Contemporary Stylistics: Language, Cognition, Interpretation

How do texts create meaning? How do we arrive at our textual interpretations? Why do we become ’lost in a book’ or feel deep emotion in response to a literary character? Through close attention to the way texts are written and the language they use, as well as what we know about the human mind, Contemporary Stylistics: Language, Interpretation, Cognition provides readers with the tools to begin answering these questions. In doing so, it introduces the theoretical principles and practical frameworks of stylistics and cognitive poetics, supplying the practical skills to analyse your own responses to literary texts. Including innovative activities for students and with case studies of work by writers like Dylan Thomas, EL James and Kazuo Ishiguro, this is a detailed analysis of contemporary stylistics that offers both historical contextualization of the discipline and points towards its possible future direction.

There are stylistic and cognitive poetic analyses through the book. The key case studies include: The Canal - Lee Rourke (2010); ’Zang Tumb Tumb’ by Marinetti (1914); ’River in Spate’ by Louis MacNeice; Under Milk Wood by Dylan Thomas (1954); ’Space Sonnet & Polyfilla’ by Edwin Morgan (1977); ’In Defense of Our Overgrown Garden’ by Matthea Harvey (2000); House of Cards; What is the What by Dave Eggers (2006); Ash Wednesday by Ethan Hawke (2002); Fresh Meat; Fifty Shades of Grey by E. L. James (2012); ’Received Pronunciation’ by Sally Goldsmith (2012); ’The house is not the same since you left’ by Henry Normal (1993); The Lives of Others by Neel Mukherjee (2014); My Name is Lucy Barton by Elizabeth Stroud (2016); How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia by Mohsin Hamid (2013); The Unconsoled by Kazuo Ishiguro (2005); The One Ronnie; The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins (2015); ’I Am The Song’ by Charles Causley; ’Hypothetical’ by Maria Taylor; ’This is the Poem in which I Have Not Left You’ by Julia Copus (2012); 13, rue Thérèse by Elena Mauli Shapiro (2011); Illuminae by Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff (2015); Karen by Blast Theory (2015); ’Blood Story’ by Melvin Burgess.