ANIDI, OJEL CLARA
PG/Ph.D/07/43701
A STYLISTIC-LINGUISTIC
LINGUISTIC STUDY OF SELECTED
NIGERIA-BIAFRA
BIAFRA WAR NOVELS
DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH AND LITERARY STUDIES
Faculty of Arts
Ezeh Remigius
i
Digitally Signed by:: Content manager’s Name
DN : CN = Webmaster’s name
O = University of Nigeria,
Nigeri Nsukka
OU = Innovation Centre
UNIVERSITY OF NIGERIA, NSUKKA
DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH AND LITERARY STUDIES
A STYLISTIC-LINGUISTIC STUDY OF SELECTED NIGERIA-BIAFRA
WAR NOVELS
BY
ANIDI, OJEL CLARA
PG/Ph.D/07/43701
A PH.D THESIS SUBMITTED TO THE SCHOOL OF POST-GRADUATE
STUDIES IN FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENT FOR THE AWARD
OF THE DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY (PH.D) DEGREE IN ENGLISH AND
LITERARY STUDIES BY THE UNIVERSITY OF NIGERIA, NSUKKA
MARCH 2013
ii
CERTIFICATION
ANIDI, OJEL CLARA, a PG student of the Department of English and Literary
Studies, Faculty of Arts, University of Nigeria, Nsukka, with Registration Number
PG/Ph.D/07/43701, has satisfactorily completed the requirements for the award of the
degree of Doctor of Philosophy in English. The work embodied in this thesis is
original and to the best of my knowledge has not been submitted, in part or full, for
the award of any other degree/ diploma of this or any other university.
…………………………..
Anidi, Ojel Clara
Reg. No.: PG/Ph.D/07/43701
………………
Date
……………………………………
Professor E.J. Otagburuagu
(Supervisor)
…………………
Date
……………………………………
Prof. D. U. Opata
(Head of Department)
……………………
Date
iii
DEDICATION
Dedicated to my dear husband and loving children
iv
APPROVAL
This project has been approved for the Department of English and Literary Studies,
Faculty of Arts, University of Nigeria, Nsukka
By
……………………………….
Professor E.J. Otagburuagu
(Supervisor)
…………………………
Date
……………………………….
Professor D. U. Opata
(Head of Department)
…………………………..
Date
……………………………….
Professor Uchenna Anyanwu
(Dean of the Faculty)
………………………….
Date
……………………………….
Professor Macpherson Azubuike
(External Examiner)
……………………………
Date
v
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
With utmost humility, I begin by thanking God for His inspiration, goodness
and mercy, without which this work would not have materialized. Also, there are
individuals who have played major roles in bringing this work to fruition. The
researcher has tried to capture them in this acknowledgement.
Professor E.J. Otagburuagu, my supervisor and academic mentor, has seen to
the fruitful completion of this research. I appreciate his encouragement at every inch
of the way. He read through all I presented to him, offering suggestions, corrections,
and guidance at each point. May you remain blessed, Prof.
To all the academics in the Department of English, University of Nigeria,
Nsukka, Professor Damian Opata (the present HOD), Rev Fr. Professor A.N.
Akwanya (the immediate past HOD), Professor Sam Onuigbo (Director, Institute of
African Studies), Dr. (Barr.) Mrs Florence Orabueze, Dr. Amadihe Ezugu and all
others that space has prevented me from mentioning, I remain grateful for all the
constructive guidance received. May your fountain of knowledge never go dry.
I cannot go further unless I express my profound indebtedness to Chief
(Sculptor) Obiora Anidi, an intellectual, a motivator, a loving, caring father and
husband all in one. There was no way I would have gone thus far but for his solid
unflinching support. I thank God for this precious gift to humanity, and pray that God
may help me to provide the same support whenever my husband needs it.
Now, to all my sweet, loving, ‘problem-free’ children – Nwaliweaku, Lotachi,
Uma, Nduche, Ejike, Ezenwata, and Chinasa – all that God gave me on loan, I say a
big “THANK YOU”, for supporting me all the way and understanding when mummy
would not be distracted. May God guide you through life’s challenges.
vi
My appreciation also goes to my gracefully aging mother, an intellectual per
excellence, Chief Nneoma (Mrs) Lucy Onodugo – the Mama in a million. Mummy,
all your encouragement has not been in vain. Thanks for your incessant caring and
prayers. In the same vein, I give a post-mortem thanks to my father, Chief Donatus
Paul Onodugo, most especially for his efforts at teaching me very early in life – his
unfailing evening lessons.
All my brothers, sisters, in-laws, relations and friends, your support is
immeasurable. Honourable Justice Ngozi Oji, my sister-in-law, for instance, made
sure she got any book pertaining to Biafra that came her way for me. I have also been
the subject of her many prayers. In the same vein, Mrs. Marcia Waite-Anidi, also my
sister-in-law, sent many internet resources she felt would be of use. Chief Chike
Onodugo, Engr Ekene Onodugo, Dr Obinna Onodugo, Mrs Tochi Ilo, my immediate
siblings, I pray I will be able to reciprocate a bit of your kind gestures to me. My
brother, Ekene, and his wife, Maureen, hosted me during my numerous trips to
Nsukka. They had often gone the extra mile to make me comfortable in their home;
for instance, buying petrol for their generator even when it was uncomfortable,
economy-wise. May God bless you all, for all you have done for me.
All the persons working with me at the Language Studies Department of the
Institute of Management and Technology (IMT), Enugu, where, presently, I am the
Head of the Department, I also thank you for your moral support. I use this
opportunity, too, to thank the present Rector of the IMT, Professor M.U. Iloeje, for
providing an enabling academic atmosphere, especially for his mentorship of staff
training and academic development. This work is a proof that all that has been done
by all the persons mentioned above has not been in vain. I doff my hat for you all.
vii
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Title……………………………………………………………………………..i
Certification…………………………………………………………………….ii
Dedication………………………………………………………………………iii
Approval Page....………………………………………………………………..iv
Acknowledgement……………………………………………………………...v
Table of Contents ……………………………………………………………...vii
Abstract ……………………………………………………………………….xiv
CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION...………………………………………..1
Background of the issue ………………………………………………………..1
Key Terminologies of the Study...……………………………………………...3
Stylistic-linguistics ……………………………………………………………..3
Stylistics …………………………………………………………………....3
Linguistic Stylistics versus Literary Stylistics ……………………………..7
Nigeria-Biafra War……………………………………………………………..9
The Novel…………………………………………………………………..11
The War Novel …………………………………………………………….13
Nigeria-Biafra War Novel ………………………………………………….16
Statement of the Problem ………………………………………………………19
Purpose of the Study …………………………………………………………...21
Research Questions …………………………………………………………….21
Significance of the Study ………………………………………………………22
Theoretical Perspective …………………………………………………………23
Text-oriented Stylistics …………………………………………………………23
Context-oriented Stylistics ……………………………………………………..30
viii
The Audience for the Study…………………………………………………….32
Delimitations …………………………………………………………………...33
Limitations of the Study ……………………………………………………….33
CHAPTER TWO: LITERATURE REVIEW.…………………………………36
Stylistics: Historical Survey..………….………………………………………..36
Conceptual Issues: Stylistic Analysis……………………………………….......43
Studies in Stylistic-Linguistic Analysis (1950-Present Day)…………………...48
Studies on War Novels/Literature ……………………………………………..55
Studies on the Nigeria-Biafra War Novel/Literature ………………………….57
Summary ………………………………………………………………………67
CHAPTER THREE: METHODOLOGY …………………………………….69
Research Participants /Samples………………………………………………...69
Instrumentation ………………………………………………………………..72
Text Linguistic Theory………………………………………………………72
Principles of Textuality………………………………………………...79
Meaning Theory …………………………………………………………….81
Foregrounding Theory ...……………………………………………………85
An Example of the Use of Foregrounding…………………………….87
Procedures ……………………………………………………………...……...91
Analytical Approach …………………………………………………………...92
A Checklist of the Stylistic-Linguistic Categories Examined in this Study…....93
CHAPTER FOUR: VOCABULARY, STRUCTURE AND COHESION IN THE
TEXTS …………………………………………………………………………97
Sunset in Biafra ………………………………………………………………97
Idioms …………………………………………………………………….97
ix
Proverbs …………………………………………………………………..104
Military Jargon ……………………………………………………………105
Never Again …………………………………………………………………..107
Lexis and Sentence Structure ……………………………………………..108
Errors of Syntax …………………………………………………………...112
Come Thunder ………………………………………………………………..115
Military Registers …………………………………………………...…….116
The Nigerian Soldiers’ Language (Pidgin) and Behaviour ……………….118
Sentence Patterns ………………………………………………………….121
Half of a Yellow Sun ……………………………………………………….....127
The English Lexicon and the Igbo Tradition ……………………………… 128
Translations …………………………………………………………….......131
Code-Mixing (the Non-translated Igbo Expressions) ………………........... 132
Transliterated English ………………………………………………………134
Diction and Structural Devices……………………………………………..135
CHAPTER FIVE: FOREGROUNDING FEATURES IN THE TEXTS ………140
Sunset in Biafra ………………………………………………………………..140
Rhetorical Question ………………………………………………………….140
Parallelism …………………………...………………………………………143
Repetition …………………………………………………………………145
Sarcasm/Ridicule …………………………………..………………………..147
Symbolism …………………………………………………………………..147
Never Again ……………………………………………………………………148
Irony …………………………………………………………………………148
Symbolism ……………………………………………………………………151
x
Rhetorical Question/ Question in the Narrative ……………………………...153
Repetition …………………………………………………………………….153
Come Thunder ………………………………………………………………….155
Simile …………………………………………………………………………156
Hyperbole ………………………………………………………...…………..162
Figures of Indirectness ……………………………………………………….162
Irony ……………………………………………………………………….162
Satire ………………………………………………………………………164
Parallelism …………………………………………………………………….166
Half of a Yellow Sun ……………………………………………………………..170
The Natural and the Supernatural ……………………………………………..170
Satire and Irony ……………………………………………………………….173
Humour ………………………………………………………………………..176
Parallelism …………………………………………………………………….176
Imagery ……………………………………………………………………....177
CHAPTER SIX: TEXTUAL AND CONTEXTUAL MEANINGS IN THE
NIGERIA-BIAFRA WAR NOVELS……………………………………………179
The Dominant Stylistic Features in the texts ……………………………….........179
Sunset in Biafra ……………………………………………………………..179
Never Again …………………………………………………………………181
Come Thunder ………………………………………………………………181
Half of a Yellow Sun …………………………………………………….......183
The Blend of Fiction and History in the Narratives ……………………………..185
Points of View ………………………………………………………………187
Military Registers in the Texts …………………………………………………..188
xi
Female versus Male War Authors ……………………………………………….190
Earlier and Later War Novels..…………………………………………………..194
CHAPTER SEVEN: SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION ……………………197
Summary of Findings ……………………………………………………….…..197
Practical Consequences of Findings ……………………………………………199
New Contributions of the Study..………………………………………………200
Suggestions for Future Research ……………………………………………….200
Conclusion/ Recommendation…………………………………………….........201
WORKS CITED ……………………………………………………………….202
Analyzed Works………………………………………………………………..202
Secondary Sources……………………………………………………………...202
Unpublished Theses and Papers ……………………………………………….225
Newspapers …………………………………………………………………….227
Encyclopedia/ Wikipedia Citations…………………………………………….228
APPENDICES…………………………………………………………………229
Appendix I: Request for Instrument Validation I……………………………...229
Appendix II: Request for Instrument Validation II…………………………..230
Appendix III: A Checklist of Stylistic-Linguistic Categories…………………231
Appendix IV: Validation of Instrument by Validator I……………………….232
Appendix V: Validation of Instrument by Validator II……………………….233
xii
ABSTRACT
This study interpreted the Nigeria-Biafra War novels from the stylistic-linguistic
viewpoint. It began by describing the key concepts and sub-concepts of ‘stylisticlinguistics’ and ‘Nigeria-Biafra War novels’. Five research purposes were stated.
Among them was “to identify the commonalities of linguistic features in the war
novels”. The literature review examined works in the fields of stylistics and the
Nigeria-Biafra War literature. The research relied mainly on the descriptive survey
design, which is explanation based, with little quantitative matter. The eclectic text
linguistics formed the theoretical base of the analysis, though other theories of
foregrounding and meaning were also employed as subsidiaries. The analyses of
samples were guided, particularly, by a checklist of linguistic categories adapted from
Leech and Short. The four samples of the study were chosen following some criteria:
for instance, that each sample must belong to the novel category of the Nigeria-Biafra
War literature, and that each must give perspectives of the male and the female
authors, and of the earlier and the more contemporary novels. The findings of the
study include: (i) Nigeria-Biafra War novels are mainly satires, blending history and
storytelling, (ii) military register and formulaic usages, examples similes and idioms,
are mainly deployed by the male writers, and (3) the more contemporary war texts
differ significantly from the earlier war texts, in objectivity and creativity. This study
confirms that stylistic-linguistics is a useful tool in the interpretation of literary texts
and by extension a requirement in the composition of original texts. The study should
also inspire further studies in subjects such as “the Nigeria-Biafra War novels as
satires".
Key words: stylistic-linguistics, Nigeria-Biafra, War, novels, text-linguistics,
meaning and foregrounding.
xiii
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
Seven main categories have been discussed in this chapter: background of the
issue, statement of the problem, purpose of the study, significance of the study,
theoretical perspective, the audience for the study, and delimitations.
Background of the Issue
Despite the many novels on the Nigeria-Biafra War, there seem to be no
detailed study yet, known to the researcher, analyzing the stylistic-linguistic contents
of the novels. A few literary reviews have been done on some of the novels, but these
reviews have only stressed issues of theme, plot, and characterization, leaving a
yawning gap in matters of style and language of the novels. No text can exist without
language. It is only through a close scrutiny of the language of a text that its real
meaning can be grasped. A carefully done stylistic-linguistic analysis of the NigeriaBiafra War novels, therefore, is necessary; more so as the event of the Nigeria-Biafra
War has continued to generate attention from literary artists, environmentalists,
military strategists, historians, social and political analysts. For Isiguzo (writing in
Nigeria News), Biafra/ Ojukwu has become a passion, almost a profession, especially
to some who use the subjects as reference points in the larger fight for group
relevance seen in Nigeria, today. The level of enthusiasm and controversy which
greeted Achebe’s most recently published work on the war (There Was a Country,
2012) is evident of the fact that Nigerians are yet to have and learn enough of
‘Biafra’.
1
Furthermore, Hawley has observed that not many Nigerians, living now, know
much about the Nigeria-Biafra War:
Today’s Nigeria is a young country in several striking ways, and the
most telling is the age of its people: well over half are less than thirty;
an amazing forty-four percent are under fifteen years of age. The
Biafran War ended thirty-seven years ago [sic] and so was not
experienced by most living Nigerians; indeed, for many Nigerians it
figures much as “Vietnam” does for most Americans: as a symbol of a
bad time that our elders went through ... (16-17)
This observation was made in 2008, which is recent enough; the same situation still
applies. The implication, therefore, is that more studies should be done on issues
concerning the war so that more Nigerians would be aware of what that experience
was like. This reasoning is similar to Emezue’s argument that the age of silence on the
Nigeria-Biafra issue should have been over by now and thus has advocated that
Nigeria-Biafra War literatures be properly studied and carefully analysed (2) to bring
out their intrinsic values. Nwoga has also been of the opinion that though the
disastrous events of the Nigeria-Biafra conflict are over, the tragic consequences, and
the lessons which the sufferings should teach, must not be allowed to dissipate (1977,
10).
The above views indicate the need to study the Nigeria-Biafra War from every
ramification. Considering the gap in the area of the style/ language of the war writers,
the present researcher intends to plug it by engaging in this study. The key
terminologies of this study are discussed in the sub-section following.
2
Key Terminologies of the Study
The key concepts upon which the study is based are ‘stylistic-linguistics’ and
‘the Nigeria-Biafra War novel’. These concepts have other sub-concepts which have
all been explained below.
Stylistic-Linguistics
Stylistic-linguistics is concerned with the application of linguistic and stylistic
elements in the analysis and the interpretation of literary works. An attempt is made,
below, to describe the concept of ‘stylistics’, which is the home discipline of stylisticlinguistics.
Stylistics
Two main descriptions of stylistics will be taken here: (1) Stylistics is a study
of the linguistic features of texts and (2) Stylistics is an area of mediation between
literary criticism and linguistics.
Many writers recognize the fact that stylistics examines the language of a text.
Widdowson in an interview with ELTNEWS, for example, states that stylistics is “the
study of the linguistic features of texts, the actual verbal texture of occurrences of
language use and its effects”. In a similar way, Simpson has also viewed stylistics as
“a method of textual interpretation in which primacy of place is assigned to language”
(2). As Simpson explains,
The reason why language is so important to stylisticians is because the
various forms, patterns and levels that constitute linguistic structure are
an important index of the function of the text. The text’s functional
significance as discourse acts in turn as a gateway to its interpretation.
3
While linguistic features do not of themselves constitute a text’s
‘meaning’, an account of linguistic features nonetheless serves to
ground a stylistic interpretation and to help explain why, for the
analyst, certain types of meaning are possible. (2)
Implicated in the above statement is the fact that though stylistics is primarily about
the language of a text, meaning is the ultimate end of the exercise.
On the issue of ‘form’ and ‘content’, Stockwell is of the opinion that to
describe stylistics as only ‘form’ is to relegate it to the practice of traditional rhetoric
where style was merely ‘ornamentation’ of an utterance (746). Stylistics, as Stockwell
explains, goes much further than that, for every form is motivated by personal and
socio-cultural factors and, thus, should be evaluated along these ideological
dimensions. Thus, for Stockwell, both form and content should always go together in
stylistic analysis. That is not to say, however, that the linguistic elements of a text
serve only as a means for interpreting the text. Apart from meaning-making, they
provide a good means of understanding how a language (in which the text is written)
works. For this reason, stylistics has been a resource in the teaching of language,
especially in the second language situation. Also, scholars training for rhetorical
leadership or skills have relied on stylistic analysis for practical examples of how
words and texts are used creatively.
Stylistics is also described as an area of mediation between literary criticism
and linguistics. The morphological make-up of stylistics suggests this link: the ‘style’
component relates it to the former, and the ‘istics’ component to the latter
(Widdowson 3). Widdowson has emphasized that what distinguishes stylistics from
literary criticism, on the one hand; and stylistics from linguistics, on the other hand, is
that stylistics is essentially a means of linking the two and has no autonomous domain
4
of its own. Enquiries of a linguistic kind can be conducted without any reference to
literary criticism and vice-versa. But stylistics involves both literary criticism and
linguistics.
Other writers who have noted this connection between the three fields of
linguistics, literary criticism and stylistics include Leech and Short (1995), Short and
Candlin (1988), and Carter (1997). Leo Spitzer, one of the founding fathers of
stylistics, regarding this connection, has observed that stylistics while using the
analytical techniques of modern linguistics strives to unite the analytical description
with a critical interpretation that relates the style to a larger conceptual or situational
frame (Catano). Leech and Short, as cited by Tallapessy, describe this analytical
technique as ‘cyclic motion’, where a linguistic observation stimulates a literary
insight; a literary insight in turn stimulates further linguistic observation.
Stylistics is not literary criticism. Literary criticism is largely concerned with
literary history, incidents of an author’s personal life, sources of his inspiration,
political, social and economic history of the age and only at the end may give
considerations to the literary work itself, its language (Hough 39). Literary critics
often differ in their judgements of literary texts – such judgements, like, “Soyinka is a
great novelist but only next to Achebe”. The stylistic study, on the other hand, starts
from a positive and identifiable point – the precise verbal manifestation. A stylistic
critic shows dissatisfaction with what Halliday (1970) calls “amateur psychology,
armchair philosophy or fictitious social history” (70). For Agrawai, the concentration
on linguistic method, in stylistics, results in impersonal reproducible truth. This
implies that, at any time, a person can approach the text applying the identical stylistic
procedure to arrive at the same results.
5
Also, stylistics is not the same as linguistics. Linguistics studies language in
general, beginning by observing the way people use language, on the basis of which
linguists establish underlying rules concerning language as a whole. Once the rules
for particular languages have been mapped out in this empirical fashion, the linguist
hopes to provide a model which will explain how all languages work. The production
of this model, a universal grammar, is the pinnacle of linguistic enquiry (Finch 2).
Stylistics, on the other hand, only borrows from the methodology of linguistics to
study the concept of style in language.
Concerning the mediating role played by stylistics in the two fields of
linguistics and literary criticism, Enkvist, as quoted in ‘Literary Stylistics: Lecture
Notes No. 1’ asserts:
We may…regard stylistics as a subdepartment of linguistics, and give
it a special subsection dealing with the peculiarities of literary texts.
We may choose to make stylistics a subdepartment of literary study
which may on occasion draw on linguistic methods. Or we may regard
stylistics as an autonomous discipline which draws freely, and
eclectically, on methods both from linguistics and literary study.
The two major traditional approaches to stylistics – linguistic stylistics and
literary stylistics – are natural developments resulting from the fact that stylistics
relates to linguistics as well as to literary criticism. Note that Enkvist (1973)
constantly refers to linguistic stylistics as stylolinguistics. In actual practice, the
division between linguistic and literary stylistics is not easy to define. Concerning this
difficulty, Michael Short, a professor of Linguistics in the University of Lancaster and
a leading authority in stylistics, with profound contributions in textual analysis and
interpretations, has argued that:
6
…stylistics can sometimes look like either linguistics or literary
criticism, depending upon where you are standing when looking at it.
So, some of my literary critical colleagues sometimes accuse me of
being an unfeeling linguist, saying that my analysis of poems, say, are
too analytical, being too full of linguistic jargon and leaving
insufficient room for personal preference on the part of the reader. My
linguist colleagues, on the other hand, sometimes say that I’m no
linguist at all, but a critic in disguise, who cannot make his descriptions
of language precise enough to count as real linguistics. They think that
I leave too much to intuition and that I am not analytical enough. I
think I’ve got the mix just right, of course! (Qtd in Missikova 15)
The above implies that Short is interested in both the linguistic forms and the
contextual meanings/messages of the analysed texts.
In spite of the similarity between the methods of linguistic stylistics and
literary stylistics, these two sub-fields of stylistics are recognized, traditionally.
Invariably, the academic specialty of the scholar determines the nomenclature s/he
uses. Nonetheless, the views of some scholars concerning the two sub-fields will be
examined below.
Linguistic Stylistics versus Literary Stylistics
There are two broad branches of operation generally identified in stylistics –
linguistic stylistics and literary stylistics. The two branches can, alternatively, be
termed ‘text-oriented’ and ‘context-oriented’ stylistics, respectively. As observed in
the discussion above, some of the approaches of stylistics sometimes interrelate or
overlap. Short’s dilemma over whether he is a literary stylistician or a linguistic
7
stylistician, shown above, is a strong pointer to the fact that the two main areas of
stylistics are interconnected.
The descriptions given by Carter and Nnadi may help us to make a distinction
between linguistic stylistics and literary stylistics. Linguistic stylistics, for Carter, is
the purest form of stylistics in that its practitioners attempt to derive from the study of
style and language a refinement of models for the analysis of language and thus to
contribute to the development of linguistic theory (10). On the other hand, literary
stylistics is more concerned with providing the basis for fuller understanding,
appreciation and interpretation of avowedly literary and author-centered texts (Carter
10). For Nnadi, any such study that leans heavily on external correlates with none or
just a smattering of attention to the rules guiding the operation of the language can be
regarded as literary stylistics (24). As Nnadi further states, “The converse of this
premise (i.e. a study that relies heavily on the rules guiding the operation of the
language in the explication of a literary text) is what we regard here as linguistic
stylistics (24)”. Though Carter and Nnadi attempt to point out the difference between
the two main operations of stylistics, it cannot be denied (even from their definition)
that there is a strong connection between the two; at least both, to a greater or a lesser
degree, are concerned with language.
Enkvist, in his own case, seems to think like Short above. For him, many of
the assumed differences between linguistic stylistics and literary stylistics have
acquired political overtones. In actual practice, according to him, these differences
solve themselves pragmatically, as long as each investigator allows himself/herself
the freedom of choosing and shaping his/her methods to achieve his/her own
particular goals (33). Wisneiwski, discussing this issue in “Stylistics”, is of the
8
opinion that the three terms, ‘stylistics’, ‘linguistic stylistics’ or ‘literary stylistics’,
can be used interchangeably.
The present researcher keeps in constant view the flexible nature of the
stylistic meta-language. She also realizes the cross-disciplinary nature of stylistics.
The nomenclature ‘stylistic-linguistic’, found in the title of this study, mean the same
as ‘linguistic stylistics’. For purposes of precision and conciseness, the researcher
prefers to use the compound word, stylistic-linguistics, to the two words, linguistic
stylistics. The researcher’s preference for the linguistic type of stylistics (as against
the literary stylistics) is due to her academic background; she is stressing the area of
language, not literature, in the Department of English/Literary Studies. However, her
study has encompassed some aspects of literary stylistics, having used a deictic
methodology to accommodate the literary works she has analysed. The researcher
believes that much as an analysis of the real linguistic elements of the texts is worthy
of interest, nevertheless, she cannot jettison the individuality and situational
components of the literary texts being examined.
Nigeria-Biafra War
The Nigeria-Biafra War (alternatively referred to as the Nigerian Civil War or
the Biafran War) is the major source of the creative works upon which this study is
based. The war began on 6th July 1967 and ended on 12th January 1970. It was
between the then Eastern Region of Nigeria (which seceded and declared itself the
Republic of Biafra) and the rest of the country, Nigeria. Many writers have traced the
cause of the war to the colonial period, when the British came and merged peoples of
different histories and traditions into one country they called ‘Nigeria’. In addition,
the colonial government in Nigeria made little effort at genuinely uniting the different
9
ethnic groups in the country. This heightened the divisions among these ethnic
groups. It has been alleged that Lord Lugard at the 1914 amalgamation insisted that
his task was “to unify administrations not peoples” (Odogwu 187).
The ethnic divisions in Nigeria clearly manifested after the 1960
independence, with the disorganized political parties. This degenerated to general
confusion and insecurity in the country, until the military intervention of January 15
1966 – the Nzeogwu-led coup. A counter-coup by military officers from Northern
Nigeria shortly followed on July 29, 1966. Both coups seem to be organized along
ethnic lines; the second was clearly a reprisal against the people of Eastern Nigeria
whom the Northerners felt purposely eliminated their key politicians (the Prime
Minister, Alhaji Sir Abubakar Tafewa Balewa, and the Northern Premier, Sir Ahmadu
Bello – all victims of the first coup) to make way for their own leadership in Nigeria.
The pogrom against the Easterners, especially those who lived in the North, followed
this second coup. By October 1966, over 30,000 Igbos had lost their lives, several
thousands more were maimed, and an estimated 1,800 Igbos fled from other parts of
Nigeria back to the East (Forsyth 83).
Under this horrifying situation, and at the failure of the two sides to agree to
any peace talk, in May 1967, the Eastern Nigeria, under Governor (Col.) Odumegwu
Ojukwu, broke away from the rest of Nigeria. Their new nation, the Republic of
Biafra, was declared on 30th May 1967. Following this was the 30-month gruesome
war, the Nigeria-Biafra War. It has been estimated that about three million souls
perished in that war, a reasonable percentage of that from hunger and disease. Most of
the casualties are from the Biafran side.
Since the end of the civil war, creative artists who participated in, witnessed or
heard stories of the war have tried to recapture their experiences in many literary
10
genres, especially the novel. In the next sub-section, the researcher examines the
novel, the genre to which the war texts selected for this research belong. For the
researcher, the novel is the most effective art-form for presenting the experiences and
emotions of characters, real or imagined, that lived during the War.
The Novel
A novel is “a work of imagination grounded in reality” (The Columbia
Encyclopedia). In modern literary usage, it is a sustained work of prose fiction a
volume or more in length. What distinguishes the novel from its predecessors,
romance, epic and ‘histories’, is its realistic treatment of life. Its heroes are ordinary
men and women (not super-human), and its chief interest, as Northrop Frye asserts, is
"human character as it manifests itself in society” (cited in Wikipedia). Novelists, like
historians, can depict the social, political, and personal realities of a place and period,
but with a clarity and detail historians cannot dare to explore.
The novel is the youngest of the three main literary mediums (novel/ fiction,
play/ drama and poem/ poetry). This reason is obvious. Poetry can thrive in an oral
tradition; dramatic performances can do without the printed word; short stories, like
poetry, can be passed on from generation to generation, but the novel has to be read
from the printed page, simply because of its length. To produce a novel, it has to be
printed. It also has to be transported from the print-house to points of sale. More over,
there has to be enough people who can read and a level of economic power to be able
to buy this ‘relatively expensive and non-essential product’ (Stephen 61). Such
conditions did not prevail in Europe until the seventeenth century and in Africa until
the nineteeth century. In English literature, Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe (1719)
and Moll Flanders (1722) are regarded as the first novels.
