry is “a romanticist” because

of his concepts that life is a surprise. ( Current Garcia, A study of short Fiction, 157)

Most of the foregrounding examples are adverbials that are supposed to be at the end

of sentences in conventional speeches of everyday life use of language.

The researcher believes as it is mentioned by the author that it is impossible for any

person to decide whether a certain event is merely a coincidence or one’s fate that
 32

should be accepted willingly. Rudolf 's adventure might not have turned out pleasant.

The reason why Rudolf decides to open the green door is that the man who is

distributing the cards has given him two cards upon which was written "The Green

Door" and that astonishes him because all the other cards contain advertisements for a

dentist.

The tone shifting as the narrator introduces Rudolf Steiner, about a man whom he

calls a true adventurer. He is a young, attractive man who works in a music shop. He

has been arrested, lost his money, and even had his property stolen, however, Rudolf

always wants to know what is lurking around the next corner. Discovery and initiation

through adventure is one common theme in O. Henry’s stories (Pizer and Harbert:

1982)

4.1.2 Phonological scheme

The second device that O. Henry uses is alliteration, the repetition of sounds at the

beginning of words and in the middle as in this example: “Usually he passed the

dispenser of the dentist’s cards without reducing his store, but tonight the African

slipped one into his hand so deftly that he retained it there smiling a little at the

successful feat” (O. Henry, The Green Door,35). The researcher notices here the

repetition of sound /d/ at the beginning and end of words in the same position to gain

the reader’s attention to create some sound effect by giving prominence to certain

sounds to carve out a long-lasting image. There is another alliteration for sound /t/ in

words: slipped, passed, tonight , at, feat showing Rudolf distinctive moments of luck

and coincidence.

At this part of the story, Rudolf does his job of selling pianos and he feels that he is free

during the evening to roam the city. He is unmarried and nothing that prevents him in
 33

searching for adventure so he is even ready to risk his life. O. Henry makes him an

adventurer by allowing him to try his chance through a coincidence when he picks the

green door card because O. Henry thinks perhaps with one adventure can come good

fortune. According to this point of view , not all people are fortunate since there are

different routes people have to predicate well to make sure which way is the fortunate

one.

4.1.3 Tropes

What is going to be seen here is a language used in a figurative way that gives extra

meaning using figures of speech in the novel. Simile is one stylistic figure that can be

seen here as in this example: “Every half minute he chanted a harsh, unintelligible

phrase akin to the jabber of car conductors and grand opera.”(O. Henry, The Green

Door, 36)

The word (akin) means like or similar. The author is comparing the man’s speech to the

(jabber of bar conductors and grand opera), in other words, it is unintelligible.

Regarding these words, O. Henry says them to describe the Ethiopian, the negro who

distributes the cards. The researcher thinks that O. Henry is giving that man this quality

to describe an accurate fact about such persons who mess around selling cards without

considering people who almost are having senseless intentions and sometimes tricking

the people who are passing by.

This (slang) language that is used by O. Henry is to describe everyday life situations at

that time as in this word “akin”. As a result of this slang, he has been criticized by

many critical essays and not only belittled but also ignored by writers on American

literature as in The Literary History of the United States (1946) mentions him twice,
 34

once as a user of slang and once as a writer popular in the U.S.S.R. The Literature of the

American People (1951) ignores him altogether. O. Henry is known for using ”the

maltreatment of words”. His vocabulary contains a lot of slang words and phrases.

Certainly, the existence of slang language makes O. Henry more likable to the general

public (Current-Garcia: O. Henry, 159). Some have described him as superficial more

than perfect. For them, he is no more than a humorous and comic journalist (Cerf and

Cartmell: 2010). Critics regard all O. Henry works as jokes, using slang and for not

being taken seriously (Harris: 1980). Such rhetorical devices like coinage, exaggeration,

euphemism or his tricky expressions help to make a homogenous relation of the

addresser and the addressee. (Halliday: 1985)

The researcher believes that O. Henry is accurate enough through his style and

techniques by transferring his experience in life into his writings and narrates the real

events about everyday life situations by using the slang language of the common

people.

In this story, the researcher has witnessed a remarkable technique synecdoche is that

when a part is used to represent the whole and the opposite as in this example, "She

began to tell him her little story. It was one of a thousand such a city yawns every

day.”(O. Henry, The Green Door, 40)

To explain this passage, one can understand that a city cannot (yawn) rather the author

indicates that the inhabitants incline to yawn when they tell stories like the girl’s story.

Thus, the (inhabitants) are represented by the whole like the city. This passage also is

considered personification since the author speaks of the city as if it were a person

who can yawn.

 35

It can be recognizable that the most prominent stylistic device that has been used by the

author O. Henry is ‘personification’ as we find here in this passage, perhaps the most

noticeable passage, “In the big city the twin spirits Romance and Adventure are always

abroad seeking wooers.(O. Henry, The Green Door, 32). Romance and Adventure are

not actually people who can peep at us and challenge us. The author has given them the

quality of human beings.

It seems that other device is used here in this passage, which is graphological deviation

as written in words "Adventure and Romance" because these words have been

capitalized as having proper names although they are not proper nouns but in fact

abstract nouns. The purpose of O. Henry is to give emphasis to these words so to be

recognized by the reader.

It is perceivable that O. Henry employs other stylistic devices such as hyperbole, an

obvious exaggeration for humor effect. “The most striking trait for O. Henry is humor.”

(Current-Garcia, A study of the Short fiction, 158) When O. Henry describes Rudolf

Steiner, like a true adventurer by explaining that there are few evenings he doesn’t go

forth from his bedchamber in search of the unexpected and the egregious. Therefore,

since Rudolf searches for the adventure in his immediate area, his actions seem less than

expected. One main theme by O. Henry is pretense, the desire to show someone as what

one is not as a permanent theme (pizer and Harbert: 1982).

Paradox is an apparent contradiction that happens here in this story. It is perceivable

that O. Henry uses it to express the complexity of life by showing how opposing ideas

can be true. When “the adventurer salesman” enters the building where he conceives

that “his adventure must lie”, he discovers behind the green door a starving young shop

girl. He offers her food and hot tea and becomes jealous at the idea that someone else
 36

might come to her as a strange expedient. When he shuts the door, he ironically finds

other green doors. He lies about the fact why he comes to her so not to know about the

card that directs him to her. Later he knows that the Negro hands him an advertising

green door about a play in the town named The Green Door.

According to this level, there is another technique, which can be seen by using the

rhetorical device oxymoron, the use of contradictory terms side by side as in this

example: “She began to eat with sort of dainty ferocity.”(O. Henry, The Green Door,

39) dainty and ferocity are both opposites, yet the author combines them in one phrase.

The researcher notes that O. Henry utilizes this device also to gain the reader’s interest

in his story and to support meaning.

4.1.4 Irony

The irony is that Rudolf has been dreaming of adventure and romance; a green door.

But all what he has found when he knocked on the " Green Door" was only a poverty –

sicken girl in need for help. He has found the green door but only the wrong door. In

fact, it seems that there is a mistake happens when the Negro hands him the card he

advertises a play that is going on in his city entitled The Green Door. It lies in the

contrast between what is expected by the title and, what one reads in the narrative and

what actually happens when the young man opens the green door instead of attending a

play of the theatre besides, it turns out that there are other green doors.

Hence, it is perceivable that O. Henry uses multiple techniques to convey one truth of

life that he is so deftly and skillful in the patterns of language he is using. "The Green

Door" simply offers O. Henry a small literary output of a clever story about fate,

romanticism and findings, the right door of opportunity.

 37

According to O. Henry, that is one of the advantages of an adventure is to make friends

with others, specifically when it appears a young woman in the matter, by hiking up the

horizon and meeting new people. He may be suggesting that those who have limited

view on life and those who live their life conventionally are those who do not grant

themselves the opportunity to explore further the world around them because they don’t

diverge from the norm.

Through the analysis of the stylistic features of O. Henry’s short story, it is helpful to

understand the writing style of the author. The author uses specific adjectives and

phrases to emphasize the description, employs foregrounding, repetitive phrases to

achieve a particular effect and some rhetorical devices ‘figures of speech’ to make this

story more picturesque also uses the special way of surprise endings to produce the

irony and to make a surprising effect for the story.

4.2 Stylistic analysis of "The Last Leaf"

The last leaf is the other story that we are going to deal with by O. Henry.

