The Epithet

From the strongest means of displaying the writer's or speaker's
emotional attitude to his communication, we now pass to a weaker but
still forceful means— t h e epithet. The epithet is subtle and del-
icate in character. It is not so direct as the interjection. Some people
even consider that it can create an atmosphere of objective evaluation,
whereas it actually conveys the subjective attitude of the writer, show-
ing that he is partial in one way or another.

The epithet is a stylistic device based on the interplay of emotive
and logical meaning in an attributive word, phrase or even sentence
used to characterize an object and pointing out to the reader, and fre-
quently imposing on mm, some of the properties or features of the ob-
ject with the aim of giving an individual perception and evaluation of
these features or properties. The epithet is markedly subjective and eval-
uative. The logical attribute is purely objective, non-evaluating.
It is descriptive and indicates an inherent or prominent feature of the
thing or phenomenon in question.

Thus, in 'green meadows', 'white snow', 'round table', 'blue skies',
'pale complexion', 'lofty mountains' and the like, the adjectives are
more logical attributes than epithets. They indicate those qualities of the
objects which may be regarded as generally recognized. But in 'wild
wind', 'loud ocean', 'remorseless dash of billows', 'formidable waves',
'heart-burning smile', the adjectives do not point to inherent qualities of
the objects described. They are subjectively evaluative.

The epithet makes a strong impact on the reader, so much so, that he
unwittingly begins to see and evaluate things as the writer wants him to.
Indeed, in such word-combinations as 'destructive charms', 'glorious
sight', 'encouraging smile', the interrelation between logical and emotive
meanings may be said to manifest itself in different degrees. The word
destructive has retained its logical meaning to a considerable extent, but
at the same time an experienced reader cannot help perceiving the emo-
tive meaning of the word which in this combination will signify 'con-
quering, irresistible, dangerous'. The logical meaning of the word glo-
rious in combination with the word sight has almost entirely faded out.
Glorious is already fixed in dictionaries as a word having an emotive

meaning alongside its primary, logical meaning. As to the word encouraging
(in the combination 'encouraging smile') it is half epithet and half log-
ical attribute. In fact, it is sometimes difficult to draw a clear line of
demarcation between epithet and logical attribute. In some passages
the logical attribute becomes so strongly enveloped in the emotional as-
pect of the utterance that it begins to radiate emotiveness, though by
nature it is logically descriptive. Take, for example, the adjectives green,
white, blue, lofty (but somehow not round) in the combinations given above.
In a suitable context they may all have a definite emotional impact on
the reader. This is probably explained by the fact that the quality most
characteristic of the given object is attached to it, thus strengthening
the quality.

Epithets may be classified from different standpoints: s e m a n-
t i с and structural. Semantically, epithets may be divided into
two groups: those assосiated with the noun following and those
иnassосiated with it. Associated epithets are those which point to a feature which is es-
sential to the objects_they describe: the idea expressed in the epithet is to
a certain extent inherent m the concept of the object. The associated
epithet immediately refers the mind to the concept in question due to
some actual quality of the object it is attached to, for instance, 'dark
forest', 'dreary midnight', 'careful attention', 'unwearying research', 'in-
defatigable assiduity', 'fantastic terrors', etc.

Unassociated epithets are attributes used to characterize the object by
adding a feature not inherent in it, i.e. a feature which may be so unex-
pected as to strike the reader by its novelty, as, for instance, 'heart-
burning smile', 'bootless cries', 'sullen earth', 'voiceless sands', etc. The
adjectives here do not indicate any property inherent in the objects in
question. They impose, as it were, a property on them which is fitting
only in the given circumstances. It may seem strange, unusual, or even
accidental.

In any combination of words it is very important to observe to what
degree the components of the combination are linked. When they are so
closely linked that the component parts become inseparable, we note
that we are dealing with a set expression. When the link between the
component parts is comparatively close, we say there is a stable word-
combination, and when we can substitute any word of the same grammati-
cal category for the one given, we note what is called a free combination
of words.