11
In Nigeria, the emergence of the novel followed the introduction of the written
art in the country, starting with the Arabic language (Ajami literature) in the North,
the Nigerian vernacular languages and, eventually, the English language, which
developed mainly from the South. The earliest writers of Ajami literature were
Islamic scholars such as Abdullahi Suka who wrote Riwayar Annabi Musa, and Wali
Danmasani Abdulajalil who wrote the Hausa poem “Wakir Yakin Badar” (Umaisha).
However, the bulk of the writings in Nigeria came after the arrival of European
missionaries, from 1840. The vernacular novels of Isaac Thomas (Itan Emi Segilola
Eleyinjuege, Elegberun oko laiye, in Yoruba, 1930), Pita Nwana (Omenuko, in Igbo,
1933), and Daniel Olurunfemi Fagunwa (Ogboju Ode Ninu Igbo Irunmale, in Yoruba,
1938) are some of the early attempts at novel-writing in Nigeria.
The efforts at writing in English, in Nigeria, came in 1952, with Amos
Tutuola’s The Palm-Wine Drinkard and His Dead Palm-Wine Tapster in the Deads’
Town. Then, the Western world became interested in the distorted but recognizable
version of English noted as the lingua franca of many semi-educated Africans (Gerard
629). People of the City, written in 1954, by Cyprain Ekwensi, is among the first
African novels (written in English) to achieve international recognition. After
Ekwensi’s book, many other Nigerian novels were published. That gave rise to the
Onitsha Market literature, which provided the impetus for greater literary
development in Nigeria and throughout West Africa. The greatest trend in the
development of the novel and literature in Nigeria came with the publication of
Achebe’s Things Fall Apart. Achebe’s novel has been described as the “first literary
fruit of the intense imaginative ebullience that had gathered momentum since the
foundation of a University College at Ibadan in 1947” (Gerard 630). A host of other
Nigerians soon joined in the art of novel writing. They addressed basic Africa’s
12
problems like colonialism and neo-colonialism, and propagated African values to the
outside world. Their main interest then was to correct the misrepresentation of
Nigerians and Africans in literary works, like Joyce Cary’s Mister Johnson and
African Witch, Rider Haggard’s She, King Solomon’s Mines and Allan Quartermain,
and Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness. Thus, the Nigerian novel contributed
immensely in giving African literature focus and direction.
The War Novel
Wikipedia has defined a war novel as a novel in which the primary action
takes place in a field of armed combat (battle front), or in a domestic setting (home
front) where the characters are preoccupied with the preparations for, or recovery
from war. For Stephen, the concept of war literature can no longer be ignored because
there is a vast canon of writing inspired by the First World War and other modern
conflicts which are coming in for increasing critical attention after years of neglect
(270). As Stephen further opines, the interest in war writings allows a full expression
of one of the healthiest developments in literature – “the willingness to blur the lines
between the traditional academic disciplines of English Literature and History, and
even the newer ones of Sociology and Economics, and write about literature in its
widest possible context, and not merely as lines upon a page” (270).
There exists in every part of the world a large number of literatures on the
primordial tribal wars, the Greek/Trojan wars, the Israelites’ wars, the Chinese Civil
War, the American Civil War, the Vietnam War, World Wars I & II, the different
anti-colonial conflicts in parts of Africa, and the recent wars in Algeria, Sudan, the
Congo, and Burundi-Rwanda. It is an endless list. The subject of war has been everrecurring in many historical and fictional works. It has been suggested that, in
13
contemporary fiction, time and art may by default have become the only effective
means to digest the poison of the past, and to slowly heal from within the damage that
has been done (Hawley, 16). This quotation seems to be mainly directed at the war
fiction.
Apart from war fiction, many notable philosophers, statesmen, and writers
have expressed various opinions on the issue of war and war study. Machiavelli, for
example, has warned that the ruler must never let his mind be turned from the study of
warfare:
A Prince … should have no other aim or thought, nor take up any other
thing for his study, but war and its organization and discipline … The
chief cause of the loss of states is the contempt of this art, and the way
to acquire them is to be well versed in the same (37).
Following Machiavelli’s dictums, John Ruskin (1819-1900), a famous art historian
and critic, in a lecture to a group of young English soldiers asserted that war alone
determines “who is the best man; who is the highest bred, the most self-serving, the
most fearless, the coolest of nerve, the swiftest of eye and hand” (cited in Ogunpitan
3). The Doctrine of Fascism (Enciclopedia Italiana) also extols war and the inherent
‘virtues’ in them. These assertions on war, however, should be weighed seriously by
any responsible leader. Certain world leaders have already gone to dangerous
incredible extents, in their skewed understanding of the principles of war, for instance
Hitler (1889-1945), the Nazi dictator who led the World War II, with all its atrocities.
The study of war writings, especially the war novels where ‘real’ emergency
situations are created, is not to encourage the idea of war, but to make people and
society abhor war in its entirety.
14
The war novels take their roots in the epic poetry of the classical and medieval
periods, especially Homer’s The Iliad, Virgil’s The Aeneid, the Old English saga
Beowulf, and different versions of the legends of King Arthur. The concept of war
novels came of age during the nineteenth century, with the publishing of works like
Stendhal’s The Charterhouse of Parma, featuring the Battle of Waterloo, Leo
Tolstoy’s War and Peace, about the Napoleonic Wars in Russia, and Stephen Crane’s
The Red Badge of Courage, about the American Civil War. These earlier novels
established the conventions of the modern war novel as it has come down to us today.
They give significant insights into the nature of heroism, cowardice, and morality in
wartime.
In East, South, South-Central and West Africa, several wars have broken out
at different points in history and novelists have tried to relive the different forms of
experiences in their works. In East Africa, the war novels have focused on the anticolonial struggle, like the autobiographical work of Jomo Kenyatta, Suffering without
Bitterness (1967), and Julius Nyerere’s Uhuru na Umoja/ Freedom and Unity (1967).
In Uganda, Return to the Shadows by Robert Serumaga gives a fictional account of
the 1966 armed conflict in Uganda between the forces of Kabaka of Buganda and
those of President Milton Obote. Two wars have received the greatest attention from
writers in South Africa: the Anglo-Boer war of 1899-1902, and the anti-apartheid
conflict of the 1970s and 80s. The Dop Doctor (1910) by Richard Dehan, for instance,
gives some indication of the brutality of the first war. Almost all the black South
African writers of the 1970s and 80s could be said to be writing war literature, if the
apartheid struggle is defined as war. Mongane Serote’s To every Birth Its Blood,
specifically, deals with the guerilla war waged by the ANC and its allies, and has been
described as the most faithful to the actual experiences of combatants at that time
15
(Killam & Rowe 297). Some white writers in South Africa have written to endorse the
apartheid regime, regarding the liberation guerilla fighters as terrorists, like Peter
Essex in The Exile (1984).
In West Africa, the Nigeria-Biafra War constitutes the greatest theme of the
war writings. Novels on the Nigeria-Biafra War will now be discussed, in the
following sub-section.
Nigeria-Biafra War Novel
What is referred to as Nigeria-Biafra War novels (or Nigerian War novels)
here are those novels written in Nigeria by Nigerians (and non-Nigerians alike) about
the Nigeria-Biafra War. The researcher has included ‘non-Nigerians’ in this
description because Achebe, while discussing what constitutes Nigerian literature, has
asserted that “a national literature is one that takes the whole nation for its province,
and has a realized or potential audience throughout its territory” (cited by Griswold
and Bastian 215). Therefore, any novel written by a Nigerian and/or discussing issues
relating to Nigeria, written in either the national language (English) or any of the
indigenous languages, is a Nigerian novel.
Nigeria-Biafra Civil War of 1967-1970 has generated so much literature that
literary critics have come to regard this historical event as important in both
periodization and the aesthetic development of Nigerian literature; (Killam & Rowe
178). The boom in the publishing of novels in Nigeria after the civil war was possible
due to a number of other reasons, apart from the obvious need to comment on the war.
First, the number of British publishers interested in creative African and Nigerian
literature increased. Also, several new Nigerian publishing houses were established;
among them, Ethiope Publishing Co., Benin City (1972), Onibonoje Press and Book
16
Industries, Ibadan (1973), African Far-East Publishers, Onitsha (1973), Di Nigro
Press, Lagos (1976), and Fourth Dimension Publishing Co., Enugu (1977). More
over, there is ample proof that the majority of publishers /writers were encouraged by
examinations boards (like, West African Examinations Board) and cultural ministries
who wanted the inclusion of African literature in schools’ and universities’ syllabuses.
Hence, the number of authors rose considerably at the end of the war.
It is difficult to give a chronological list of the Nigerian War novels, but an
attempt will be made to capture some of them. The first decade after the war
witnessed the publication of many of these novels. Behind the Rising Sun by
Sebastian Okechukwu Mezu was published in 1971, a year after the civil war. Kole
Omotoso’s allegorical narration, The Combat, came in 1972; followed by Elechi
Amadi’s autobiographical account of the war Sunset in Biafra (1973). Unlike most of
those who wrote on the war, Amadi did not support Biafra, but the Federal
Government of Nigeria. John Munonye’s A Wreath for the Maidens (1973) and I.N.C.
Aniebo’s first novel, The Anonymity of Sacrifice (1974) portray the same issue – death
and the futility of war. Flora Nwapa’s Never Again, a satire of the Biafran war efforts,
came in 1975. Chukwuemeka Ike’s Sunset at Dawn, Eddie Iroh’s Forty-eight Guns
for the General, Isidore Okpewho’s The Last Duty, and Cyprian Ekwensi’s Survive
the Peace all came around 1976. Eddie Iroh wrote another war novel, Toads of War,
in 1979. Iroh’s episodic style can be contrasted with John Munonye’s broad epic
presentations. Among all the writers of the war, Soyinka was exceptional. He did not
directly refer to the events of the war, yet his works “represent the largest body of
writing inspired by the war” (Ime Ikkideh, as qtd. in Gerard, 1986)”. Soyinka’s The
Man Died was published in 1972, followed by Season of Anomy in 1973.
17
Novelists in the second decade after the war include both fiction and nonfiction writers. Among them is Ossie Enekwe whose fictional work, Come Thunder,
came in 1984. Other war writers of that decade include Alexander A. Madiebo (The
Nigerian Revolution and the Biafran War, 1980), Adewale Ademoyega (Why We
Struck, 1981), Ben Gbulie (Nigeria’s Five Majors, 1981), and A.M. Mainasara (The
Five Majors: Why They Struck, 1983), all military men discussing their parts in the
coups and the war, following. There are also Frederick Forsyth (Emeka, 1982), Kalu
Okpi (Biafran Testament, 1982), Victor Nwankwo (The Road to Udima, 1985),
Odogwu Bernard (No Place to Hide: Crises and Conflicts inside Biafra, 1985), and
Joe Achuzia (Requiem Biafra, 1986).
The third decade did not produce much work on the war, but, surprisingly,
there is a resurgence of ‘Biafra’ from the fourth decade. Novels produced in this
period include Emeka Otagburuagu’s Echoes of Violence (2004), Dulue Mbachu’s
War Games (2005), Uzodinma Iweala’s Beast of No Nation (2005), Chimamanda
Adichie’s Half of a Yellow Sun (2006), and Ngozi Ogbonna’s The Nigerian Civil
War: Personal Experiences of a Student Nurse (2008). Right now, a few years into
the fifth decade, writers and analysts are still enthusiastic to recount and analyze the
‘Biafran’ story. With the death, on 26 November 2011, of Emeka OdumegwuOjukwu, the Biafran military leader who executed the war, some writers seem to be
even more inclined to reflect on the War. Achebe’s recent work, There was a Country
(2012), among other treatises, bears testimony of this.
It is remarkable that most writers who have written about the Nigeria-Biafra
War belong to area of the defunct Republic of Biafra, the present southeast and southsouth region of Nigeria, who are predominantly Igbos. The explanation is that it is
these people who bore the brunt of the war; their homes were the battlegrounds. It is
18
therefore only natural that they would make more emotional and psychic meanings
out of the events that preceded, postdated and went on during the Nigeria-Biafra Civil
War. Hence, the four novels analyzed in this research are works of authors from this
area of Nigeria.
Statement of the Problem
There is a dearth of studies on the stylistic-linguistic analysis of the NigeriaBiafra War novels. Previous studies on the war novels have been in forms of literary
criticism, largely focusing on issues of theme, plot, authorship, and characterization.
Stylistic-linguistic examinations in such works are relegated to the background. For
instance, Emenyonu’s article on some Nigeria-Biafra War novels only has this to say
about Nwapa’s use of language: “The style is plain and ordinary, devoid of imagery
or any form of linguistic manipulation” (96). No further effort is made to give details.
Readers of analytical works have often yearned for more details on certain stylisticlinguistic issues raised in the texts analyzed. Ebeogu, for example, has regretted that
Ogonna Agu’s essay, “Songs and War: the Mixed Messages of Biafran War Songs”,
“allows little room for a detailed stylistic scholarship, and the reader is left somewhat
disappointed that certain fundamental stylistic factors that are raised … cannot be
pursued in the same breath” (127).
Other instances abound where readers have been left disappointed about issues
of language left unattended to in literary analysis. This situation is worrisome because
no text exists without language. It is only through a close scrutiny of the language of
the text that the text’s precise/ retrievable meanings, values, emotions and truths – all
that the text embody – could be revealed. Again, in an environment like Nigeria,
where English is used as a second language, any detailed stylistic-linguistic study of
19
literary texts written in English usually provides practical opportunities for active
language learning, for the comprehension and interpretation of texts, and the
composition of one’s own original texts. Hence, such researches should be of primary
interest to students and teachers of English. The neglect of this highly valued stylisticlinguistic aspect of the Nigeria-Biafra War novels, therefore, makes imperative the
present study, in order to fill this gap.
Furthermore, the importance of the Nigeria-Biafra War novels is seen in the
growing number of these texts, which even after forty years of the War are still being
written and published. These texts, through their art, seem to provide the muchneeded psychological and socio-political healing to Nigerians and Nigeria after the
damages of the War. There is, then, the necessity to study carefully and analyze
properly these novels, to harness their intrinsic elements.
In addition to the above, there are perspectives of the Nigeria-Biafra War
novels which needed to be clarified. For example, writers like Feuser and Iroh were of
the opinion (in the 1980s) that “time” might have a role to play in the shaping of the
“art” of the Nigerian-Biafra War novelists. For them, the war writings done
immediately after the War might not be the same with those writings done a
generation later. Feuser puts it thus: “[I]t will probably take another generation to
come to terms fully with the past, be it politically or artistically” (150). For Iroh, “we
express sentiments now because we remember it so closely, but I believe the greater
work about the war is yet to come – an unbiased, total assessment of the whole
tragedy – and it will be necessary (cited in Feuser 150). The authenticity of these
predictions needed to be confirmed. Also of interest is the fact that the novels
comprise both male and female writers. This seems to have implications in the nature
20
of the stylistic-linguistic elements seen in the war novels. All these issues constitute
the problem which this study is meant to tackle.
Purpose of the Study
The main purpose of this study includes:
1. To identify the commonalities of linguistic features in the war novels studied.
2. To determine the degree to which the field (war/military) has affected the
military registers of the writers.
3. To determine the stylistic/ linguistic differences between the male versus the
female writers
4. To identify any marked stylistic difference(s) between the earlier and the more
recent war novels.
Research Questions
The following research questions will, therefore, guide this study:
1. What are the dominant stylistic-linguistic features found in the war novels under
study?
2. How has the field (war/military) affected the vocabulary (registers) of the writers?
3. What is unique about the stylistic/ linguistic devices of the female war authors in
comparison with the male war authors?
4. How has time/period (age of the work) affected the linguistic orientation of the
war novels?
21
Significance of the Study
This study is significant in several ways:
1. It will serve as resource material to learners of English as second language
needing to understand the art of creative compositions. In the same vein,
teachers of language and literature can, drawing samples from this study,
demonstrate to their students how works can be analysed using the stylisticlinguistic approach.
2. It will assist stylistic, linguistic and literary scholars to further appreciate the
expanding frontiers of stylistics as a discipline. The eclectic procedures
adopted in the study, with a strong anchor in text linguistics, will help in
fostering the spirit of stylistic ecumenism, and contribute towards a rethink of
the divisions between linguistic and literary modes of stylistics.
3. Global leaders training for communication/stylistic/rhetorical skills will find
this study invaluable. Campbell and Huxman, for example, believe that a
rhetorical art (an essential for rhetorical leadership) “involves the description,
analysis, interpretation, and evaluation of persuasive uses of language” (5).
The many stylistic/ linguistic devices exposed and described in the war texts
would serve as samples in the learning of creative, stylistic, and persuasive
skills of language.
4. In the field of mass communication, this study, through its interpretative
analysis, can be used to teach students the skill of text-editing and meaning
synthesis.
5. Security and forensic agents can also apply the stylistic-linguistic principles,
exhibited in this study, in the detection of fraudulent mails, example the 419
scams.
22
6. The war registers and language found in the novels will help linguists to
develop further the military ESP (English for Special Purposes).
7. The study will provide a good source of information to many Nigerians and
non-Nigerians seeking to learn more about the events and experiences of the
1967-1970 Nigeria-Biafra War. By extension, the work will help to deter
readers from such practices capable of plunging communities/ nations into
war. In this regard, Emezue, among others writers, has advocated that NigeriaBiafra War literatures be properly studied and carefully analysed (2).
8. Youths needing insights into human behavior and ethical leadership,
especially in times of crisis, will find this study useful.
9. Nigerian linguists, culture experts and translators searching for new insights
into the National Language question in Nigeria will find useful the aspects of
this work dealing with code-switching, transliteration and Nigerian
expressions
10. Generally, this kind of analysis could be learnt and applied in many different
situations and fields, for problem-solving. So the study is highly significant.
Theoretical Perspective
This sub-section has discussed the theories of stylistics under two main
umbrellas: text-oriented and context-oriented stylistics.
Text-oriented Stylistics
Considering the flexible use of terms in language, an attempt shall be made to
state what is meant by ‘text’, here. Borrowing from Halliday and Hassan, ‘text’ is
“any passage, spoken or written, of whatever length, that does form a unified whole”,
23
defined by “relations of meaning” or by cohesion and register (14, 23). The term,
‘text-oriented’ stylistics, therefore, refers to stylistic practices/analyses that pay more
attention to issues of linguistic form rather than contextual or thematic issues raised in
a text. As mentioned above, ‘text-oriented’ stylistics can be equated to ‘linguistic’
stylistics. Its main theories have gone from formalist, mentalist, to text-linguistic
stylistics.
The term ‘formalist stylistics’, as Zyngier states, is preferable to that
generally called ‘linguistic stylistics’. To support this, she purports that if Halliday
(1967) points out that stylistics is the linguistic study of literary texts, then calling it
‘linguistic’ would be a tautology (369). Formalist stylistics, for Zyngier, is the
grandchild of Russian formalism and an offspring of structuralism. According to
Stockwell, Russian formalism and their practitioners were branded formalists by their
detractors (744). Formalist stylistics came into being as a number of radical analysts
from the tradition of practical criticism (formalism) resorted to aspects of linguistics
in search of a detail practical criticism did not offer. Their strategy was to concentrate
on the text as an object and their main interests remained on the formalistic and
mechanical description of patterns of phonology, lexis and syntax at sentence level
(Zyngier 369). Formalist stylistics has been criticized for disregarding the way
literature functions in context (Mackay 81-93). For formalist stylisticians, literature is
not a living discipline, it is stone dead, only marks on paper, or particular frequencies
of sound wave, or the visual and aural phenomena at a dramatic performance, or in
poetry, the lines and nothing else (Sinclair 98-99). Hence, critics, like Mackay, have
resumed attacks on stylistics (in the manner of Stanley Fish’s 1973 criticism of
stylistics), based on the practice of formalist stylistics.
24
Since formalist stylistics originates from formalism and structuralism, the two
schools of analysis will be briefly surveyed below.
Formalism is an interpretive approach that emphasizes the ‘form’ of the text.
In the age of Positivist philosophy in the 1920s, the question of the ‘nature’ of
literature, not just the ‘utilitarian’ view became of interest to linguistic scholars. In
that age, as Akwanya purports, grammar became a positive science and with it the
study of literary texts, which are linguistic constructions (131). The two concepts of
‘defamiliarization’ and ‘literariness’ were then the concerns of analysts. The former
deals with “the particular ways in which words are used in the text of literature, and
the deviations they are subjected to” (Akwanya 118), while the latter refers to the
structure and elements of the text objectively analysed (Akwanya 118). As Brewton
puts it, “formalism, like structuralism, seeks to place the study of literature on a
scientific basis through objective analysis of the motifs, devices, techniques, and other
‘functions’ that comprise the literary work”. Formalism studies the devices of
literature, like traditional rhetoric, but unlike in rhetoric, these devices are not meant
to give pleasure and to persuade, they are in themselves the object of study, meant to
be understood, in order to understand the principles behind their use. Hence,
formalism is sometimes referred to as the ‘new criticism’, indicating a break with
traditional methods. Some of the well known Russian formalist critics are Roman
Jakobson and Viktor Shklovsky. However, the American universities of the 1930s and
40s helped to a large extent in developing this area(s) of analysis.
In structuralism, which is an off-shoot of formalism, the ideas of the Swiss
linguist, Ferdinand de Saussure, plays a dominant role. Saussure regards the signifier
(words, marks, symbols) as arbitrary and unrelated to the concept to which it referred
(the signified). Within the way a particular society uses language and signs, meaning
25
is constituted by a system of ‘differences’ between units of the language. This means
that particular meanings are of less interest than the underlying structures of
signification that make meaning itself possible, often expressed as an emphasis on
‘langue’ rather than ‘parole’. Structuralism, thus, becomes a metalanguage (a
language about languages) used to decode actual languages, or systems of
signification.
Other prominent structuralists include Claude Levi-Strauss, Tzvetan Todorov,
A.J. Greimas, Gerard Genette, and Roland Barthes. In Levi-Strauss’s structural
anthropology, the two parts of structural analysis – constituent structure and
transformations – are shown. One notion of structuralism ‘literary structuralism’ is
that developed by Barthes. It focuses on the constructional format of the sentence –
the subject, predicate, noun, verb, etc, analysis of the sentence. These categories,
renamed noun phrase (NP), verb phrase (VP) by Chomsky, have provided a rigid
frame for looking at sentences. For Barthes, there is a relationship between the
sentence and the narrative. In explaining this, Akwanya has asserted, “The same way
a sentence is analyzed into a subject and a predicate , so does discourse involve verbs
in all their categories, as well as subjects of operation, as characters (134). Barthes is a
key figure on the divide between structuralism and poststructuralism.
Poststructuralism, as a theoretical movement, seems to be less unified than
its precursor, structuralism. The works of the advocates of post-structuralism are
known by the term ‘deconstruction’, and it calls into question the possibility of the
coherence
of
discourse,
or
the
capacity
for
language
to
communicate.
‘Deconstruction’, ‘semiotic theory’ (a study of signs with close connections to
structuralism), ‘reader response theory’ in America/ ‘reception theory’ in Europe
(chief proponents, Stanley Fish, Jane Tompkins, and Wolfgang Iser) and ‘gender
26
theory’ (informed by the psychoanalysts Jacques Lacan and Julia Kristeva) are areas
of inquiry located under the banner of ‘poststructuralism’. If signifier and signified
are both cultural concepts, as they are perceived in poststructuralism or
deconstruction, the argument, then, is that this loss of reference causes an endless
deferral of meaning (a system of differences between units of language). This would
mean that language has no resting place, or final signifier that would enable the other
signifiers to hold their meaning. Hence, Jacques Derrida, the most important theorist
of deconstruction, asserts: “There is no getting outside text,” indicating a kind of free
play of signification in which no fixed, stable meaning is reached. Barthes, similarly,
applies these currents of thought in his famous declaration of the “death” of the
author: “writing is the destruction of every voice, of every point of origin” (cited by
Brewton, web).
Mentalist stylistics (the theory of transformational grammar) is interested in
discovering how the surface structure reflects the deep structure of particular poems
(Thorne 44). For Roger Fowler, surface structure is ‘the observable, or the expressive,
layer of the sentence’, while the deeper level is ‘the structure of meaning which is
being expressed; while we experience surface structure directly, we retrieve deep
structure or meaning by a complex act of decoding (cited in Akwanya 148). While
structural linguistics is concerned with the components of the narrative and their
cohesive techniques, the mentalists investigate the origin of the components
themselves. The mentalists regard the narrative as a ‘surface’manifestations of the
work of ‘deeper’ simpler elements. It is these simple elements (now lost after the
work is finished) that the deep structure analysis tries to reconstitute. Thus, the
analysis can be regarded as a search into the ‘origin’ of a ‘given’ work, concerned
with “unveiling the structural frame where insertions, movements, embellishments
27
take place” (Akwanya 147). The most important data for mentalist stylistics are
responses relating to what is intuitively known about language structure.
The
transformational grammarians (mentalists) criticize the formalists for being concerned
only with the surface structure; whereas, as they believe, stylistic judgements belong
to ‘deep structure’. This ‘mentality’ has, however, been criticized by several writers.
Cook, for instance, points out, that the metaphors ‘deep’ and ‘surface’ are pejorative;
surface is associated with ‘trivial, false and empty-headed’, whereas deep is ‘serious,
genuine and thoughtful’ (71). Toolan criticizes mentalist stylistics for being too
narrow and for following the “microlinguistic turn of generativism” (2).
‘Algebraic’ linguistics is a product of the mentalist tradition. It is the
formalization (mechanization) of the determination of syntactic structure. Just as
mathematical logic, regarded for years as the most abstract and abstruse scientific
discipline became overnight an essential tool for the designer and programmer of the
digital computer, so algebraic linguistics regarded for years as the most abstract and
speculative branch of linguistics is now considered by many a must for the designer of
automatic translation routines (Bar-Hillel 2).
K. Ajdukiewicz (1935) and R. Carnap (1937) started working on the logical
syntax of language even before Noam Chomsky. There were other authors like Z.S.
Harris, C.F. Hockett, L. Hjelmslev and H. Udall, all structural linguists, who being
more and more conscious of the syntactic theory deliberately gave their theory an
algebraic look. It was E.L. Post (1943) who succeeded in formally assimilating ‘rules
of formation’ to ‘rules of deduction’ which paved the way for the application of the
powerful theory of recursive functions, a branch of mathematical logic to all ordinary
languages viewed as combinatorial systems (Bar-Hillel 1). However, Chomsky’s
investigations on linguistic structures were unlike all these models. Chomsky’s model
28
(1957) exhibited a degree of testability which was unheard of before that. Bar-Hillel,
in the quotation below, gives a modified view of Chomsky’s phrase structure
grammar:
…a context-free phrase structure grammar, a CF grammar for short,
may be defined, again in slight variation from Chomsky’s original
definition, as an ordered quadruple <V,T,S,P>, where V is the (total)
vocabulary, T (the terminal vocabulary) is a subset of V, S (the initial
symbol) is a distinguished element of V–T (the auxillary vocabulary),
and P is a finite set of production rules of the form X→x, where XεV–
T and x is a string over V. (4).
It has been proved that for each CF grammar, there exists a weakly equivalent
restricted categorical grammar and vice versa (Bar-Hillel 4).
Text linguistics, an eclectic type of the text-oriented stylistics, developed
around the 1970s. Like formalist stylistics, it is concerned with form, but unlike
formalist stylistics, it sees the text as a unit of discourse, not as a string of sentences.
Hence, as Van Dijk states, text linguists may study narrative organization,
intersentential cohesion and levels of meaning to point out “textual macrostructure”
(cited in Zyngier: 2001). In text linguistics, the term, ‘discourse’ (instances of written
language; not including instances of spoken language) also comes into the picture.
Text linguists place their work on the level of discourse, where the two terms, ‘text’
and ‘discourse’, are regarded as equivalent. Both mean “a continuous stretch of
language larger than a sentence…” (Nunan 5). To other linguists, however, discourse
implies the interpretation of the communicative event in context (Nunan 6-7). The
method of analysis employed in this study relies mainly on the text linguistic theory;
29
hence, the subject of text linguistics shall be dealt with in greater detail in Chapter
Three (Methodology).