The story centers on two artists named Johnsy and Sue who live together in a studio

upper a run-down apartment building and later they depart to Greenwich Village in New

York City. As winter comes closer and the weather gets colder, Johnsy becomes so sick

with pneumonia. She gets so ill as she believes when the last leaf falls from the vine

outside her window, she will pass away. An old artist named Behrman, who lives in the

same building where the girls live, challenges a storm one night to draw a leaf on the

wall; a leaf that will never fall. He catches pneumonia and dies because of feeling cold

and wet from painting in the icy rain. This gives Johnsy the hope to stay alive in spite of

her sickness and it also presents her the masterpiece, Behrman always dreams of

drawing.
 38

Figures of Speech
4.2.1 Grammatical and lexical schemes

In "The last leaf", O. Henry uses different types of literary devices to mirror his

attitudes about illness and hope. The study first sheds light on these features, which

include (repetition and parallelism) that maintain a foregrounding effect as in this

passage: “She was looking out the window and counting- - counting backward”

(O. Henry: 1995, 180)

O. Henry describes how Johnsy’s eyes were open wide so that she wouldn’t miss

counting the leaves from the old ivy vines. It has been three days since she begins

counting. They were almost a hundred, now they are six. She wants to count the leaves

because she can feel when the last leaf falls, she will go. This shows by counting

backward from twelve to eleven how Johnsy is nervous and frightened. She feels she is

approaching her last moment.

“An old, old ivy vine, gnarled, decayed at the roots…..” (O. Henry, The Last Leaf, 180).

Here, it seems perceivable how different views both they have on the ivy vine tree.

According to this point of view, Sue still doesn’t understand what these ”silly old ivy

leaves” have to do with Johnsy getting well. Quite the opposite, Johnsy is still obstinate

about the fact that “when the last leaf falls, she must go”

“I’m tired of waiting. I’m tired of thinking” (O. Henry, The Last Leaf, 181).

Simply, it can be noted here that O. Henry uses repetition in a remarkable way. This has

added another important feature to the novel that may give a reference to anaphora as

a rhetorical device, which adds rhythm to the passage used to emphasize a phrase.

It seems that Johnsy is fed up and feels sick and tired now; she doesn't want to think any

more about her health status. It is all about how to see the last leaf falls because at this
 39

time she will die as she believes. As Sue tells Johnsy to stop looking out of the window

by asking her to close her eyes and sleep but Johnsy asks to tell her when she finishes as

she is drawing. Johnsy wants her friend to finish her drawing because she can't wait any

longer. The repetition of the two sentences shows how desperate Johnsy is in her

situation.

''I want to turn loose my hold on everything and go sailing down, down, just like one of

those poor, tired leaves.'' (O. Henry, The Last Leaf, 181).

Johnsy feels that she is losing power or not having hold of everything, imagining herself

just like one of those yellow, dry leaves coming closer to her end because of her

declining health.

It is found that Johnsy asserts that she will die when the last leaf falls. But Sue is trying

to do everything possible to help her, caring about her and assuring her that doctor has

given her a good chance of recovery which shows the strength of their attachment. Sue

knows how important not to lose hope by concealing the doctor’s pessimistic prognosis.

However, Johnsy is still increasingly cold and unresponsive to Sue’s attempts to cheer

her up turning away from friendship as she psychologically prepares herself for death

despite all efforts by Sue. Both of them have been given a distinguished role, which

depicts a real life situation about certain valuable themes of friendship and hope.

Here is another instance where parallelism is used to give emphasis to certain words:

“Young artists pave their way to Art by drawing pictures for magazine stories that

young authors write to pave their way to literature.”(O. Henry, The Last Leaf, 180).

This shows how those two young girls are ambitious, realizing their dreams and

achieving their goals, how they are able to gain money to earn their living. They are

great artists both reaching their targeted audience through magazines because it is a
 40

common ground for both of the artists and the writers. The parallelism is both semantic

and lexical showing how activities are done by young artists and young authors along

with their ambitions to achieve their goals. The parallel elements in the sentence are the

way the young artists and the young authors follow to get what they want.

4.2.2 phonological scheme

Alliteration can be seen in the same quote earlier mentioned:

“ An old, old ivy vine, gnarled and decayed at the roots, climbed half way up the brick

wall.” (O. Henry, the last leaf, 180).The vowel sound in the letter (i) creates alliteration

and the letter (d) creates also an alliterative sound to give emphasis to certain words for

catchy effect through giving a detailed description of the tree that carries the last leaf as

sue is looking through the window and counting the rest number of the leaves. It shows

O. Henry style of showing romance through his deep description and picturesque

phrasing. The sounds within words are arranged in a rhythmical way. When he writes,

he is able to paint a picture for us. His stories have “the harmony of tone”, notes

Rollins (Current – Garcia: 1993, A study of short fiction, 158). It is suggested by some

critics that many of O. Henry humorous paraphrases provide allusions through his

artistry of work to famous writers like Shakespeare. These allusions show his own style

of reinforcing the figurative use of language which is marked by the ambiguous

vocabulary of description. Word plays are always amusing and witty that is extremely

known by his twist endings. (Garcia: 1965, O. Henry)

4.2.3 Tropes

Regarding this section, many rhetorical devices are being used by O. Henry in a

distinctive way to attain special effect: “Why, that’s almost as good a chance as we
 41

have in New York when we ride on the street cars or walk past a new building.” ( O.

Henry, The Last Leaf, 180)

Simile in several instances has been used. It is one of the most notable devices. The

researcher believes that O. Henry does it to show beauty.

Here, Sue is trying to persuade Johnsy that her chance of life is not so bad by making a

comparison between what the doctor has mentioned as giving Johnsy one in ten percent

of survival and the chance they have when they ride on New York streets.

In an attempt by the doctor to help Johnsy recover, his attempt has been intertwined

as he wonders about Johnsy’s depression. Sue answers him that her depression is

because of her unfulfilled ambition to paint the bay of Naples which makes the doctor

suspicious because he thinks Johnsy is depressed because of some romantic troubles are

worth woman’s concern and not over artistic conditions. This shows how O. Henry has

been creative over depicting such situations which reflects prevailing attitudes about

gender at that time. Another important thing is that the doctor diagnosis exposes the

linkage between health and hope by mentioning that Johnsy won’t live unless she has

something that she is curious about. It is suggested that Sue knows all these facts about

Johnsy because they are romantically involved making a firm assurance that Johnsy is

keen on traveling and developing her talents as an artist and not on marriage and

children.

"Tell me as soon as you have finished," said Johnsy, closing her eyes lying white and

still as a fallen statue.” (O. Henry, The Last leaf, 181)

During Johnsy’s illness, Sue insists that Johnsy should sleep and not look out of the

window while Sue is trying to finish her painting. At the same time, Johnsy asks Sue to
 42

tell her as soon as she has finished. After this conversation, O. Henry is symbolizing her

to a fallen statue by using the word "as" through his creative technique of Simile.

“She told him of Johnsy's fancy, and how she feared she would, indeed, light and fragile

as a leaf herself, ..” (O. Henry, The Last Leaf, 181). In this passage, Sue explains

Johnsy’s situation to Mr. Behrman. This is the way how O. Henry is comparing Johnsy

to a declined, fragile, weak leaf which she may lose her life.

Understatement is one of the devices the author uses in the short story.

“Then they imported some pewter mugs and a chafing dish or two from Sixth Avenue

and became a colony”.(O. Henry, The Last Leaf,178).

It lies in the fact that the number of items would not serve for the whole colony.

Another instance where we witness a paradox in this sentence:

“At the top of a squatty, three-story brick Sue and Johnsy had their studio.”(O. Henry,

The Last Leaf, 179)

The paradox here is the sentence begins by saying at the top of a squatty. Squatty

means short and thick is such as a small structure and not a three-story building to be

called squatty.

On the contrary, overstatement happens in other passages of the story. That is when the

doctor says that Johnsy has one chance in ten, and after a while he says :

"if you will get her to ask one question about the new winter styles in cloak sleeves I

will promise you a one in five chance for her, instead of one in ten.” (O. Henry, The last

Leaf, 179)

It is perceivable that the doctor is changing his tone in an attempt to recover Johnsy. He

wants to lift her spirit in a positive way if she imagines what she will wear for summer.

From the beginning, improving her chance from one in ten to one in five show

overstatement automatically.
 43

“In November a cold, unseen stranger, whom the doctors called Pneumonia, stalked

about the colony.. with his icy fingers” (O. Henry, The Last Leaf,179).

This passage reveals how in November pneumonia invades the colony and attacks the

people and how it infects them. Here, the author is referring to pneumonia by using

personification. He gives it a human character by using words which are used referring

to human beings. For example, the word stranger indicates a person that one is not

acquainted with. The author uses the word (unseen) because the disease is something

not to be seen but to be felt. O. Henry also describes the way how it spreads and walks

to colony bringing harm and infection to a large number of people by informing the

reader that pneumonia is a new phenomenon to the colony.

“Over on the east side, this ravager strode boldly, smiting his victims by scores..”(O.

Henry, The Last Leaf, 179).

This passage shows how pneumonia terribly conquers the east side and how slowly it

spreads to the maze of the narrow and moss-grown places. Thus the words or verbs used

here such as: stalked, whom, touching one here and there, icy finger are all ascribed to

human beings.

