How to differentiate literary texts Essay

Carter argues that on that point ar six particular features which arouse help several(predicate)iate literary texts from others and that a literary texts testament exhibit most or wholly of them. These features are speciality independence, genre-mixing, semantic density, polysemy, displaced interaction and text patterning. (Carter, 1997, cited in Thornborrow, 2006, p.81-85)If I look at the first feature place by Carter, strong suit independence which misbegottens that a literary text does not blaspheme on other medium or media to be read ,(Carter, 1997, cited in Thornborrow, 2006, p.81 ) and apply it to my texts, I can see that the except from The gentle of The peal is so medium independent. The extract does not need photos and the text stands up on its own, it needs no additional in jumpation. By contrast, the advertizing from the online catalogue is media dependant. The text at the beginning and the end describes a rally which is obviously for sale so a photo awaits to be quite necessary as I do not think m whatever a(prenominal) people would buy a piece of je easilyery without seeing it no matter how appealing the description is. The text itself seems to beg for an accomp whateve evade photo so I think it can safely be state that it is medium dependant.The fleck feature identified by Carter is genre-mixing which is the conception that any style of writing not necessarily associated with a literary condition can be drilld to create a literary effect. (Carter, 1997, cited in Thornborrow, 2006, p.82) If I am to look at the Lord of The peal extract, thither is several(prenominal) genre-mixing although not very much, the extract is obviously part of a novel solely the death ii lines read like poetry. Of volumes poetic features are usually associated with a literary context by their very disposition so what those last devil poetic lines do for the ataraxis of the text is to elevate it, that is, convey the feeling that the extr act has literary pretences at the very least or is simply literary in some ways. In the second text, genre-mixing is more obviously present, the first carve up is concise as it describes a wall which is for sale unless the rest of the text which introduces tire out Jagger as the designer of the ring is mainly create verbally in journalistic style. The last cardinal lines go back to publicizing written style.Semantic density, the third feature identified by Carter is deemed by him to be very important. He believes that semantic density is a occur sign of the literariness of a text. (Carter, 1997, cited in Thornborrow, 2006, p.82) The Lord of The ring extract has semantic density. One cannot escape the become patterning and many initial rhymes which are present in a lot of the text. The text is unquestionablely peppered with it. For exercising, the wizard stood looking at the call forth then he stooped and removed the ring. or ..he now saw fine lines, finer than the fin est pen-strokes, running along the ring, extraneous and insidelines of fire that seemed to form the garner of a flowing script. The actual sound patterning along with the syntactic arrangement shows clear semantic density. The use of the adjective fine along with two of its adverbs finer and finest coupled with the sound patterning serves to show how fine the script on the ring actually is. Similarly, the alliteration in running and ring plus the sound patterning as well as the two opposites adjectives outside and inside that immediately follow forward going back to the lines which are now made of fire that form the letter of a flowing script (alliteration plus sound patterning again) strive the reader a vivid picture of the actual ring. in that respect is overly contrast in the text. One drill is silent and clack, another is bright and remote, it is as if those contrasts reflect the contrast between the two adult males, one which is Mordor, faint simply unmistakeably danger ous and the normal peaceful world of the Shire. I must point out the seemingly random forge association of the clack of Sams shears. The clack which is sure onomatopoeic because the sound which makes up the pass newsworthiness mimics the sound which the word conjure ups to (Short,1996, p.115) and the marvellous alliteration of Sams shears which once again produces a incredibly vivid picture, accompanied by sound no less(prenominal)T here is besides some semantic density in the second text about the slovenly woman Jagger ring. The first sentence has sound patterning as well as the syntactic arrangement ..sterling silver ring.stylised..design adorn..a scattering of sparkling. zirconias. Sound patterning and syntax aside, the alliteration s start almost every word having to dowith the ring offers a psychical picture of that ring, a very shiny one at that. The last sentence of the first paragraph