Context-oriented Stylistics
‘Context’ is defined here as “the extra-linguistic situation” (Bataineh 6). The
context-oriented stylistics refers to the sub-types of stylistics which are not only
interested in the language of a given text, but are also interested in the non-linguistic
or experiential situations surrounding the text (Zyngier 371). As Zyngier further
states, contextualized stylistics is an umbrella term which refers to all those
approaches which consider literature as an event within a specific situation. The
context-oriented stylistics includes pragmatic, radical, empirical/critical, and
pedagogical stylistics.
Pragmatic stylistics, for instance, looks at everyday conversation as a means
to understand literary discourse. Leech describes pragmatic stylistics as the tendency
to consider the text from an interactive point of view (cited in Zyngier 371). For
Fowler, illocutionary and pragmatic theory leads us to study explicitly manipulative
constructions such as imperatives, interrogatives, responses, etc. (at a more superficial
side of linguistics). It also deals, at a more abstract level (literary theory and analysis),
with implicature, presupposition, and other assumptions (1979, 15).
Radical stylistics (another instance of context) searches for the ideological
imprint of the text. The term ‘radical’ was coined in 1982 by D. Burton. Like
pragmatic stylistics, radical stylistics goes beyond the text into the social, political and
historical forces influencing its production and reception. Stylisticians who propose
for the radical analysis of literary works include T. Eagleton, 1983; M.L. Pratt, 1989;
D. Birch, 1989; G. Graff, 1990; A. Durrant and N. Fabb, 1990; W. van Peer, 1991;
30
and M. Montgomery. In the opinion of Peer “textuality is partly a linguistic
characteristic and partly the result of socio-cultural forces which provide the text its
place and function within society as a whole” (30). In his own argument, Birch has
stated that stylistics is “a study not just of structures of language and texts, but of the
people and institutions that shape the various ways language means (167)”.
Empirical/ critical stylistics has been described as the approach that best
accommodates developments in linguistic, literary and culture theories (Zyngier 372).
It is the offspring of Empirical Study of Literature (ESL) which began in Germany in
1973. One of the main propositions of ESL is the idea that text-meaning is not an
intrinsic property of the physical text; meaning is created in the process of response.
About this view of critical stylistics, Schmidt holds that,
…texts are no longer regarded as autonomous entities but always in
relation to those actions which are necessarily performed by agents
within the system of literature [–]…the roles of producing, mediating,
receiving and post-processing [–] those actions, objects, or events
which are considered literary by agents according to the norms
internalized by the agents. (1982, 243)
Here, ‘production’ refers to authors, ‘mediation’, to books and publishers; ‘reception’,
to readers, and post-processing, to critics. Hence, empirical stylistics goes hand in
hand with developments in linguistic, literary and cultural theories. The interdisciplinary nature of stylistics is highly portrayed in empirical stylistics.
Pedagogical stylistics, mainly developed by H.G. Widdowson, R. Carter, and
M.N. Long, is aimed at using literature for the teaching of language. A web
document, ‘Lecture 2’, has asserted that this kind of stylistics alerts students to the
way language works; stimulates them to exercise and develop their own creativity,
31
and helps them ‘deautomatize’ their own language (being consciously creative) and
thus more persuasive in their writing and speaking. More recently, the emphasis is on
sensitizing students to the use of metalanguage in literature. Metalanguage is a
professional ‘linguistic’ language for discussing language. It draws from
developments in Language Awareness and Critical Discourse Analysis to help
students verbalize the ideological implications of linguistic choices.
The walls of separation which have customarily existed between textual and
contextual theories are virtually collapsing in the practice of stylistics today. Stylistics
as a discipline today is building bridges across many disciplines; hence its
methodologies have gone from the monolithic to the pluralistic. This implies that any
researcher in the field of stylistics must be largely eclectic in his/her approach.
The Audience for the Study
The audience for this study includes budding scholars of stylistics, linguistics
and literary criticism, who can apply similar principles employed in this research in
their interpretation of literary texts. Learners of English as second language are also
among the targeted audience. Through analysis like this, they understand how
language works and learn to use it more creatively for different communication
purposes. In this regard, global scholars/ leaders training for rhetorical/stylisticlinguistic arts are also potential audience for the study. Other potential audience for
this work includes: the media practitioners who ‘constructs’ and ‘deconstructs’ news;
security officials working with forensic evidence; Nigerian linguists and culture
experts working on multilingualism, culture-synthesis and the National Language
Question in Nigeria; military personnel eager to discover their particular
32
terminologies; all readers of texts written in English; translators; and any Nigerian or
non-Nigerian who wants to learn more about the Nigeria-Biafra War novels.
Delimitations
This study is concerned with only the novels written about the Nigeria-Biafra
War. Plays or poems on the War are not included, except where they have been
analyzed along with some war novels, as seen in some reviews in Chapter Two. The
field of stylistic-linguistics is the study’s main interest. The study’s method of
analysis has emphasized the text linguistic theory. The design is the descriptive
survey, which has relied on stylistic-linguistic categories adapted from Leech and
Short (1995). The nature of this study has given rise to the choice of this
methodology, which belongs to the qualitative and not the quantitative type of
research. The sample texts being analysed provide the primary data for the analysis,
unlike in quantitative analysis, where the data is obtained through questionnaires
distributed in the field.
Limitations of the Study
A common problem experienced in most stylistic-linguistic analyses is that
formal structures of any text are too many and complex. Any detailed study in this
field, therefore, produces a mass of data, in such areas as lexis, grammar,
foregrounding, cohesion and context. This becomes cumbersome to the researcher and
perhaps unpalatable to the reader. About this situation, Fowler has commented:
“…this grubbing out of facts is the least of the services of linguistics to
the study of literature. Some of it may be invaluable in certain facets of
literary history. But the difficulty of the exposition, the unfamiliarity
33
and chaotic documentation of the method will seem to inhibit
immediacy of contact between critical mind and text. (27)
One method the researcher has used in controlling this problem has been to limit her
analysis to just four Nigeria-Biafra War novels. While this reduces the quantum of
data and analysis, it ensures thoroughness in scrutinizing the novels.
Another limitation experienced in this study is the lack of practical scholarly
examples (works which have done something similar) from which to borrow ideas –
both in the area of the war novels and in the area of text linguistics. No meaningful
study found in the area of the Nigeria-Biafra War novel has addressed the subject of
stylistic /linguistics. Again, most books on text linguistics are not easy to come by.
Though the internet has helped in sourcing a reasonable number of materials, yet
some of the internet resources have not been very extensive or intensive in treating the
topics.
There is also the issue of the vastness of the field of stylistics; it is hard to
limit the area of operation of this field. There are variations of techniques and
terminologies and a reasonable freedom in their use. It becomes difficult to tell, for
instance, what is meant by ‘text linguistics’ in a particular work until the work is read.
‘Text’ may mean a book, and the text linguist becomes, for example, the writer or
reader; or it can mean ‘text grammar’, where the rules of grammar are checked, or
‘newspaper editing’, or it can mean a synchronic or diachronic account of some
events. Fowler (1979) has observed this problem as it concerns the use of the term,
“Linguistic Analysis”:
A linguistic analysis of a literary text could, judging by some
precedents, be exclusively grammatical, or metrical, or lexical, or
34
phonetic, and, whichever of these emphases governs it, it could use the
language of any of a number of existing forms of linguistics. (2)
For Adejare, this is a case of lack of scientificity and precision for the concept
of style or stylistics (2-3). Hence, some scholars, according to Adejare, have asserted
that it is impossible to analyze style.
However, notwithstanding these limitations, the present researcher believes
that the study and analysis of style are inevitable, for they are the only way that the
full potentials of a literary text could be harnessed, and the text’s precise meanings
revealed. Because the study of style and language encourages creativity, individuality
and originality, many analysts in this area, intentionally or unintentionally, choose
methodologies that are creative too.
Finally, this study may be misrepresenting, unintentionally, some writers or
scholars whose works have been consulted in the course of the research. The
researcher, therefore, craves the indulgence of any such writer who may feel
misrepresented, in any form, in this study.
35
CHAPTER TWO
LITERATURE REVIEW
This chapter has surveyed important events and works that have been done in
the two areas of ‘stylistic-linguistics’ and the ‘Nigeria-Biafra War novels’/ literature.
The main objective was to find out if there were similarities or differences between
works already done in the areas of ‘stylistics’ and the ‘Nigeria-Biafra War novel’ and
this present study. The question is: Have analysts been examining the Nigeria-Biafra
War novels from the stylistic-linguistic angle? A summary is provided at the end of
the chapter to answer the question. In the next sub-section, effort has been made to
capture the major historical events and works done in the area of stylistics over the
centuries.
Stylistics: Historical Survey
One main challenge facing anyone delving into the evolution of stylistics is
the problem of definition which the subject of stylistics suffers. There have been
many parallel, overlapping and correlated developments, connected with stylistics,
occurring in several countries over the centuries,. Some highpoints of these
developments are discussed below.
The remote ancestor of modern-day stylistics is rhetoric. Nearly all the well
known classicists like Aristotle, Cicero, and Quintilian speak of prose style in the
context of oratorial rhetoric (Ardat 33). In the fifth century B.C., in ancient Rome and
Greece, rhetoric was taught as a practical discipline for the elite. It was taught along
with poetics (the techniques and principles of expressing ideas) and dialectics (the art
of creating and guiding a dialogue). Aristotle’s Poetics and Socrates’ “dialogue
36
technique” are some of the works from that era. Therefore, the three language arts –
rhetoric, poetics, and dialectics – could be said to be the ancestors of stylistics.
Catano has observed that among the early treatises devoted to the study of
style is Demetrius’s On Style (C. E. 100). Catano has also observed, however, that
most of these earlier (pre-twentieth century) discussions on style appear as secondary
components of rhetorical and grammatical analyses or in general studies of literature
and literary language. Even as late as 1674, in the Romantic era, when the book, L’Art
poetique written by Nicolas Boileau-Despreaux, was published, no serious attempt
had been made at a stylistic description. L’Art poetique, for instance, discussed the
three different styles, first mentioned by Cicero, another ancient author. The styles
were stylus altus (works of art), stylus mediocris (style of high society), and stylus
humilis (of low society, also used in comedies). Boileau-Despreaux’s work reflects
the preliminary attempts to describe the notion of style based primarily on the
selection of expressive means. It forms the foundation of the French classical theory
of styles.
It was linguistics that provided the first incentive for the study of style. At the
beginning of the 19th century, a German linguist and philosopher, Wilhelm von
Humboldt, described functional styles and treated poetry and prose as opposites in the
selection of expressive means – words and expressions, use of grammatical forms,
syntactic structures, emotional tones, etc. Since Humboldt’s ideas were not supported
by any linguistic analyses of text samples, they remained idealistic. Later, many
linguists, among whom were the members of the influential Prague Linguistic Circle
(1926), V. Mathesius, B. Havranek and F. Travnicek, elaborated on Humboldt’s ideas.
Ferdinand de Saussure’s lectures (Cours de linguistique generale, 1916)
opened the door for a structural approach to language. Structuralism views language
37
as a system of arbitrary signs governed by universal laws. Saussure created a
dichotomy between langue and parole with his preference of the former as the domain
for the systematic and scientific aspects of linguistics. Structural linguistics, with its
wide range of linguistic theories and grammatical models, provided a whole set of
analytical tools for stylistics.
The first product of structuralism was French stylistics (Bally’s stylistique). It
should be noted that Charles Bally was a student of Saussure, and was instrumental to
the publication of Saussure’s work, Cours de linguistique generale, after Saussure’s
death. Borrowing from the Saussurean langue, Bally’s stylistique, together with the
Russian-Formalist-Jakobsonian poetics (introduced to France through Todorov and
Garvin), focused on the affective aspect of the French language. Bally’s concept of
stylistics is classified as emotionally expressive because of his strong belief that each
component of linguistic information combines a part of language and a part of the
man who interprets or gives the information.
The tradition of philology in Germany helped in no small measure in the
formation of stylistics. Because Saussure has defined linguistics as the study of the
langue, the system of communication, this new German school of style (represented
by Vossler, Spitzer and Auerbach) strove to develop the study of parole, the special
verbal behaviour or performance of individuals in speaking and writing. The
‘philological circle’, as they are called, developed the basic methodological principle
for descriptive stylistics.
The study of stylistics has had a long tradition in Britain, where the teaching
of language and literature has always been a priority from the primary to the tertiary
levels. The British practical view of the world has helped them in producing such
highly theorized reading strategies as Deconstruction or New Historicism. Also,
38
colonialism elevated the imperialist English to the status of a world language, the
most widely used language in the world. The study of English literature in the late
19th century focused on two different pedagogical traditions – linguistic education
formally undertaken by classical rhetoric and philology, and the moral education
formally undertaken by religion (Leavisite moralism). After attaining a temporal
combination in I. A. Richard’s (1924) critical theory, the two different modes of
reading went different ways. Leavisite orthodoxy was eventually rejected, leaving
only practical or pedagogical stylistics. The new sub-discipline of pedagogical
stylistics is still expanding in the areas of stylistic theory, language and literature
teaching and, recently, in the ESL and EFL contexts.
Poetics breaks down the symmetry between interpretation and science in the
field of literary studies. It is not concerned with meaning but the general laws that
preside over the birth of each work. Poetics is not concerned with the actual literature,
but with the abstract property that constitutes the singularity of the literary
phenomenon, ‘literariness’. As Todorov (1981) states:
The goal of this study [poetics] is no longer to articulate a paraphrase,
a descriptive resume of the concrete work, but to propose a theory of
the structure and functioning of literary discourse, a theory that affords
a list of literary possibilities, so that existing literary works appear as
achieved particular cases. (6-7)
For Saito, Todorov’s approach to literary text is far more dynamic, macroscopic and
discoursal than Saussure, Bally’s and their successors (19).
Roland Barthes has made a semiotic approach to literature and to cultural
phenomena in general. Barthes’ examination of texts (though he declares his approach
is not stylistics, by which he means a simple observation of grammatical structures
39
and vocabularies) is concerned with the whole idea of narrative structure, an
important textual feature by the standard of recent theories of stylistics, which are
getting more and more holistic in their approach to textual discourse. Also, Michael
Riffaterre, the champion of reader-response theory (Riffaterre, 1966; 1978), and
Gerard Genette, who built a comprehensive theory of narrative discourse (Genette,
1972; 1983), all joined to develop the French stylistics.
Formalism developed in Russia at the beginning of the twentieth century
mainly as a reaction to the traditional study of texts from the historical point of view.
The leading figure of formalism is Victor Shklovsky and the most important idea he
presented was the idea of ‘defamiliarization’ (ostranenie in Russia):
The purpose of art is to impart the sensation of things as they are
perceived and not as they are known. The technique of art is to make
objects ‘unfamiliar’, to make forms difficult, to increase the difficulty
and length of perception because the process of perception is an
aesthetic end in itself and must be prolonged. Art is a way of
experiencing the artfulness of an object; the object is not important.
(Qtd in Saito 21)
Roman Jakobson and the Prague Linguistic Circle helped in the internationalization of
stylistics. The concept of the dominant was one of the most crucial concepts of the
school; dominant is the focus of a work of art: its message or context. The greatest
contribution of the Prague linguistic school to the Formalist tradition is the idea of
foregrounding, a more positive theorization of deautomatization as a linguistic device.
Foregrounding, as defined by Garvin, means the use of the devices of the language in
such a way that this use itself attracts attention and is perceived as uncommon, as
40
deprived of automatization, as deautomatized, such as a live poetic metaphor (as
opposed to a lexicalized one, which is automatized) (10).
Stylistics became an academic discipline in the United States and Britain with
the discovery of linguistic works of Ferdinand de Saussure, Roman Jakobson and
most especially, Noam Chomsky (Syntactic Structures, 1957). Then followed the
publishing of many other stylistic works, chiefly among them, Donald Freeman, ed.,
Linguistics and Literary Style, 1970; Seymour Chatman, ed., Literary Style: A
Symposium, 1971; and Roger Fowler, ed., Style And Structure in Literature: Essays in
the New Stylistics, 1975. In all these works, the main attraction for stylistics remained
that of “formal descriptive power”.
Gradually, this notion of ‘formal descriptive power’ of stylistics began to
come under censure for what was perceived as the “sacrificing of interpretive
complexity for scientific efficiency (Catano)”. Stanley Fish, for example, in his work,
“What is Stylistics and why are they saying such dreadful things about It?” (issued in
two parts, 1973 and 1980) flaws stylistics for being based on scientific analyses. Such
arguments maintain that there is no way to link the empirically defined features of a
text with the rest of the critical analyses except through the subjective interpretative
framework of a critic. Fowler also writes about this unhappy situation which in his
opinion has hindered the integration of linguistics with its natural companion, literary
criticism:
The image is sometimes an unhappy one: pretension of scientific
accuracy; obsession with an extensive, cumbersome and recondite
terminology, display of analytic techniques, scorn of all that is
subjective, impressionistic, mentalistic - in a word, ‘prelinguistic’. But
this view of the linguist – armed to the teeth and potentially destructive
41
by his attack on a sensitive work of art cannot be substantiated: it
rarely has any factual basis in the actual practices and the interest of
linguists. (1)
These arguments represent the shifting trends in modern day stylistics. The
value of efficient description is fading as a renewed desire for social, cultural and
contextual analysis in the study of language is increasing (Catano). Roger Fowler’s
Literature as Social Discourse, 1981, and M.A.K. Halliday’s Language as Social
Semiotics: The Social Interpretation of Language and Meaning, 1990, among others,
reveal this shift in the emphasis of stylistics and linguistics. In addition, there was the
influence of feminism and psychoanalysis: Robin Lakoff’s Language and Woman’s
Place (1975), Cheris Kramarae’s Women and Men Speaking (1981), Deborah
Cameron’s Feminism and Linguistic Theory (1985), John Forester’s Language and
the Origins of Psychoanalysis (1980), and K. Wales’s (ed.) Feminist Linguistics in
Literary Criticism (1994). All these works reinforced the need to move away from
strict formalism towards a greater concern with function and context. In the words of
Carter, “…if the 1960s was a decade of formalism in stylistics, the 1970s a decade of
functionalism and the 1980s a decade of discourse stylistics, then the 1990s has
become the decade in which discursively based sociohistorical and sociocultural
stylistic studies are the main preoccupation” (qtd in Zynger 378). Of course, stylistics
is flexible enough to accommodate the different cultural and contextual waves the
new millennium is offering.
The fear, as Catano observed, is that these new interests may push the entire
discipline of stylistics back into the related disciplines of literary criticism, linguistics
or rhetoric (resulting in a loss of self-definition for stylistics). However, recent
historical and contextual readings of literary and non-literary texts suggest that
42
stylistic models can be expanded sufficiently to allow the discipline to continue to
draw upon all related fields adequately for its own purposes while maintaining its own
autonomy. For Akwanya, scholarship, from the twentieth century, has become
interdisciplinary and the field of language studies is not sacrosanct (113-114). Leech,
in the same vein, asserts that “the most interesting and illuminating aspect of
communication in literature is beyond the scope of linguistics” (qtd in Fowler 155156).
As a matter of fact, Fulton has observed that, “Stylistics has become
dissatisfied with studies which describe patterns in grammar and lexis but pay scant
attention to the kinds of contextual issues raised by Feminists, Marxists, historicists
and (even) poststructuralist critics” (8).
Some conceptual matters on stylistic analysis have been discussed in the
section following.
Conceptual Issues: Stylistic Analysis
Many stylists have their individual impressions of what stylistic analysis
actually examines in a literary work. In the opinion of Simpson (2004), stylistic
analysis is not primarily interested in coming up with new and startling interpretations
of the text being examined. According to him, the main aim of stylistics is to explicate
how our understanding of a text is achieved, by examining in detail the linguistic
organization of the text and how a reader needs to interact with that linguistic
organization to make sense of the text. For Short (1996), the ‘news’ comes from
knowing explicitly something that you had only understood intuitively, and from
understanding in detail how the author has constructed the text so that it works on us
in the way that it does. Simpson’s list of what should be examined in a stylistic
analysis includes phonology (the way words are pronounced), graphology (the shape
43
of language on the page), morphology (words and their constituent structures), syntax/
grammar (how words combine with other words to form phrases and sentences),
lexicology (the words used, the vocabulary of a language), semantics (the meaning of
words and sentences), and pragmatics/ discourse analysis (the meaning of language in
context). In this research, however, features of graphology and phonology are not
emphasized.
Fabbs gives a long list of the areas of interest in the analysis of stylistics. This
includes narrative structure, point of view and focalization, sound patterning,
syntactic and lexical parallelism and repetition, metre and rhythm, genre, mimetic
(representational, realist effects), meta-representation (representation of speech and
thought, irony), metaphor and other ways of indirect meaning, utilization and
representation of variation in dialect, group-specific ways of speaking (real or
imagined), examination of inferential processes which readers engage in to determine
communicated meanings. Fabbs’s list is very detailed, and most of the areas he
mentioned will be considered in this study, though the metalanguage may differ
slightly.
Stylistics can also scrutinize language through the ideational, interpersonal and
textual functions (Halliday’s metafunctions), which relate language to the social
context. The ideational function relates the text (for example, the way the participants
are represented) to the writer’s experience of the outer world /environment;
interpersonal function considers the relationship the text establishes with its recipients
– the use of either personal or impersonal pronouns, speech acts, the tone and mood of
the statements; and the textual function is language-oriented and deals with cohesive
and coherent aspects of the text production (the organization and structure of
linguistic information in the clause). For Halliday (1981), metafunctions can be
44
compared to grammatical categories of context of situation, like field (which is related
to ideational transitivity), tenor (related to interpersonal mood), and mode (related to
textual theme). Analysts, like Albert Tallapessy (2002), and Casey Whitelaw and
Shlomo Argamon (“Systemic Functional Features in Stylistic Text Classification”)
have applied the Halliday’s metafunctions in their works. The present writer has not
actually used the metafunctions as Halliday has presented them, and as used in these
other works.
Azuike (1992) has developed an elaborate systematic guide on how to analyze
style, linguistically and literarily. For Azuike, the fundamental principle for any
effective analysis is the ability to read and grasp the message of the text (3). The next
step is analyzing the level of diction, which involves examining the register, phrasal
and clausal typology, and vocabulary. Another important level of analysis which
should be considered, according to Azuike, is the sentence category – their types and
combinatory patterns in the text. This may include the use of punctuation marks and
other rhetorical devices, like antithesis and parallelism. Azuike concludes that,
When we have examined these various elements of the text, it is
important that we make general statements on how they combine to
give the text a unity i.e, how they have been combined for the
communication of the subject matter. The conclusion we can reach
from this step by step analytical procedure may be that the message has
been effectively or ineffectively conveyed. However, this conclusion
may not always be a matter of success or failure as the writer can
achieve some measure of success in conveying his message even when
there are obvious lapses in his analysis. For the linguistic stylistician,
he can sign off at this point since he claims that his analysis is
45
objective as it is intratextual and intertexual, that is based on the
content of the text under analysis. (3)
Azuike’s analogy above still refers to the traditional distinction between the methods
of a literary critic and those of the linguist. However, newer approaches, like
discourse analysis and text linguistics, have diminished this classic dichotomy
between the two methods of analysis. A text linguistic analysis, as shall be explained
in subsequent section, can take care of both linguistic and literary (intratextual,
intertextual as well extratextual) aspects of the texts.
Hill has discussed a prospectus theory of style, by elaborating on Trager’s
three-level system of communication, similar to Chomsky’s generative grammar with
its three components:
The lowest level is the world of sounds, the noises we make with our
faces. This is the prelinguistic level. The middle level is the
microlinguistic. This is the world of language as a system and pattern,
the world of sentences, clauses, phrases, words, and words elements.
This is the world of the analytical student of language, whether he calls
himself grammarian, philologist, or linguist. The upper and final level
is the metalinguistic world, the correspondence between entities and
structures in the metalinguistical world; the correspondence is the
meaning of the microlinguistic items and structures. The metalinguistic
world is, then, the world of meaning (Hill 31).
Leech and Short (1995) have given a much more detailed checklist of features
that should be examined in a stylistic analysis. The categories are grouped into four
major areas: lexical categories, grammatical categories, figures of speech, and
cohesion and context. These categories are, somehow, interconnected. Lexical
46
category, for Leech and Short, includes stylistic questions such as: Is the vocabulary
simple or complex, formal or colloquial? Are the emotive words frequent? Does the
author use abstract or concrete nouns, stative or rather dynamic verbs? Are the
adjectives and adverbs frequent, and what do they attribute to (Leech and Short 7576)?
Another category explained by Leech and Short is the grammatical category. It
includes questions like: What types of sentences does the author prefer – statements,
questions, commands, or exclamations? Structurally, what are the sentences like –
simple, complex, etc? What kinds of clauses and phrases can be drawn from the
sentences? Are there any important departures from the simple past tense? Minor
word classes (prepositions, pronouns, conjunctions, determiners, auxiliaries,
interjections) and the effect they have on the text also belong to this category (Leech
and Short 76-78).
The third area is figures of speech. Here, Leech and Short consider features
which deviate from general language norms. In order to identify these departing
features, they recommend using the traditional figures of speech such as metaphor,
metonymy, synecdoche, or irony. The questions the analyst asks are, for example: Is
there any formal or structural repetition? Are there any cases of phonological
patterning such as rhyme, alliteration, or assonance? (Leech and Short 78-79)
The last of the four categories in the checklist of stylistic features proposed by
Leech and Short is context and cohesion. Cohesion is the way in which parts of the
text are linked together. Context, on the other hand, presumes that there is a relation
between text’s participants – author and reader, characters in the work, etc. In
assessing context, the analyst should ask questions such as: Does the author address
his readers directly or indirectly? What is the author’s attitude towards the subject of
47
the text? Does the style depend on who is currently speaking or thinking in the text?
(Leech and Short 79-80)
The checklist of linguistic and stylistic categories by Leech and Short is just
an outline of what the researcher may look for in the analysis of style. Every text
differs and what might be significant in one text does not have to be significant in
another text. The present study has largely adapted Leech’s and Short’s stylistic
categories in its analysis. These adapted categories are presented in Chapter Three.
In the next sub-section, an attempt has been made to present some of the
stylistic (particularly, linguistic) studies carried out from the mid twentieth century to
the present day.
Studies in Stylistic-Linguistic Analysis (1950-Present Day)
Originally, the preferred object of study in stylistics was literature – plays,
poems and novels. Stylistics was then seen as an extention of literary criticism,
linking interpretation to a more precise linguistic analysis of texture. It was some
discussions of literary texts by linguists in the 1950s that first attracted attention to the
applicability of linguistic techniques to literature (Fowler 4). Some of those
discussions include “An Analysis of The Windhover: An Experiment in Structural
Method” by A.A. Hill (1955) and “Robert Frost’s “Mowing”: An Inquiry into
Prosodic Structures” by Seymour Chatman (1956). Consequently, some literary critics
acknowledged the necessity for the close study of the language of literature: for
examples, Donald Davie, Articulate Energy (1955); Christine BrookeRose, A
Grammar of Metaphor (1958) and Winifred Nowottny, The Language Poets Use
(1962) (Fowler 4-5). A brief insight into the last three works mentioned above will
help to reveal some of the shortcomings of stylistics at that time.
48
Davie’s (1955) analysis, for instance, is very close to stylistic analysis, though
he, sometimes, quotes passages without bothering to analyse them, except may be for
a passing comment. It is difficult to understand, for example, what Davie means by
‘energy’ in this comment, “The lines are full of energy” (50). Brooke-Rose focuses on
metaphor which is one of the oldest rhetorical devices in literature and very often
regarded as the primary feature of ‘literary’ language. Although her lexical analysis of
metaphor seems rather simple and old-fashioned in comparison to the later studies in
this area, yet her work is important for it exploits grammar as a true apparatus for
analysis. Nowottny has worked on a theoretical synthesis of the various approaches to
poetic language attempted in the early stage of style-study in Britain. He contends that
poetic language is a complexity consisting of diverse elements – vocabulary, rhyme,
metre, syntax, etc., and that a variety of poetic values or effects such as metaphor,
ambiguity, symbolism, or obscurity stem from the ‘formal relations’ of those
elements. Nowottny’s work offers hardly any apparatus for analysis of texts. But it
offers a very basic grammar and Practical-Critical terminology. This work is
important for its advocacy of holistic reading of texts and the connection between
description and response (interpretation).
Firth’s (1957) study is one of the first works to take a critical look at the
stylistic aspects of language. This work, through its description of language as an
abstract system, has contributed, directly and indirectly, to the theorization of
linguistics/ stylistics. Halliday (1964, reprinted 1970) has borrowed extensively from
Firth’s ideas that language exists only in the context of other events (systemic
functional grammar). Halliday has analyzed Yeats’s “Leda and the Swan”, paying
particular attention to the nominal group structures and the ‘deverbalisation’ or
transformation of verbs into nominal groups in terms of function. Halliday has also
49
compared three passages from the literary works of John Braine, Dylan Thomas and
Angus Wilson on three different textual features: nominal group structures, lexical
sets and cohesion.
