The Analysis of “W.S.” by L P. Hartley

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The analysis of “W.S.” by L P. Hartley The fragment of emotive prose which has been chosen for stylistic analysis is one of the numerous stories belonged to a prominent English novelist – L. P. Hartley “W.S.” The author was a highly skilled narrator and all his tales are admirably told. “W.S.” comes from “The Complete Short Stories of L. P. Hartley” published posthumously in 1973. A close study of the story for the purpose of examining its style involves a careful observation and a detailed description of the language phenomena at various levels. The text of the fragment is complete in itself and it is interesting from the point of view of its idea. As for the type of narration it is author’s narrative. As for the composition the excerpt is not homogeneous: the author’s narrative is interrupted by elements of description, the short inserts of interior speech and (thoughts and feelings of the main character which are imperceptibly interwoven with the narration) e.g. “Never mind, he thought; perhaps I was getting into a groove” also we can observe examples of represented speech e.g. “His anonymous correspondent’s criticism lingered in his mind. Did he really fail to come to grips with his character? Perhaps he did”. All these types of narration are characteristic of psychological prose. The main character is Walter Streeter, a novelist. The type of character drawing is direct because while reading this very excerpt we get information about the character and it may be said that the author tries to thrust his opinion on the readers. For instance he says: “….he was conscientious,….he was not a man to experiment with acquaintances…” Besides, indirect way of characterization is also employed and it is realized through the represented speech and interior speech, which help to understand that the character is strained and full of hidden apprehension and
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