 |
 |
 |
 |
|
 |
 |
168
two or more constituent rhemes (sub-rhemes) in various concrete contexts.
* Irtenyeva N.F., Shapkin A.P., Blokh M.Y. The Structure of the English Sentence. M., 1969, p. 110.
The sub-rhemes may be of equal importance from the informational point of view, as in the following
example:
We were met by a guide who spoke excellent English and had a head full of facts.
The sub-rhemes may be of unequal informative importance, the predicative expansion rendering the basic
semantic content of the sentence. E.g.:
She gave us her address and asked us to come and see her.
The coordinated predicate groups may also be informatively fused into an essentially simple rheme, i.e. into
a phrase making up a close informative unity. E.g.:
He took out als diary and began to write. The man looked up and laughed.
As different from the semi-compound construction with its exposed informative properties, the very identity
of the subject themes in a compound sentence of complete composition is a factor making it into a
communicatively intense, logically accented syntactic unit (compare the examples given at the beginning of the
paragraph).
C H A P T E R XXXI
SENTENCE IN THE TEXT
§ 1. We have repeatedly shown throughout the present work that sentences in continual speech are not used
in isolation; they are interconnected both semantically-topically and syntactically.
Inter-sentential connections have come under linguistic investigation but recently. The highest lingual unit
which was approached by traditional grammar as liable to syntactic study was the sentence; scholars even
specially stressed that to surpass the boundaries of the sentence was equal to surpassing the boundaries of
grammar.
In particular, such an outstanding linguist as L. Bloomfield, while recognizing the general semantic
connections between sentences in the composition of texts as linguistically relevant, at the same time pointed
out that the sentence is the largest grammatically arranged linguistic form, i.e. it is not included into any other
linguistic form by a grammatical arrangement.*
* See: Bloomfield L. Language. NY„ 1933, p. 170.
However, further studies in this field have demonstrated the inadequacy of the cited thesis. It has been
shown that sentences in speech do come under broad grammatical arrangements, do combine with one another
on strictly syntactic lines in the formation of larger stretches of both oral talk and written text.
It should be quite clear that, supporting the principle of syntactic approach to arrangement of sentences into
a continual text, we do not assert that any sequence of independent sentences forms a syntactic unity. Generally
speaking, sentences in a stretch of uninterrupted talk may or may not build up a coherent sequence, wholly
depending on the purpose of the speaker. E.g.:
BARBARA. Dolly: don't be insincere. Cholly: fetch your concertina and play something for us (B. Shaw).
The cited sequence of two sentences does not form a unity in either syntactic or semantic sense, the
sentences being addressed to different persons on different reasons. A disconnected sequence may also have
one and the same communication addressee, as in the following case:
DUCHESS OF BERWIC... I like him so much. I am quite delighted he's gone! How sweet you're looking!
Where do you get your gowns? And now I must tell you how sorry I am for you, dear Margaret (O. Wilde).
But disconnected sequences like these are rather an exception than the rule. Moreover, they do not
contradict in the least the idea of a continual topical text as being formed by grammatically interconnected
sentences. Indeed, successive sentences in a disconnected sequence mark the corresponding transitions of
thought, so each of them can potentially be expanded into a connected sequence bearing on one unifying topic.
Characteristically, an utterance of a personage in a work of fiction marking a transition of thought (and
breaking the syntactic connection of sentences in the sequence) is usually introduced by a special author's
comment. E.g.:
"You know, L.S., you're rather a good sport." Then his tone gew threatening again. "It's a big risk I'm
taking. It's the biggest risk I've ever had to take" (C.P. Snow).
As we see, the general idea of a sequence of sentences forming a text includes two different notions. On the
one hand, it presupposes a succession of spoken or written utterances irrespective of their forming or not
forming a coherent semantic complex. On the other hand, it implies a strictly topical stretch of talk, i.e. a
continual succession of sentences centering on a common informative purpose. It is this latter understanding of
the text that is syntactically relevant. It is in this latter sense that the text can be interpreted as a lingual entity