also has the repeat alliteration in edgy, contemporary, jewellery which once again gives information about the ring nevertheless also about its potential buyer. Semantic density is also shown in this text by the reference to the halcyon days and the sentence stating that Jade Jagger has since carved a feted reputation as an artist.This is an abnormal persona as carving has to do with a concrete material much(prenominal) as stone or wood and it is not possible to physically carve a reputation. It is of draw a metaphor (Mick Short,1996, p.7).The fourth criteria in Carters theory is polysemy which is the possibility for a text to be read in different ways. (Carter, 1997, cited in Thornborrow, 2006, p.84) For case, in the Lord of The Rings extract, the room becomes puritanical and silent. It could of course be because Gandalf has closed the shutters and emaciated the curtains, just it could also be due to the fact that the ring is in the fire and waking up uncover its true dark nature therefore affecting the atmosphere of the room. The reader is also told o f Gandalfs bristling brows, it could mean that Gandalf has stiff and coarse eyebrows which I so imagine him to hire but it could also infer that Gandalf is showing irritation at Frodos nerve-racking to get the ring out of the fire, hence the Wait before the bristling brows. The word fiery is also good because we retain been told that the letters are lines of fire so they are obviously fiery but fiery could also allude to the dark talking to of Mordor or the quick and dangerous humor of Saurons spirit which is of course in the ring itself.My last example is that when Frodo receives the ring, it seemed to have become thicker and heavier. It can actually be that the fire, by revealing what the ring is, has also physically altered it and made it thicker and heavier but it may just seem thicker and heavier in Frodos hand because it is a dark ring, a ring of power and evil which the fire has just awakened.In the second text on the other hand, I cannot see any obvious example of pol ysemy apart from the halcyon days which can be read as the carefreedays or the fabulous days as it can refer to the mythical bird. Both meanings are plausible as the pop art scene in modernistic York was famously carefree and happy and it has since acquired a mythical type of reputation. There is also the metaphor carved a feted reputation but I cannot see it other evidence of polysemy.The fifth feature of Carters is displaced interaction which means that the text is there for the reader to read and interpret as it wishes. (Carter, 1997, cited in Thornborrow, 2006, p.84) The Lord of The Rings text is a perfect example of displaced interaction as there is nothing for the reader to do but read and provide meaning to the text. The Jade Jagger ring online advert just is not an example of displaced interaction as the aim of the text is to run the reader to buy a piece of jewellery.The last feature identified by Carter is text patterning which is similar to the idea of parallelism in which some features remain the same while others change. The variant features are usually quarrel while the remaining features are structural. (Carter, 1997, cited in Thornborrow, 2006, p.85) (Short,1996 p.14) The most obvious example of parallelism in the Lord of The Rings extract is the last two lines. While the structure stays the same with the same subject, The Ring, the verbs are different. What this does is draw and quarter attention to the verbs themselves which is presumably what Tolkien wanted as the verbs tell us what the ring actually does. It rules, finds, brings and binds Although different verbs with slightly different meanings, it gives a general idea of power. There is another example of parallelism in this text The letters are Elvish, of an ancient mode but the language is that of Mordor, which I will not utter here Again, the structure stays more or less the same but the Lexis is different so as to charge the readers attention on the difference between the let ters and the language and Elvish and Mordor. Tolkien wants to highlight these differences are they are crucial to the arrangement of the story. In those two lines we also have an example of deflexion, when something in the texts deviates from the sensed rules of slope which makes it particularly memorable. Deviation is a part of foregrounding, the produce of deviation from linguistic and non-linguistic norms (Short,1996, p.12)The deviation in the last two lines is the invention of the word Mordor which Tolkien made up for the particulars of his story. This is called a neologism (Short, 1996, p.45) Finally, I must pertain that the last two lines of the Lord of The Rings are an internal deviation, that is, they are two rhyming lines structured like lines of a poem but this is a departure from the rest of the text which