THE NARRATIVE POTENTIAL OF THE DESCRIPTIVE

Abstract

Narrative and descriptive represent different modes of the utterance. However, they often interact within one text. As a rule, descriptive sequences constitute a part of narrative texts. The traditional approach towards the studying of descriptive sequences is basically directed at delimiting descriptive passages and opposing them to narrative. However, this approach ignores the dependence of the descriptive rhetorical strategym on the leading (narrative) rhetorical strategy that generates the particular text. If the global (narrative) strategy of the text is taken into account while analyzing its descriptive inclusions, it becomes clear that descriptive fragments are integrated both into the system of viewpoints, which are responsible for the perspectivation of the narrative as the “event of telling”, and into the eventful structure of the narrative as an “event told”, thus realizing their narrative potential. Taking into consideration the interaction of both rhetorical strategies within one textual whole allows us to expand our understanding of the status and functions of the descriptive inclusions into this textual whole.

Keywords:

narrative, descriptive, mode of utterance, discursive practice, type of discourse, perspectivation, eventfulness