The Pragmatics Of Drama Interpretation: A Relevance-Theoretic Approach To Pinter's Plays

This dissertation is intended to explore the possibility of applying the relevance theory (RT) to the analysis of drama texts, aiming to test the feasibility of this application. The study mainly consists of two parts: the establishment of an RT-framework for drama interpretation and its application to the analysis of Harold Pinter's plays.In preparation to work out the interpretive framework, a review of the previous studies on RT and its application to discourse analysis is presented. Then in view of these previous accounts, a tentative relevance-theoretic framework for textual analysis is proposed, which consists of three levels of factors, namely, linguistic level, visual level and supralinguistic level, in addition to the notion of relevance. The three levels, the more specific elements that form each of them, and the relationships that hold between them are discussed in detail. Among the factors that constitute the framework, linguistic level, with all the elements therein, forms the basic core of the target text to be approached. Inference serves as the overall means to the end of exploring meaning and relevance acts as the governing principle of the inferential process, as the search for relevance underlies the interpretation of the utterances made by both the communicator and the addressee. During the process of inference, the features gathered in terms of semantics, syntax, phonology and the whole text will serve as signposts for reasoning. Last but not least, the assumptions from the encyclopedic knowledge and context will be the auxiliary tools that constantly adjust the direction of reasoning when called for. To sum up, an integrated approach is required when an interpreter is tackling these factors for the purpose of acquiring the meaning to be communicated. To test the validity and applicability of the framework, we adopt it in the interpretation of two plays by Harold Pinter, The Birthday Party and The Homecoming.The major findings of the present study are as follows: 1) it is justifiable to view drama interpretation as a process of continuously reasoning out and renewing contextual assumptions, with the expectation of relevance incorporated in the construal; 2) as the inference for the intended meaning proceeds, the features observed in semantics, syntax, phonology and the whole text will serve as cues to suggest the appropriate path of reasoning; 3) through the screening of potential implications, our incipient understanding is reinforced, enriched, or contradicted by the subsequent assumptions; 4) with more and more information introduced into the cognitive environment, a more relevant interpretation is gradually obtained, making manifest to us the possible intentions underlying the playwright's maneuver.