has been written in prose. (Short,1996, p.59) Of course this internal deviation makes those two last lines even more memorable. Although there is some text pattern ing in the second text, particularly around the word Jade, I do not feel it can be compared to the other Lord of The Ring text as it doesnt seem to actually reinforce an important message.So, if we follow Carters criteria when it comes to targeting a literary text, the Lord of The Rings extract seems to be more literary than the Jade Jaggers online ring advertisement. The Lord of The Rings extract is not medium dependant, it has some genre-mixing, it has semantic density, polysemy, displaced interaction and text patterning. The Jade Jaggers online ring advertisement is medium dependant,it is not really polysemic, it is not an example of displaced interaction, I dont feel it has important text patterning but it does have some semantic density.On Carters cline of literariness, The Lord of The Rings is indeed a literary text as it possesses all of the features which usually identify literariness. Jade Jaggers ring advertisement does not seem to be a literary text according to Carters cline.Are the two texts originative? I am tempted to answer that if a text is considered literary then it must be creative which would make the Lord of The Rings extract creative as well as literary. I refer to Papen and Tusting who state that creativeness refers to making something which is new, which did not exist before the creative act (Papen and Tusting,2006, p.315) Taking this into account, both(prenominal) texts analysed in this paper are indeed creative. Cognitive poetics which combines linguistic analysis with insights from cognitive science in score to explain the relationship betweenthe language of texts and readers responses to texts (Semino, 2006, p.37) is provoke as it implies that creativity is always present in literary and non-literary texts but that literary texts are characterised by particular novel and creative uses of the linguistic and cognitive resources apply in everyday communication. (Seen and Gavins, 2003, p1, cited in Elena Semino,2006, p.37) Follo wing from this is the confidence that, yet again, both the texts analysed in this paper are creative, none more so than the other but that the Lord of The Rings text analysed here would be considered more literary than the Jade Jaggers ring advertisement as it showcases especially new and creative uses of language and cognitive resources used in everyday communication.(Seen and Gavins, 2003, p1, cited in Elena Semino,2006, p.37) Eagleton with his sociocultural approach would imply that The Lord of The Rings text was definitely literary since the sociocultural approach states that lit is made so by society, whether the text had pretence to literariness or not.( Eagleton, 1983, p.11, cited in Maybin and Pearce, 2006, p.12) Since The Lord of The Rings has been widely accepted by society in the last 40 years as being a literary work, then it must be, according to the sociocultural approach.As a conclusion, I feel that there is an agreement across different school of thoughts that creat ivity is present in most texts so I would say that both the texts I analysed in this paper are creative in different ways. According to Carters inherency approach, the Lord of The Rings text is more literary than Jade Jaggers ring advertisement and although I realise that Carters method of analysis is not without its weaknesses, I must say that I feel that The Lord of The Rings extract is indeed more literary than the advertisement because of the degree of inventiveness involved in the language (I could have added so much more to the analysis of the text) and imagination. I think that the extract (and the book it comes from) combines the two most important things when it comes to literature beautiful language and a fantastic imagination.ReferencesMaybin,J., Pearce,M., 2006, Literature and creativity in incline, The craft of Englishliterary Creativity, Palgrave McMillan, The Open UniversityEagleton,T. (1993), Literary Theory An Introduction, Oxford, Blackwell,pp.9-11)Carter, R, (19 97), Investigating English DiscourseLanguage, Literacy and Literature, London, RoutledgeThornborrow J., 2006, chapter 2 Poetic Language, The cunning of EnglishLiterary Creativity,, Palgrave McMillan, The Open UniversityShort,M.,1996, Exploring The Language of Poems, Plays, and Prose, Addison Wesley Longman LimitedPapen, U&Tusting, K, 2006, Chapter 7Literacies, Collaboration and Context,The Art of EnglishEveryday Creativity, Palgrave McMillan, The Open University.Semino, S., 2006, Reading CCognitive Poetics, The Art of English Literary Creativity, Palgrave McMillan, The Open UniversitySeen,G. And Gavins, J. (2003), Contextualising cognitive poetics, in J.Gavins and G.Steen (eds), Cognitive Poetics in Practice, London, Routledge