Onomatopoetic Words.––This coördination of the two appeals is the origin and the essence of the quality of 210 style. But the question now demands to be considered,––how may this coördination be effected? The first detail we must attend to is the choice of words. Tennyson’s task, in the lines that we have just considered, was comparatively easy. He was writing about certain sounds; and it was not especially difficult for him to imitate those sounds with the words that he selected to denote them. His device was the obvious one which is called, by rhetoricians, onomatopœia. In every language those words which are denotative of sounds are nearly always also imitative of them. Such words, as, for example, “whisper,” “thunder,” “rattle,” are in themselves stylistic. Alone, and apart from any context, they incorporate that cognate appeal of significance and sound which is the secret of style. Thus far the matter is extremely simple. But there are also many words which denote other things than sounds and yet somehow convey subtly to the ear a sensuous suggestion of their content. Such words, for instance, are “mud,” “nevermore,” and “tremulous.” Any child could tell you that words like these “sound just like what they mean”; and yet it would be impossible for the critical intellect to explain exactly wherein lies the fitness between sound and sense in such a word as “mud.” The fitness, however, is obviously there. If we select from several languages words which are identical in denotation, we are likely to find that, because of their difference in sound, they connote different phases of the idea which they contain. For example, the English word “death” has a spiritual sound; whereas the German “der Tod” sounds horrible and grim, and the French “la mort” sounds fearsome and bizarre. In content, these three words are indistinguishable; but in style they differ very widely. Their diversity of connotation is obviously inherent in their sound; and yet, though the difference 211 may be heard at once, it seems inexplicable by the intellect.
Memorable Words.––But by far the greatest number of stylistic words owe their connotation not so much to their sound alone, as to their capacity for evoking memories. They awake the psychologic process of association. Such are the words which lie close to the heart of every one’s experience,––words like “home,” “sorrow,” “mother,” “youth,” and “friends.” Whenever such a word is used, it conveys to the reader or the listener not only the specific meaning intended by the momentary context, but also a subsidiary and subconscious recollection of many phases of his personal experience. All of the indisputably magic words possess this associative or memorable quality. Saying one thing definitely, they evoke a concordant harmony of subconscious and shadowy suggestion. Expressing a message in the present, they recall remembered beauty from the past. Thus it is with the words of those two enchanted lines of Keats,––
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“Charm’d magic casements, opening on the foam Of perilous seas, in faery lands forlorn.” |
They say much more than what they say. Conveying one meaning to the reader, they remind him of many, many others.
The Patterning of Syllables.––But the choice of suggestive and memorable words is only the first step toward mastery of style. The perfect marriage of significance and sound is dependent not so much upon the words themselves as upon the way in which they are arranged. The art of style, like every other art, proceeds by an initial selection of materials and a subsequent arrangement of them in accordance with a pattern. In style, the pattern is of prime importance; and therefore, in 212 order to understand the witchery of writing, we must next consider technically the patterning of words.
Stevenson on Style.––This phase of the subject has been clearly expounded and deftly illustrated by Robert Louis Stevenson in his essay “On Some Technical Elements of Style in Literature.”[9] This essay is, so far as I know, the only existing treatise on the technic of style which is of any practical value to the incipient artist. It should therefore be read many times and mastered thoroughly by every student of the mystery of writing. Since it is now easily accessible, it will not be necessary here to do more than summarize its leading points,––stating them in a slightly different way in order that they may better fit the present context.