“Mr. Pneumonia was not what you would call a chivalric old gentleman. A mite of a

little woman with blood thinned by California zephyrs..”(O. Henry, The last Leaf, 179).

This is another passage where pneumonia is personified by O. Henry. Here, also the

author posits how pneumonia is un-majestic, disgraceful, dishonored, shameful, brutal

and rough through the use of words/verbs assigned to human beings only.

Metaphor has been used in this short story in several instances as in these passages:

“He was past sixty and had a Michael Angelo’s Moses beard curling down from the

head of a satyr along the body of an imp.”(O. Henry, The Last Leaf, 181)
 44

Metaphor here is the similarity made by the author between Behrman’s beard and

that of Michael Angelo’s. This can give a clue to Tanner’s appearance and state as an

old man who has never been able to draw a masterpiece only some daubs for

commercial benefits that shows Tanner’s failure.

“The most lonesome thing in all the world is a soul when it is making ready to go on its

mysterious, far journey.”(O. Henry, The Last Leaf, 182)

This sentence gives an image of Jhonsy’s situation in her sentimental state. It is notice-

able that she is highly disappointed and there is nothing she can do to stay alive.

She is ready to give up her soul riding on a mysterious journey.

Graph logical Deviation is another prominent device in this story where capitalization

is seen to certain kinds of words in the middle of paragraphs suggested gaining the

reader’s attention which is the opposite to the grammatical rules that supposed to be in

the lower case like[ Literature, Mistress, Art, Pneumonia..]. The reason behind using

capital letter in the last word for example is to emphasize the effect of this horrible

disease ‘Pneumonia’ that is “stalking” and conquering the colony which leaves its effect

on a person like Johnsy in a very bad, conditional case. It has left its effect not only on

Johnsy but on Behrman and people of the east side and residents of the maze of the

narrow and moss-grown places that takes a very dominant place in the making of the

entire story.

Other words like ‘Art and Literature’ can exhibit how those young artists/authors are

successful as professionals in art and literature. As mentioned in the story, they have to

work hard, paving their way by writing stories for magazines/ drawing pictures.

By analyzing O. Henry's creative style, the researcher finds that the story tells about

another fact, which is how Greenwich Village is taken up by art people and by
 45

capitalizing these two words, the author is informing the readers how those

professionals are highly judged by inhabitants of the area. Regarding this village, it is

worth noting that Greenwich Village has historically been home to a large portion of

New York’s lesbian and gay population—a fact which becomes substantial in light of

Henry’s inference that the two female protagonists may be romantically involved

besides the fact that this village is a shelter for poor artists. O. Henry depicts a creative,

vibrant community. O. Henry usually uses” a city as a playground for imagination”

(Pizer and Harbert: 1982, 415).

While the purpose behind capitalizing Mistress's role is to underline the fact that in the

last forty years, Mr. Behrman never paints a masterpiece. Besides, he has been stated as

a failed man in art. However, at the end of the story, he has achieved his desire by

painting a masterpiece that has been a savior for Johnsy.

4.2.4 Irony
The irony exposes in the final paragraph of the story when Sue has told Johnsy

everything about what happens to Behrman, " Mr. Behrman died of pneumonia today in

hospital. He was ill two days ago …Didn’t you wonder why it never fluttered or moved

when the wind blew?" (O' Henry, The last leaf, 183)

It is clear that Behrman who has been trying to save Johnsy from pneumonia dies of

pneumonia. Behrman paints a leaf on the outside wall as part of his attempt to

encourage Johnsy to live but ironically he causes his own sudden death because he went

out in the cold weather. Current-Garcia (1965) mentions that many adults who read his

stories are curiously waiting for his surprise endings. He makes someone thinks that he

has found it out but later stunned by a twist ending. Rollins mentions, "the conclusion is

an enigma."(Current-Garcia, A study of the Short Fiction, 155). It tells about how

Behrman is the one who actually has been chosen for death and not Johnsy who stays
 46

counting and waiting for the last leaf to fall as she is ready for death and in the end it

turns the opposite. Reversal of fate is a major concept in his stories. (Pizer and Harbert:

1982)

The story reveals that Behrman has stayed out all night painting the image of the last

leaf. The last leaf has survived the storm and has at last painted his masterpiece

according to Sue’s remark. In this twist ending, it is not Johnsy who dies but Behrman.

Behrman's sacrifice was not in vain. Sue's remark of Behrman’s masterpiece is

amazingly realistic. Some suggest his twist endings as legendary (Vogel & Flora: 2006).

Others consider his twist endings unacceptable because of the way he ends his stories

with jokes which is merely his trademark and that his success would be for a short

period of time (Bert & catron: 1993).

It seems perceivable that Mr. Behrman has carried out his promises and wish before

his death. O. Henry depicts him as a failure in art, eager to paint a masterpiece but never

does. He is the one who considers himself as especial mastiff who guards and assists the

two young artists in the studio above. His promise is handed over (through his

masterpiece) by enabling Johnsy to heal fully from her sickness-that is all she needs at

that moment.

“Someday I villbaint a masterpiece, and ve shall all go away. Gott! Yes.”(O. Henry,The

Last Leaf,182). He uses frequent expressions interpreting them with humorous phrases

(Gale: 1997) which expresses his way in the narrative as a result of his dealing with the

outlaws from his childhood in the south. His patterns and the rhythms that are marked

by the local color as a result of the mastery of the vernacular and his insight into life

makes it a “pungent language” (Current-Garcia, Twentieth Century literary Criticism

Vol. 19, 181)

 47

Behrman’s character can make a wonderful comparison with Pneumonia image which

brings destruction only.

With regard to this story by O. Henry, he has depicted very well meanings of sacrifice,

support, love, illness, hope, disease, etc. The abundance of these images makes it very

hard to get all in one story through the magnificent imagination by one author that

shows him as a unique writer. O. Henry using to unexpected ending in his style, twist

ending, supplies larger accounts in his stories. So it is believed that O. Henry has

wittingly knitted his implications to reflect the people’s everyday experiences through

the use of different styles and themes of humor and romance, twist ending, slang

language of the vernacular.

4.3 Stylistic analysis of " Good Country People"

This story is the third that the researcher is going to analyze after giving a summary. It

has been written by Mary Flannery O’Connor. In writing of "Good Country People",

O’Connor uses different rhetorical devices which reflect her style in literary texts to

convey her ideas which are most distinguished for its language as a violent, animate

entity as a recurring image. Many of O’Connor’s protagonists endure disabilities or

sustain physical deformities. She was a writer who agonized from Lupus. Her father

died of the same illness when she was thirteen. Her Catholic beliefs ruminate in her

work, as well as the invocation of violence and darkness ironically used in her short

stories. The titles in the stories inform the readers of an idea that the stories are the

opposite of what the titles actually state. Metaphors and similes are used by her to

describe the characters and the settings of the stories. Each story belongs to the darkness
 48

of the characters: people with racial prejudice, ignorance, and evil. Most of her stories

end in tragedy.

This story revolves around a girl named Hulga who is living with her mother, Mrs.

Hopewell in a small Southern society. Although her mother, Mrs. Hopewell names her

daughter (joy) at birth as she is an optimistic woman, she feels defeated that her

daughter's name is changed into Hulga. Hulga has a Ph.D. in philosophy and refuses her

mother's Christian attitudes. She purposefully cultivates a mean, unpleasant belief just

to offend her mother. Mrs. Freeman and her two daughters are tenants who are

supposed to give farm services to Mrs. Hopewell. Hulga is shocked because of an

accident that results in losing a leg. She has now to live with her mother and wear a

prosthetic leg. Hulga feels scornful towards this turn of events and treats her mother

awfully.

A traveling Bible salesman named Manley Pointer calls on the Hopewells. It becomes

evident to that salesman that Hulga's weakness is her educational vanity. He simply tries

to benefit from this and tempts her in a hayloft. Finally, Manley is exposed to be a con

artist who is only paying attention to sex. He steals Hulga's prosthetic leg and her

glasses, leaving her disabled and helpless in the hayloft without any way of getting

down, struggling herself alone. Concerning the analysis in this part of the study,

rhetorical devices are used by the author to achieve a special effect by using words in a

distinctive way. "Good country People" carries deep meaning, sensitive, sentimental

situation that attracts the attention of readers as a humanistic status.

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Figures of speech

4.3.1 Grammatical and lexical schemes:

According to this level, Major repetition and parallelism are being seen that the writer

uses to foreground some of his ideas. Some of these repetitions that the writer uses:

"Science wishes to know nothing of Nothing" (O’Connor: 1971, 277), "We know it by

wishing to know nothing of Nothing" (O’Connor, Good Country People, 277),"You

know, you're the wheel behind the wheel"(O’Connor, 273)

The parallelisms in the first and in the second sentence show the way how the writer

wants to give emphasis to the word 'Nothing'. This parallelism is both semantic by

trying to understand the link between the first and the second nothing in meaning as

well as lexical by having this repetitive behavior. In this quote, O'Connor is

emphasizing the idea of Hulga's loss by feeling disappointed because she realizes that

everyone else is incapable of understanding neither her genius nor her pain inside. In

addition to her missing leg (which was shot off by her father in a hunting accident when

Joy was 10 years old), Hulga has a weak heart and is not expected to live past the age of

45. This repetition has a special rhetorical effect which is one of “antithesis” (Adane,

2012, 17). As Mrs. Hopewell picks one of Hulga's books titled 'What is metaphysics?