Carter’s (1982) analysis of Hemingway’s “Cat in the Rain” has almost the
same linguistic framework with Halliday’s analysis. The only difference is that
Halliday begins with a general discussion on linguistic strategies before describing the
linguistic features of the texts under study. Carter starts by interpreting the text before
going on to analyze the text’s linguistic components and to link his analysis to his
initial response, to ascertain the true interpretation of the text.
Sinclair (1966) also adopts the neo-Firthian linguistics to analyze Philip
Larkin’s “First Sight”. The article begins by only suggesting that linguistic
descriptions of a literary text might help a reader to understand and appreciate the
text. The article, surprisingly, goes into a detailed examination of sentences, clauses,
word groups, and line-by-line grammatical elements in the work. The conclusion is
that meaning can be described independently of a text’s evaluation.
Quirk (1959) has studied the idiolectal use of language in Charles Dicken’s
novels, from the point of view of phonology, grammar of the verb, typography (its
unique presentation of speeches) and character-idiolect. For Chatman (1972), Quirk’s
analysis is one of the most primitive forms of style-study, because Quirk listed
Dicken’s idiolectical characteristics without bordering to explain them. Saito (1997)
has asserted that Quirk’s non-committal use of linguistic theories and terminologies is
preemptive of the flexibility of practical stylistics. Quirk, after that linguistic quest,
seems to have faced the more macroscopic, socio-linguistic phenomenon –
globalization and internationalization of English, as his later works reveal.
50
Fowler who laments that linguistics has not integrated fully with its natural
companion literary criticism has, in his earlier works, not modified the basic
assumption of linguistic stylistics that “description could be conducted independently
of evaluation and interpretation” (Fowler 3). His first approach (1966, 1971) to the
stylistic aspects of literature was by way of traditional metrics. He worked on the
metrical format and rhetoric-logical structure of Shakespeare’s seventy-third sonnet,
clearly reflecting his interest in affective stylistics. Fowler (1977) adopts the
generative-linguistic notions of surface structure and deep structure. In the work,
many different levels of style, including text and discourse, are discussed. Fowler,
later, has been associated with the pragmatic or functional aspects of language
(Fowler, 1981). His notion of ‘linguistic criticism’ (1986) has expanded his purview
from sheer linguistic analysis of individual texts to socio-linguistic considerations of
text production.
Widdowson (1975) positions stylistics as an essentially interdisciplinary field
of study between linguistics and literary criticism. He has illustrated how literature
works not only as text but also as discourse – a dynamic combination of linguistic
elements and literary messages. Widdowson’s book has moved from a flexible
description of stylistics to the practical demonstration of the application of the
discipline to literary teaching in the actual classroom context. Though Widdowson’s
work is mainly pedagogical, it does not give any practical classroom activities.
Leech and Short (1995), like Widdowson, have synthesized different trends in
linguistic and literary stylistics; for them, they are mediators between linguistics and
literary criticism. Leech and Short’s book contains mostly ‘theoretical’ descriptions of
fictional discourse – process of creation and grammatical selection, lexicon, message,
semantics, syntax, graphology, rhetoric, or speech/thought presentation. Leech’s and
51
Short’s stylistic concepts have mainly influenced the present study. It has been
described earlier in this Chapter, under “Conceptual Issues: Stylistic Analysis”.
The algebraic aspect of stylistics has been explored by Holloway (1979). He
innovatively views a narrative as “a set of sets” (not set of events) where “each
member of this total set is a set of events which represents the narrative so far as we
have read (or listened) up to a certain point in it” (qtd in Saito 43). He achieves this by
dividing a narrative into episodal units, where each event is a matter of “simple
occurrence/nonoccurrence alternative of a certain basic action” and he tries to
highlight the relation between those events. Holloway explains the whole structure of
Muriel Spark’s The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie with a pedantic mathematical formula,
‘∑2’.
Adejare’s (1992) analysis of Wole Soyinka’s texts has applied what he
describes as an aspect of the Systemic Grammar of Halliday. Adejare’s
“textlinguistic” theory is innovative and original. Adejare, for instance, has cited
himself alone in defining the word ‘text’. For him, “the text is a unit of language that
has been used in a specific context by a text producer with the purpose of
communicating a message through the use of the linguistic signs existing within a
language’s semiotic universe” (6) Adejare’s version of systemic textlinguistics is
preoccupied with the levels of meanings projected in a text. Most authors have
associated text linguistics with ‘meaning’. Dijk, for example, defines it as a sentence
sequence with “a global structure of meaning” (41), but Adejare’s classification of
levels of text meaning is creative. Categories like message, lexis, coinages and
grammar are placed under the primitive level of meaning; the second order level
includes significance of names, dialogue, interference variety, etc; while the prime
order level discusses metaphors, imagery and other descriptions. Adejare’s study
52
depicts the flexibility typical of stylistics, encouraged by approaches like text
linguistics or discourse analysis. The present study, like Adejare’s, has employed the
text linguistic analytical approach, but not in this particular ‘order of levels of
meaning’ developed by Adejare. This present study shall dwell on the textual and the
contextual aspects of meaning, mainly relying on some stylistic categories adapted
from Leech’s and Short’s (1995) checklist of stylistic features.
Saito (1997) has explored the possibility of a new theory of creative stylistics
(a prescriptively-oriented discipline) which will be complementing the traditional
descriptive-oriented stylistics. Saito’s work is a model for the classroom where
literature is taught together with English, in an ESL situation. Saito ‘prescribes’
exercises like jigsaw reading, matching and rewriting to be done before main passages
are described, as ways of tuning students to the language of literature. Students can
also be asked to imagine situations read by comparing them to similar situations in
their environment (gap-filling). Saito’s conclusion is that providing prescriptive
guidelines will help students better than allowing them to use their intuition to tackle
stylistic exercises. Saito’s main interest is to seek a way of applying stylistics to
creative writing in an ESL classroom. Saito’s work is unique for it stresses literary
creativity more than literary analysis.
As stylistics wades into the twenty-first century, its pedagogical use as a
device for understanding texts and for creating one’s own original texts has become
one of the major attractions to the subject. In this area of applied stylistics, global
scholars and leaders training for rhetorical leadership have become interested in
stylistic analysis – to understand how words can be used creatively –to persuade and
influence. To this end, modern-day stylistics, just as Carter observes, has become
increasingly confident and mature.
53
Two contemporary analyses done in this millennium have been added to this
review – Olaosun’s (2005) study of Wole Soyinka’s Kongi’s Harvest and Nnadi’s
(2010) linguistic stylistic analysis of Chukwuemeka Ike’s novels. Olaosun uses the
approaches of stylostatistics and componential analysis: stylostatistics is the
application of statistical methods to stylistic analysis of texts, and componential
analysis (an approach to lexical semantics) involves the analysis of the sense of a
lexeme into its component parts in order to clarify or simplify that sense (91). The
study identifies certain prominent features (words) of the text and attempts a smallscale count of these words. It also evaluates these features in terms of their relevance
to the theme of the text. Some critics have opposed this method of text analysis on the
basis that style cannot be reduced to counting, and again that the frequency of
occurrences of features is irrelevant to style. But others, like M.A.K. Halliday, Ullman
and Fowler, seem in favour of frequency in grammatical analysis. Recently, most
studies involving mathematical, quantitative or corpus data are carried out with the
use of machines/ computers. The advantage of machine-use is that it ensures
exactness in the results. Olaosun’s study proves that manual quantitative analysis,
where simple data are counted (without the aid of machines or computer), is possible.
However, his study is quite different from the present one, but has been reviewed to
show the different methodologies open to a stylistician.
“A Linguistic Stylistic Analysis of Chukwuemeka Ike’s Novels”, by Nnadi
(2010), is a study which can be likened to the present one, at least, by its title. Nnadi
uses a ‘flexible’ type of Post-Bloomfieldian structuralism to analyze ten novels of Ike.
Nnadi’s analysis, in spite of the recent cross-disciplinary nature of stylistics, has
conservatively remained on the linguistic and grammatical elements of the texts. The
analysis pays great attention to issues of diction, paragraph /sentence structure, and
54
linguo-literary features, like proverbs, rhetorical questions, etc., found in Ike’s novels.
The only ‘non-grammatical side of Nnadi’s discussion is the plots of the novels which
he has traced. Nnadi’s work may seem to have some similarities with this research, in
terms of their both dealing with linguistic stylistic analysis, but the present study is on
the stylistics/ linguistics of Nigeria-Biafra war novels. The two concepts of ‘NigeraBiafra War novels’ and ‘stylistic-linguistics’ combined in this study already indicate
the type of analytical approach suitable for it. It is not one that would focus on the
grammatical structure of the texts alone; it should be a method that will be able to
portray the ‘Biafra’ of each of the writers. Using the eclectic text linguistic analytical
tool, this research shall vividly depict all that is implied in each of the Biafran War
stories – the contextual, political, social, linguistic and stylistic.
Studies on War Novels/ Literature
The search for resources on the Nigeria-Biafra War novels has revealed a
number of studies; some following some empirically formulated theses, others mere
opinion papers of little scholarly insight. Moreover, studies on other war novels
/literature world-wide, not just the ‘Nigeria-Biafra War’ novels, have been
discovered. Some of these studies are worthy of mention. Hence, this sub-section of
the review has dealt with them.
Krishnamurthy’s (2008) stylistic analysis of Joseph Heller’s Catch 22 (a novel
on World War II) is done from the surrealist viewpoint. Krishnamurthy defines
surrealism as pure psychic automatism, by which one proposes to express verbally, in
writing or by any other manner, the real functioning of thought. Among the surrealist
elements studied by Krishnamurthy are paradox, tautology and circumlocution, and
absurdities. For Krishnamurthy, these figures are employed by the writer of Catch 22
55
to ridicule the idea of war. For instance, by refusing to engage in war, Yossarian gets
transmogrified into a true hero. It is in the moments of cowardice that Yossarin proves
that he is the bravest of them all. This is paradoxical. The conclusion drawn by
Krishnamurthy is that Heller brings in surreal elements to draw attention to the
devastation war wrecks on the human psyche. Another writer who has done
something similar to Krishnamurthy’s analysis is Reeves (2000). Though her work is
not a stylistic analysis, Reeves has elaborately discussed Catch 22 (along with other
post-war American fictions) from the concepts of ‘laughter’ and ‘madness’.
Concerning the links between Krishnamurthy’s work and the present research, the
following points should be noted. Though Krishnamurthy studies stylistic features
like paradox, tautology, periphrasis and absurdities, her analytical tool is surrealism,
not stylistic-linguistics (the tool of the present research). Also, Krisnamurthy’s scope
is limited to one novel, which, moreover, is not a Nigeria-Biafra War novel.
Dooley’s (2010) analysis of Stephen Crane’s The Red Badge of Courage
(1895), a popular American war classic generally believed to be based on the
historical Battle of Chancellorsville, has focused on the areas of theme, irony and
historical relevance. Dooley has also dwelt on the successes recorded by the novel, in
terms of the great appeal it holds for many readers and the large sales it has accrued,
right from its first appearance in 1894. Even the very manuscript of the novel (with
Crane’s own hand-written comments) is said to be kept in the special collections of
the University of Virginia. Nevertheless, Dooley’s analysis is relevant for it exposes
the international/ global dimension to the study of the war novels.
Rooney (1991) has analyzed Irene Staunton’s Mothers of Revolution, a novel
which recounts the experiences of thirty Zimbabwean women during the country’s
War of Independence. Rooney’s main interest in the analysis is socio-political, not
56
literary, linguistic, or stylistic. Rooney reveals that women have moved from familial
to national roles during the war. The role of women in the Zimbabwean war, as
revealed in Rooney’s analysis, brings into focus the part played by Nigerian women
during the Nigeria-Biafran experience. To this end, Rooney’s work is relevant to the
present research.
Gunner (1991) discusses two other novels of the Zimbabwean War of
Independence – Shimmer Chinodya’s Harvest of Thorns and Chenjerai Hove’s Bones.
Both novels critically (radically) analyze events before, during, and after the war, to
the extent that they force the reader to ruminate on the purpose of the war and who the
actual beneficiaries are. Gunner observes a creative manipulation of oral forms within
the matrix of the written genre in the novels. However, there is no strict analysis of
the language of the texts by Gunner. So far, not much has been noticed in the area of
style concerning civil war writings, in general. Below, studies on the Nigeria-Biafra
War novels/literature shall be discussed. Note that some analysts have analyzed the
novels together with other literary genres, hence the term ‘war novel/literature’.
Studies on the Nigeria-Biafra War Novel /Literature
Between studies on the war novels (world-wide) and those on the NigeriaBiafra War novels, there is Ogunpitan’s (2008) work. His work has not dwelt on the
Nigeria-Biafra War novels alone, like the present study, but has embraced both that
and the American War novels. He has compared works of fiction on the American
War with those on the Nigeria-Biafra War, from the points of view of literary
criticism and historiography. Ogunpitan has surveyed the link between literature and
war, and made comments on works that qualify as the “best” war fiction. “Best” war
fiction, for Ogunpitan, includes “works that present realistic characters, actions, moral
57
vision and innovative techniques” (1). Ogunpitan’s samples for analysis consist of
three novels, Stephen Crane’s The Red Badge of Courage, Ken Saro-Wiwa’s Sozaboy
and Isidore Okpewho’s The Last Duty, whose thematic and social relevance are
examined. The conclusion drawn is that many narrators see war in more personal than
social terms. For the writer, “in the best war novels, the characters with whom the
reader is invited to sympathize have no desire to take part in the violence and in the
cruelty around them” (25). This analysis pays no attention to issues of linguistics or
stylistics, and so can be largely contrasted from the present study.
Other writers who have worked on the Nigeria-Biafra War literature include
the following: Krishnan (2010) has discussed the concept of closure in four
contemporary Nigeria-Biafra War novels, Graceland by Chris Abani, Half of a
Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Beast of No Nation by Uzodinma Iweala,
and Measuring Time by Helon Habila. Narrative closure is described as “the narrative
folding in on itself”, sealing itself into a comprehensible whole (Krishnan 193).
Krishnan considers the Nigeria-Biafra War texts as lacking closure, comparing this to
Nigeria’s problems of colonialism, sectarian violence, ethnic conflict and military
intervention which keep the country in a constant state of death and rebirth. The
social, political, national and international perspectives of the war novels are the
interests of Krishnan; there is no linguistic dimension to his analysis. This makes his
work different from the current research. Krishnan’s work is a journal paper and
therefore lacks the depth and volume witnessed in this research. The only affinity that
Krishnan’s work shares with the present research is his inclusion of Adichie’s Half of
a Yellow Sun among the selected works for analysis.
Like Krishnan, Hawley (2008) has studied the concept of closure in three
contemporary accounts of the Nigeria-Biafra War: Dulue Mbachu’s War Games
58
(2005), Chimamanda Adichie’s Half of a Yellow Sun (2006), and Uzodinma Iweala’s
Beast of No Nation (2005). As seen from their selections, Hawley and Krishnan have
two common texts, Half of a Yellow Sun and Beast of No Nation. The subject of their
analyses, also, looks similar. Krishnan discusses the concept of lack of closure in the
Nigeria-Biafra War novels. Hawley assesses the war’s impact on Nigeria’s cultural
expression in the twenty-first century. Though Hawley has not used the term,
‘closure’, his analysis shows that the subject of the war has been continually revisited
in the Nigerian literary scene. Hawley has cited both Feuser and Iroh who had stated
in late 1980s that there had still not been enough time to produce the sort of art that
will have sufficient distance from the suffering of the war. As Feuser puts it, “[I]t will
take another generation to come to terms fully with the past, be it politically or
artistically” (qtd in Hawley 18). For Hawley, Iroh’s prescience seems to manifest in
the recent writings on the Nigeria-Biafra War, considering the different perspectives
of narration displayed by each of the three writers he studied. Mbachu’s perspective,
for instance, is that of a child-narrator. Adichie’s novel never dwells on the horrors of
the war in any sustained way. Iweala’s own perspective is more from a radical
analysis of the politics of war, with his account of child soldiering. In summary,
Hawley has done a critical literary analysis of these modern-day war novels, no
linguistic or stylistic aspects of the novels are mentioned in his study.
Hodges’s (2009) work on Chimamanda Adichie’s Half of a Yellow Sun, and
Buchi Emecheta’s Destination Biafra is partly based on Iroh’s assertions about the
requirements for a successful account of Biafra, which include objective distance,
factual judgement on the participants in the war, affirmation that Biafra was, in fact, a
‘great tragedy’. Also, Hodges discusses the issue of reconciling historicism with
story-telling – a challenge facing all historical fiction. There are fictional characters
59
over which the writer has authorial control, but there are the real characters and events
who belong to the history books and who remain beyond the grasp of the writer. This
complex between historicism and fiction will be looked into in this present research.
Hence, Hodges’ work is relevant to this present research.
Ugochukwu (2011) has also studied Adichie’s Half of a Yellow Sun, together
with Chinua Achebe’s Girls at War and Leslie Ofoegbu’s Blow the Fire.
Ugochukwu’s work is mainly a thematic study of the three novels; he takes time to
describe the depths of disintegration portrayed in Girls at War, the family/feminine
aspects of surviving the war in Blow the Fire, and the general survival strategies
displayed by the many characters in Half of a Yellow Sun. Ugochukwu’s analysis has
touched on the significance of ‘the road’ in the texts. For him, displacement is at the
heart of all texts whose pages tell of highways, checkpoints, roads where “scores of
pedestrians, dusty and exhausted, some military, some civil”, locked in a “tight,
blockaded and desperate world”. Not much has been discussed on Adichie’s Half of a
Yellow Sun in Ugochukwu’s analysis; mention has only been made of the fragmented
nature of this novel which, according to Ugochukwu, like Achebe’s short-story genre,
expresses the dismantling effects of the war. This present research, therefore, will
make up for the scanty references to Half of a Yellow Sun, in Ugochukwu’s analysis.
Mey (2010/2011) has examined Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Half of a
Yellow Sun from the points of view of trauma, history and literature. Using the trauma
theory developed by Caruth, Mey has discussed the Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder
(PTSD), which Olanna, Richard and Ugwu (characters in the novel) all suffer from, in
varying degrees. The conclusion reached by Mey is that trauma is usually healed after
successfully narrating the traumatizing experience. Mey’s study of Half of a Yellow
Sun is related to this new research, in that Half of a Yellow Sun is one of the selected
60
war novels for the research. The difference between the two researches, however, is
huge; Mey has not discussed anything stylistic in her own study.
Another study close to Mey’s is Orabueze’s (2011) analysis of ‘dispossession’
in Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Purple Hibiscus and Half of a Yellow Sun. Using the
theories of Marx, Freud and Christopher Julia, Orabueze has analyzed the psychology
and psychiatry of the characters found in these novels and discovered that most of the
characters had some form of psychiatric disorder. Though Half of a Yellow Sun has
attracted a lot of public interest since its publication, Orabueze’s work is among the
few detailed scholarly analysis seen on the novel so far. However, there has not yet
been a corresponding detailed stylistic analysis of the novel, hence, the necessity for
this present research.
The only work concerning stylistic usages in Half of a Yellow Sun so far seen
by the researcher is Madu’s (2011) conference article, “African Literature as a Tool
for the Expression of the Indigenous Knowledge: A Study of Chimamanda Adichie’s
Half of a Yellow Sun”. Madu has analysed how the Igbo language and the translated
English language are used in Adichie’s novel, which, according to her, makes for easy
comprehension and translation. In the end, she concludes that Adichie’s use of her
dialect has drawn the world to the peculiarities in Igbo language and its different
dialects. Though Madu did not use the word ‘stylistics’, her analysis of the Igbo
usages in Half of a Yellow Sun is, in part, a stylistic analysis. Though the work is
skeletal, it has some affinity with certain issues that are raised in the present study; for
example, the traditional Igbo motifs found in some war novels (not limited to Half of
a Yellow Sun). However, Madu has not discussed Adichie as a war-novelist.
The Nigeria-Biafra Civil War novels have also been discussed from the angle
of of ecocriticism. Iheka (2011) has discussed the environmental consequences of the
61
civil war by analyzing Isidore Okpewho’s The Last Duty, Festus Iyayi’s Heroes, and
Chimamanda Adichie’s Half of a Yellow Sun. Iheka stresses the need to recognize
humanity in any environmental discourse. For instance, he shows the exploitative
actions of the elites against the masses; the masses in turn exploit the environment.
For Iheka, the environment is the greatest casualty of war though it is hardly ever
considered as such by many war analysts. The incidents of air raids which turn places
into a wasteland; the bunkers and trenches which give way to flooding, erosion, pests
and disease; the smoking planes and gunfires which emit toxic gases into the
atmosphere, leading to global warming, heat waves, heavy rains, draught and rise in
sea level are all ecocritical issues analysed by Iheka. This environmental aspect of
analysis of the war novels is not within the scope of this current research.
In his work, Nwahunanya (2007) assesses some war novels in two distinct
ways: historicism of the words and the imaginative creativity. Note that Hodges’s
(2009) work has discussed the same complex of historicism and story-telling. Among
the novels Nwahunanya discusses are Cyprain Ekwensi’s Survive the Peace,
Chukwuemeka Ike’s Sunset at Dawn, Songs of Steel by Andrew Ekwuru, Eddie Iroh’s
Forty Eight Guns for the General, Okechukwu Mezu’s Behind the Rising Sun, Ifeanyi
Aniebo’s Anonymity of Sacrifice, John Munonye’s Wreath for the Maidens, and
Isidore Okpe’s The Last Duty. Nwahunanya has concluded that the Nigerian war
novels reveal various degrees of artistic success, determined by the extent of each
writer’s weaving of history into art. Though Nwahunanya has touched on many
Nigeria-Biafra war novels in his discussion, none of the novels under study presently
has been included. This makes the present research fresh and original.
Earlier, Nwahunanya (1997) studied some analytical works on the NigeriaBiafra War novels. Nwahunanya, for instance, presents a contrastive analysis of
62
McLuckie’s “Literary Memoirs of the Nigerian Civil War” and Remy Oriaku’s
“Political Memoirs of the Civil War”, from the point of view of the novels’ subjectmatter. McLuckie, for example, sees Wole Soyinka’s memoirs as the most accessible
to all, while Elechi Amadi’s and Ken Saro-Wiwa’s are only but personal histories. On
the other hand, Oriaku asserts that the war memoirs clearly illustrate the fact that each
autobiographical text has its internal truth which is determined by the author to
conduce to his overall self-image.
Other works Nwahunanya compares are Onyemaechi Udumukwu’s “Federal
Voices in the Nigerian War Novel” and Chinyere Nwahunanya’s “Biafran Voices in
the Nigerian War Novel”. Udumukwu has submitted that the few writers on the
Federal side of the conflict all derive their material from a common historical source
and that their responses to this common source have remained varied and constitute a
babel of voices”. Nwahunanya, on the other hand, has asserted that the Biafran
novelists portray the “predatory behaviour exhibited by men who were in positions of
power during the war”, and that these men “have gone on with such behaviour even
after the war, and, out of it, fashioned and adopted an enitirely new and objectionable
ethos” (qtd in Nwahunanya). J.O.J. Nwachukwu-Agbada, Augustine Amanze
Akpuda, and Akachi Ezeigbo are all analysts whose works have been subsequently
analysed by Nwahunanya in A Harvest of Tragedy. Nwahunanya’s work, therefore,
provides a good bibliography of critical studies for anyone working on the NigeriaBiafra War novels.
Gbemisola (2003) has done a survey of Nigeria’s post-colonial literature with
a view to assessing the part played by the military in the country’s postcolonial
governance. Of particular relevance to this present research is the section on “Words
of War” in Gbemisola’s study. For Gbemisola, the war novels provide a useful
63
documentation and a communal catharsis of healing the wounds of the war. An array
of war literature has been analysed in the study, though Festus Iyayi’s Heroes has
received the greatest attention. Gbemisola gives some thematic interpretations of
Iyayi’s views on the exploitative nature of the war, where the poor soldiers and
general masses suffer over an unnecessary competition for national resources between
a few generals, politicians, businessmen and clerics. None of the civil war works
mentioned by Gbemisola is among the selected works for this research; giving more
credence to the fact that this research is going into newer and unexplored frontiers,
not merely repeating old information.
Uwasomba (2010) has discussed the concept of language (together with war
and violence) in Ken Saro-Wiwa’s Sozaboy – what he calls a sociological-cumlinguistic analysis of the work. He, first, gives a brief illustration of how English has
developed in Nigeria and a historical brief of the devastation the war has brought to
Nigeria before going into the analysis proper. Uwasomba gives a few illustrations
from Sozaboy to show how the characters, especially Mene, the chief narrator, have
code-switched between Pidgin, Broken or Standard Engish. Some of the words used
to show phonological interference suffered by Sozaboy’s characters include: ‘enzoy’
for enjoy, ‘zenttle lady’ for gentle lady, ‘porson’ (person) and ‘massa’ (Master). SaroWiwa himself has consciously distorted his words, for instance, in numbering the
chapters, he uses words like ‘Lomber one’ (number one), etc. For Uwasomba, the
disorderly nature of Sozaboy is in keeping with the lawlessness of war. It also shows
the limitless extent to which the English language can be manipulated within the
Nigerian environment in service of communication. Though Sozaboy is not being
examined in the present research, Uwasomba’s linguistic analysis of the novel can be
compared to the analysis being done with other novels in the present research.
64
However, the scope of the present research is much more extensive and its analysis
much more intensive.
There are other essays on the civil war novels found in other critical works,
though these discussions are mostly thematic surveys. Ezeigbo and Gunner (1991),
for instance, have compiled about seven war essays in their works. Some of the essays
are addressing wars fought in other African countries, like the Zimbabwean and
Somalian experiences. Two of the essays in Ezeigbo’s and Gunner’s compilation have
already been discussed above – Rooney’s and Gunner’s works. Ezeigbo herself has
one essay in the compilation, just like her co-editor, Gunner. Ezeigbo’s essay traces
the growth of the thriller and detective tradition in Nigerian fiction, as demonstrated
in Eddie Iroh’s Forty-Eight Guns for the General and The Siren in the Night. Ezeigbo
concludes that Iroh’s thriller narratives are remarkable because of their sense of
verisimilitude achieved through the interplay of history, aesthetics and fiction.
Some literary reviews have been found on one or two of the novels under
study.
Chukwukere (1995), for example, in “The Heroine and the Nigerian Civil
War” has analyzed Nwapa’s depiction of the agony and disillusionment of a people
who have believed in success so implicitly, in Never Again. All the area concerning
language in the paper comprises four illustrations drawn from the novel: one is about
“slipshod and awkward prose” leading to “overlaboured simplicity”; another, of
wrongly spelt words; the third, of a concord error; and the fourth, of a punctuation
error. There is, however, not much effort made at explaining any of the linguistic
issues raised.
Emenyonu (1991) has analysed some Nigerian Civil War novels, focusing on
two of Achebe’s short stories in Girls at War and Other Stories and five other novels,
namely, John Munonye’s A Wreath for the Maidens, Flora Nwapa’s Never Again,
65
Chukwuemeka Ike’s Sunset at Dawn, Kalu Okpi’s Biafra Testament, and Eddie Iroh’s
Toads of War. In his study, Emenyonu has noted that most of the accounts on the War
focus on the excruciating Nigerian Might and the indefatigable Biafran Resilience,
“Nigeria’s crude brute force” and “Biafra’s subtle and crafty intelligence”. Emenyonu
has also noted that, apart from Elechi Amadi’s Sunset in Biafra, most of the war
novelists have chosen to tell their stories from the point of view of imaginative
fiction. Not more than one short paragraph is left for the discussion of the use of
language in Never Again, for instance. Assertions, such as “The style is plain and
ordinary, devoid of imagery or any form of linguistic manipulation”, are made, but
without any explanation.
Emenyonu and Oguzie (1989) have also explored the themes of three NigeriaBiafra War novels, Eddie Iroh’s Forty-eight Guns for the General, Elechi Amadi’s
Sunset in Biafra and Isidore Okpewho’s The Last Duty. In the first two, they treat the
issue of ‘horrors of war’, and in the last, that of ‘honour and morality in a war
situation’. Not much is done in the area of language or stylistics of the war literature/
novels.