With regard to epithets, this division becomes of paramount impor-
tance, inasmuch as the epithet is a powerful means for making the desired
impact on the reader, and therefore its ties with the noun are generally
contextual. However, there are combinations in which the ties between
the attribute and the noun defined are very close, and the whole combina-
tion is viewed as a linguistic whole. Combinations of this type appear as
a result of the frequent use of certain definite epithets with definite
nouns. They become stable word-combinations. Examples are: 'bright
face', 'valuable connections', 'sweet smile', 'unearthly beauty', 'pitch dark-
ness', 'thirsty deserts', 'deep feeling', 'classic example', 'powerful influ-

ence', 'sweet perfume' and the like. The predictability of such epithets is
very great.

The function of epithets of this kind remains basically the same:
to show the evaluative, subjective attitude of the writer towards the
thing described. But for this purpose the author does not create his own,
new, unexpected epithets; he uses ones that have become traditional, and
may be termed "language epithets" as they belong to the language-as-a-
system. Thus epithets may be divided into language epithets
and speech epithets. Examples of speech epithets are: 'slavish
knees', 'sleepless bay'.

The process of strengthening the connection between the epithet and
the noun may sometimes go so far as to build a specific unit which does
not lose its poetic flavour. Such epithets are called fixed and are most-
ly used in ballads and folk songs. Here are some examples of fixed epi-
thets: 'true love', 'dark forest', 'sweet Sir', 'green wood', 'good ship',
'brave cavaliers'.

Structurally, epithets can be viewed from the angle of a) composi-
tion and b) distribution.

From the point of view of their compositional structure
epithets may be divided into s i m p l e, compound, phrase
and sentence epithets. Simple epithets are ordinary adjectives.
Examples have been given above. Compound epithets are built like com-
pound adjectives. Examples are:
'heart-burning sigh', 'sylph-like figures', ' cloud-shapen giant',

"...curly-headed good-for-nothing,

And mischief-making monkey from his birth." (Byron)

The tendency to cram into one language unit as much information
as possible has led to new compositional models for epithets which we
shall call phrase epithets. A phrase and even a whole sentence
may become an epithet if the main formal requirement of the epithet
is maintained, viz. its attributive use. But unlike simple and compound
epithets, which may have pre- or post-position, phrase epithets are always
placed before the nouns they refer to.

An interesting observation in this respect has been made by O. S. Akh-
manova. "The syntactical combinations are, as it were, more explicit,
descriptive, elaborate; the lexical are more of an indication, a hint or a
clue to some previously communicated or generally known fact, as if
one should say: 'You know what I mean and all I have to do now is to
point it out to you in this concise and familiar way'." ¹

This inner semantic quality of the attributive relations in lexical
combinations, as they are called by O. S. Akhmanova, is, perhaps, most
striking in the phrase and sentence epithets. Here the 'concise way'
is most effectively used.

Here are some examples of phrase epithets:

¹ Akhmanova 0. S. Lexical and Syntactical Collocations in Contemporary English.
"Zeitschrift fur Anglistik und Amerikanistik", M., 1958, Heft I, p. 19.

"It is this do-it-yourself, go-it-alone attitude that has thus far
held back real development of the Middle East's river resources."
(N. Y. T. Magazine, 19 Oct., 1958.)

"Personally I detest her (Gioconda's) smug, mystery-making,
come-hither-but-go-away-again-because-butter-wouldn't-melt-in-my-
mouth expression." (New Statesman and Nation, Jan. 5, 1957)

"There is a sort of ^lOh-what-a-wicked-world-this-is-and-how-
I-wish-I-could-do-something-to-make-it-better-and-nobler' expression
about Montmorency that has been known to bring the tears into
the eyes of pious old ladies and gentlemen." (Jerome K. Jerome,
"Three Men in a Boat")

"Freddie was standing in front of the fireplace with a ^lwell-that's-
the-story-what-are-we-going-to-do-about-it' air that made him a focal
point." (Leslie Ford, "Siren in the Night")

An interesting structural detail of phrase and sentence epithets is
that they are generally followed by the words expression, air, attitude and
others which describe behaviour or facial expression. In other words,
such epithets seem to transcribe into language symbols a communication
usually conveyed by non-linguistic means.