'by Montin Heidergger's Existence and randomly beginning to read, she sees this quote.

She has noticed the word ‘Science’ which has to assert soberness and seriousness. So

how 'Nothing' can it be for science ‘Anything’ but horror and phantasm! So here it

parallels science to nothing. Mrs. Hopewell thinks it as some evil incantation in

gibberish. So here is presented as the very antithesis of knowledge. According to this

point of knowledge, science rationally is concerned with what is positive not the

negative. Thus, based on this philosophy, one can't know anything without considering
 50

nothing. It remains the fact at the very point where science tries to put its essence in

words, it evokes “the aid of nothing” (Hardy: 2003, 78). Simply it signifies by

O’Connor that there is no hope in the modern science through the character of Hulga.

While in the third quote, the writer has given emphasis to the word 'wheel'. This shows

the way how O'Connor makes use of everyday life realistic descriptions and frequent

assertions of the truth. As O'Connor places Hulga in a place that would attract sympathy

by the reader which makes her live every day in vain as Mrs. Hopewell shows her

inability to understand her by "mouthing pseudo-philosophical and clichéd maxims"

which isolated her further from her daughter in spite of her catholic compassion as she

may apparently look "simple_ minded mother or shrewd hired woman"(Dibble: 1986,

28). McFarland (1976) argues that O'Connor employs conventional language for comic

and ironic purpose stressing the meaningless and the platitudes in the mouth of her

characters at the same time using words to assign main themes in the story. She usually

launches remarks like" It takes all kinds to make the world", "Nothing is perfect", "you

are the wheel behind the wheel".However, O’Connor endures the imperfections and

deformities very poorly in society only for her readers to understand her deep

implications.

4.3.2 Phonological Scheme

'Alliteration' as one of the stylistic techniques, is most noticeable here in this quote:

"It takes all kinds to make the world." (O'Connor, Good Country People, 273).

The writer uses alliteration here just to give interest to the sentence. The sentence is

giving emphasis to certain words as well as to gain interest by the readers and to create

an everlasting image in the reader's mind.

 51

Here in this quote, the letter k alliterates with letters of other words in the same

position. The same thing happens with the letter d. This type of harmony consolidates

points of equivalence to attract the readers' attention, making them easy to remember as

a cliché or a maxim. Although Mrs. Hopewell feels proud of herself on her tolerance

and is fond of such expression, it makes evident that she is utterly disappointed in her

daughter as a graceless bookworm because of her daughter's terrible behavior. Mrs.

Hopewell is convinced that nothing is perfect and that she has wide experience with the

trash that’s why she tries to keep Mrs. Freeman and her husband. She thinks she is a

woman of patience and she has no specific qualities of her own concerning other

people.

4.3.3 Tropes

In this section, rhetorical devices have been used by the author to achieve a special

effect by using words in a distinctive way, will be explained:

First, The Meaning behind their names as instances of symbolism and allegory. There

are many instances of symbolism and allegory under which hide implied meanings:

Flannery O’Connor, a devout Catholic writer who likes to strike opposing religious

values through her stories, alters the bases of Nihilism in her story “Good Country

People.” O’Conner uses several direct descriptions to get her point directly as well as

several types of symbolism. The choice of names by O'Connor has a deep symbolism.

The characters’ names tell much about the character as well as giving the story another

layer behind the literal descriptions supplied. Glynese, Carramae, Mrs. Freeman, Mrs.

Hopewell, and Manley Pointer, and Hulga (Joy) Hopewell carry more than just titles in
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their names. These names give an accurate insight into the meaning of O’Connor’s

story.

Mrs. Freeman has two daughters. They are Glynese and Carramae who are brought into

the story for certain purposes as indirect characters. They are often called by Hulga as

(Glycerin and Caramel). Glycerin often irritates Hulga because Hulga hasn’t got any

interest from males like her. Glycerin is eighteen years old with red hair, has many

admirers. Caramel is married and pregnant, reminds Hulga that she will never have any

connection with males. She is fifteen years old. Thus Hulga changed their names with

things which seem disgusting for her. Glycerin is (a blend of fat and oil used in soap)

while Caramel is a terrible sweet dessert for her. Both of them become antagonistic of

Hulga's unusual life.

Mrs. Freeman and Mrs. Hopewell work as opposite sides of Hulga’s life. Mrs. Freeman

has free speeches of reality with freethinking who is interested in disease and deformity,

trying to talk about matters that are free from the bonds of good Christian morals by

bringing Hulga a gossip of real-life situations of the world. Mrs. Hopewell sends (as the

name implies) hope through good Christian beliefs. She sees the good in anyone and

feels with glory for her ability to create a positive idea out of a bad situation. Therefore

Mrs. Hopewell and Mrs. Freeman become the little Angel and Demon sitting on

Hulga’s shoulder, by constant attempts to spread their influence from the breakfast table

without forcing their opinion.

Manley Pointer’s name has a certain significance because it is not his name in reality.

His first name, Manley, implies that he will fill a gap in Hulga's life made by the

missing of any substantial male presence. His last name, Pointer, signifies that he will

expose, or point out something in Hulga’s life. However, this is not his real name and
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therefore the male presence he fills is truly nonsense. The revelation given about her life

is about falsities. The best physical image to reveal his name comes with the Bible he

takes out in the hayloft. An empty bible filled with non- religious, and perverse items

that show his true character. He is a true Nihilist, and he shows Hulga actually what it

means by his belief in nothing.

Hulga Hopewellis not really her name. She is named Joy Hopewell until an accident

makes her lose her leg and changes her appearance on life. According to Mrs. Freeman,

she is Hulga but to her mother, Mrs. Hopewell, she is Joy. This duality of names

supposes a dual life. She gets used to both names. Hulga has strengthened herself

through her intellectualism and kept herself hideous forgetting about her innocent ten-

year-old self because of her artificial leg which is something she feels most ashamed of.

O’Conner uses the name Joy to reveal the Christian side, but Hulga is the Nihilistic

privilege sides of Joy’s life which is the opposite. It has been twenty-two years since the

accident happens and Mrs. Hopewell is still calling Hulga Joy in spite of changing her

name legally into Hulga.

O’Conner uses this number of names on purpose. This once again suggests the duality

of Hulga’s character, a Christian girl who has demolished her faith and innocence in the

science of the world. This makes her believe in nothing or never proud of that science.

O’Connor uses many levels of symbolism to reveal this demise of nothing followers.

Her story leaves Hulga with her belief views destroyed and her innocence stolen.

O’Connor has categorized the characters with a great deal of thought toward her main

purpose from Hopewell as hope to Hulga as hideousness. A purpose of eliminating

secular views and asserting Christian values. However, the names utilized give the

reader quick entailments of the character’s personality and purpose.

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On the other hand , other rhetorical devices are being found having first an apparent

instance of a simile with the help of the word "as" such as in this quote:

"Education has removed the last traces of that as a good surgeon scrapes for

cancer"(O'Connor, Good Country People, 288). According to O'Connor, Hulga feels

ashamed of her leg whenever anyone reminds her of that but only education could

remove a little of that.

Another instance of Simile as in this quote: "His eyes like two steel spikes".(O’Connor,

289). O'Connor describes Manley's eyes as spikes of a wheel to show his evil side and

his maltreatment as a tricky man towards Hulga after he makes fun on her and takes her

artificial leg in the barn above the ladder that gives a reference to violence process in

her story.There is also a sign of metaphor as in this quote: "I've got a lot of interesting

things”,"One time I've got a woman's glass eye and you needn't think to catch me."

(O’Connor, Good Country People, 291) O'Connor is symbolizing her glasses

(representing clear insight/judgment) to her own education that after Manley removes

them from her for means of seduction, so it is suggested that he is controlling her at the

same time she is surrendering to his will leaving her education and intelligence beyond

affording himself instead. She mentions that she is unable to see well, lacking good

sense even with them because she is a character blinded by her own intelligence and

honesty through which she gains insight into reality. Hulga here is exposed to violence.

She is spiritually defeated by this violent act.

Jeanne Reesman as cited in Bloom(1999) about the grotesque in the work of O'Connor

mentions that the “ocular metaphor” is that Joy /Hulga losses her eyeglasses at the end

of the story but her internal vision has been reconfigured. There are many repeated

references to watching, eyes, the inner vision to this story, vision in the world is faulty.
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Joy informs us that she sees from afar through to nothing but Manley's" steel spikes".