From the search done, there seems to be no comprehensive scholarly work (of
any sort, even if non-linguistic) carried out on any of the war novels under study. In
the case of Enekwe’s Come Thunder, only one literary review has so far been found
on the novel – Awhefeada’s (2008) discussion of themes of hope and despair in the
novel. Enekwe’s war novel seems to be among the “unknown” works on the NigeriaBiafra War. For many years after the publication of Come Thunder, only a few short
commentaries were found on it. Regarding this, Ihekweazu has commented as
follows:
66
When this novel appeared it had two adversities against it. One is that
the manuscript has been lying too much long in the publisher’s safe so
that book after book came out on the theme of the civil war in Nigeria
and the reading public could have become tired of it. The second
obstacle is that the novel was published in a youth series called
“juggernaut” and carries a picture that rather points to a romantic love
story than a war-novel. This could have prevented serious readers from
having a second look at the novel. (15)
Nevertheless, Come Thunder is among the most engaging of the NigeriaBiafra War novels. It offers the standpoint and experiences of the boy-soldiers, who
are mere pawns used by the leaders to carry out the war. Come Thunder has been
compared with Stephen Crane’s The Red Badge of Courage. A more recent comment
on Come Thunder, by Chimalum Nwankwo, has dismissed the novel along with Eddie
Iroh’s Forty-eight Guns for the General as “racy accounts which do not probe” (114). But Come Thunder actually “probes”, though in an indirect manner. It is a very
subtle cynicism of the Biafrans’ war efforts.
Summary
Out of all the literatures found on the Nigeria-Biafra War novels, including the
other ‘world’ war novels, none has discussed the stylistic-linguistic features
characterizing the novels, in any detailed way. Most of the discussions have dwelt on
issues of theme, characterization and plots. Again, they are mostly journal articles.
The literature review reveals that Half of a Yellow Sun by Adichie (one of the war
novels under study) has received considerable attention from analysts. However, this
attention has mainly been from the psychoanalytical perspective (like Orabueze’s
67
2011, and Mey’s 2010/2011 studies) or thematic viewpoints (as witnessed in
Ugochukwu’s 2011, and Hodges’s 2009 works). Except for an article written by
Madu (2011), no other analyst, known to the researcher, has studied the language of
Adichie’s war novel. Nevertheless, Madu’s brief article has only discussed Half of a
Yellow Sun as a tool for the expression of the indigenous knowledge, not as a war
novel written in a creative style. There has also been an ecocritical survey on the
Nigeria-Biafra War novels done by Iheka (2011). Iheka, anyway, has neither treated
any of the war novels in the present study nor any of the issues being presently raised;
his main interest is on the environmental consequences of the war as displayed in
some novels.
In the stylistic-linguistic part of the review, Nnadi’s “Linguistic Stylistic
Analysis of Chukwuemeka Ike’s Novels” is discovered as the only work similar to the
present study, in terms of analytical orientation. However, Nnadi’s study is neither on
the war novels nor on any of the novels being studied presently. Also, Nnadi has not
employed the eclectic text linguistic theory (the theory that has guided the present
research) in his analysis.
This present research, therefore, is unique in a number of ways. No detailed
work, known to the writer, has been done in the area of ‘stylistics’ of the NigeriaBiafra War novel. Considering all this, the present research will be a trailblazer in the
body of knowledge yet to exist on the ‘Nigeria-Biafra War novel ‘dialect’/stylistics’.
68
CHAPTER THREE
METHODOLOGY
This study is a qualitative descriptive survey and its analysis focuses mainly
on the eclectic text-linguistics. Because the study is eclectic, it has also borrowed
from the theories of meaning and foregrounding. All these theories have influenced
the researcher in drawing the checklist of stylistic-linguistic categories used for this
study. Leech’s and Short’s checklist of stylistic categories have again influenced the
present researcher’s own checklist to some degree. Four sub-items have been treated
here: research participants, instrumentation, procedures, and analytical approach.
Research Participants/ Samples
This study has attempted to interpret the stylistic-linguistic elements the
Nigeria-Biafra War authors have devised in presenting the experiences of characters,
real or imagined, that lived during the war. The novel genre, therefore, becomes the
most suitable tool for the job. Some people, who participated in the war, witnessed or
heard stories of the war have tried to recapture their experiences using the genre.
Again, the novel genre provides a good tool for stylistic analysis. Toolan (citing
Kundera), for example, has asserted that novelists, because of the sheer length of their
work (when compared with the poem or play), often resort to artistic/ stylistic
expressions to make their work indelible in the minds of readers (110). For Toolan,
lyric poetry stands the best chance of being memorized and unforgotten; in contrast,
the novel is a very poorly fortified caste. “Thus cruelly abused, the novelist responds
by striving to build “an indestructible castle of the unforgettable” by imposing form,
composition, or what Kundera alternatively calls architecture (Toolan, 110). In
summary, the present researcher believes, like Kundera and Toolan, that “The beauty
69
of a novel is inseparable from its composition or architecture” (Kundera 150, Toolan
110). This being the case, the novels discussing the Nigeria-Biafra War are likely to
produce more unforgettable linguistic elements than the other literary works on the
war. A close scrutiny of some samples of this stock will definitely provide a good
linguistic resource which will be central in understanding the values, emotions and
meanings of the texts.
The second factor considered is the author’s ethnicity. The researcher has
given a high priority to novels written by authors from the defunct Biafran region, the
present South-East and South-South people of Nigeria. The researcher’s reason for
concentrating on novels written by the Biafrans is not far-fetched. These people have
written more war novels than any other ethnic group in Nigeria today, because they
bore the brunt of the war. It was in their area that the war was fought, with a
likelihood of leaving greater impact on the socio-cultural milieu and the psyche of the
people than it would in the other regions of the country. This point can be linked to
that mentioned in the paragraph before: ‘the novel depicts normal men/women
grappling with social realities’. It follows then that a novelist is better able to present
all the dynamics of a situation if s/he has experienced or is actively affected by the
situation. Biafrans fought desperately at the war and were shattered by their defeat in
the war. It is, therefore, expected that they should have more to say about the war.
The selection of the study’s samples has also taken into account the degree of
new insight the analysis of each war text would provide. A novel whose analysis
reveals new perspectives on the interpretation of the Nigeria-Biafra War ‘dialect’ is
accorded more priority over those whose analysis merely confirms existing
interpretations. The choice of Enekwe’s Come Thunder, for instance, is made in this
regard. Come Thunder belongs to the not well-known works on the war; very few
70
literary reviews have been found on the text.
Following this objective of new
insights, the researcher has considered other factors, such as the representation of the
male and female writers, of earlier and later novels, and of fictional and nonfictional/autobiographical novels. The factor of earlier and later novels is of particular
interest to the researcher because it has been suggested that later war novels may be
better artistic works than earlier war novels because they have sufficient distance from
the war phenomenon (Hawley 18).
An important issue in the sample selections is the need to reduce unnecessary
repetitions of the analysis of particular linguistic features. Thus, if a linguistic feature
has already been fully identified in one text, another text which provides the same
linguistic elements may not be selected for analysis again. This is in order to avoid
unnecessary repetitions of information. To this end, the researcher has only selected
novels that will provide newer and different perspectives of the linguistic/ stylistic
features of the Nigeria-Biafra War novel.
These factors and techniques explained above led the researcher to the choice
of four Nigeria-Biafra War novels to be used as samples for the study, namely:
1. Sunset at Dawn, by Elechi Amadi
2. Never Again, by Flora Nwapa
3. Come Thunder, Onuora Ossie Enekwe
4. Half of a Yellow Sun, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
In these samples, there are two male (Amadi and Enekwe) and two female (Nwapa
and Adichie) writers. The first three novels (as mentioned) belong to the earlier war
writers, while the last is a contemporary war text. The earlier war novels are more in
number because the researcher found more writers within that period.
71
Instrumentation
This sub-section has discussed the instruments – the theories – upon which
this work lies. The theories include text linguistics, foregrounding and meaning.
Text Linguistic Theory
Text linguistics is a branch of linguistics which studies the defining properties
of texts, that is, what constitutes their textuality and texture (Crystal, 1992). For the
traditional linguists, from Saussure to Chomsky, the text as an object of study has no
place at all. It belongs to the area of parole, not langue. The sentence for them is the
highest unit of grammatical structure. Thus, they devised a grammar which examines
the order of words in sample illustrative sentences. They had no answers for usages
found in typical communication situations, for instance, the ellipsis found in
spontaneous conversation, which is an indication of grammatical connection among
sentences rather than a phenomenon inside the single sentence. The theory of
encapsulation developed by Sinclair, for example, provides that each utterance in a
text is assumed to provide a framework within which the next utterance is placed.
Thus, discourse is assumed to be designed in such a way that a first segment of text
raises implicit questions that subsequent discourse will address, wholly or in part, and
second and subsequent segments may open or prospect further kinds of question for
yet later text to resolve (Sinclair 2004: 82-101, 115-127). In the opinion of
Beaugrande, therefore, any grammar which looks only at the order of words inside
isolated sentences and not at why speakers say what they say, how language is used in
various social groups, how it is used in communication, must remain a shallow and
superficial enterprise (“Text linguistics at the Millennium” 5). Thus, the text begins to
72
engage the attention of linguists, for grammatical issues not well accounted for within
the single sentence.
Initially, the earlier practitioners of text linguistics were cautious about putting
the text in the domain of “actual” use, parole; because of the fact that linguistic theory
had described language use in negative terms, may be to rationalize its neglect
(Beaugrande (De) in Zienkowski, Ostman, and Verschuren, eds. 289). Saussure, for
instance, described ‘parole’ as ‘individual’, ‘heterogeneous’ and ‘momentary’, and so
cannot be studied (1969: 13). For Chomsky, actual speech in performance was
‘scattered’ and ‘deficient’ and had a ‘degenerate quality’, replete with “false starts’,
‘fragments’ and ‘deviant expressions’. Thus, earlier theorists of text linguistics
describe the text as close as possible to linguistic theory. For Hartmann, however,
sentence formation proceeds through rules of individual languages, whereas “text
formation proceeds through principles applying to all languages and through
extralinguistic stylistic and individual requirements”, e.g., motives, intentions, effects
(1968: 218). Hence, Hartmann insists that separating the text from the communicative
context and situation obscures rather than clarifies the question of what a theory
should account for.
Many of the early proponents of textual linguistics recognize the value of the
‘text' in their theories, but fail to give practical examples, in terms of investigations
carried out. All the four volumes published by Hjelmslev on text analysis never
provided even one demonstration of text analysis. His major directive is this: “The
text is regarded as a class analysed into components, then these components as classes
analysed into components, and so on until the analysis is exhausted” (1969: 12). The
text, for Hjemslev, is taken as a big chunk of language gradually taken into smaller
73
and smaller pieces, over and over, until the opposite end from its undivided integrity
(Hjemslev, 1969: 7, 57).
For J.R. Firth, the text carries the implication of utterance and refers to typical
participants in some generalized context of situation (1957: 220, 226). Hence, as he
states, the attested language text should be ‘duly recorded’ and abstracted from the
matrix of experience (1968: 99). Since it may not be possible or desirable to present
the whole of the materials collected during the observation period, some corpus is
essential. Firth, in reverence to Saussure and Hjelmslev, still does not classify text as
mere speech ‘parole’; he uses his own terms, ‘typical participants’ and ‘generalised
contexts’. Again, like Hjelmslev, Firth’s own four published volumes give only a few
sketchy demonstrations of this type of analysis. Other theorists who have contributed
to the practice of early text linguistics include Harweg (1968), Koch (1971), and
Wienold (1972).
These early text linguists aspired to build upon ‘sentence linguistics’. The text,
for them, was a sequence of sentences, inheriting the established properties of the
sentence such as being grammatical, well-formed and rule governed. All the theorists
agree that the organization of a text or discourse is determined in part by the abstract
language system, and in part by the context of communication. Whereas an abstract
analysis could uncover a vast total of linguistic forms and features, the human
processing of discourse probably focuses on that strategic subset that supplies relevant
input or output in a given communication (Beaugrande, “Ground Rules for Text
Linguistics” 6). The appropriate unit for analysis is no longer the morpheme, word or
phrase (as seen in the formalist models), but the co-text, the utterance environment of
variable lengths, in which words and phrases tend to appear together.
74
The idea that a linguistic string (a sentence) can be fully analysed without
taking ‘context’ into account has been seriously questioned. As Brown & Yule state:
“If the sentence-grammarian wishes to make claims about the ‘acceptability’ of a
sentence in determining whether the strings produced by his grammar are correct
sentences of the language, he is implicitly appealing to contextual considerations”
(25-26). The same point has been stressed by Gary in this statement: “there are certain
types of sentences which we cannot make sense of, either syntactically or
semantically, without examining them with respect to a discourse context” (1). A
textual perspective was, therefore, developed in order to explain some of the
phenomena that could not be researched properly from a sentential perspective. In the
opinion of Werlich, sentence grammars do not tell the foreign learner the whole story
about communication by means of language (14).
Today, the text is widely defined as an empirical communicative event given
through human communication. Each such event ‘rides on’ a dynamic dialectic
between the virtual system of possibilities and the actual system constituted by the
choices of the text producer; the text is thus on neither side of ‘language’ versus ‘use’,
but integrates and reconciles the two. The task is to describe as empirically or
realistically as we can the processes whereby communicative participants can and do
produce and receive texts. This plainly demands interdisciplinarity research between
text linguistics and psychology, sociology, ethnography and so on – all who work
with real data from the standpoint of human activities.
In this process, text linguistics has steadily merged with discourse
(Beaugrande (De) in Zienkowski, Ostman, and Verschuren, eds. 291). The latest and
most decisive step in the merging of the two sub-fields is the compilation of the ‘Bank
of English’, a vast computerized corpus of contemporary spoken and written English
75
discourse, which enables reliable statements about the typical patterns and collections
of English. Sinclair provocatively compares the large corpus to the telescope in
astronomy and the microscope in Biology, because, in his opinion, the implications
drawn from the research data are likely to be felt by all practitioners of linguistics
(Beaugrande, in Zienkowski et al 291). Modern practice of text linguistics has merged
with discourse analysis, and here, finally, the dichotomy between langue and parole is
finally cleared. Regularities in the language, it is discovered, can be directly derived
from real data.
The early real practice (projects) of text linguistics constructed a text-grammar
top-down in the narrow and abstract generative sense. For example, the text-grammar
for a fairly short text by Bertolt Brecht (‘Herrn K s Lieblingstier’) “got tangled in an
explosive complexity of rules (Van Dijk, Ihwe, Rieser, and Petofi, 1972). The project
was eventually abandoned with no official conclusion. For Beaugrande, the same fate
is predicted for any project that describes ‘texts’ on comparable levels of abstraction
and formality (5).
The newer and better approach for text linguistics is to describe the text from
the bottom-up. How this will be done has been identified as follows:
We need to examine a comprehensive range and variety of authentic
[not hypothetical] texts and explore what sorts of properties deserve to
be accounted for, including, but not restricted to, those of grammar in
the broad sense of it …. We can apply whichever categories and
concepts of previous ‘linguistics’ that seem productive, but we can also
apply ones from adjacent fields, such as literary studies, cognitive
science, artificial intelligence, ethnography, economics and political
science … whatever bases we can enlist in exploring how speakers do
76
select and combine words inside phrases, clauses, sentences, or any
other relevant units, such as paragraphs, essays or science textbooks.
(Beaugrande 5, emphasis mine)
To this end, the object of text linguistics is the ‘text’ “treated holistically as an integral
phenomenon generated in the process of language communication embedded in a
broad cultural context” (Labocha 59).
Text linguistic application thrives in the domains of native and foreign
language instruction, translation, Bible studies, news editing, and literary studies. For
Bartminska, modern text linguistics is now a common ground for linguists and literary
researchers, and this has prospects for the integration of the whole philological
discipline (citd in Labocha 59). Bartminska also advocates that the name, ‘textology’
be adopted, instead of text linguistics, to show the literary or anthropological
dimensions of the concept. Two studies applying the text linguistic approach are
sampled below.
Terino (1988) has done a synchronic analysis of the Jacob narrative, which he
entitled “A Text Linguistic Study”. He draws his analytical paradigm from
Longacre’s linguistic analysis. Robert Longacre has dedicated a detailed text
linguistic analysis to the Joseph story and to the Flood narrative in the Bible,
employing the tools of discourse analysis, developed by himself and other theological
linguists. Terino situates his synchronicism within the contextual relations in the Book
of Genesis. He uncovers the underlying unity of the structural divisions in Genesis, on
the grammatical, lexical and semantic levels, particularly applying the features of
cohesion and plot progression.
Toolan (2008) has demonstrated how the principles of text linguistics could
lead to the discovery of the textual cues that create “expectations which in turn evoke
77
feelings now of fear, now of suspense, now of surprise, menace, grief, anger, and so
on together with the thought of unfairness, or futility, or disproportionality, or
marvelous good fortune – the whole gamut of possible thoughts and emotions that fill
our minds and absorb our attention in the course of our reading an engaging narrative”
(106). Toolan is of the opinion that the concepts of prospection and expectation are
important in the analysis of narrative. Readers are continually engrossed with
questions about what is going to happen now or next in a narrative. This is based on
John Sinclair’s assertion that an accurate and powerful description of discourse needs
to focus on the written or spoken text’s prospective qualities (Toolan 108). In a story,
only a part of the text carries the main burden of signaling prospection or narrativity
by which the reader responses and expectations, such as surprise, tension, confusion,
are created. This core narrativity material must be relatively easily noticed –
foregrounded text. For Toolan, a literary narrative, like a novel, is structured in
peculiar ways that the work remains indelible in the reader’s mind. It is, therefore, the
job of the text linguist to scrutinize the linguistic details of the literary work to come
up with those elements that make the texts unforgettable. By so doing, the texts are
fully appreciated, linguistically and contextually.
Toolan from the explanation above is using the text linguistic principles to
uncover the linguistic elements of prospection found in a narrative. The ultimate end
of the analysis is to make the narrative unforgettable, by rendering in a memorizable
way the skeletal architecture of the work. These principles should guide scholars who
are venturing into text linguistics. Below, the seven main features which characterize
a text are briefly described. Every text analyst usually considers them in one way or
the other while examining a text.
78
Principles of Textuality
There are seven principles of textuality identified by De Beaugrande and
Dressler (1981, 1995) which every text must possess to remain valid and acceptable.
These features include; (a) cohesion, (b) coherence, (c) intentionality, (d)
acceptability, (e) informativity, (f) contextuality, and (g) intertextuality.
a. Cohesion
It has to do with the ways in which components of the sentences of a text, i.e.
the words we actually hear and use, are mutually connected (grammatically and
lexically). According to Halliday & Hasan (1976: 11) there is cohesion “where the
interpretation of any item in the discourse requires making reference to some other
item in the discourse”. Cohesion is represented in the text by particular features, such
as repetitions, omissions, occurrences of certain words and constructions. These
features are categorized as reference, substitution, ellipsis, conjunction and lexical
cohesion. Reference relies in the retrieval of information (referential meaning) from
somewhere else in the sentence or in a neighbouring sentence by using pronouns,
demonstratives, comparatives or a variety of other lexical constructions. In the case of
substitution a substitute is basically used “in the place” of another word or phrase to
prevent repetition of the same word or phrase. In the process of ellipsis elements in
sentences are physically omitted because the writer believes that the reader will insert
the missing elements on their own as the sentence is used (Donnelly 103). In this case
the pressure is on the reader or listener to make the cohesive link. Often, conjunctions
and adverbs are used to connect propositions in neighbouring sentences according to
certain semantic relations (e.g. additive, adversative, causal and temporal) between
the propositions (Donnelly 105). Lastly, lexical cohesion serves to refer to semantic
relations (such as synonymy, antonymy, collocation) created by specific lexical items.
79
b. Coherence
"A coherent text has an underlying logical structure that acts to guide the
reader through the text” so that “it ‘sticks together’ as a unit” (Hatch 209).
c. Intentionality
Every text always has a producer who usually has the intention to produce a
sound piece of information to a receptor (Carstens 1997: 352-385).
d. Acceptability
The receptor on his/her part needs to be willing to accept the proffered text as
a communicative text. In order to do this both producer and addressee have to
adhere to the pragmatic co-operative principle that states that one has to make the
maximum effort to enable a piece of intended communication to be successful.
e. Informativity
This principle in text linguistic research broadly has to do with the way in
which parts of the text have communicative value (Carstens 1997: 427-429). A
statement like “Joy has gone out” has more communicative value than a pronoun like
“her”.
f. Contextuality
This principle focuses on the very important role context plays in any form of
communication. It has often been asserted that it is practically impossible to study the
implications of context without having knowledge of other sub disciplines. The idea
of register comes under context. In register, two main factors are seen: the author of
the text and his use of language. In the former, sub-factors like the author’s
geographical background, historical factor, social class, level of education and
personal characteristics of language are considered. The second factor of register has
nothing to do with the author of the text. Elements like the field of discussion (law,
80
language), level of formality/ tenor (casual, serious) and mode of expression are
usually considered here. Other contextual domains are intention (of more concern to
pragmatics) and cultural signs (area of semiotics).
g. Intertextuality
The principle of intertextuality is often applied in literary studies. It literally
means that the formation and understanding of one text will be influenced by the
structure of another text similar to it (Carstens 1997: 450-469). Your reading of a
Shakespearean play, for instance, will affect your subsequent response to another of
such plays.
Text linguistics is actually a vast area, but one can surmmarize its many
principles into two major ones, of text and context. Also, in the practice of text
linguistics, one can still apply whichever categories and concepts of previous
‘linguistics’ that seem productive to one’s study, and can equally borrow from other
fields of study. This present study, for instance, has adapted Leech’s and Short’s
checklist of Stylistic features. Also, academic fields, like the cultural, military,
historical and political studies have influenced the analysis in the study. In subsequent
sub-sections, the different theories which have influenced the present study will be
seen.
Meaning Theory
The field of meaning includes semantics, pragmatics, and semiotics.
Semantics is defined as the study of meaning communicated through language; it
studies linguistic meaning of morphemes, words, phrases, and sentences (Saeed 3).
The study of how context affects meaning – for example, how the sentence It’s cold in
here comes to be interpreted as “close the windows” in certain situations – is called
81
pragmatics (Fromkin, Rodman and Hyams 173). Semiotics describes language in
terms of signs, which in turn is divided between signifier and signified. The signifier
is the sound/letters of the linguistic object. The signified, on the other hand, is the
mental construction or image associated with the sound or word. The sign, then, is
essentially the relationship between the two.
The importance of meaning, particularly semantics, to linguistics has been
stressed by Milne, in the following passage:
‘We cannot go any further with our studies of the other levels of linguistic
analysis. We keep coming up against the problems raised by semantics. It is
only through a deeper insight into what semantics is all about that we can
proceed with our other studies’ (97).
The above statement, made in the 1970s, is, interestingly, a sharp contrast to what
obtained in the 1950s and 60s, when semantics was considered unscientific. Then, to
assert that any present linguistic study is ‘based on meaning’ is tantamount to
impeaching the scientific integrity of the author of that study. This was worse among
linguistic scholars (Milne 97).
The initial negative attitude of linguists to issues of meaning has led to the late
arrival of this field of linguistic study. Of the three levels of linguistics – phonetics
and phonology (phonemics), grammar (comprising morphology and syntax) and
semantics – semantics is still relatively young, with little definitive work. Ironically,
linguists have always used meaning, in one way or the other, in their studies of
phonology, morphology and syntax; without really understanding the concept of
meaning. Semantics, therefore, tries to explain the meaning theories and to look at the
meaning-making situations.
82
There are different theories of meaning, each a reflection of those sub-fields of
meaning mentioned above. Some theorists define meaning in terms of the extralinguistic, that is, the outside world of experience. Proponents of this theory see
meaning as relying on speech situation and learners’ response (Bloomsfield), or the
different instances of language use (Wittgenstein), or situational context
(Malinowsky) (Adegbite 53). Other theorists account for meaning within the
linguistic structure and not in the outside world of experience. In Chomsky’s
generative grammar, semantics is veiwed as that which assigns interpretation to the
structural description generated by syntax at the deep structure. However, scholars
like Lakoff, McCawley and Chafe have further worked on Chomsky’s notion to get a
variation termed ‘generative semantics’. For them, sentences are generated in the first
instance as semantic entities before being described syntactically or phonologically.
A semiotic variety of meaning includes pragmatic relations and excludes
phonological levels of meaning. Semiotics is the study of the sign systems in general;
thus its concern extends to the interpretation of behaviour, objects, artworks,
paintings, drama and dances. A semiotic description subsumes three interrelated types
of relations: the syntactic, semantic and pragmatic relations. While syntax relates
signs to one another, semantics relates signs to their real objects, and pragmatics
relates signs to users of a language. Adegbite mentions some major types of meaning,
including linguistic, ideational (cognitive), interpersonal (social), textual and
contextual types. Linguistic meaning is subdivided into phonological, graphological
and grammatical (i.e syntactic and lexical) meanings. The ideational, interpersonal
and textual meanings express the experiences and thoughts of participants, social roles
which language is used to perform and the organization of text, respectively.
83
The next group of theorists recognizes meaning as a ubiquitous term which
applies to all levels of language description, both formal and non-formal. As
explained by Adegbite, at the formal level, word arrangement (syntax), sounds
(phonology), graphology (writings) all come into play in the interpretation (54). The
informal level of meaning is the extra-linguistic, which relates to the context or
situation. Context in linguistics is an abstract category which provides the link
between formal items and situational components of language use. The context of
culture and the context of situation are two considerations of contextual meaning.
While the former specifies conventional (socio-cultural) rules of behaviour which
participants must share to communicate successfully with each other, the latter
specifies relevant features of immediate and wider experiences of the participants, like
their educational background. Note that contextual meaning generates the concept of
stylistics, which describes the relations between formal linguistic forms and features
of situational contexts. It also includes co-textual meaning, which relates particular
linguistic features to one another in the linguistic environment.
Theories of literature tend to focus on the source of the meaning of the text,
how it is constituted, its form, and destination (Akwanya 113). In the opinion of
Akwanya, language in literature is not used simply to make meaning appear, as
happens in other books on geography, history, biology. That implies that stylistics is
not worried about meanings of a text per se, but about how a text makes its meaning.
However, as Akwanya has also noted, “Any approach to meaning that includes
discourse in its scope will necessarily be interdisciplinary, it must be committed to
linguistic theory as well as to epistemology, literary criticism, philosophical
hermeneutics, and so on” (2).
84
In this research work, the approach to meaning to be adopted will be that
which recognizes meaning as applying to all levels of linguistic description both
formal and informal. Only in this approach will the language, characters and events
described in the Nigeria-Biafra War novels under study be meaningful.
Foregrounding Theory
The term ‘foregrounding’ is borrowed by stylisticians from art criticism. It
refers to those elements of a work of art that stand out in some way: the foreground as
against the background of a painting, for instance. The principles of foregrounding are
observable in the work of the Gestalt psychologists of the early 1900s, particularly in
Rubin's work on the distinction between ‘figure’ and ‘ground’ (McIntyre, citing
Koffka,). Our visual field is organised in such a way that we make a distinction
between figures and backgrounds, and that we are able to distinguish the contours of
separate objects when there is a strong contrast between their respective colors and
degrees of brightness (Dan McIntyre, citing Murray,). For example, a particularly
bright object will stand out against a dull background and will consequently be
perceived as figural and therefore prominent. It is easy to see how this concept is
employed in the visual arts and, by analogy, how the notion of a figure equates to the
linguistically foregrounded elements of texts.
According to Leech, foregrounding is translated from the Czech word
‘aktualisace’ (in Fowler (1979) 144). For Finch, foregrounding derives from the
Russian Formalist concept, ostranenie (estrangement) (192). Akwanya has noted that
ostranenie literally means ‘making strange’, and according to him, Viktor Shklovsky
of the Formalist school was the coiner of the term (120). Akwanya also notes that for
the Formalists, deviation from ordinary language is what characterizes literary prose,
85
literariness. Art shocks; its main purpose is to see the world in a new way through
‘defamiliarisation' or ‘making strange’. By defamiliarizing a language element, we
make it stand out from the norm – it becomes foregrounded. After the Russian
formalists, such scholars as Roman Jakobson, Felix Vodicka, and Rene Wellek
exported the theory to Britain. The theory was further refined in British stylistics,
most notably by Geoffrey Leech (1969).
The pre-war Prague School of Linguistics used the term, ‘foregrounding’,
first, in literary analysis, but they are not the originators of the concept as shown
above. The concept was a further historical development from the ideas of the early
Russian Formalists which operated between1914 and 1916. Foregrounding, according
to the Prague School, means ‘unique deviation’; ‘unique’ here suggests that the usage
is peculiar to the person who employs it. The person employing this technique has
deviated from common usage in a creative and original manner. This deviation,
however, should be meaningful, not merely an unmotivated aberration. Also,
according to the Prague School, foregrounding is not confined to creative writing, but
is found even in joking speech and children’s language games. However, as Leech has
stressed, literature is characterized by ‘consistency and systematic character of
foregrounding’
For there to be foregrounding it is necessary for readers to perceive some
features as prominent against a background of other less prominent ones (Fulton 9).