Another structural feature of such phrase epithets is that after the
nouns they refer to, there often comes a subordinate attributive clause
beginning with that. This attributive clause, as it were, serves the pur-
pose of decoding the effect of the communication. It must be noted that
phrase epithets are always hyphenated, thus pointing to the temporary
structure of the compound word.

These two structural features have predetermined the functioning
of phrase epithets. Practically any phrase or sentence which deals with
the psychological state of a person may serve as an epithet. The phrases
and sentences transformed into epithets lose their independence and as-
sume a new quality which is revealed both in the intonation pattern
(that of an attribute) and graphically (by being hyphenated).

Another structural variety of the epithet is the one which we shall
term reversed. The reversed epithet is composed of two nouns linked
in an of -phrase. The subjective, evaluating, emotional element is embod-
ied not in the noun attribute but in the noun structurally described, for
example: "the shaaow of a smile"; "a devil of a job" (Maugham); "...he
smiled brightly, neatly, efficiently, a military abbreviation of a smile"
(Graham Green); "A devil of a sea rolls in that bay" (Byron); "A little
Flying Dutchman of a cab" (Galsworthy); "...a dog of a fellow" (Dickens);
"her brute of a brother" (Galsworthy); "...a long nightshirt of a mackin-
tosh..." (Cronin)

It will be observed that such epithets arе metaphorical. The noun
to be assessed is contained in the of -phrase and the noun it qualifies is a
metaphor (shadow, devil, military abbreviation, Flying Dutchman, dog).
The grammatical aspect, viz. attributive relation between the members
of the combination shows that the SD here is an epithet.

It has been acknowledged that it is sometimes difficult to draw a line
of demarcation between attributive and predicative relations. Some at-

tributes carry so much information that they may justly be considered
bearers of predicativeness. This is particularly true of the epithet, espec-
ially genuine or speech epithets, which belong to language-in-action
and not to language-as-a-system. These epithets are predicative in es-
sence, though not in form.

On the other hand, some word-combinations where we have predic-
ative relations convey so strongly the emotional assessment of the
object spoken of, that in spite of their formal, structural design, the
predicatives can be classed as epithets. Here are some examples:

' Fools that they are'; ' Wicked as he is.'

The inverted position of the predicatives 'fools' and 'wicked' as well
as the intensifying 'that they are' and 'as he is' mark this border-line
variety of epithet.

Some language epithets, in spite of opposition on the part of ortho-
dox language purists, establish themselves in standard English as con-
ventional symbols of assessment for a given period. To these belong words
we have already spoken of like terrible, awful, massive, top, dramatic,
mighty, crucial (see p. 66). From the point of view of the distribution of the epithets in the sentence, the first model to be pointed out is the string of epithets. In his depiction of New York, O. Henry gives the following string of epithets:

"Such was the background of the wonderful, cruel, enchanting,
bewildering, fatal, great city;"

Other examples are: a plump, rosy-cheeked, wholesome apple-
faced young woman (Dickens); "a well-matched, fairly-balanced give-
and-take couple." (Dickens)

As in any enumeration, the string of epithets gives a many-sided
depiction of the object. But in this many-sidedness there is always a
suggestion of an ascending order of emotive elements. This can easily
be observed in the intonation pattern of a string of epithets. There is
generally an ascending scale which culminates in the last epithet; if
the last epithet is a language epithet (great), or not an epithet (young),
the culminating point is the last genuine epithet. The culminating point
in the above examples is at fatal, apple-faced, and give-and-take. Another distributional model is the transferred epithet. Transferred epithets are ordinary logical attributes generally describing the state of a human being, but made to refer to an inanimate object, for example: sick chamber, sleepless pillow, restless pace, breathless eagerness,
unbreakfasted morning, merry hours, a disapproving finger, Isabel shrugged
an indifferent shoulder.