After all, he gets the glass eye from earlier gaining control. Vision itself is grotesque

(Bloom, 38). These grotesque figures are foolish figures that do not follow the true

religion and those Christ figures whom O’Connor belong to are actually having

theological displacement in spite of their position in society as social figures. (Muller:

1972)

There is an instance of 'allusion' as O'Connor comparing Hulga to the Ugly Sweating

Vulcan. The Ugly sweating Vulcan was a Roman god, as Hulga imagines derived from

Hephaestus, the Greek god, who is the god of fire, blacksmiths, stonemasons, and more.

So right away, the reader can see her name change by the Vulcan reference, as an act of

fiery creation because of her name 'Hulga' while her name, Joy, on the other hand,

represents another character, Aphrodite, the goddess of love. This duality of her name

makes her a unique character. As Hulga plans to change her name from Joy to Hulga,

the following happens: "She had a vision of the name working like the ugly sweating

Vulcan who stayed in the furnace and to whom; presumably the goddess had to come

when called. She saw it as the name of her highest creative act."(O’Connor, Good

Country People, 275)

"She isn't deceiving a basket, she's deceiving herself." Later in the same paragraph,

we're told: "One of her major triumphs was that her mother had not been able to turn her

dust into Joy, but the greater one was that she had been able to turn it herself into

Hulga." (O’Connor, Good Country People, 275).

Hulga is struggling herself away from her mother. Once having a name of Hephaestus

who is physically undesirable because of having a problem in her leg, too and yet

married to Aphrodite, the goddess of love, beauty. Hulga herself is the goddess being
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demanded. So she is beautiful as having this creative act. The duality of her name

constitutes part of the paradox as a rhetorical device.

There is another instance of personification which can be found also in the same quote

earlier mentioned:"Science wishes to know nothing of Nothing"

Here, the author O’Connor uses personification by referring to science. She gives it a

human nature by using a word which gives a reference to a human being (wish). In one

conference for writers O’Connor says that they see a fact that a Ph.D. is “crippled” in a

spiritual and physical way that gives another instance of personification since

(crippled) is one kind of human being 's illnesses because, this can't make up for the loss

of her leg. (Dibble: 1986, 31)

There is an instance where O'Connor uses the Rhetorical device 'synecdoche' through

which she uses the part of the body to represent the whole. Apparently, it may seem

like the technique 'simile' because of the word 'as' which means 'like' but mostly

O'Connor is famous in using the body and its parts in her searching of sacramental and

grotesque through the foregrounding of body parts by saying that through analyzing the

body parts, there’s a grammatical middle voice which presents a new aspect of

understanding of the body parts which explains the struggle between spirit and matter

through the linguistic literary techniques by the quantitative examination of the

interaction between the grammatical voice and the physical bodies. The middle voice of

the body parts nearly signifies that the subject refers to himself or herself.(Hardy, 2007)

Further studies made by Barbara Korte by which she distinguishes between two kinds of

the body languages, “the independent”(Hardy: 2007, 6) (that which not connect to

speech) as in Manley’s example,” his eyes like two steel spikes”(O’ Connor, Good

Country People, 289) and “sparkling eyes” (O’Connor, 277) that reflects his real
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intentions. And “the comitative” (Hardy, 6) (that keeps with speech) as in Manley’s

saying “Oh, I saw it said ‘The Cedars’ on the mailbox” (O’Connor, Good Country

People, 277) pretending to be unaware and as in Mrs. Freeman 's behavior trying to take

advantage of Mrs. Hopewell by making use of her facial expressions and hiding her

real intentions. The body language has a communicative role in literature, therefore

O’Connor, in many of her stories, uses the independent body language to support her

ideas in her search of the grotesque, and the sacramental O’Connor focus on the body

and the flesh accompanies with certain symbols that might not be recognized in the

glare.

There are other instances, where O'Connor has dealt with the body parts as in this quote:

"His eyes raced around the room before he added..." (O'Connor, Good Country

People,278)

Hopewell asks the salesman to come to the parlor to see what he is selling. He keeps

looking at the wall to notice if there is any (family Bible) on the wall means any place

for keeping the Bible or any scripts on the wall, because he thinks they are Christians

and should keep the Bible everywhere but Mrs. Hopewell tells him that Hulga is an

atheist and she wouldn't let her do it. She is keeping them on her bedside. However, this

quote gives a reference to another rhetorical device which is personification. The word

(race)is a quality of human beings and it can only be used with the whole as a human

being and not the part.

Another quote where simile is found at which Hulga dealing with her leg as a part of her

soul: "She was sensitive about the artificial leg as a peacock about his tail."(O'Connor,

Good Country People, 285). It happens at a time when Manley tries to take her wooden

leg in the barn after he spends time with her alone and abuses her. O'Connor depicts this
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as tragic states of affairs as a devout Christian, The missing of faith in her life leads her

to depend on philosophy to consolidate herself. The part of Hulga that depends on

cynicism and philosophy can be seen as this wooden part of her soul. Although she has

a deep knowledge of philosophy and her comic appearance, O’Connor shows that

Hulga’s spiritual state is still vulnerable. Hulga considers her artificial legas her soul.At

first, she refuses as the Bible salesman wants to see it because she spends her life hiding

it. When she makes him take it off, It is not strange that at the same moment, she

experiences accumulation of spiritual awakening. The leg has got to represent her soul;

it is what makes her distinguished, and what makes her vulnerable. Manley makes use

of Hulg’s blindness to reality for his own advantage. Hulga is so angry to discover that

the proof of love required by Pointer is that she shows him where her wooden leg

attaches her body being so sensitive about, and no one ever can touch it but her.

Gallawy (1996) in his essay about O’Connor in her book the Mystery and Manners, has

written that the man in violent situations exposes those aspects of a character that will

lead him into eternity. Even if the character doesn't die, will be immortal as in the

example of Hulga character in Good Country People through which she slatterns faith

in the ‘Nothing' but awarded the opportunity for grace and redemption as a result of

humiliation that will grow spiritually. O’Connor, in fact, uses the character Hulga to

criticize intellectualism and pseudo intellectualism (Dibble: 1986).O'Connor applies the

idea and her style of grotesque in the deformity represented by Hulga's leg, the side

defect of the main characters in her stories.

Another instance where there is hyperbole and paradox at the same time as having

Mrs. Hopewell praises Mrs. Freeman and her daughters as well as the Bible salesman as
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in those quotations, "He was so sincere and genuine I couldn’t be rude to him" "he was

just good country people” (O'Connor, Good Country People, 282)

"Mrs. Hopewell liked to tell people that Glynese and Carrammae were two of the finest

girls she knew and that Mrs. Freeman was a lady..” (O'Connor, Good Country People,

272).

Calling Mrs. Freeman and Manley Pointer as good country people by Mrs. Hopewell is

not reasonable while in fact, she is blind to the fact that Joy is the one who deserves the

highest praise because of her Ph.D. in philosophy. Besides the fact that Mrs. Freeman,

as well as Manley, appears both shrewd and tricky . "She is the nosiest woman ever to

talk on earth", "She's got to be in everything" The man whom Mrs. Hopewell

telephoned said on Mrs. Freeman (O’Connor, Good Country People, 272). In spite of

Mrs.Freeman nosy character, Mrs. Hopewell is convinced with her farming services

(Bloom:1999). The phrase (Good Country) comes under scrutiny by the author. For

Mrs. Hopewell, the good country people are the salt of earth whileMrs. Freeman often

shows her contempt "resentment" and displeasure " a direct attack" calling her Hulga at

a time when Mrs. Hopewell not around (O’Connor, Good Country People, 274).

However Hulga and her mother are impressed by Mrs. Freeman service and for Hulga,

Mrs. Freeman rescues her from walking with her mother and remains hideous behind

Mrs. Freeman daughters whom they get attention instead of her.

4.3.4 Irony

Irony is a rhetorical device which has been introduced in this story in spite of its Gothic

style which distinguishes Flannery O'Connor. There is an instance where Mrs. Hopewell

seems to be unwittingly ironical (Bloom: 2007) towards Manley the Bible salesman:"He
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was so simple, but I guess the world would be better off…," "Some can't be that

simple," (O’Connor, Good Country People, 291)

The story ends with this perspective as Mrs. Hopewell and Mrs. Freeman are working in

the back pasture of the farm when they suddenly see Manley appearing from the woods,

heading towards the main road. This passage further shows how Mrs. Hopewell social

status preoccupation is ridiculous making her a double-faced woman. Another instance

of irony that happens at the end of the story as a result of Manley's revelation:

"And you needn't to think you'll catch me because Pointer ain't really my name. I use a
different name at every house”, “I don’t even believe in God” (O'Connor, Good Country
People, 290).
The same thing happens with Christianity that is not real after Hulga tells him that he is

a perfect Christian, he exposes himself by saying; "I hope you don't think " "that I

believe in that crap!......." (O’Connor, Good Country People, 291)

O’Connor is famous for her use of the grotesque and the bizarre in her style to attract

the reader to her stories. Here, the sudden revelation of Manley Pointer’s hatred is both

dramatic and shocking but a fitting climax to a story whose protagonist, Hulga, makes

an effort of driving away illusions. The reader expects the opposition between Hulga

and Pointer to occur but is surprised by the role each ends up playing.