Inevitably, this entails breaking the norms of the standard language, with the result
that what characterizes literariness is the degree of linguistic deviance. For Yankson,
any linguistic technique which brings a particular message to the forecourt of the
reader’s attention is known as foregrounding. The normal linguistic code is the
86
background – the norm. Any deviation from this norm, therefore, is a foreground, as it
attracts attention to itself (3).
Nagar, in his article, “Foregrounding”, has noted that the term 'foregrounding'
has come to mean several things at once:
First of all it is used to indicate the (psycholinguistic) processes by which during the reading act - something may be given special prominence. Second,
it may refer to specific devices (as produced by the author) located in the text
itself. It is also employed to indicate the specific poetic effect on the reader.
Furthermore, it may be used as an analytic category in order to evaluate
literary texts, or to situate them historically, or to explain their importance and
cultural significance. Finally, it is also used in order to differentiate literature
from other varieties of language use, such as everyday conversations or
scientific reports.”
Thus, the term covers a wide area of meaning. This may have its advantages, but may
also be problematic: which of the above meanings is intended must often be deduced
from the context in which the term is used.
An Example of the Use of Foregrounding
The device of linguistic parallelism found in one of General OdumegwuOjukwu’s speeches during the Nigeria-Biafra War has been analysed below:
Proud and courageous Biafrans I see the birth of a new Biafran society
out of the carnage and wreckage of war. I see a new breed of men and
women, with new moral and spiritual values, building a new society –
a renascent and strong Biafra. ... When I look into the future, I see
Biafra transformed into a fully industrialized nation, wasteland and
87
slums giving way to throbbing industrial centres and cities. I see
agriculture mechanized by science and technology, which have already
made their mark in the present war. I see a Republic knit with arteries
of roads and highways; a nation of free men and women dedicated to
the noble attributes of justice and liberty for which our youth have shed
their blood; a people with an art and literature rich and unrivaled.
(Ojukwu: 1969, 221-229)
Analysis:
The phrase ‘I see’ has appeared several times. ‘Biafra/Biafran’ has appeared
four times. ‘Men and women’ has appeared twice. In addition to this are the similar
syntactic structures and semantic patterns, indicating forms of parallelism. Syntactic
parallelism is found in the following structures:
I see the birth of a new Biafran society
I see a new breed of men and women
I see Biafra transformed into a fully industrialized nation
I see agriculture mechanized by science and technology
I see a Republic knit with arteries of roads and highways
The first two clauses have the same syntactic structure: Subject-Verb-Noun Phrase,
while the last three have the same: Subject-Verb-Noun-Past Participial Phrase.
Parallelism in meaning (semantics) is also seen in these same phrases:
new Biafran society
new breed of men and women
both refer to a new society
fully industrialized nation
mechanized by science and technology
knit with arteries of roads and highways
88
all refer to a developed nation
If parallelism is unexpected regularity, then deviation is unexpected
irregularity. Deviating from accepted norms also produces a foregrounding effect.
Leech uses the word ’figures’, from ‘figures of speech’, to denote the deviant or
foregrounded features of literary language, which are observable and classifiable.
Figures are classified as either syntagmatic or paradigmatic. Items are said to be
syntagmatic when they combine sequentially in the chain of linguistic events; and
paradigmatic when they enter into a system or set of possible selections at one point
in the chain. In the statements, ‘The farms are far’ and ‘The day is dingy’, there is a
syntagmatic relationship between the words used – Subject-Verb-Complement –
creating a linguistic chain. In paradigmatic cases, the writer/speaker may select an
item which is not a member of the normal range of choices in a linguistic chain – ‘I
will butcher my way through’ or ‘all the sun long’. Here, there is an unrestricted
choice of words in a position where normally only members of a limited list of words
are used. In ‘butcher … way’, a verb usually associated with ‘killing’ has been used
with a noun that does not belong to the normal chain.
In other words, for syntagmatic foregrounding, where there is a choice to be
made at different points in the chain, the writer repeatedly makes the same selection.
Leech describes it as unexpected regularity. But paradigmatic foregrounding makes a
selection which is not equivalent to the normal range of choices: it is foregrounding
through deviation – unexpected irregularity. The alliterative figure, ‘…day is dingy’,
or assonant figure, ‘…farms are far’, are examples of syntagmatic foregrounding
(parallelism); while ‘all the sun long’ or ‘will butcher my way through’ are forms of
paradigmatic foregrounding (deviation).
89
There seems to be various forms of parallelism and/ or deviation in the
literatures of all known languages, cultures, and historical periods; therefore, the
concept of foregrounding can be a useful tool for analyzing and studying literature. It
should be noted, also, that there are degrees of deviation in literary language, and that
is where the scales of descriptive and institutional delicacy, as Leech purports,
become relevant. According to Leech, “a linguistic feature will be highly deviant if it
is unique to a low-generality variety of English; if it is common to a number of lowgenerality varieties, or unique to a variety of higher generality, it is to that extent less
deviant. The least deviant or ‘most normal’ feature of all will be that which is
common to all varieties of English (139).” It has been pointed out, however, that in
many studies of foregrounding, linguistic features can be prominent without
necessarily being foregrounded. That means that only those features of prominence
(whether of a single instance or of a pattern) which are arguably important for
readers’ understanding of the text and can be shown to contribute to interpretation
will count as foregrounding.
Some writers have expressed the fear that foregrounding devices may, because
of their very use, lose their defamiliarizing potential, and thus stand in need of
constant replacement. What this means is that the devices considered as unfamiliar or
deviant become familiar once they are used and learnt. The implication here is that
there would be a continuous wavelike substitution and renewal of the devices and
processes by which foregrounding operates. On this issue, however, it has to be stated
that there is no question of words losing their ‘defamiliarizing potential’. The whole
idea of foregrounding is to encourage creativity in literature. Again, writers, like
Nagar, feel that there are similarities between foregrounding and some other theories
of literature. But this feeling seems to be unfounded. Yes, foregrounding may be
90
interested in the bizarre (like, Surrealism) or the absurd (like, the Theatre of the
Absurd); but it goes beyond them to include any usage that is aesthetically
captivating. One can say that foregrounding is more concerned with the linguistic
forms (as against the experiential aspects) than any of the other theories being
compared with it.
For the present researcher, foregrounding means prominence; that is, when
specific linguistic features receive special prominence or attention through the
unusual structures applied – compounding and coupling, neutralization of semantic
opposition, imagery, sound patterns, etc. Their prominence in the text means they
have been foregrounded for the reader’s attention. The researcher, therefore, believes
that all the linguistic features she shall discuss in each of the war texts have already
passed the test of prominence or foregrounding before being singled out for attention
and analysis.
Procedures
The data collected for analysis in this study were drawn from the primary
texts, the novels being analyzed in the study. The stylistic/ linguistic markers in each
of our sample novels are taken systematically, one after another. Stylistic analysis is a
highly selective exercise. As Leech and Short (1995) have pointed out, it is
impossible to select all the features of style in any particular text and it is also difficult
to analyse every single feature identified in the texts. However, the researcher in this
study has tried to provide adequate references from the texts for whatever feature
selected. There are instances where she tries to get all the references for the feature
mentioned, for examples, in the cases of ‘military registers’, ‘idiomatic expressions’
and ‘phrasal verbs’ – such items of usage that stand out most prominently in any of
91
the novels. It should be mentioned that the identification and interpretation of
linguistic features were done simultaneously, in the first part of the discussion, in
Chapters Four and Five. The second aspect of the analysis (Chapter Six) is the
interpretative stage; it sums up the findings made in the two preceding chapters.
Analytical Approach
The analysis of the linguistic features collected from the texts has mainly
followed a qualitative descriptive survey design. Qualitative research employs an
explanation-based methodology. The overall schematic difference between qualitative
and quantitative studies goes thus:
Qualitative Study: Situation––Evaluation/Interpretation––Conclusion (Basis)
Quantitative
Study:
Hypothetical
Evaluation––Testing––Conclusion
(Confirmed or Overtuned)
However, the explanation tone of the qualitative research may change in the
discussion section when the analyst needs to assess the implications of findings.
Following this design of qualitative description, the study has mainly applied
the technique of evaluation/ interpretation to analyze each feature identified in the
sample texts, taking each sample one after the other. The first part of the analysis
(Chapters Four and Five) has involved a simultaneous identification and analysis of
the linguistic features from individual texts. The analysis, however, in a few cases,
has employed some little quantitative information. The use of quantitative description
has been applied only when the linguistic feature, due to its prevalence or frequency
of occurrence in a text, needs to be counted ordinarily. Note that the frequency counts
meant here are not the abstract statistical analyses which mechanizes or reduces the
whole idea of incisive linguistic description into mere number of nouns or any other
92
feature in the text. This study is modern in its approach to linguistic stylistic analysis.
Besides, the subject of analysis, the Nigeria-Biafra War novel, is such that will give
more beneficial insights if the data interpretation is mainly qualitative.
The second part of the analysis (the Conclusion, Chapter Six) has also
employed little quantitative information – ordinary counting of linguistic features
interpreted in the preceding chapters. This has been used mainly to give provable and
repeatable conclusions to the analysis, thereby ensuring validity to the study. The
discoveries or findings have been drawn by systematically following the study’s
research questions. This strategy has an advantage of showing all the steps leading to
the findings of the study. It also creates the possibility of verifying the findings
presented.
Below is a checklist of stylistic-linguistic categories which have guided this
study.
A Checklist of the Stylistic-Linguistic Categories Examined in this Study
The present checklist as drawn up has been sent to two experts in the area of
language analysis, and each has validated these instruments as adequate and suitable
for this study.
Four major areas will be examined:
1. Vocabulary
2. Cohesion
3. Features of Foregrounding
4. Textual and Contextual Meanings
It should be noted that, sometimes, some of the stylistic features seem to overlap, in
the analysis.
93
Vocabulary includes:
i.
Lexis
ii.
Register
iii.
Formulaic units (like, idiomatic collocations, proverbs)
iv.
Dialects/ Nigerianism/ neologism
v.
Epigrams/Aphorisms
vi.
Allusions/ Quotations
Cohesion here involves:
i.
Sentence types
ii.
Peculiar
constructions,
like,
detached
constructions,
parenthesis,
enumeration, embedding
iii.
Asyndeton or Polysyndeton (deliberate omission of connectives versus
abundance of connectives)
iv.
Aposiopesis
v.
Prosiopesis
vi.
Anacoluthon
vii.
Ellipsis
viii.
Syllepsis
ix.
Fronting
Features of Foregrounding include:
i.
Irony
ii.
Satire
iii.
Rhetorical questions/ Questions-in-narrative
94
iv.
Parallelism/ structural repetition: Also included are cases of phonological
patterning such as rhyme, alliteration, or assonance.
v.
Formal Repetition: This includes all cases of anaphora, epiphora, framing,
anadiplosis,
pleonasm/tautology/redundancy
and
other
recursive
constructions
Textual and Contextual Meanings
This is the interpretative part of the analysis, and thus provides a kind of
summary to the earlier part of the stylistic/ linguistic examination. It has often been
stated that to be ignorant of the stylistic techniques is to be ignorant of meanings.
Thus, the analysis, at this point, will try to discover the particular meanings of the
texts.
Note:
Each of our sample texts is checked (analyzed) along the stylistic features
which are in our checklist. However, to avoid repetitions, any linguistic feature which
is adequately described in one sample would not be so thoroughly described in the
next sample where it has also manifested. However, that feature and examples of
usage in the second sample will be identified.
Also, it has been stated that this research is interested in analyzing features
which will project the different perspectives, and true nature of the war novels as a
whole. Therefore, dwelling on features which have already been adequately taken
care of will amount to mere waste of words – only a confirmation of old findings.
Thus, the idea of ‘newer perspectives’ is always born in mind in this analysis, not
necessarily the frequency of occurrence of a feature.
Following the checklist above, the remaining chapters shall be organized as
follows: Chapter Four – Vocabulary, Sentence Structure and Cohesion in the Texts;
95
Chapter Five – Features of Foregrounding in the Texts; and Chapter Six – Textual and
Contextual Meanings in the Nigeria-Biafra War Novels. Chapter Seven is the
Summary and Conclusion.
96
CHAPTER FOUR
VOCABULARY, STRUCTURE AND COHESION IN THE TEXTS
This chapter has examined some features of vocabulary, structure and
cohesion in the war novels selected
Sunset in Biafra
This novel is Elechi Amadi’s autobiography, though limited to his life during the
Nigeria-Biafra War, hence the novel’s sub-title, A Civil War Diary (see its title page).
In the text, Amadi combines factual history with personal reflections. He takes time to
describe the degradations he suffers in a Biafran detention camp, because he has not
believed in the Biafran cause. He also describes how, eventually, he joins the Nigerian
Army to fight against the Biafrans, at the fall of Port Harcourt.
The dominant features of vocabulary and cohesion in Sunset in Biafra include
the use of idioms, proverbs and military jargons.
Idioms
An idiom is a more-or-less fixed expression whose meaning is not the sum of
its constituents and is usually non-literal, i.e. figurative or metaphorical (Jackson 63).
In other words, it is an expression, word, or phrase that has a figurative meaning
separate from the literal meaning or definition of the words of which it is made. Saeed
describes an ‘idiom’ as words collocated that become affixed to each other,
metamorphosing into a fossilized term (60). This collocation (being commonly used
in a group) redefines each component word in the group until the group becomes an
idiomatic expression. Idioms are not necessarily wise sayings, like proverbs, which
summarize philosophies of a people’s life. However, every language has peculiar
97
manners of expression embodied in its idioms. Idioms are, therefore, part of the
vocabulary of a language.
Idioms of a language may not be properly interpreted when translated into
another language. An Igbo idiom, for instance, when translated (literally) into English
may be difficult for the English native speaker to interpret, because English idioms
are different from Igbo idioms. However, certain idioms are more transparent than
others. Transparency in idioms is a situation where the idiom is understood, even if
translated literally. Among the transparent idioms are: ‘lay one’s card on the table’,
meaning ‘to reveal a secret’; ‘keep one’s nose clean’, meaning ‘to avoid getting into
trouble’, etc. An idiom is said to be opaque when one is unable to deduce the true
meaning of the expression, unless one has previously learnt that idiom: ‘kick the
bucket’–to die, ‘pick a bone’– discuss issues, ‘feather your nests’ –enrich yourself,
etc.
In Sunset in Biafra, Amadi’s preferences are for those idioms with the
structure of phrasal verbs, comprising verbs and prepositions, as we can see in the
analogy, below. There are also other idiom types in the text, as evident in the table
following:
S/N
IDIOMATIC EXPRESSION
1
the
rebel
officers
MEANING
…were resisting capture
TYPE
Phrasal verb
holding out in Kaduna (p.8)
2
This bluff paid off (p.28)
was effective
Phrasal verb
3
Man of some standing (p.30)
some status or reputation
Nominal group
4
Telling effect at checkpoints showy and effective
(p.36)
98
Adjectival
5
To keep my nose clean in the to
future (p.34)
6
avoid
getting
into Regular
trouble
(informal)
…ran into (no end of) trouble ran into - encountered, no Phrasal
(p.37)
verb
end of trouble – a great /adverbial
deal of …
7
Civilians … bore the brunt of carried the main negative Regular
their disagreements (p.37)
8
effect or force
…people were worked up to a Agitated
dangerously
high
state
Phrasal verb
of
excitement (p.40)
9
They caused a big stir (p.47)
10
…wormed their way into proceed
one-another’s
11
Commotion
Nominal group
deviously
confidence obsequiously,
(p.50)
please
let down your guard (p.50)
relaxing
a
eager
or Phrasal verb
to
defensive Phrasal verb
posture or state of mind
12
if a defendant felt he had no to have nothing to justify Nominal group
leg to stand on (p.52)
13
his case
…while a case was hanging on adjournment
Participial
fire, a landgrabber could plant
phrase
crops and harvest them (p.53)
14
but I knew it was a pyrrhic victory won at such great Nominal group
victory (p.53)
cost to the victor that it
amounts to a defeat
99
15
The colonel let fly, and the lost his temper
Verbal
shoe found the back of the
soldier’s head (p.147)
16
…had completely gone off his exploded with anger to Phrasal verb
head at last (p.101)
17
the point of losing control
…this was a case of a few enriching themselves
Participial
individuals feathering their
phrase
nests (p.109)
18
…Port Harcourt could not hold survive
out much longer (p.112)
(not
being Phrasal verb
captured), i.e., will be
soon captured
19
…a small garrulous woman Deranged
Adjectival
who they said was a little
unhinged (p.127)
20
Having dug in somewhere in Hidden
Phrasal verb
Potts-Johnson Street (p.140)
21
I kept my head (p.140)
22
…quickly snuffed out the put an end to the attack
stayed calm
Regular
Phrasal verb
attack (p. 142)
23
…this move stemmed off a Stopped
major disastrous setback for
the Federal forces (p.180)
100
Phrasal verb
24
That
put
paid
to
rebel Prevented
Phrasal
ambitions in Ahoada Division.
verb,
informal
(p.181)
25
Take up the rifle (p.149)
to
begin
soldiery
the
job
of Phrasal
verb
(military idiom)
From the above table, the following summary can be drawn regarding the types of
idioms and their number of use in Sunset in Biafra. The names given to them here
have been drawn from their structure.
1. Idioms described as phrasal verbs are thirteen (13) in number. A phrasal verb
consists of verb + particle/preposition. The expression “take up the rifle”, for
example, is made up of a phrasal verb + a complement, with the complement
further decomposable into a modifier (usually an article) + headword. The
description, ‘phrasal verb’, given to this class of idioms is used for easy
reference. It is taken as such because the phrasal verb is the key term in that
type of idiom. Using the same example, “take up the rifle”, “take up” is the
phrasal verb and the key term in the idiom. The complement, “the rifle”, can
always be changed. For examples, “take up the job”, “take up the problem”,
etc. In No. 6, above, note that there are two idioms in one – “ran into no end of
trouble”. The first, “ran into”, belongs to the phrasal verbs; while “no end of
trouble” is an adverbial phrase idiom. Only the first idiom has been considered
in our numerical summary.
2. The participials are two (2), as seen in our table – “hanging fire”, “feathering
their nests”. Just like in the instances described as phrasal verbs, here the term,
101
participial, has been chosen because the key words giving their interpretations
belong to the phrasal adjectives. Here, “hanging fire”, for instance, refers to
the noun “case” outside the idiom. As seen from the table above, darker letters
are used to emphasize the area which the writer describes as idioms.
3. One (1) verbal is found in the table. The difference between what has been
referred to as ‘verbal’ and the phrasal verb is found in their compositions;
while the verbal is made up of two verbs (“let fly”), the phrasal verb consists
of a verb and a particle. In “let fly”, “let” is a finite verb, while “fly” is a bare
infinitive (an infinite verb). The rest of the utterance where the idiom is used
has not been considered, because many other compositions could employ the
same verbal idiom to make their meanings. The meaning of the idiom remains,
but their complementary part can always change.
4. The idioms referred to as ‘regular’ here have the most common structure
associated with idioms – lexical verb + complement. To “bear the brunt” of
something, or to “keep one’s head” has the structural pattern ‘lexical verb +
complement’. The difference between the regular idiom type and the phrasal
verb type is seen in their structure, the former contains a lexical verb (single in
form), while the latter has a phrasal verb (a group of words doing the job of
one verb). They all have a complement, usually a modifier + a headword.
5. The word, adjectival, indicates that the idioms described as such perform the
function of a normal adjective. Two idioms belong to this group, as seen in our
table. The single-word idiom, “telling” effect, as recognized in the passage, is
significant. Some scholars accept single words as idioms, others do not.
Among the first group are Katz and Postal, 1963, and Frazer, 1970. The
second group, who only accepts the multiword expressions as candidates for
102
idioms, includes writers like Fernando and Flavel, 1981, and Strasster, 1982
(Akinwale, 148).
6. Some idioms function as nouns. The term, “nominal group” or noun phrase,
indicates that they are a group of words without a finite verb doing the job of a
normal noun in a sentence. Idioms in this group are four in number, for
instance, “no leg to stand on”, “phyrric victory”, “a big stir”, etc. The idiom,
“no leg to stand on”, can also be taken as imagery. One could derive its
meaning by imagining a situation where one has “no leg”, and thus nothing to
rely on.
In totalty, from our table above, twenty-five idioms have been discovered in
the novel, Sunset in Biafra. A numerical summary on the various kinds of idioms
found in the novel, as discussed above, is shown below:
Idiom Types
Number found
Phrasal verb
13
Participial
2
Verbal
1
Regular
3
Adjectival
2
Nominal group
4
TOTAL
25
The many instances of idioms in Sunset in Biafra indicate that Amadi is
conversant with the English lexicology. Amadi seems to know the exact expression to
use in each circumstance, and their connotative relevance. These idioms can pass as
103
euphemisms or innuendos, for they express serious ideas in an indirect, suggestive,
manner. Generally, the idioms reveal Amadi’s distaste and lack of support for the
Biafran struggle. All that the Biafrans do is “to cause a big stir”, to “’worm’ their way
into one another’s confidence”, “to feather their nests”, to bluff, etc; yet only one
attack from the Federal side is all that is needed to ‘put paid to’ all the skirmishes.
Some of these idioms would be explained, here.
…Port Harcourt could not hold out much longer. (p.112)
This is a mild way of stating the serious fact that ‘Port Harcourt will be captured any
moment’.
That put paid to rebel ambitions in Ahoada Division. (p.181)
The idiom ‘put paid’, here, is an indirect way of referring to the fact that Biafran
incursion in the Ahoada area was effectively repelled.
…this was a case of a few individuals feathering their nests (p.109)
Here, Amadi waves away the Biafran issue as nothing but a few individuals wanting
to enrich themselves.
Having been a soldier, Amadi’s words are full of imagery of force (“hang
fire”), activity (“dug in”), impatience (“let fly”), and politics (“wormed their way”,
“feathering their nests”) associated with the military. Note that ‘worm’ is negatively
connotative. It is not the usual friendly ‘warm’, but the destructive ‘worm’ that is
achieved from the friendship being sought.
Proverbs
As mentioned earlier, a proverb is not an idiom. Granted, they all
communicate ideas indirectly, but proverb is concentrated wisdom of a people. In
proverb, objects and situations familiar to a people are exploited to give strong
104
pictorial impression of the ideas being conveyed. Thus, proverb is culture-based, as
seen in the following examples.
1. It is said that until the cock pretends to lurch drunkenly it really does not
succeed with a hen (p. 67)
2. Monkey work, baboon chop (p. 97) – Pidgin English
These are the only proverbs found in Sunset in Biafra. It is obvious that Amadi prefers
the English idiom to the African or Nigerian proverb.
The image of the cock and the hen in love-play is a familiar one for most
ethnic communities where fowls (cocks, hens, and chicks) freely move about in the
homesteads. In 2, the imagery of the monkey and the baboon are familiarly African,
too. It is often employed to convey the injustices inherent in society. In the text, Joe,
the kind soldier, uses it to describe the injustices in the Biafran army, “this hopeless
army. Monkey work, baboon chop.” The saying is in Pidgin English, a language
common in Amadi’s locality. Most people in the riverine minority tribes of Nigeria
use the Pidgin English like a first language. The word ‘chop’ means ‘eat’. The
expression means ‘while the monkey does all the work, it is the baboon that takes all
the credit’.
Military Jargons
They include the following:
Combing: Amadi describes this as ‘crude intelligence work’ – “Hundreds of people,
armed with matchets and cudgels, would invade an area and search for suspicious
objects and persons” (p. 39).
Amadi’s sarcasm concerning this exercise is evident in the passage below,
105
When food was short, farms were popular targets for the combers. Yams and
other crops were ‘combed’ out almost as a matter of routine. Farmers who
objected to this practice were branded saboteurs. (p. 40)
There is a sarcastic indication that rather than search and ‘comb’ out the enemies, the
‘hungry’ Biafran soldiers are more interested in ‘combing’ out food items to serve
their perennial hunger.
Propaganda: This means deliberate misinformation, as illustrated in this passage:
By 14 May, shells had began (sic) to land on the outskirts of Port Harcourt.
The rumour, however, was that determined saboteurs had got hold of mortars
and were shelling from hideouts. Accordingly the search for saboteurs was
intensified. (p. 128)
(Take note of the error in ‘had began’. The correct participle is ‘had begun’).
Double back: go back the same route
I doubled back as one or two [large green flies] settled on me (p. 95)
Double up: bend the body over sharply
…double up my legs (p. 96)
Fan out: to spread out in the shape of an open hand-held fan
‘Fan out! Fan out!’ I cried. (p. 134) – when the detainees get their freedom at
the fall of Port Harcourt. (It should be noted that Amadi uses these military
terms even when the occasion is not military. The three terms above, for
examples, have been employed to describe non-military actions.
Mopping up: ensuring that any remaining resistance in a captured city is finished off
At the mopping up stage, the soldiers cannot as yet tell friends from foe. (p.
140)
Casualties: wounded or dead persons (p. 142)
106
Give a ‘rocket’: a severe scold (p. 147)
Fall out: to leave organized ranks or positons
Amadi remembers how in his younger days, Colonel Adekunle would, after giving
him a terrible scold, order him to “fall out!” (p. 148)
Never Again
Flora Nwapa, in Never Again, satirizes, in highly theatrical terms, the Biafran
propaganda machines during the civil war. For Nwapa, the Civil War, on the Biafran
side, is propaganda warfare. Hence, in the novel, Never Again, she portrays the
heroine, Kate, as the one interrogative mind, who refuses to be deceived by the
military propaganda and the general falsehood around her. For Kate, it is apparent that
Biafra is losing the battle, judging from the incessant evacuations her family and
others have suffered in many areas. They have fled from Enugu, Onitsha and Port
Harcourt. Also, Elele, at the beginning of the story, is about to fall too. Yet the news
remains positive: “The gallant Biafran soldiers wiped them [Nigerian forces] all out”
(p. 21). Eventually, Kate comes to terms with the fact that nobody wants to face the
truth: “We couldn’t win a civil war with mere impotent words meaningless words. We
would win with guns, guns – and arms and ammunition.” (p. 45)
In the areas of lexis and cohesion, a significant aspect of Nwapa’s text is its
use of simple sentences and vocabularies. An attempt will be made, in the sub-section
following, to examine some of the passages which reflect these stylistic features.
107
Lexis and Sentence Structure
Nwapa’s preference for simple sentences and vocabularies is illustrated in the
following passages:
1. I meant to live at all costs. I meant to see the end of the war. Dying was
terrible. I wanted to live so that I could tell my friends on the other side what it
meant to be at war – a civil war at that, a war that was to end all wars. I
wanted to tell them that reading it in books was nothing at all; they just would
not understand it. I understood it. I heard the deadly whine of shells. No books
taught us this. (p.1)
2. The exodus from Ugwuta continued. My God, so there were so many people
in Ugwuta! Old and young, men and women and children. Goats and sheep.
They were walking, walking out of Ugwuta to an unknown destination. Soon,
perhaps the buildings and the trees would develop legs and begin to walk. No
it was not possible. (p.55)
The different sentences to be found in each passage include:
Passage 1
This passage contains a total of eight sentences. The following are their structures:
1. I meant to live at all costs.
2. I meant to see the end of the war.
3. Dying was terrible.
4. I wanted to live so that I could tell my friends on the other side what it meant
to be at war – a civil war at that, a war that was to end all wars.
5.
I wanted to tell them that reading it in books was nothing at all; they just
would not understand it.
6. I understood it.
108
7. I heard the deadly whine of shells.
8. No books taught us this.
With the exception of nos. 4 and 5 above, the rest of the sentences here are simple
sentences, by their structure. Their component parts are shown in the table, below:
S/no
Subject
Verb
Complement
Object
Object
(subject)
(indirect)
(direct)
1
I
meant
to live
2
I
meant
to see
Adverbial
at all costs
the end of
the war
3
Dying
was
Terrible
6
I
understood
It
7
I
heard
the deadly
whine
of
shells
8
No
taught
Us
This
books
Nos. 4 and 5 are more complex in structure.
Analysis of Sentence 4:
I wanted to live so that I could tell my friends on the other side what it meant to be
at war – a civil war at that, a war that was to end all wars.
This sentence, without the repeating constructions, is complex. A complex sentence is
a sentence containing one main clause and one or more subordinate clauses.