As may be seen, it is the force contributed to the attribute by its
position, and not by its meaning, that hallows it into an epithet. The
main feature of the epithet, that of emotional assessment, is greatly
diminished in this model; but it never quite vanishes. The meaning of
the logical attributes in such combinations acquires a definite emotional
colouring.

Language epithets as part of the emotional word-stock of the lan-
guage have a tendency to become obsolescent. That is the fate of many
emotional elements in the language. They gradually lose their emotive
charge and are replaced by new ones which, in their turn, will be re-
placed by neologisms. Such was the fate of the language epithet good-na-
tured. In the works of Henry Fielding this epithet appears very often, as,
for example, 'a good-natured hole', 'good-natured side'. The words vast
and vastly were also used as epithets in the works of men-of-letters of the
18th century, as in 'vast rains', 'vastly amused'.

The problem of the epithet is too large and too significant to be fully
dealt with in a short chapter. Indeed, it may be regarded as the crucial
problem in emotive language and epithets, correspondingly, among the
stylistic devices of the language.

It remains only to say that the epithet is a direct and straightforward
way of showing the author's attitude towards the things described, where-
as other stylistic devices, even image-bearing ones, will reveal the au-
thor's evaluation of the object only indirectly. That is probably why those
authors who wish to show a seeming impartiality and objectivity in
depicting their heroes and describing events use few epithets. Realistic
authors use epithets much more sparingly, as statistical data have shown.
Roughly speaking, Romanticism, on the other hand, may to some extent
be characterized by its abundant use of epithets. In illustration we have
taken at random a few lines from a stanza in Byron's "Childe Harold's
Pilgrimage":

The horrid crags, by toppling convent, crowned,
The cork-trees hoar that clothe the shaggy steep,

The mountain-moss by scorching skies imbrown'd,
The sunken glen, whose sunless shrubs must weep,

The orange tints that gild the greenest bough...

Oxymoron

O x у moron is a combination of two words (mostly an adjective
and a noun or an adverb with an adjective) in which the meanings of the
two clash, being opposite in sense, for example:

'low skyscraper', 'sweet sorrow', 'nice rascal', 'pleasantly ugly
face', 'horribly beautiful ', ' a deafening silence'.

If the primary meaning of the qualifying word changes or weakens,
the stylistic effect of oxymoron is lost. This is the case with what were once oxymoronic combinations, for example, 'awfully nice', 'awfully
glad', 'terribly sorry' and the like, where the words awfully and terribly
have lost their primary logical meaning and are now used with emotive
meaning only, as intensifiers. The essence of oxymoron consists in the
capacity of the primary meaning of the adjective or adverb to resist for
some time the overwhelming power of semantic change which words
undergo in combination. The forcible combination of non-combinative
words seems to develop what may be called a kind of centrifugal force

which keeps them apart, in contrast to ordinary word-combinations where
centripetal force is in action.

We have already pointed out that there are different ratios of emotive-
logical relations in epithets. In some of them the logical meaning is
hardly perceived, in others the two meanings co-exist. In oxymoron the
logical meaning holds fast because there is no true word-combination,
only thе juxtaposition of two non-combinative words.

But still we may notice a peculiar change in the meaning of the quali-
fying word. It assumes a new life in oxymoron, definitely indicative of the
assessing tendency in the writer's mind.

Let us take the following example from O. Henry's story "The Duel"
in which one of the heroes thus describes his attitude towards New York.

"I despise its very vastness and power. It has the poorest million-
aires, the littlest great men, the haughtiest beggars, the plainest
beauties, the lowest skyscrapers, the dolefulest pleasures of any town
I ever saw."