"Good Country People" is a story of a thirty-two-year-old woman who owns a wooden

leg. when she died, ironically, the author was thirty-two. Another irony, the name of the

woman is Joy. The wooden leg typifies not only a physical but emotional and a

religious impediment to Joy-Hulga, who loses her leg because of a childhood accident.

She is an atheist and a highly-educated woman with a Ph.D. in Philosophy. She uses

philosophy to denounce faith, but the irony in this story is that she offers her wooden

leg to a Bible salesman. This part of the story embodies that even those who do not
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confess to religious beliefs need to believe in something or someone. Her Ph.D. makes

her an easy target for pointer’s lies as it happens in his last scene with him, dispossesses

the last resource in the feeling of her intellectual superiority when he says "And I’ll tell

you another thing, you aren’t so smart.” (O’Connor, Good Country People, 291).

Hulga’s epiphany moment of grace occurs as result of pointer’s betrayal to her faith in

him because she depends on her wisdom and not on her Biblical warning (Dibble:1986).

Despite the fact that O'Connor is concerned with religious beliefs and matters of life and

death, she always ends her short stories with a sort of comic or irony so as to gain

interest in her stories and support by her readers. She uses it to expose a certain reality

or to provide a lesson and not merely providing a comic.

Anthony Direnzo (1993) notes (about the flesh and the grotesque), that in spite of the

realistic description of everyday life, the grotesque hyperbole and the harsh laughter, the

story ends with a comic shock as a principal concern. Both attempt seduction using all

complicated narrative elements but finally belittled by satire (Bloom 2007). That is

another technique showing O’Connor’s stable use of unresolved endings. There’s a lack

of certainty to whether Hulga will sacrifice herself or not as a result of her experience.

Both of Mrs. Hopewell and her daughter accept the false view of the reality of the world

as Mrs. Hopewell thinks that she will meet her needs and Hulga by thinking that there is

nothing beyond the surface of the world.

It is so apparent that O’Connor provides a depth in meaning for the sake of her spiritual

and intellectual message. According to her, the meaning has to be embodied inside the

story by which it needs every word to say what the meaning is. She is one of the most

famous applicants of the genre as a Southern Gothic style in the literature that she joins

between the elements of religion and the grotesque. However, she introduces irony
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through the phrase (good country people) which finally shows that Mrs. Hopewell as

well as the others are not really ‘good country people’ by the many stylistic techniques.

4.4 Stylistic analysis of "Judgment Day"

The fourth story that the research is going to analyze is "Judgment day" by O’Connor.

The action of "Judgment Day" covers the final hours of Tanner's life, with flashbacks

being employed to provide additional information about the old man. It is, however,

fairly, well-set up to convey the author's intention. This short story provides one of the

most important techniques which have been used in most of O’Connor’s short stories

about the meaning of violence and evil which is a way for seeking redemption and

specifically in this story by the main character the protagonist, named Tanner. Judgment

Day is a revision of the other story The Geranium’ which the author has earlier begun.

It has been criticized by many authors like Alice Walker and Claire Kahane that it has

been used by O’Connor to examine attitudes on “race relations” (Gentry: 1968, 87).

Anyhow, the researcher has also chosen to give a summary before beginning the

analysis:

Briefly told, the protagonist, Tanner is living in Gornith, Georgia with his friend,

Coleman, in a shack. They build it themselves, as they are both old men. This shack is

in an area of a wealthy man who was a doctor. Suddenly his daughter asks him to go

with her to New York along with her family but he refuses to go. His daughter insists

that he should go with her. Finally, he agrees to go with her. Both Tanner and his

daughter share the same apartment with another black man. Unfortunately, several

altercations take place with his neighbor, the black man which later causes him a stroke.

One day his daughter goes out for a while. When she comes back, she finds her father

dead which resulted from the last altercation with the Negro. While he is out in the hall,
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the Negro squeezes Tanner's head and legs between the spokes of the banister, leaving

him there because Tanner asks this Negro to help him up, whom he mistakenly thinks

him, his old black friend, Coleman. His daughter calls the police and buries him there in

New York. At last, she feels guilty and decides to return him to Gornith after his grave

is dug up by her.

4.4.1 Figures of speech

Grammatical and Lexical schemes
There are many instances where the technique of ‘repetition’ and ‘parallelism’ are seen

as in the following examples:

'That morning and the morning before, he had allowed his daughter to dress him''

“The next day and the morning after”(O’Connor: 1971, 532).

“Dead or alive, he would be home.., the dead or alive did not.”

“once down the steps, …..“once out of it, he would hail a taxi cab” “once he got in

freight car,…”

“your promise aint any good”, ”your promise……..”(O’Connor, Judgement Day, 533)

The short story here begins with sort of repetition and parallelism as in the first

example and it seems according to the researcher that the author is trying to avoid

repetition by using a substitution of descriptive phrase suggesting that Tanner is waiting

for days, hours may be seconds when he is going towards the end of his life as he is

in his daughter's house. The repetition of these words is connected with Tanner's case

of the idea that his pride in accordance with his flashbacks, his un ability to bear in

mind being paralyzed having a stroke every time that is attacking him and reminding

him that he has to pass away.

Another prominent technique based on grammatical categories, it seems that O’Connor

is fond of using coordination like (dead or alive; druggist and undertaker). The
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researcher supposes that the rhetorical function of that technique is to provide

equivalence and parallelism to enhance utterances and may be to gain the reader’s

attention to the fact of the difference between life and death or similar oppositions.

Simply the author is creating different patterns of elements that ascribe to the

signification of the very idea by repeating the recurrent theme which reminds of the

death.

“We are confronted with a relationship of equivalence between two contrasting

elements” (Amare: 2002, 105). These equivalent phrases may tell the reader that it

makes no difference for Tanner by now to live or die and supposes that he probably

loses patience or that tanner doesn't care how he might die or where. While it's still

repeated, insisting the idea that tanner is leaving soon or later as suggested by reader's

interpretation and it may emphasize the idea that every part in the story is a good

reminder of the title itself. These words are said from the beginning until the end of the

story. Tanner knows that he is dying and the most important thing for him, dead or

alive, is to return to Corinth. He even dreams about being brought home to Corinth in a

coffin only for Coleman to open it up and Tanner to jump up crying (Judgment Day!

Judgment Day!) and asking them not to fool themselves. The dream is significant

because it highlights to the reader the shift from grief (death) to joy (being home). This

is important because it is through the dream that the reader realizes how important

Corinth is to Tanner. He is paralyzed in New York (having had the stroke and disliking

the city life). Tanner has also given a religious dimension to his dream; his springing

from the coffin, from being dead to coming alive again is suggestive of resurrection or

having been saved (salvation). The fourth passage refers to another rhetorical device

anaphora showing sentimental effect. The repetition of the word (once) is to emphasize
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Tanner’s idea of going back home whenever he has a chance by being taken in the

freight car.

4.4.2 Phonological scheme

A single instance can be seen here which marks alliteration as in this quote:

“ He was willing to wait for trouble.” (O’Connor, Judgement Day, 537).

These words beginning with (w) are having phonetic associative. They alliterate in the

same position. This type of consonance reinforces points of equivalence across the

sentence and makes it interesting and easy to remember events. It happens at a time

when Tanner uses to work along with other six men in the saw mill in the pine forest. At

that time he sees himself so high with pride, carrying a pen knife and controlling those

around him. The first time when he sees a nigger hanging around, he asks the other

workers to tell him to come to work with them or leave. Directly he goes to him with his

penknife and threatens him but instead of attacking him, he gives him a wooden glasses.

However, in his character never known to have killed one, always having his own way

with niggers, treating them with wit since he always has the panic of hell. O’Connor

creates violence for her main characters only for the sake of getting redemption.

4.4.3 Tropes

The research shows that there are instances of personification as in this passage “His

eyes were trained on her like the eye of an angry corpse'',(O. Connor, Judgement

Day,533) where the author personifies the corpse giving it the quality of a human being

angry. This passage is helped by another device which is ‘Simile’ by comparing

Tanner’s eyes with an angry corpse. It is possible that the author is trying to remind the

readers of death which semantically collocates with the topic of this story. A further

stylistic technique in this passage is O'Connor's using of the body parts. According to
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Donald Hardy (2007), the eye and sight are so important as symbols for spiritual

insight, blindness, knowledge, and innocence. The incarnational bodily details strongly

reinforce O'Connor's sacramental and grotesque attitudes. Much of what Tanner’s does,

is carried out through the intercession of his body parts like many of O’Connor’s

characters in her stories which is one kind of bodily expression. After Tanner overhears

the dispute between his daughter and her husband about her intention to bury her father

in New York, he feels so furious and explodes in her face. It is so much apparent

through his eyes looking. The symbol of anangry corpse can indicate about her style of

writing of the Gothic horror genre.