I wanted to live: main clause
109
so that I could tell my friends on the other side: subordinate clause (adverbial,
of reason)
what it meant to be at war: subordinate clause (noun)
The repeating constructions in this sentence are introduced by the punctuation mark,
dash (–).
a civil war at that: nominal phrase + adverbial (disjunct)
a war that was to end all wars: a nominal phrase with an embedded adjectival
clause.
These constructions are examples of epiphora; because the term ‘war’ found at the
end of the sentence is repeated in the adjoining constructions.
Analysis of Sentence 5
I wanted to tell them that reading it in books was nothing at all; they just would
not understand it.
This construction would have been two separate sentences; if the punctuation-mark,
semi-colon (;), has been a full-stop. But with the semi-colon, the construction remains
one sentence. By this, the writer shows the closeness of the two thoughts. It is a
compound-complex sentence; made up of two main clauses and one subordinate
clause.
I wanted to tell them (something): main clause
they just would not understand it: main clause
that reading it in books was nothing at all: noun clause
Passage 2 is made up of the following constructions:
1. The exodus from Ugwuta continued.
110
2. My God, so there were so many people in Ugwuta!
3. Old and young, men and women and children.
4. Goats and sheep.
5. They were walking, walking out of Ugwuta to an unknown destination.
6. Soon, perhaps the buildings and the trees would develop legs and begin to
walk.
7. No it was not possible.
The word ‘constructions’ is preferred here, because not all the seven items are full
‘sentences’, the way they are written. Nos. 3 and 4 are not complete sentences. They
have been used stylistically, to show ellipsis. Here, the initial part of the sentences has
been left out. This stylistic device is called ‘prosiopesis’.
Their structures go thus:
1.
Subject
Verb
The exodus from Ugwuta
Continued
2.
Vocative
Conjunct
Subject 1
V
S2
Adverbial
My God
So
There
Were
so many people
in Ugwuta
3.
Subject 1
Verb
Subject 2
(There)
(are)
old and young, men and women and children
4.
Subject 1
Verb
Subject 2
(There)
(are)
goats and sheep
111
5.
Subject
Verb
Adverbial
Adverbial
They
were walking
out of Ugwuta
to an unknown destination
6.
Clause
Adjunct
Subjunct Subject
Soon
perhaps
1
the
Verb
buildings would
and the trees
Clause
(Soon)
(perhaps)
2
(the
Object
Conjunction
Legs
And
develop
buildings would begin
to walk
and the trees)
This is a double (compound) sentence, containing two clauses of equal strength
(joined by a coordinating conjunction).
7
Evocative
Subject
Verb
Subject Complement
No
It
Was
not possible
Errors of Syntax
Some of the syntactic errors noticed in Never Again are evident in the analysis,
above. For instances, Sentences 3 and 4 in the second passage are not complete
sentences.
1. Old and young, men and women and children.
2. Goats and sheep.
Much as we know that literary writers in an effort to foreground certain images may
commit some grammatical blunders. This fact is likelier to happen in poetry, hence
the idea of ‘poetic license’. In the text, however, one is not sure whether Nwapa
112
intentionally indulges in such grammatical mistakes to create some stylistic effects or
whether the errors are real careless errors.
The grammatical practice is to either join these phrases (our Sentences 3 and
4, above) to the preceding sentence or to add certain items to make them complete
sentences:
My God, so there were so many people in Ugwuta – old and young, men and
women and children, including goats and sheep.
Or
3. There are the old and young, men and women and children.
4. There are also goats and sheep.
Though one may call these slips grammatical mistakes, they are, somehow,
elements of Nwapa’s style, just like the repetition of ‘walking’ in Sentence 5 of the
same passage 2:
They were walking, walking out of Ugwuta to an unknown destination.
This sounds like poetry. Nwapa has stylistically captured the emotion displayed by
Kate, as she stares at the sheer number of people (together with their property) fleeing
Ugwuta.
Another passage which aptly reflects the nature of lexis and sentences in
Never Again goes thus:
‘Kal has good news,’ my husband said.
In spite of all my frustrations, I listened. ‘Good news. We hear good
news every day,’ I said under my breath. ‘What is the good news?” I
asked. Where is the enemy “bottled up” this time. In Aggrey Road?’
113
Kal was angry. It showed in his eyes. But he controlled his anger. Chudi made
to say something, thought better of it and shut his mouth. Only his compressed
lips and his eyes betrayed his anger.
Then Kal said. ‘Kate! people like you should go into detention and remain
there until the end of the war, and the state of Biafra fully established. You are
too dangerous.’ (p. 2)
The above text is taken from a conversation between Kate, Chudi, her husband, and
Kal, their friend. Being a conversation, it is made up of indirect speeches: The
sentences in the passage are short and most of them are simple in form.
1. In spite of all my frustrations, I listened.
2.
‘Good news. …
3. Kal was angry.
4. It showed in his eyes.
5. But he controlled his anger.
Punctuation errors in some of the sentences have led to sentence splices.
1. Good news. …
This should have been ‘Good news! …’ (An exclamation mark will change the
sentence splice into a grammatically correct exclamatory sentence).
2. “Where is the enemy “bottled up” this time. In Aggrey Road?’
Here, a comma (,) is better than a full stop:
“Where is the enemy “bottled up” this time, in Aggrey Road?”
3.
Then Kal said. ‘Kate! people like you should go into detention …
Here, there should not be a full stop after Then Kal said.
114
It is one expression, not two. Then Kal said, ‘Kate! People like you should go into
detention ...’
Also, there should not have been an exclamation mark after ‘Kate’, it
fragments the sentence It is better to say …’Kate, people like you should go into
detention and remain there until the end of the war, and the state of Biafra fully
established!’
The sentence splices here (whether conscious or not) reflect the disorganized
state of the speakers/ the participants at this period.
It is difficult to exclude other features which appear within another feature
being analyzed. In the passage above, for example, both irony and satire are depicted.
The fact that friends and relations take offence when people make truthful comments
about Biafra (as seen in this passage) is both ironical and satirical. In the same vein,
the repetition of the phrase ‘good news’ is satirical and ironical, for the news is
actually ‘bad news’, which is made to sound good.
Come Thunder
In the novel, Onuora Ossie Enekwe recounts the horrors of the Nigeria-Biafra
War through the experiences of Meka in different battle fronts. This young boy, Meka
(only fifteen years old) is among the many under-aged youths who hurriedly
volunteered to fight for Bala (Enekwe’s indirect word for Biafra), their beloved
country. The reckless courage of the Balan soldiers and the huge waste of human lives
experienced during the war have been aptly foregrounded by the writer in all forms of
imagery, linguistic parallelism, ironies/ indirectness,/satire and military diction. In this
chapter, only the writer’s military diction and sentence patterns will be analyzed.
115
Military Registers
Fowler (1979) has defined register as a set of contextual features bringing
about a characteristic use of formal features. For Halliday (1978), register is
determined by what is taking place, who is taking part and what part the language is
playing. The presumption here, as noted by Quirk and Greenbaum (2000), is that the
same speaker has a repertoire of varieties and habitually switches over to an
appropriate one as occasion arises. In Come Thunder, which is centred on the
experiences of the Biafran soldiers in the war fronts, Enekwe has naturally adopted
those lexical items peculiarly used by the military – the Nigerian military, in
particular. This is in consonance with contemporary stylistics which does not separate
content from form. Here, Enekwe’s theme has naturally influenced his form of
expression, his military registers.
The military terms found in Come Thunder include the following, in their
alphabetical order:
Alphabets
Military Terms
A
Advance, ambush, ammunition, armoured cars, artillery
B
Batman, battle, bayonet, bomb, bombardment, bullet
C
Camp, cannon, carbine, casualties, civilians, commandments, corporal,
cover, crater
D
Defeats, double-barrel
E
Enemy
F
Front, fusillade
G
Garrison, genocide, grenade
H
Howitzer
I
Infantry
116
L
Lieutenant
M
Mark 3, martial music, massacre, mines, Molotov Cocktail, mortar
O
Officer
P
Parade, parapet, patrol, pistol, platoon, private, propaganda
R
Rebel, reconnaissance, rifles, retreat
S
Saboteurs, sergeant, shell, shrapnel, sub-machines
T
Tactics, tanks, trench, troop
V
Vandalism, violence
W
Withdrawal
Other Military Slang Expressions
The use of slang is common among soldiers. Slang shows intimacy and
solidarity among colleagues, peers, and friends. It is worthy of note that some of the
slang used in present day English are derived from the military field, and this
followed World Wars I and II. Major events in history have naturally brought many
terms into the English vocabulary. Many slang expressions have been adopted from
railway workers, criminals and police, airline workers, truck drivers, teenagers and
students, etc. Some of the military slang terms in Come Thunder are peculiar to the
Nigerian military, especially the erstwhile Biafran soldiers (the Balan soldiers),
described in the novel. They are as follows:
1. Ammo: This is the shortened form of ammunition. Ammunition are devices or
substances of human destruction.
2. AWOL: “desertion, insubordinate behaviour, illegal duty, and others triable under
Army laws” (Lectures and Discussion During 82 Division NA Study Period (Sept
117
1998). This slang has extended to general usage; means ‘Absence Without Official
Leave’. In Come Thunder, at the ‘Bachelors’ Eve’ of Lt. Umana; John, one of the
officers in attendance, allayed the worries of his colleagues when he tells them he is
not on AWOL, but has got official permission for his absence (p. 73).
3. Coffin Ogbunigwe: ‘Ogbunigwe’ is an Igbo terminology, which can be translated
as ‘killer of multitudes’. It is a land-mine constructed by the ‘Balan’ army engineers.
(p. 111)
4. Proper appreciation: This is used when a particular combat situation is well
assessed. In the text, we see Umana congratulating his sergeant for proper
appreciation (p. 82).
5. Recce: The full meaning is reconnaissance. Reconnaissances, according to Scott
(77), are war-like operations for the purpose of procuring information of the positions
and strength of corps of the enemy. Without such knowledge, no well-concerted
measures of attack or defense can be made. In the text, “recce patrol” is mentioned
severally.
6. Sabo: (short for saboteur). In a war, somebody who deliberately undermines the
war efforts of his own group is a saboteur.
7. Parade expressions: ‘Double’ – move quickly; ‘Fall in’ – form a straight line.
The Nigerian Soldiers’ Language (Pidgin) and Behaviour
In Come Thunder, in addition to the military registers, there is also the
peculiar Nigerian soldiers’ language, a mixture of Pidgin (Nigerian Pidgin) and
English (Nigerian English). If the soldier is an officer, probably with a higher
education, he often uses good English, but the rest of the junior officers usually resort
118
to Pidgin English. It should be noted that almost all the characters in the text are
soldiers (the unskilled soldiers); as such the majority of the dialogue are in Pidgin. In
Nigeria, Pidgin is patronized in the Army and the Police, because many people of
different ethnic groups mingle together there.
Going by what Elugbe and Omamar (in Bamgbose, 1982) describe as pure
Nigerian Pidgin (NP), where the diction is ‘uncorrupted’ by English (67), one,
therefore, may not categorize the Pidgin in Come Thunder as pure Nigerian Pidgin. It
is rather a Pidgin which has undergone some form of ‘decreolization’. Decreolization
is a situation where there is an interference of Standard English on the NP, when both
languages co-exist in the same environment. In this decreolized state, the NP,
especially in its written form, becomes more and more like English. This we can see
in the Pidgin expressions in Come Thunder:
“You call yourselves soldiers; people who don waste their manhood poking
harlots all over the town…Everybody wan’ be soldier, soldier for mouth. You
no fit march, but you call yourself soldier. You see that one who de march as
if they put spoke for him penis… or fit be he de dance ajasco music. Make you
dance ajasco now … bullets will play ajasco for you soon … (p. 5)
In the passage, above, “bullets will play ajasco for you soon” is Pidgin, but
with a Standard English interference. The pure NP will go like this: “bulets go ple
ajasco for una sun” (both grammar and spelling are affected). In pure NP, spellings
are as pronounced, the same way it happens in the indigenous Nigerian languages.
Again, in the above passage, the earlier part of the first sentence, “You call yourselves
soldiers”, is in good English, though the remaining part is in Pidgin. This means that it
is not only a Pidgin that is decreolized (in grammar and spelling). In the soldiers’
language, often, there is code-mixing, where the Pidgin and the Standard English
119
languages are combined in the same utterance. Another illustration will help to depict
this device of code-mixing:
“You must keep firing at them. You fire at one small-small and at the next
small-small. Make you just shoot” (Lt Uwana, giving instructions to his
platoon boys, p. 78).
The two languages of Pidgin and Standard English are seen here: “You must keep
firing at them” (Standard English); “Make you just shoot” (Pidgin).
Enekwe’s Pidgin in Come Thunder often serves as comic relief, just as Roscoe
(1971) has remarked about the use of Pidgin in African literature. It seems that
Enekwe deliberately exploits this medium, first, to depict the soldiers’ language; and,
second, to create a comic relief from the ugly and hostile realities of war.
From the soldiers’ language (refer to passage, above, taken from p. 5), other
issues concerning their behaviour can be deduced. Soldiers are harsh and violent
especially when it comes to enforcing discipline. Again, because soldiers are either
fighting a war or training for war, their language has a peculiarity which, oftentimes,
people regard as lacking refinement. As Tim O’Brien puts it, “Send guys to war, they
come home talking dirty.” (O’Brien, in Meyer, 552-561). When Chris Okigbo, the
poet, lost his life trying to defend the Nsukka sector during the Nigeria-Biafra war,
many cynics blamed him, for having abandoned the relatively superior calling of a
poet for the relatively inferior profession of a soldier (Obiechina, 1992). This shows
how the military profession with its vulgar language is viewed. The references to
‘penis’, ‘poking of harlots’, in the passage, above, are indications of the crudity of
soldiers’ language.
120
Sentence Patterns
Some passages will be examined to determine the common sentence patterns
in the Come Thunder. This will involve a structural analysis of these sentences.
Passage 1:
At night every place was quiet, but horrible news plagued the mind.
Slaughter and bitterness. Woe upon woe. Too many battles. Twenty
enemy soldiers killed at Mere sector … thirty rebels dead at Amari.
News from the B.B.C. News from the Voice of America, Radio Togo,
Radio Ghana, everywhere. Hope and despair in combat in the mind.
(p.107)
In this passage, one sees a double sentence, and other fragmented sentences. A double
sentence is made up of two coordinate clauses, usually joined by a coordinating
conjunction.
At night every place was quiet, but horrible news plagued the mind
First clause: At night every place was quiet
Second clause: Horrible news plagued the mind
These clauses are all main clauses which can be independent of each other. In other
words, they are two different sentences which have been joined together for stylistic
reasons. In the two clauses, two semantic opposites are brought together: ‘quiet’ and
‘horrible’, quiet place/ horrible news. One sees the literary device of oxymoron; that
is, the juxtaposition of two opposites. This helps to depict the heightened anxiety of
the people at this time.
A fragment is an incomplete sentence. From the passage, above, the following
fragments will be seen:
1. Slaughter and bitterness.
121
2. Woe upon woe.
3. Too many battles.
4. Twenty enemy soldiers killed at Mere sector … thirty rebels dead at
Amari.
5. News from the B.B.C.
6. News from the Voice of America, Radio Togo, Radio Ghana, everywhere.
7. Hope and despair in combat in the mind.
These enumerated items would have remained homogenous parts of the first sentence,
but they have been made heterogeneous (syntactically and semantically), to
emphasize how these horrible news filter into the mind. If the writer wanted, he would
use a semi-colon to mark off these phrases; thereby making all these phrases remain
in the first sentence. If that happened, the sentence would become a compound
complex one:
At night every place was quiet, but horrible news plagued the mind:
slaughter and bitterness; woe upon woe; too many battles; twenty
enemy soldiers killed at Mere sector … thirty rebels dead at Amari;
news from the B.B.C; news from the Voice of America, Radio Togo,
Radio Ghana, everywhere; hope and despair in combat in the mind.
Ellipsis
Another option is to look at Enekwe’s passage as employing the device of
ellipsis. In ellipsis, some material is left out since its repetition is felt to be
unnecessary. Ellipsis is common in conversations: “Two glasses, please”, which fully
means “I want two glasses of wine, please. Such materials omitted relate either to
nouns or verbs. In the passage being analysed, the fragmented sentences can assume
full forms, like:
122
1. (News of) slaughter and bitterness (plagued the mind).
2. (News of) woe upon woe (plagued the mind).
3. (News of) too many battles (plagued the mind).
4. (News, like,) twenty enemy soldiers killed at Mere sector … thirty rebels
dead at Amari (plagued the mind).
5. News from the B.B.C (plagued the mind).
6. News from the Voice of America, Radio Togo, Radio Ghana, everywhere
(plagued the mind).
7. Hope and despair (were) in combat in the mind.
As we can see, the first three sentences are structurally the same; for example:
News of slaughter and bitterness plagued the mind
subject (noun phrase)
verb
object
Embedding and Subordination
In Sentence 4, another stylistic device termed embedding or subordination is
found. Here, one sentence, clause or phrase is included within another. Thus, in this
instance, the following structure appears:
News (like, twenty enemy soldiers killed at Mere sector … thirty rebels dead at
Amari) plagued the mind.
Here, two past participial phrases have been embedded in a simple sentence:
News plagued the mind
S
V
O
First embedded past participial phrase: “twenty enemy soldiers killed at Mere sector”
Second embedded past participial phrase: “thirty rebels dead at Amari”
123
The punctuation mark ‘…’ (ellipsis) found in between the participial phrases
shows that other news items have been left out. It indicates that there are so many
news items that plague the mind.
The structure of Sentence 7 is different. It is the only one of the statements
without the verb ‘plagued’.
Hope and despair were in combat in the mind
S
V
A
A
Note that the coupling of the two contradictory terms, ‘hope’ and ‘despair’ is like the
type seen in the first sentence of this passage, where ‘quiet’ and ‘horrible’ have been
juxtaposed. The device as noted before is oxymoron, and it helps to show the
confusion in the minds of people at the war period.
From the foregoing, Enekwe seems to have the poetic license of using
sentences that are not altogether grammatical, but poetic and acceptable in the literary
parlance. Occasionally, Enekwe intentionally stylistically elongates his constructions;
as seen in the illustration below.
Passage 2:
Through the haze of the noon sun, Meka discerned the British Ferret
armoured cars which gradually become specters of iron monsters, built
by Lucifer and his servants, hidden in the entrails of hell for a billion
years, abnormal steel tortoises with coffin-loads of death, driven by
red-eyed, fat, sweaty British Mercenaries white as scalded pigs and
smoking marijuana in pipes, made of iron and as big as the barrel of a
machine gun; iron huts upon which an iroko tree had crushed; metal
houses which became mobile after roasting and consuming their
tenants…, monstrous steel land tuna fish… (p. 83)
124
Aposiopesis
One would have termed the above construction a sentence, but for the fact that
it did not end with a full stop, question mark, or exclamation mark. Rather, the ellipsis
(…) at the end of the sentence indicates that the thought or sentence has been broken
off before it is completed. This technique of incompleteness is termed aposiopesis. It
is usually employed in moments of emotions. The above construction is of interest,
however, not just because the writer employs aposiopesis – a breaking off of thought
– but because the utterance has been purposely lengthened. This is the longest
construction found in the text.
The utterance is made up of one main clause, three subordinate adjectival
clauses, and many other types of phrases some of which would be mentioned here.
Main clause:
Meka discerned the British Ferret armoured cars.
Subordinate clauses (Adjectival):
3.
which gradually became specters of iron monsters (describing ‘armoured cars’)
4.
upon which an iroko tree had crushed (describing ‘iron huts’)
5.
which became mobile after roasting and consuming their tenants… (describing
‘metal houses’)
Participial Phrases (participles are verbal adjectives): We find both the pastparticipial and the present-participial phrases in this passage.
Past-Participial Phrases
1. built by Lucifer and his servants (describing ‘iron monsters)
2. hidden in the entrails of hell for a billion years (describing ‘iron monsters)
125
3. driven by red-eyed, fat sweaty British mercenaries …(describing ‘steel
tortoises’)
4. made of iron and as big as the barrel of a machine gun (describing ‘pipes’)
Present-Participial Phrase
1. smoking marijuana (describing the British mercenaries)
Noun Phrases (subject-compliments or in apposition to ‘the British Ferret armoured
cars’)
1. specters of iron monsters (subject complement)
2. abnormal steel tortoises (in apposition)
3.
iron huts (in apposition)
4. metal houses (in apposition)
5. monstrous steel tuna fish (in apposition)
In this passage, as in many other passages in Come Thunder, Enekwe employs a
complex of syntactic structures in creating different images of fear, destruction and
death. Here, one also notices the metaphors, similes, personification, hyperbole and
symbolism employed to further intensify and elaborate the objects of description.
Note that the figures of speech will be taken in the next chapter. However, a brief
mention will be made of some of the figures found in this sentence analysis.
All the five noun phrases, above, are metaphors for ‘the British Ferret
armoured cars’. Note that metaphor, like the simile, is used for comparison; but, while
simile uses words, such as, ‘like’, ‘as’, ‘seems’, metaphor does not. It compares
directly: for instance, ‘John is a lion’, not ‘John is like a lion’. These metallic
metaphors show the monstrous strength of the armoured cars, and the fear and
foreboding they arouse in people.
126
These similes help us to picture the shapes and nature of mercenaries and their
smoking pipes:
1. (the) red-eyed, fat, sweaty mercenaries (were) white as scalded pigs
2. …smoking marijuana in pipes …as big as the barrel of a machine gun
Personification exists in this construction – “metal houses…became mobile after
roasting and consuming their tenants”. These metal houses (armoured cars) have the
human capacities of ‘roasting and consuming their tenants’.
The phrase, ‘built by Lucifer and his servants’, is symbolic of wicked, deadly
and devilish enterprise of the devil. Also, ‘hidden in the entrails of hell for a billion
years’ is both an exaggeration (hyperbole) and symbolic of the heinous nature of these
war weapons. The personification, metaphor, hyperbole, symbolism and simile
that abound in the text all help to depict the mere waste of lives which, ironically,
seem to be all the war has achieved.
Half of a Yellow Sun
Chimamanda Adichie belongs to the more contemporary novelists who still
address that old wound of 1967-1970. For Krishnan (2010), the newer literature
represents the striving of a younger generation to remember the trauma of the past and
to forge a sense of kinship and identity through their shared connection in community.
Otagburuagu’s Echoes of Violence (published in 2004, many years after the war) may
also be ranked among this group, except that the writer may not be considered as
belonging to the younger generation (that is, in the sense of people who did not
witness the war, but are writing about it). Otagburuagu, by virtue of age, witnessed
the 1967-1970 war, though his novel is young/ recent. The implication of a
contemporary novel on the Nigerian Civil War is that its likelihood of containing
127
more relevant contemporary issues regarding the subject is higher than the older
Nigerian war novels. These newer Nigeria-Biafra works have, in many ways, marked
“the entrance of Biafra and the Biafran War into transnational memory” (Krishnan,
2010).
Adichie’s interest in the war is remarkable, for she was born in 1977, seven
years after the war ended. Yet, she tells the story like a first-hand witness. However,
Adichie pays homage to her huge literary inheritance – the older war writers from
whose works she has borrowed ideas. The work is a true faction: combining both
reality and fiction. The factual / historical characters and events of the war are woven
around some probably fictitious characters of Professor Odenigbo (a university don),
Olanna (his girlfriend and, later, his wife), Ugwu (their houseboy), Kainene (Olanna’s
twin-sister), and Richard (Kainene’s British boyfriend). To a large extent, these
civilians belong to the upper class; they are not like the rural people in Otagburuagu’s
(2004) Nigeria-Biafra War story. All the same, the war has taken its toll on them. Half
of a Yellow Sun raises many stylistic issues. Multilingualism (Igbo-English codeswitching and code-mixing) is chief among them. Also relevant are the writer’s
extensive use of the English lexicon; vivid imagery; sentence structure/ parallelism,
and keen interest in the natural and supernatural worlds. This chapter emphasizes the
English lexicon and sentence structure; the next chapter will discuss other features of
foregrounding, parallelism, the natural and the supernatural and irony.
The English Lexicon and the Igbo Tradition
Today, the debate which has dominated the African literary scene in the past
fifty years about the use of the English language versus the vernacular languages in
African literature has, to a large extent, been moderated. It is no longer a question of
128
extreme ‘radicalism’ or ‘accommodationism’. The former refers to those critics who
call for immediate adoption of indigenous African languages, Obi Wali and Ngugi
Wa Thiongo, for instance. Accommodationists, here, refer to those who favour an
outright use of imperialist languages (like, Leopold Sedar Senghor of Senegal). In
Nigeria, today, many writers recognize the close connection between language and
political/ cultural emancipation, and could quickly have embraced the indigenous
Nigerian languages as a formal means of writing literature. However, the utilitarian
role of English in Nigeria, as a symbol of unity (the only mode of communication)
among the various ethnic groups in the country, leaves writers not much choice but to
continue to rely on the language. The writers have, thus, devised new ways of
contextualizing aspects of our indigenous culture and meaning in their use of English.
More and more Nigerian writers stylistically deploy the vernacular expressions/
meanings in their works. Apart from Chinua Achebe, Amos Tutuola, Wole Soyinka,
Gabriel Okara, and J.P. Clark-Bekederemo, whom many critics have studied, there are
other writers, like Ossie Enekwe, Emeka Otagburuagu, and Chimamanda Adichie
(most of whom are contemporary war writers), who have infused in their literary
works the Nigerian indigenous traditions. Adichie’s war novel, Half of a Yellow Sun,
is a strong testimony of the stylistic efforts being made by many Nigerian/ Igbo
writers at imbuing the vernacular/ Igbo traditions into their creative works.
Adichie’s novel has many vernacular (Igbo) loan words and expressions,
much more than seen in Otagburuagu’s Echoes of Violence, which has been
established as a study in Igbo worldview and communication strategies (Otagburuagu
and Anidi 19). Half of a Yellow Sun is like a text purposely constructed to teach its
readers the Igbo language. Many utterances are brazenly written in their vernacular
forms; some come as transliteration of Igbo expressions (as mostly seen in Achebe);
129
others as meaning-translations. Very few of the usages, however, belong to the Igbo
wise sayings or proverbs (as seen in Otagburuagu’s Echoes of Violence) or Nigerian
Pidgin (as seen in Enekwe’s Come Thunder). Adichie’s main procedure of language
use in Half of a Yellow Sun is code-switching, which comes in form of translations –
Igbo expressions translated into English, and English expressions translated into Igbo.
One of the shortcomings of this device is that it causes redundancy. Meanings seem to
be repeated (especially to the bilingual). Nevertheless, the text’s main objective of
acculturating the Nigerian tradition into the English language seems to be achieved.
Hence, apart from show-casing the Igbo language/ culture to the wider world, the text
also provides encouragement to many Nigerian writers/ scholars researching on the
unique issues of definition, identification, classification, intelligibility and norm of
‘Nigerian English’.
In Half of a Yellow Sun, one sees that distinctiveness of Igbo English which
writers, as Igboanusi (2001), assert manifests itself in experimentation in language, in
recreating distinct Igbo discourse in English, and in stylistic innovations. The writer
uses the native language of the characters (mostly Igbo) to capture some of their
socio-cultural habits – emotions, greetings, abuses, and conversations. As mentioned
before, the major procedure employed by Adichie in expressing this Igbo tradition in
the text is code-switching, where the speaker moves back and forth between English
and Igbo languages. Sometimes, there is, also, code-mixing within a particular
utterance; that is, when the speaker uses (mixes) the two languages within a particular
utterance.
130
Translations
Below is a list of some of the English-Igbo/ Igbo-English translations in Half of a
Yellow Sun:
1. ‘Kedu afa gi? What’s your name? Master asked (p. 5)
2.
‘Itetago? Are you awake?’ (p. 143)
3. ‘Our eyes have seen plenty, anyi afujugo anya,’ Obiozo said. (p. 144)
Translation: English to Igbo
4. ‘Yes, my brother. Dalu. Thank you.’ (p. 145)
Code-switching – English, Igbo, English; translation – Igbo to English)
5. ‘Do you want some bread?’ …. ‘I choro bread?’ (p. 145)
The assumed Igbo translation here is a mix of Igbo and English. Adichie is a
typical Nigerian Igbo, who has been greatly influenced by the English language.
Such people can hardly make an utterance in their own native Igbo without,
somehow, adding a word of English.
6. When Olanna loses many of her relatives in the Kano massacres, many friends
and relatives “came by to say ndo – sorry – and to shake their heads …” (p.
157)
7.