The Pattern of Rhythm.––Every normal sentence, unless it be extremely brief, contains a knot, or hitch. Up to a certain point, the thought is progressively complicated; after that, it is resolved. Now, the art of style demands that this natural implication and explication of the thought should be attended by a cognate implication and explication of the movement of the sentence. Unless the hitch in the rhythm coincides with the hitch in the thought, the two appeals of the sentence (to the intellect and to the ear) will contest against each other instead of combining to accomplish a common effect. Therefore the first necessity in weaving a web of words is to conquer an accordance between the intellectual progression of the thought and the sensuous progression of the sound. The appeal of rhythm to the human ear is basic and elemental; and style depends for its effect more upon a mastery of rhythmic phrase than upon any other individual detail. In verse, the technical problem is twofold: first, to suggest to the ear of the reader a 213 rhythmic pattern of standard regularity; and then, to vary from the regularity suggested, as deftly and as frequently as may be possible without ever allowing the reader for a moment to forget the fundamental pattern. In prose, the writer works with greater freedom; and his problem is therefore at once more easy and more difficult. Instead of starting with a standard pattern, he has to invent a web of rhythm which is suited to the sense he wishes to convey; and then, without ever disappointing the ear of the reader by unnecessarily withholding an expected fall of rhythm, he must shatter every inkling of monotony by continual and tasteful variation.
The Pattern of Literation.––But language, by its very nature, offers to the ear not only a pattern of rhythm but also a pattern of letters. A mastery of literation is therefore a necessary element of style. Effects indisputably potent in suggestion may be gained by running a recurrence of certain letters, deftly for a time withheld,––since blatancy must always be avoided,––yet triumphant in harmonious return. The great sentences of literature which echo in our ears because their sound is married to their meaning will be found upon examination to incorporate an intricate pattern of tastefully selected letters. Thus it is with the following sentence of Sir Thomas Browne’s, wherein it is difficult to decide whether the rhythm or the literation contributes the larger share to its symmetry of sound:––“But the iniquity of oblivion blindly scattereth her poppy, and deals with the memory of men without distinction to merit of perpetuity.” Thus it is, again, with this sentence from Ruskin’s “Seven Lamps of Architecture”:––“They are but the rests and monotones of the art; it is to its far happier, far higher, exaltation that we owe those fair fronts of variegated mosaic, charged with wild fancies and dark hosts of imagery, thicker and quainter 214 than ever filled the depths of midsummer dream; those vaulted gates, trellised with close leaves; those window-labyrinths of twisted tracery and starry light; those misty masses of multitudinous pinnacle and diademed tower; the only witnesses, perhaps, that remain to us of the faith and fear of nations.” So it is also with these sentences from De Quincey’s “The English Mail-Coach”:––“The sea, the atmosphere, the light, bore each an orchestral part in this universal lull. Moonlight, and the first timid tremblings of the dawn, were by this time blending; and the blendings were brought into a still more exquisite state of unity by a slight silvery mist, motionless and dreamy, that covered the woods and fields, but with a veil of equable transparency.”
Style a Fine Art.––A more detailed study of style along these lines would lead us to considerations too minutely technical for the purpose of the present volume. Style, in its highest development, belongs only to the finest art of literature; and it must be admitted that literature is not always, nor even perhaps most frequently, a fine art. Of the four rhetorical moods, or methods, of discourse, exposition lends itself the least to the assistance of the quality of style. Explanations are communicated from intellect to intellect. Words, in exposition, must be chosen chiefly with a view to definite denotation. The expository writer must be clear at any cost; he must aim to be precise rather than to be suggestive. Style is considerably more important as an adjunct to argumentation; since in order really to persuade, a writer must not only convince the reader’s intellect but also rouse and conquer his emotions. But it is in narrative and in description that the quality of style is most contributive to the maximum effect. To evoke a picture in the reader’s mind, or to convey to his consciousness a sense of movement, it is advisable (I am 215 tempted to say necessary) to play upon his sensibilities with the sound of the very sentences that are framed to convey a content to his intellect.
Style an Important Aid to Fiction.––Since narrative is the natural mood of fiction, and since description is more often introduced than either argument or exposition, it follows that the writer of fiction must always reckon with the factor of style. It is true that stories may be written without style; it is even true that many of the greatest stories have been devoid of this indefinable quality: but it is not therefore logical to argue that the factor of style may be neglected. How much it may be made to contribute to the attainment of the aim of fiction will be recognized instinctively upon examination of any wonderfully written passage. Let us consider, for example, the following paragraphs from “Markheim.” After Markheim has killed the dealer, and gone upstairs to ransack the belongings of the murdered man, he suffers an interval of quietude amid alarms.––