Ironic rodents – rhetorical and pragmatic dimensions of the ironic discourse
in the world of fairy-tale rats by La Fontaine
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Les rongeurs ironiques – dimensions rhétorico-pragmatiques du discours
ironique dans l’univers des rats fabuleux de La Fontaine
Publication date: 2009
Romanica Cracoviensia, Volume 9 (2009), Volume 9, Issue 1, pp. 153 - 168
Authors
Les rongeurs ironiques – dimensions rhétorico-pragmatiques du discours
ironique dans l’univers des rats fabuleux de La Fontaine
The present paper discusses the rhetorical / pragmatic dimensions and levels of the verbal irony
through the example of La Fontaine’s Rat-fables. Verbal irony performs a pragmatic function, making
use of a potential contrast between expected and experienced events. This makes verbal irony
generally funnier, more criticizing, more expressive of a difference between expected and ensuing
events and more protective of the speaker than literal remarks. This paper also proposes a study of
verbal irony, as purely pragmatic phenomenon, in order to provide a plausible review how irony is
distinguished from non-irony, how the traditional pragmatic theory, the echoic interpretation theory,
the pretence theory and the recent implicit display theory could be applied for checking and analysing
the nature and function of the verbal irony in the fables. Furthermore, this set of adequate theories
indicates the validity of 17th century fables, and contributes a detailed analysis of the allegoric
‘ironicalness’.
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Information: Romanica Cracoviensia, Volume 9 (2009), Volume 9, Issue 1, pp. 153 - 168
Article type: Original article
Titles:
Les rongeurs ironiques – dimensions rhétorico-pragmatiques du discours
ironique dans l’univers des rats fabuleux de La Fontaine
Ironic rodents – rhetorical and pragmatic dimensions of the ironic discourse
in the world of fairy-tale rats by La Fontaine
Université de Debrecen Hongrie
Published at: 2009
Article status: Open
Licence: None
Percentage share of authors:
Article corrections:
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FrenchView count: 1969
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