Even the superlative degree of the adjectives fails to extinguish the
primary meaning of the adjectives: poor, little, haughty, etc. But by some
inner law of word-combinations they also show the attitude of the speaker, reinforced, of course, by the preceding sentence: "I despise its very vastness and power."

It will not come amiss to express this language phenomenon in terms
of the theory of information, which states that though the general ten-
dency of entropy is to enlarge, the encoding tendency in the language,
which strives for an organized system of language symbols, reduces
entropy. Perhaps, this is due to the organizing spirit of the language,
i.e. the striving after a system (which in its very essence is an organized
whole) that oxymoronic groups, if repeated frequently, lose their stylistic
quality and gradually fall into the group of acknowledged word-combina-
tions which consist of an intensifier and the concept intensified.

Oxymoron has one main structural model: adjeсtive + noun.
It is in this structural model that the resistance of the two component
parts to fusion into one unit manifests itself most strongly. In the ad-
verb + a d j e с t i v e model the change of meaning in the first element, the adverb, is more rapid, resistance to the unifying process not being
so strong.

Sometimes the tendency to use oxymoron is the mark of certain liter-
ary trends and tastes. There are poets in search of new shades of meaning
in existing words, who make a point of joining together words of contra-
dictory meaning. "Two ordinary words may become almost new," writes
V. V. Vinogradov, "if they are joined for the first time or used in an unex-
pected context ". ¹

Thus, 'peopled desert', 'populous solitude', 'proud humility'
are oxymoronic.

¹ Виноградов В. В. Русский язык. М., 1938, т. 1, с-121—122.
163

Sometimes, however, the tendency to combine the uncombinative is
revealed in structurally different forms, not in adjective-noun models.
Gorki criticizes his own sentence: "I suffered then from the fanaticism of
knowledge," and called it "a blunder". He points out that the acquiring
of knowledge is not blind as fanaticism is. The syntactic relations here
are not oxymoronic. But combinations of this kind can be likened to
oxymoron. The same can be said of the following lines from Byron's
"Childe Harold's Pilgrimage"

"Fair Greece! sad relic of departed Worth!
Immortal, though no more, though fallen, great!"

Oxymoronic relations in the italicized part can scarcely be felt, but
still the contrary signification is clearly perceived. Such structures may
be looked upon as intermediate between oxymoron and antithesis (see
p. 222).

4. INTERACTION OF LOGICAL AND NOMINAL MEANINGS
Antonomasia

We have already pointed out the peculiarities of nominal meaning.
The interplay between the logical and nominal meanings of a word is called antопоmasia. As in other stylistic devices based on the inter-
action of lexical meanings, the two kinds of meanings must be realized
in the word simultaneously. If only one meaning is materialized in the
context, there is no stylistic device, as in hooligan, boycott and other
examples given earlier. Here are some examples of genuine antonomasia.
"Among the herd of journals which are published in the States,
there are some, the reader scarcely need be told, of character and
credit. From personal intercourse with accomplished gentlemen
connected with publications of this class, I have derived both pleas-
ure and profit. But the name of these is Few, and of the other
Legion, and the influence of the good is powerless to counteract the
mortal poison of the bad. (Dickens)

The use of the word name made the author write the words 'Few',
and 'Legion' with capital letters. It is very important to note that this
device is mainly realized in the written language, because generally
capital letters аre the only signals to denote the presence of the stylistic
device. The same can also be observed in the following example from
Byron's "Don Juan":

"Society is now one polished horde,

Form'd of two mighty tribes, the Bores and Bored."