Other instances of Simile can be found in this story such as :

“The old man felt his heart inside him hard and tough as an oak knot”(O’Connor,

Judgement Day, 545)

“his feet dangled over the stairwell like those of a man in the stocks”(O’Connor,

Judgement Day, 549)

In both of these passages, O’Connor is describing Tanner’s body parts. In the first

example, she is comparing his heart with an oak knot. And in the second example, she is

comparing his feet with someone’s feet in the stocks. The reader can imagine how much

Tanner is horrified at that moment by the nigger fierce, violent act. One can understand

that these passages offer another clue of O’Connor’s style of writing.

There's another instance of personification “intruding intelligence” (O’Connor,

Judgement Day, 538) which the author states how the intelligence of that man is

directed towards that nigger, aiming to take the chance of killing him using his

curiosity, giving the word (intelligence) the quality of human being as an intruder. At

that time, Tanner was a young man trying to reach the nigger, Coleman, in the pine
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forest of Dr. Foley near the saw mill. Tanner has a feeling of seeing himself a negative

man for his earlier bad behavior.

The figurative use of language includes also any lexical deviation neologism which is

indicated by the author’s creative use of language. Thus, the researcher can see that

there is one kind of lexical deviation represented by the word ''choosey'' (O’Connor,

Judgement Day, 534) which is said by his daughter while she is talking with her father

about death in her house. It is also possible to suggest that the author wants to gain the

readers' attention and to mock the concept of death by showing some lexical deviation

through this word. Perhaps O’Connor means to say that all people are passing away and

at that moment of their death, they wouldn’t have the time to choose where to bury their

bodies. No doubt O’Connor here is making use of religious themes. At the end of the

story, Tanner finds himself incapable of moving because he is crippled by the stroke.

After a while, his confidence returns and begins moving, "mumbling lines from the 23rd

psalm towards the sofa”. O’Connor uses the first lines from the 23rd psalms. It is

believed that O’Connor uses this allusion from the Bible to enhance the idea

particularly about death and redemption which helps the reader create an image,

however, the meaning is implied having this concluding passage: "and I shall dwell in

the house of the Lord for years to come”. The reader may suppose that O’Connor sees

Tanner dwelling in the same place. No doubt, O’Connor is trying to pass her Christian

beliefs to the audience. (Dibble: 1986, 46)

There is one technique by O’Connor which shows the use of flashbacks to describe

Tanner's life before coming to New York with his daughter. This shows how Tanner is

eager to the past, which reminds of his old friend. Tanner sits every day to look through

the window in the flat, a vision appears to him suddenly through which he remembers
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his past events, “The vision failed him before he could decipher it” (O’Connor,

Judgement Day, 539).

Flashbacks constitute the bulk of the story. Tanner scolds his daughter for planning to

break her promise and he cursed her. He calls back the events which brings him to New

York. His daughter finds him living in a shack, on land he does not own, with Coleman

Parrum, a black companion of thirty years. Tanner becomes a friend with Coleman

because of an experience they have years earlier. At that time, Tanner values himself so

high particularly he feels he can handle the black workmen. He usually threatens them

with a sharp penknife. Once he realizes that his usual technique would not work when

he first saw Coleman. Instead of threatening Coleman, he gives him a pair of wooden

glasses, asking him to put them on. The man makes a broad smile and wears the glasses.

Tanner sees before him a vision, which shows him as a negative person. This vision is

an epiphanal moment. The result is that he establishes a relationship with Coleman

which is based on mutual understanding and respect even though may look a traditional

black-white relationship between them. (Dibble: 1986) Glorification of the past is one

important technique in O’Connor’s style of narration.

The figurative use of language in this story by O’Connor can tell about other stylistic

devices like the use of foreshadowing as the researcher can feel it:

“You won’t find a tall when you get back”(O’Connor, Judgement Day, 547)Tanner said

to himself. "The judgment day is coming" them that keep their promises from them that

didn't"(O’Connor, 541), “preacher, I’m on my way home”(O’Connor, Judgement

Day,549).

No way Tanner here is telling about something not happens yet, but he feels inside that

this will certainly happen. He thinks inside that he will certainly pass away, leaving to
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his eternal place ( home). Home also gives a reference to his place in life (Georgia)

where he had good memories with coleman. So Before his daughter leaving to the store

and directly after his first attempt of trying to make a friend with that nigger in their

apartment, he is knocked down by that nigger and pushed back towards his open door,

tottering into his living room. In spite of his feeling sorry for trying to know that nigger,

yet he makes another deadly trial which will certainly defeat him and lead to his death.

In the second example, O'Connor implies that those who keep their promises will

certainly be rewarded in the judgment day, contrary to those who do not. Once again,

O'Connor gives another proof for her religious beliefs.

As for graphological deviation, There is one instance of capitalization, the creative use

of this technique where it supposes not to be capitalized must have a certain

interpretation as in:“The day coming”, ”when the white folks IS going to be working for

the colored and you mights well to git ahead of the crowd” (O’Connor, Judgement Day,

540).The word “IS” is capitalized which has not to be capitalized as a verb to be. The

metaphorical use behind this capitalization is synthetic. It has probably been used by the

author to stress a certain fact about the white folks working for the colored one day and

one day they will do so. The doctor (Mr. Foley) here seems to speak non- standard

language having grammatical mistakes which are marked by ungrammatical structures.

It might tell that he is a man of a bad reputation, talking to people with pride and

arrogance. His language can aid in making the background of the story.

The simplicity and colloquialism that these passages may seem, can help the reader

understand a better view about the realistic, effective situations in life. What happens

that Tanner confronts Dr. Foley, a half breed entrepreneur the same day that he has a

confrontation with his daughter as a result Tanners plan to stay in Georgia shattered.
 70

The land upon which tanner and his friend are squatting is already purchased by Dr.

Foley. He notifies Tanner that he can stay on his land only in one condition that he

should run a still for him. Exasperated, Tanner disagrees to his condition and sets out to

live with his daughter in New York. (Dibble: 1986)

“I don’t take no crap”(O’Connor, Judgement Day, 545)“There ain’t no Jesus.”

(O’Connor, 549).

These passages are also marked by ungrammatical structures. They happen at the end of

the story as the negro "his neighbor" is coming across with his wife, kicking Tanner on

his knees and legs and giving him a push while Tanner was sustaining a stroke. All the

above examples are attractive for readers showing a repetitive action. It looks like that

the writer wants to expose all kinds of misbehaving and disgrace of modern society.

Tanner’s last traces of pride are subversive when he fails to act properly with a black

man who moves into the apartment house, the place where his daughter lives, stimulated

by desire at last partly to talk to someone from the south. Tanner thinks that the nigger

probably would like to talk to someone who understands him. Unfortunately, he falls on

his first attempt to communicate with that nigger. The reader can imagine how

sentimental this situation is when you are being maltreated by a criminal act for good

intentions you have inside you. Brittian and Driskell (1971) mention that her stories

usually concentrate on basic human aspects which associate with matters of life and

death that allow the reader to share in the experience rather than testifying.

“Your promise ain’t any good” (O’Connor, Judgement Day, 533). This passage is said

by Tanner to his daughter. In this passage, Tanner’s dream of going back to Georgia

vanishes after he overhears his daughter and her husband breaking their promise of

burying him at home. It appears that Tanner is disappointed and betrayed by this act. In
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this example, Tanner wants to make sure where his daughter is going to bury him. It

seems from the above example that his daughter has another plan. After he has made

sure that his daughter will bury him in New York, Tanner begins to think of escaping.

He writes a note “NO KIND OF PLACE” (O’Connor, Judgement Day, 531) to anyone

who finds him dead to ship and collect his body to his friend Coleman. Tanner is ready

now making his trip as soon as he finds the opportunity. (Dibble: 1986)

4.4.4 Irony

Multiple scenes of Irony can be seen specifically at the end of the story such as:

“Good morning, preacher” ,“I reckon you wish you were back in South Alabama”,

“I thought ………….we could find a pond.”(O’Connor, Judgement Day, 544).

Tanner is trying to make a friend with the nigger and his lady. He is calling him a

preacherwhile in fact, he is an actor. It is funny and ridiculous trying to be a friend with

someone who aims at killing you. It merely reveals the kind of society in a city like

New York which is shown by O’Connor as a tough world.The nigger might not well get

it, imagining that Tanner unconsciously wants to make fun on him. It seems, that’s one

reason why the nigger appears unresponsive (sullen) towards the old man, Tanner.

