Pedagogical stylistics and literary evaluation

Summary

This article is about pedagogical stylistics in general and about the critical evaluation of fictional narrative in particular. It examines levels of narrative organisation in a passage from Ernest Hemingway's novella The Old Man and the Sea ([1952]1976) and makes specific reference to patterns of speech and thought presentation in the extract. A basic teaching programme is outlined which is designed to encourage students’ awareness of the way modes of speech and thought presentation function in narrative. The programme is also designed to enable students to place their stylistic analyses of the text against literary‐critical commentaries on the same text, thereby problematising the connections between stylistic analysis and literary evaluation.

Hierdie artikel gaan oor pedagogiese stilistiek in die algemeen en oor die kritiese evaluasie van fiksionele narratiewe tekste in die besonder. Dit ondersoek vlakke van narratiewe organisasie in ‘n gedeelte uit Ernest Hemingway se novelle The Old Man and the Sea ([1952]1976) en verwys spesifiek na patrone in die aanbieding van spraak en van gedagtegang in die uittreksel. ‘n Basiese onderrigprogram word uiteengesit wat ontwerp is om studente aan te moedig om raak te sien hoe maniere van spraak‐ en gedagteaanbieding in narratiewe tekste funksioneer. Die program is ook ontwerp om studente in staat te stel om hulle stilistiese analises van die teks te vergelyk met literêr‐kritiese kommentare van dieselfde teks, waardeur die verbintenisse tussen stilistiese analise en literêre evaluasie geproblematiseer word.

Keywords:

• Hemingway, Ernest
• language teaching
• literary evaluation
• narrative pedagogical stylistics
• speech presentation
• The Old Man and the Sea
• thought presentation