In these two examples of the use of antonomasia the nominal meaning
is hardly perceived, the logical meaning of the words few, legion, bores,
bored being too strong. But there is another point that should be mentioned.
Most proper names are built on some law of analogy. Many of them
end in -son (as Johnson) or -er (Fletcher). We easily recognize such words

as Smith, White, Brown, Green, Fowler and others as proper names. But
such names as Miss Blue-Eyes (Carter Brown) or Scrooge or Mr. Zero may
be called token or telling names. They give information to the
reader about the bearer of the name. In this connection it is interesting to
recall the well-known remark by Karl Marx, who said that we do not
know anything about a man if we only know that he is called Jacob. The
nominal meaning is not intended to give any information about the per-
son. It only serves the purpose of identification. Proper names, i.e. the
words with nominal meaning, can etymologically, in the majority of
cases, be traced to some quality, property or trait of a person, or to his
occupation. But this etymological meaning may be forgotten and the word be understood as a proper name and nothing else. It is not so with
antonomasia. Antonomasia is intended to point out the leading, most char-
acteristic feature of a person or event, at the same time pinning this
leading trait as a proper name to the person or event concerned. In fact,
antonomasia is a revival of the initial stage in naming individuals.

Antonomasia may be likened to the epithet in essence if not in form.
It categorizes the person and thus simultaneously indicates both the
general and the particular.

Antonomasia is a much favoured device in the belles-lettres style.
In an article "What's in a name?", Mr. R. Davis says: "In deciding on
names for his characters, an author has an unfair advantage over other
parents. He knows so much better how his child will turn out. When Saul
Bellow named Augie March, he had already conceived, a hero restlessly
on the move, marching ahead with august ideas of himself. Henry James
saw in Adam Verver of "The Golden Bowl" a self-made American, sprung
from the soil, full of verve and zest for life. In choosing names like 'Murd-
stone', 'Scrooge', and 'Gradgrind', Dickens was being even more ob-
vious." ¹

In Russian literature this device is employed by many of our classic
writers. It will suffice to mention such names as Vralman, Molchalin,
Korobochka and Sobakevich to illustrate this efficient device for character-
izing literary heroes, a device which is now falling out of use. These Rus-
sian names are also coined on the analogy of generally acknowledged
models for proper names, with endings in -man, -in, -vich.

An interesting literary device to emphasize token names is employed
by Byron in his "Don Juan" where the name is followed or preceded by
an explanatory remark, as in the following:

"Sir John Pottledeep, the mighty drinker."
"There was the sage Miss Reading."
"And the two fair co-heiresses Giltbedding."
"There was Dick Dubious, the metaphysician,

Who loved philosophy and a good dinner;
Angle, the soi-disant mathematician;

Sir Henry Silvercup, the great race-winner."

¹ The New York Times Book Review, Nov. 13, 1966.

The explanatory words, as it were, revive the logical meaning of the
proper names, thus making more apparent the interplay of logical and
nominal meanings.

The use of antonomasia is now not confined to the belles-lettres style.
It is often found in publicistic style that is, in magazine and news-
paper articles, in essays and also in military language. The following are
examples:

"I say this to our American friends. Mr. Facing-Both-Ways does
not get very far in this word." (The Times)

I suspect that the Noes and Don't Knows would far outnumber the
Yesses." (The Spectator)

So far we have dealt with a variety of antonomasia in which com-
mon words with obvious logical meaning are given nominal meaning
without losing their primary, basic significance. But antonomasia can
also make a word which now has a basic nominal meaning acquire a ge-
neric signification, thus supplying the word with an additional logical
meaning. The latter can only be deciphered it the events connected with a
certain place mentioned or with a conspicuous feature of a person are
well known. Thus, the word Dunkirk now means 'the evacuation of troops
under heavy bombardment before it is too late'. Sedan means' a complete
defeat', Coventry — 'the destruction of a city by air raids', a quizling now
means 'a traitor who aids occupying enemy forces'.

The spelling of these words demonstrates the stages by which proper
nouns acquire new, logical meanings: some of them are still spelt with
capital letters (geographical names), others are already spelt with small
letters showing that a new word with a primary logical meaning has al-
ready come into existence.

This variety of antonomasia is not so widely used as a stylistic de-
vice, most probably due to the nature of words with nominal meaning:
they tell very little or even nothing about the bearer of the name.