Greater part of Tanner’s pride has been destroyed which results from the misery of

living in the city. He sees better to occupy (squat) the doctor’s land and obey orders

from a nigger than staying in a city like New York. (Dibble: 1986)

One more irony lies here. Tanner asks for help thinking him his friend, the preacher,

Coleman. It is the turning point in the story comes at the end when Tanner tries to walk

out of the apartment after his daughter has gone. While he is in the corridor he has

another stroke. Eventually, the black actor and his wife see Tanner in the corridor and
 72

instead of helping him, the actor pushes Tanner's legs and arms through the spokes of

the banisters and leaves him there. Now, it has become clear once again that the actor is

extremely upset by Tanner’s saying, “Hep me up, Preacher. I’m on my way home”

''-Judgment Day! You idiots didn't know it was Judgement Day, did you?","Coleman?"

he murmured. (O’Connor, Judgement Day, 549)

The irony revealed in the last two paragraphs how Tanner is mixing unable to see well

or distinguish between things or humans, thinking that the negro is his friend Coleman

telling him of Judgement day. It is possible to want to gain the reader's sympathy and

interaction with the event that happened to a sick, old man. It is a terrible end and so

emotional when an old man is treated like this way which reveals acts of violence in her

stories. It is also possible to say that it is a moment that would at last fulfill Tanners

wish of death through this Blackman. The correspondence that happens is that when

Tanner cries (judgment day) in the face of that black man implies a semantic reference

to that negro man, the one who is the cause of that act (judgment day). It looks like

that he has achieved salvation only through this symbolic resurrection. He is back home.

The reader can understand how desperate Tanner is as repeating these words to gain

sympathy and attraction by saying (alive or dead and judgment day).

These grotesque figures like Tanner who is being used to develop thematic elements

(Christian themes) is one other feature in O’Connor’s short stories. The idea of being a

freak for essential displacement is clearly depicted. These grotesque figures have

become Christ types for the mysterious presence of God. Gentry (1986) mentions that

Tanner’s plot indicates that he uses the grotesque in a positive way and that even if he

dies without achieving his dream, it doesn’t matter because he has no spiritual troubles.
 73

While Watkins (2009) mentions that O’Connor produces a protagonist unique, one in

whom control and surrender, will and imagination are reconciled and made one.

Mostly, it shows by O’Connor stylistic devices which she tries to keep hidden through

her creative use of language to reflect her deep meaning, sensitive, humanistic status to

get the reader’s attention. She has her own style of writing which mostly distinguished

by simplicity, colloquialism, clarity of vision to reflect meanings of violence, lack of

sympathy, redemption, grotesque attempting to make her style look more realistic and

impressive for her readers.

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Chapter Five

Findings and Recommendations

This chapter will exhibit the conclusion and the recommendations that the researcher

reaches after giving a review about the previous studies, and through the use of the

descriptive analytical approach for the four selected short stories by the two authors.

5.1 Conclusion and Discussion

This research has attempted to stylistically analyze selected short stories by O. Henry

and O' Connor. The analysis has been carried out by using two different short stories by

each one of them: "The Last leaf" and "The Green Door" by William Sydney Porter

known by his pen name as O. Henry while "Judgment day" and "Good Country People"

by Mary Flannery O’Connor. A variety of stylistic devices suggested by Leech and

Short (2007) and Simpson (2004) has been applied as a theoretical framework.

According to them, there are different linguistic and stylistic categories but this study

has limited its analysis to figures of speech besides other techniques, concentrating on

certain important devices including deviation, foregrounding, parallelism in addition to

their literary effect on meaning and interpretation of literary passages supported by

literary criticism. These devices or categories suggested by Leech and Short can be

applied by anyone who is interested in style and stylistics of all kinds of literary texts.

This subject has been tackled by other researchers but in most of them are limited to

one author of whom this research has dealt with and to other stylistic devices. It agrees

with the previous studies in some aspects and differs with them in terms of other aspects

that they haven’t come over them. According to the researcher's knowledge, there is no

previous study has joined between those two authors under analysis nor their short

stories. In conclusion, the researcher notices that both of those authors have chosen
 75

approximately similar stylistic devices but conveying different themes and attitudes

most of them are realistic or humorous. One can understand that those two authors have

been delivered different experiences so to let others know about them.

In this research, figures of speech such as simile, metaphor, personification, antithesis

allegory, irony, paradox, understatement, overstatement, and others have been in use

after giving definitions of style, stylistics and specifically by different authors whom

they have identified stylistics as a modern, systematic approach and an extension to the

traditional approach, literary criticism. The researcher has also given a detailed

definition for each of the stylistic, rhetorical devices that have been put under analysis.

In the process of analyzing these literary works by O. Henry and O’Connor, the

researcher has concluded that both of those two writers are gifted through expressing

their messages in different ways. Their potentials in addressing messages to people are

profound and amazing. The creative use of language in conveying different meanings

and raising the aesthetic value is the one that attract the readers’ interests. It's very

important to notice that the inferences are not the same. Both have conveyed different

meanings and thoughts. Numerous features like repetition, parallelism, simile,

metaphor, foregrounding, irony, personification are considered similarities. Others like

humor, local color, the use of body parts, symbolism, colloquialism, slang language,

felicity, pretense, flashbacks, unresolved endings, coincidence, etc., are considered

major differences. Instances like their place of birth, date of birth are quite different.

Both are born in different periods of time. Although they both descend from the south,

they belong to different countries and different backgrounds. Their deadly diseases may

have provided insight into their fiction but not equally, can make another mark for

similarity in circumstances they have dealt with. The fact is that their backgrounds have
 76

been much reflected in their writing style. Both have shown different allusions and

showing different character images. According to the knowledge of the researcher and

based on the limitation of this study, both have won great fame and admiration. Unlike

O. Henry's humorous style , it is so clear that O’Connor provides depth in meaning for

the sake of her spiritual, intellectual message. Concerning O. Henry style in writing and

specifically through his tendency to wordplay has allowed many stylistic devices to be

investigated in his work. Some studies have allowed for many patterns and vocabulary

of his language to be analyzed by following the stylistic systematic approach, depending

other categories.

With regard to many critics, there are many characteristics which separate O'Connor

from other writers and specifically from William Sydney Porter. O'Connor is featured

for being a Southern Gothic in her style that she differs from other writers in the genre

in many ways. As for O. Henry, it is quite perceivable that he is a popular romance. The

stylistic approaches by those two authors are many. Since the style can add a lot to the

genre, or to individuals and to languages (Lehman: 1996), specific differences lie in the

fact that O. Henry's short stories are descriptive using slang language and distinguished

by local color, obscurity of vision, humor, act of coincidence, unexpected endings that

allowed for several devices to be investigated, while in O’Connor short stories, the

researcher can witness coordination, simplicity, realism, colloquialism, clarity of vision,

the use of body parts, symbolism, grotesque, violence, besides other aspects. On the

phonological scheme, alliteration gives different interpretations. For O. Henry, the

harmony of tone is noticeable giving an idea as a poetic line and that’s one evidence of

his allusions specifically to some poets and playwrights like Shakespeare (Current-
 77

Garcia: 1965). While for O’Connor, alliteration can only serve as a collection of clichés

or maxims so for long to be remembered or never interested by her.

Consequently and through many examples of O. Henry's style, his ability to word play

through his linguistic deviation from the norm is found superior to O'Connor style

representing his way of using the slang language which is significant and noteworthy

while O'Connor advances him in her style of using the body parts and other hidden

inferences like the grotesque and redemption and deep symbolism which are unique.

The researcher can see that they have a relatively distinctive impact of their work on

literature for many years and the majority of public still witness their eccentric use of

language by using approximately similar techniques but expressing different

implications. Finally, by reaching this conclusion, the researcher believes that he has

achieved the objectives of the study.

Recommendations:
After attempting to explore and identify literary devices and mark their effect on

meaning and interpretation and after showing distinctions between the two authors, the

researcher finds it possible to assume the following recommendations.

1. The stylistic approach is pedagogic which is helpful to broaden the area of analysis in

literary texts as well as for students to learn the language from different points of view

other than literary criticism.

2. The researcher recommends readers to notice the difference in styles which can lead

to different meanings each according to his/her attitudes and beliefs or values.

 78

3. The researcher would like also to take this opportunity to invite those who are new

to this work to read and enjoy these short stories.

4. Conduct other researches to broaden the area of study towards corpus based analysis

by manipulating other categories.

5. Conduct other comparative studies between those two authors using other categories

like cohesion and context,.. etc.

6. Applying the stylistic approach on other authors.

 79

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List of websites

https://www.thefamouspeople.com/profiles/william-sydney-porter-2471

https://www.readbookonline.net/stories/henry/108/short stories by O Henry

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http://The Stories of O. Henry Critical Essays - eNotes.com.htm