A Stylistic Analysis Of The Foregrounded Features In Oliver Twist

In stylistic analysis, foregrounding is a significant sign in identifying the stylistic features in literary works. In view of the application of foregrounding theory into stylistic study of various language varieties, most researches emphasize the study of foregrounded linguistic features of poems and modern fictions; however, few documents have presented any profound study of the foregrounding in realistic novels.Realism is a very important development in the history of fiction. Realist novels directly reflect and expose the truth of social and moral problems at that time, and emphasize the intactness of plot, the objectiveness and authenticity of characters and details. Therefore, their language should fit into the realistic life. To contrast these more"readerly"realist texts against the more"writerly"texts of the modernist and postmodernist literary style, David Lodge (1990) suggests a set of criteria for defining a"realist"text, and the first of them is"the language of the text is not foregrounded (i.e. it does not draw attention to itself)". Concerning the unique writing styles presented in Dickens'realistic novels, the author of this thesis attempts to apply the foregrounding theory into stylistic study of realistic texts, focusing on Oliver Twist, the first realistic social critical novel of Dickens'and a representative masterpiece of his early works, as object of study.Foregrounding can be classified into two types: deviation and over-regularity. Deviation can be defined as a violation of norms. It may appear at various linguistic and non-linguistic levels. In this thesis, we discuss the graphological, grammatical and semantic deviation of language at the linguistic level and the deviation of narrative point of view and schema deviation at the non-linguistic level in Oliver Twist, and then make a tentative evaluation of the aesthetic effect achieved by them. Over-regularity refers to the constant recurrence of certain language units in the form of repetition and parallelism. This thesis gives a brief research on the over-regular features in this novel at the syntactical and semantic level. All of these foregrounded features at both linguistic and non-linguistic level are beneficial in making the limited text more expressive in conveying information and transferring the theme and aesthetic value of the novel to the reading public. The study of them can help readers have a better comprehension of the text.On the one hand, this thesis proves the absoluteness and inappropriateness of Lodge's definition of"the language of the realist text is not foregrounded"; on the other hand, it also testifies the feasibility of applying the modern linguistic theory—foregrounding theory into the research on classical realistic novels. It shows that in realistic novels there are also plenty of unique foregrounded features that deserve our attention. Besides, it is the foregrounded features functioning in the text that constitute the style of Dickens. Based on these investigations, we can have a better appreciation of Dickens'writing style and the unique technique and inventiveness in his early works.