‘How are things? A na-emekwa?’ Master asked. (p. 173)
8. ‘Ekwuzikwananu nofu! Don’t say that!’ (p. 195)
9. ‘O maka, it is very nice’ Harrison’s admiration of Ugwu’s room. (p. 210)
10. Children soon surrounded them, chanting ‘Onye ocha, white man,’ reaching
out to feel Mr Richard’s hair. He said, ‘Kedu? Hello, what’s your name?’ (p.
211)
11. ‘What am I to say to him? Gwa ya gini? (rhetorical questions) Olanna’s
mother was unhappy about her husband’s affairs with other women (p. 217)
131
12. ‘Anugo m, I have heard you,’ he said (p.219)
13. ‘Unu anokwa ofuma? Did you stay well? (p. 222)
14. ‘Nkem, please open, biko, please open’ (p. 225)
15. I said you will give me my money today! Tata! (p. 225)
16. ‘Ejima m’ Kainene said. Olanna could not remember the last time Kainene
had called her my twin (p. 247)
17. ‘O mu nwanyi,’ he said quietly. ‘She had a girl. Yesterday.’ (p. 247)
18. ‘Bia nwanyi!’ Come back, woman! Okoromadu was talking to the woman who
nearly abandons her jaundiced hungry baby to him because he announces
there are no more supplies to give to the people. (p. 270)
19. ‘Anyi ga-achota ya, we will find her’, her mother said’ (p.431)
Also, there is one translation from Hausa to English seen in the text:
20. ‘Na gode. Thank you, Hajia,’ Olanna said; while conversing with
Muhammed’s mother (p. 46). Note that the writer tries to capture the different
languages and dialects in Nigeria.
Code-Mixing (the Non-Translated Igbo Expressions)
Some non-translated Igbo expressions have often been mixed with English,
the main language of narration in Half of a Yellow Sun. The following passages
illustrate this:
21. ‘Ngwa, go to the kitchen, there can be something you can eat in the fridge. (p.
5)
22. His mother would be preparing the evening meal now, pounding akpu in the
mortar (p. 7)
23. ‘They were opportunities to find her bent over, fanning the firewood or
chopping ugu leaves for her mother’s soup pot’. (p. 8)
132
24. …his mother will rub his body with okwuma (p. 14)
25. His grand-mother had not needed to grow her favourite herbs, arigbe, because
it grew wild everywhere. (p. 15)
The only indication to the meaning of arigbe comes four lines away from its first
mention ‘she cooked him spicy yam porridge with arigbe.
25. ‘moi-moi’
27. ‘uziza’
28. ‘ori-okpa’
(all on p. 86)
29. ‘mmuo’
30. ‘…when she had coughed and coughed until his father left before dawn to get
the dibia …’ p. 87
31. ‘Thank you, master. Deje!’ (p. 89) ‘Deje’ means ‘welcome’ in Northern Igbo
dialect.
32. ‘Abu m onye Biafra,’ Richard said (p. 181)
33. Odenigbo has told Olanna how, as children, he and his friends spend their time
fighting over the fallen udala fruit (p. 190)
32. ‘You can go and rest, i nugo’ (p. 212)
33. ‘Do you cook ofe nsala well?’ (p. 212)
34. ‘I fugo? Does he think we employed him to steal us blind’ (p. 219)
35. ‘…. Let me hurry up and make some abacha for you to take’ (p. 226)
36. ‘Osiso! Put my blender in the car!’ (p. 228)
37. ‘I wanted to say kedu’ Olanna said 247
38. ‘Ngwanu, Good night.’ 247
39. And when Special Julius came by to say ndo, Master was just as brisk and
brief. (p. 300)
133
Transliterated English
Depending on the status of the character speaking, the writer of Half of a
Yellow Sun, sometimes, employ transliterated English:
1. ‘Thank, sah, Thank, sah. May another person do for you’ (p. 89)
This is when Ugwu’s father is thanking Odenigbo for treating his son kindly.
Note the spelling of ‘sah’, rather than ‘sir’
2. ‘They said she is controlling my son …. ‘No wonder my son has not married
while his mates are counting how many children they have (p. 97)
3. ‘Why is he coming to tell us how to put out a fire, when it is he and his fellow
British who collected the firewood for it in the first place? (p. 158). This is a
transliterated Igbo idiom.
4. ‘He who brings the kola nut brings life. You and yours will live, and I and
mine will live. Let the eagle perch and let the dove perch and if either decrees
that the other not perch, it will not be well for him. May God bless this kola in
Jesus’ name.’ (p. 164)
This is a typical Igbo prayer, purposely transliterated into English, to retain its
original idiomatic quality. Note the Igbo proverb on tolerance and coexistence, ‘Let the eagle perch and let the dove perch and if either decrees that
the other not perch, it will not be well for him’. However, the original Igbo
proverb mentions the strong birds, ‘kite’ and ‘eagle’; not ‘eagle’ (strong bird)
and ‘dove’ (soft, peaceful bird), as Adichie puts it, here. But the meaning is
the same.
5. ‘Are you throwing your child away? Ujo anaghi atu gi? Are you walking in
God’s face’ (p. 170). Both transliteration and code-mixing are found here. The
woman being addressed here wants to abandon her child (transliterated as
134
‘throwing child away’) to the officer working at Caritas, when he announces
that relief materials for the refugees are not available. ‘To walk in God’s face’,
here is a transliteration from the Igbo ‘I bu Chukwu uzo’. This can be better
translated as ‘not trusting in God’s providence’.
6. Olana’s parents paid her a visit at Nsukka and entreated her to come with them
to Umunnachi… ‘until we know whether the war is coming or going’ (p. 188)
7. ‘We do not look for quarrels, but when your quarrel finds us, we will crush
you….’ (p. 190)
8. ‘…. The man’s head is not correct’ (p. 256)
9. ‘Let the day break’ (p. 291). This statement is translated directly from the Igbo
greeting ‘Ka chi foo’. Note that Eberechi (Ugwu’s dream-girlfriend) has used
the transliterated expression; while Ugwu, himself, uses the correct English
translation, ‘See you tomorrow’ (p. 291). The writer has consciously
employed the two kinds of translation, here, to show the characters’ different
levels of exposure to the English language. No doubt, Ugwu’s long stay with
Odenigbo, a University scholar, has rubbed off well on him, in this regard.
10. ‘Did you come out well this morning?’ (p. 337)
Diction and Structural Devices
Among the features to be examined here are Adichie’s sophisticated diction,
her satirical propaganda words, and her devices of cohesion.
Sophisticated Vocabulary
Notwithstanding the fact that Adichie freely borrows from the Igbo language
and the Nigerian English, she has a good grasp of the vocabularies of English,
135
especially in the area of lexicon. Below are some of the expressions in the text, which
show Adichie’s mastery of the English lexicon.
1. ‘…. Too opulent for your abstemious revolutionary…’ (p. 103)
2. ‘international press was saturated with stories of violence … bland and
pedantic (p. 167)
3. ‘spurious argument’ (p. 191)
4. ‘awkward ineptness’ (p. 218)
5. ‘how scrupulously they avoided any contact (p. 223)’
6. ‘It was grating’ (p. 225)
7. ‘so theatrically implausible’ (p. 231)
8. ‘he was bereft (p. 235)
9.
‘She wondered if she should have been less histrionic (p. 244)
10. ‘It may have been his smug tone or the flagrant way he continued to
sidestep responsibility’ (p. 244)
11. ‘There is nothing more trite’ (p. 256)
12. ‘Kainene greeted him with a stoic face’ (p. 257)
13. She unfurled Odenigbo’s cloth flag (p. 280)
Propaganda Words
In some of the texts discussed earlier in this Chapter, propaganda language has
been observed. The propaganda expressions in these texts are employed to satirize the
antics of the Biafran government in boosting the morale of its soldiers and citizens by
feeding them with lies, half-truths, repeated information, etc – all these in the bid to
twist their minds so that they can assume that Biafrans will win and therefore can
continue the fight, against all odds.
136
The following propaganda expressions have been employed for satirical
purposes in the text, Half of a Yellow Sun:
1. ‘Traditional warriors from Abiriba used their bows and arrows and finished
the vandals in the Calabar sector. Imakwa, children were walking over their
bones to go to the stream’ (p. 265). (Imakwa is an Igbo expression, meaning
“Do you know …”)
2.
Biafra win the war.
Armoured car, shelling machine,
Fighter and bomber’
Ha enweghi ike imeri Biafra! (p.275)
This is a popular Biafran song; almost like the national pledge. Also, note the
code-mixing. The last line is the translation of one of Ojukwu’s popular slogans,
“No power in Black Africa can defeat us!” This assertion is, from every
indication, false.
3.
‘Did you hear that we shot down their bomber at Ikot-Ekpene?’ Mrs
Muokelu asked.
‘I didn’t hear.’
‘And this was done by a common civilian with his hunting gun! You know,
it is as if the Nigerians are so stupid that whoever works for them becomes
stupid too. They are too stupid to fly the planes that Russia and Britain gave
them, so they brought in white people, and even those white people can’t hit
any target. Ha! Half their bombs don’t even explode.’ (p.278)
We can see from this conversation between Mrs Muokelu and Olanna that the
common civilians have become too stuffed with the Biafran propaganda machines.
They now believe anything, no matter how illogical.
137
Embedding
Embedding (or subordination) is a technique where one or more sentence or
clause is included in another. This often features like explanatory comments found
within the clause or sentence, as seen in the following instances:
1. She sat alone at her bare dining table – even her table mats were in his house – and
ate the rice. (p. 102).
2. Their courting upset her because it – and they – assumed that her relationship with
Odenigbo was permanently over. (p. 228)
3. With each sound she heard – a lorry rumbling past, a chirping bird, a child’s cry –
she ran from the veranda bench to peer down the road (p.300)
At times, this device of embedding has been combined with that of
enumeration, as evident below:
She felt bitter towards them at first, because when she tried to talk about the
things she had left behind in Nsukka – her books, her piano, her clothes, her
china, her wigs, her Singer sewing machine, the television – they ignored her
and started to talk about something else. (p. 185).
One may also apply this term, embedding, to other cases in the text where one
narrative is subsumed in another. For instance, ‘The Book’, “The World Was Silent
When we Died”, is sandwiched within the story of Half of a Yellow Sun. As
discovered in the end, “The Book” is Ugwu’s own reflections on the political issues
of the time. It is remarkable that Adichie has used the new work, “The World Was
Silent When we Died”, as interludes when tensions become too much in the main
story. It is in much the same way that she has applied the flash-back technique in the
narrative. One notes that the episodes in Half of a Yellow Sun are not arranged
sequentially, as they actually happened. For instance, the events in Part Three,
138
historically, happened before those in Part Two. One major advantage of this
flashback technique is that it seems to reduce the distance in the long period of years
over which the novel has spanned.
Features of lexis, sentence structure and general cohesion have been exploited
in various manners by the different novelists/novels studied.
139
CHAPTER FIVE
FOREGROUNDING FEATURES IN THE TEXTS
The term ‘foregrounding’ has already been well explained in our Chapter
Three. The two concepts of linguistic deviation and parallelism are the major devices
of foregrounding in literary works. Linguistic deviations can be compared to the
figures of speech – all the unusual linguistic devices which usually capture the
attention of the reader. Linguistic foregrounding also manifests in cases of extralinguistic patterning, like parallelism (repetitive structures), and other repetitive
devices, like rhyme, assonance, alliteration, semantic symmetry, antistrophe, or
antithesis. Some of these repetitive devices have traditionally been surveyed and
described under the category of figures of speech.
In this chapter, an attempt has been made to capture some foregrounding
elements found in the war texts studied.
Sunset in Biafra
Among the foregrounding devices found in Sunset in Biafra are the rhetorical
question, parallelism, sarcasm, and symbolism.
Rhetorical Question
Rhetorical question is a stylistic device whose main function is to reshape the
grammatical meaning of the interrogative sentence; such that a question is no longer a
question but a statement expressed in an interrogative form. Hence, two structural
meanings emerge. In colloquial speech, a rhetorical question expresses various
feelings and emotions. This device is similar to another stylistic figure called
question-in-the-narrative. The only difference is that while the rhetorical question
140
may not answer the question posed; question-in-the-narrative is asked and answered
at the same time by the very person who posed the question.
Amadi, in Sunset in Biafra, has employed the two devices of rhetorical
question and question-in-the-narrative at many instances, to express worries over
affairs in Nigeria at the time of the war. The following examples will suffice:
1.
What was wrong? I believe the explanation lay in the fact that
example is more powerful than precept. To be great in the eye of the
nation you had to be rich. No one had ever been acclaimed by the
nation for naked honesty, hard work, or sacrifice. (p. 13) – questionin-the-narrative
2.
What could the young do but copy the prevailing standards of the day?
(p. 13) – rhetorical question
3.
How could one be a minister without magnificent houses, a garage of
mammoth cars, a fat overseas bank account? One would be jeered at
for one’s stupidity. As an indigent public figure one could not look
anyone in the face! One could not face the resentment of one’s family
(p.13) – question-in-the-narrative
4.
It seemed an attractive alternative, but a little thought revealed
loopholes. Who would allocate funds in the provinces? Who would
appoint key officials like provincial secretaries? Would elections to the
provincial assemblies be free? Of course no one would talk back after
the Military Governor had spoken. We drained our cups of coffee and
trooped out. (p.18)
Here, these questions-in-the-narrative reveal the author’s worries over issues
concerning the minority-tribes of Biafra.
141
Other questions in the passage are analyzed in the table, below:
S/NO
RHETORICAL QUESTION/ QUESTION IN EMOTIONS EXPRESSED
THE NARRATIVE
1
How long will this go on? (p. 62)
Frustration; the Biafran regime
2
If they wanted me so badly why had they not is hunting for him
gone to the village? (p. 62)
3
Why did Tanzania do it? Spite? I doubted it. disappointments that another
…. Envy? Possibly but unlikely (p. 89)
nation should recognize the
Republic of Biafra
4
Was I at death’s door at last? (p. 114)
Fear and musings on his own
death
5
How would death come? By bullet, I supposed.
I prayed it would be fast and clean (p. 114)
6
Why? …. Why should they bring the children “children of men” is almost
of men here and punish them in this way? like Christ’s statement “son of
What have these people to do with the war? (p. man”, who will suffer and be
95)
killed on the cross, not for his
own sins, but for the sins of
others.
142
There are occasions in Sunset in Biafra when the question-in-the-narrative is
combined with other figures of speech, as seen in the passages, following:
1. Occasionally the desire for power becomes an obsession, and then the
megalomaniac emerges. Was Ojukwu obsessed with power? I could not tell
at the time, because with the disturbance still going on in the North he had
some very powerful arguments. (p. 18)
‘Was Ojukwu obsessed with power?’ is at the same time an innuendo over what the
author actually thinks of Ojukwu as well as a question-in-narrative.
2. Who were these men who went to war in wrappers? (p.69)
Here, Amadi satirizes the so-called Biafran Civil Defence.
Parallelism
Parallelism is also found in some of the passages of Sunset in Biafra.
Linguistic parallelism is the situation where certain forms or structure – of phrases,
clauses or sentences – is repeated in a literary text, for a particular stylistic effect. This
device is dependent on the principle of equivalence, or on the repetition of the same
structural pattern. As Yankson has observed, parallelism works on the three levels of
linguistic organization: syntax, phonology, and semantics (14). At the syntactic level,
structures are regarded as being parallel and equivalent when they have the following
characteristics: (i) initiated by the same lexical item, for instance, a wh- question
form, the comparative adverbs (like, as), or other adverbials (perhaps, so, etc); (ii)
expressing the same proposition; and (iii) having the same syntactic structures – SVO,
SVC, or SVA (NP+VP, etc). Linguistic parallelism can also be termed isocolon.
Consistent rhythmic patterns, sometimes, occur in certain structures. These
indicate phonological parallelism. The patterned sounds can reinforce the meanings of
143
a text, through their echoes, chimes and tones. This relationship between phonology
and semantics (meaning) is often highlighted by the presence of certain figures –
onomatopoeia, alliteration, and assonance – in some structural patterns. Even when
the sound patterns add nothing to the meaning of the passage, their importance, then,
becomes the pleasure which they give to the “listening” ears of the reader.
When structures repeat the same proposition (as seen in syntactic parallelism),
they are bound to have some lexical items which are synonymous, or which share the
same semantic feature, whether intratextually or extratextually. This situation brings
about semantic parallelism. At times, the opposition that would have existed by the
presence of two antonymous lexical items is neutralized by the parallel structures in
which they appear. Some parallel structures will be found in the following passages:
1.
Unabashed, she and her agents came in every Wednesday morning and
collected the weekly toll. Exasperated, I made some uncomplimentary
remarks about illegal collectors of food and money. … Slowly they drove me
into adopting an openly defiant attitude (p.65).
In this passage, all the three sentences begin with adverb-modifiers – ‘unabashed’,
‘exasperated’, and ‘slowly’, followed by the nominal phrase. The three sentences can,
to a certain extent, be said to be parallel in structure.
2.
…the disintegration of Nigeria would be a bad omen for black people
everywhere. No African nation has truly emerged from colonialism. No
African nation has shown that it is truly capable of running its own affairs. I
felt sure that if Nigeria, the largest black nation, collapsed it would be
difficult to refute the assertion that black man cannot run a big, prosperous
state. (Pp. 89-90)
144
Generally, repetition, which is part of parallelism, is mainly used for intensification.
The repetitions, ‘black people’, ‘black nation’, ‘black man’, and ‘No African nation’
(repeated twice) indicate the writer’s intense feelings about the disintegration of
Nigeria.
Repetition
Some terms have been repeated severally in the text: “This is Biafra fish”, “It
is Biafra land”, etc. They are all employed to show Amadi’s feeling of frustration and
suffocation with the word “Biafra”.
Anadiplosis is a type of repetition, where the last part of a unit or sentence is repeated
at the beginning of the next.
…they are exploring ways of co-operating with each other in space
exploration. Landing a man on the moon was an outstanding technological
achievement; being proud of the fact is meaningless. Pride itself is among
the most ridiculous of all human emotions. It is also among the most
dangerous, since nearly all wars can be traced to the reluctance of nations to
swallow their so-called pride. (p. 9)
Enumeration
Amadi enjoys listing or enumeration. In enumeration, the homogenous parts of
an utterance are made heterogeneous.
1.
If the soldiers had decided to clean up the political mess, restore order and
shape the future of the nation I ought to be there to help. (p. 8)
Here, three actions are enumerated:
-
clean up the political mess,
-
restore order and
145
-
shape the future of the nation.
And they all mean the same thing – peace and order.
2.
I tried to explain to a few friends the implications of a thorough military takeover – a militarized civil service; orders barked out at gun-point; drastic cuts
in some of our cherished traditions, like prolonged burial rites involving nights
of feasting, dancing and cannonades; roadblocks, yes, roadblocks; perhaps
arbitrary arrests by over-zealous officers; and a host of other inconveniences.
(p. 6)
All the listed items mean a militarized civil service:
- orders barked out at gun-point
-
drastic cuts in some of our cherished traditions
-
road blocks
-
arbitrary arrests by over-zealous officers
-
a host of other inconveniences
Also from the passage, prolonged burial rites, one of our cherished traditions, have
been expressed in these forms:
-
3.
nights of feasting
-
,,
,, dancing
-
,,
,, cannonades
In his [man’s] present relatively civilized state he does not know what to
do with his aggressive instincts, which unfortunately he has not shed;
hence competition, perilous sports, hunting, cruelty, sadism, wars and
murder. (p.122)
The seven listed items all amount to man’s aggressive nature.
146
Sarcasm/ Ridicule
Sarcasm/ ridicule is evident in almost every section of Sunset in Biafra. At a
point in Amadi’s novel, he could no longer conceal his disgust of the Biafran cause;
and so he openly criticizes their soldiers, in highly ridiculing and sarcastic terms. Two
examples will suffice here.
1.
It had been difficult to think of rebel soldiers as real soldiers; and no wonder,
for it was not unusual for a civilian friend with whom one has been drinking
the previous night to turn up the next morning grinning and dressed up as a
captain in the ‘Biafran’ army. (p. 143)
2.
Indeed, a stage was reached when all one had to do to get into the rebel army
was to raise enough money for a khaki suit. A khaki uniform was a quick way
to free meals, free bus rides, or swell weekends in remote villages …. Shoes
depended on the taste and financial resources of the wearer. They could be
anything from ‘ten toes’ … or motor-tyre slippers to sophisticated French
riding-boots. (p.143)
Symbolism
One can also discuss symbolism as a stylistic device in Sunset in Biafra. One
major symbolic device Amadi employs in the novel is the science-fiction story which
he writes while in detention. At a point, in the story, the United Nations entrenches
suicide as a fundamental human right (p. 88). This sci-fi is symbolic of the situation in
Biafra.
Elechi Amadi has deployed a number of stylistic devices in Sunset in Biafra.
With these, he put across to his readers his resentment of Biafra and why he had to
fight against the Biafrans in the Nigeria-Biafra Civil War of 1967-1970.
147
Never Again
Never Again is infused with satire, repetition and irony.
Irony
The first irony depicted in the text is that anyone who faces the truth is dubbed
a saboteur. For instance, Kate’s community, often, suspects Kate to be a saboteur.
Even her husband, Chudi, often threatens to report her to the Civil Defenders for her
flippant and highly infuriating comments about the many ‘positive’ war reports.
People will rather pretend that all is fine than face the truth. In addition to satirizing
the falsehood of the Biafran government who hide the truth from people, the novel
also exposes the general falsehood of people who work in the civil agencies. Madam
Agafa, the women-leader, for instance, gives the false impression that she has lost her
husband and property because of the war. And, thus, uses that as a pedestal to
challenge others to come out and physically confront the enemy, irrespective of
obstacles. Another evidence of falsehood is depicted in the following passage:
On arrival at Ugwuta we told our people we were home for the weekend. We dared not tell them that Port Harcourt was under siege. We
would be called saboteurs. (p. 3)
People are dubbed saboteurs when they tell the true story. This is indeed ironical and
satirical.
Other instances abound in the novel to depict the satirical ways in which
people are branded saboteurs when they venture to talk reasonably about the Biafran
situation. For instance, when Adigwe suggests that women and children be evacuated
(to save lives) before the war comes to Ugwuta, one of the men in the audience
answers him thus:
148
When we evacuate the women and the children, who will cook for the
soldiers? Who will fetch water for the women to cook for the soldiers?
My people, didn’t I say that this boy is a sabo? We should hand him
over to the Army. (p. 11)
In the same occasion, Chudi, Kate’s husband, who asks whether the naval boys have
arms to fight also gets a measure of tirades for raising this question, as seen from the
following passage:
Ezeama got up from his seat at once. ‘You saboteur. Before the
Vandals entered Port Harcourt, you fled. Yes, my people, two weeks
before they entered Port Harcourt, this spineless man fled with his wife
and children and all his property. He hid at home for a week. …. You
are a woman. ... (p. 13-14)
Another incident in Never Again which ridicules the Biafran propaganda and
the people who have refused to face the truth is when the soldier from Oburuoto battle
front comes with the following situation report:
‘The Vandals are pushing on, and it is very likely that Oburuoto will be
evacuated at anytime. My men have no arms and ammunition to fight
the Vandals. If this were another sector, I would have withdrawn my
men. But this is my home and I want to save my fatherland. You have
very influential people here. What I want you to do is to send some of
your men to Umuahia and tell them that we have no arms and
ammunition….’ (p. 16)
‘And again,’ the soldier from Oburuoto continued, ‘For the past twenty
four hours, my soldiers have eaten nothing. They are very hungry, we
have no food. The women who were cooking for us fled as the shelling
149
became frequent. So I am asking you to organize something for my
boys to eat. …’ (p. 16)
Noboby can stand the real truth in Biafra. Of course, eventually, the soldier is
vehemently rebuked:
‘Young soldier, go back to whence you came. We don’t know you.
You may be a saboteur, you may be a Nigerian who has infiltrated into
our midst. You should be locked up. People like you should not be
allowed to go about causing panic. …’ (p.18)
The word ‘saboteur’ is a trope which Nwapa uses to ridicule the falsehood in
Biafra. Anybody who attempts to face the truth is a saboteur. Every defeat suffered is
blamed on saboteurs ‘who showed the enemy the way’. Thus, Ezekoro, the mad man,
in the same way, regards those evacuating from Ugwuta, when the town came under
real siege, as saboteurs:
He kept on shouting, ‘Sabo, Sabo, Sabo. Why are you running? Sabo.
Why, why are you running? Go back to your lake. Go back, go back to
Uhamiri. You are not Ibos. You say you are not Ibos. Sabo. Sabo. You
are running away. Sabo. All of you are Sabo. Every one of you here.
Sabo. Sabo.’
The repetition of the word ‘sabo’ elaborates its significance as a satirical tool. The
fact that it is a mad man who sings with this word ‘sabo’, several times, makes the
scene highly theatrical and satiric. Anybody fleeing for safety is a saboteur,
automatically.
The falsehood of Kal stands as a metaphor for the falsehood of the Biafran
propaganda. Kal is always quick to reprimand others and to declare his faith for
150
Biafra. Yet he is always among the first to flee from any city about to fall, even
without informing those he has convinced to stay on.
The propaganda words themselves serve as satirical materials in the text:
1. The latest report we heard from Umuahia was that the vandals were in Omoku.
The gallant Biafran soldiers beat them back last night and now they must be
far far away from Omoku. (p. 18)
2. ‘Umuokane, you know the place. Gallant Biafran soldiers wiped them all
out….’ (p. 21)
3. ‘…. Our gallant Biafran scientists have made bombs, hand grenades, guns and
shore batteries. Name it and our boys have made it. What have the Nigerian
scientists made? Nothing. All they have done since the war began was
quarrel.’ (p. 31)
4. ‘…. Ignorant Nigerians, spineless Vandals, uncircumcised idiots, kolanut
eaters. …’ (p. 31)
Symbolism
The mad man’s claim, that he will drive away the vandals with his fan is
symbolic of the Biafrans’ claim that they can drive away the vandals with their dane
guns and matchets. Mark the mad man’s words:
‘… I will save Ugwuta. Nobody can save her but me. Dirty Nigerians,
they can’t fight. I’ll drive them away with my fan.’ He waved his fan
above his head, then made for Ugwuta. Nobody could stop him. He
made for his death, certain death. Nobody saw him again. (p. 62)
This incident of the mad man who has purposely (in his deranged condition)
committed suicide by going back to a city under siege can be likened to the people in
151
the sci-fi story Amadi has written while in detention. In the story, suicide is legalized.
The story of the mad man (by Nwapa) and the sci-fi story (by Amadi) are all symbolic
of the Biafran story.
The only news that proves not to be mere propaganda in Nwapa’s story is this:
‘The gallant Biafran forces had retaken Ugwuta in less than forty eight hours’. (p. 71).
Nobody knows exactly how it happened. As Nwapa writes,
All that they knew and appreciated was that the Federal troops had
been driven out from Ugwuta and that they were waiting to re-enter
their home. The Woman of the Lake had not after all let them down.
(p. 72)
The general belief is that the goddess of Ugwuta Lake, Uhamiri, “the Woman of the
Lake”, has intervened.
Nwapa has always written about this Lake Goddess, Uhamiri, described as
“the eternal spring and mythical inspirer of … [Nwapa’s] fiction” (web). It is to be
found in her first and second novels, Efuru and Idu. This may not be far from the fact
that Nwapa’s birthplace is near the Ugwuta Lake, the abode of the legendary goddess.
In Never Again, apart from the faith in the Christian God, which the characters have,
there is also the belief in “Uhamiri”. During the war, women offer white rams to her,
seeking her protection over the whole town. At the imminent fall of Ugwuta, people
become disappointed with the Woman of the Lake; but their faith is, eventually,
restored when the town gets cleared out, almost immediately.
152
Rhetorical Question/ Question-in-the-Narrative
A prominent device found in Never Again is rhetorical question and questionin-the-narrative
1. At the other end of the mission, the youths were still training. Were they mad?
Were they going to face automatic weapons with sticks? (p.53)
2. They should have left us in peace in our new found Biafra ‘where no one
would be oppressed’. Was anybody sure of this? ‘Where no one would be
oppressed’? There was already oppression even before the young nation was
able to stand on her feet. Wasn’t it even possible that war could have broken
out in the young nation if there was no civil war? Perhaps Nigeria did well to
attack us. If they hadn’t we would have, out of frustration begun to attack and
kill one another. (p. 51)
Like Amadi, Nwapa employs these devices of questioning to take on serious issues
concerning the Biafran question. There are the issues of lack of arms on the part of
Biafra, whose youth are now training with sticks, and the general essence of the
secession.
Repetition
Repetition is a common device in Never Again. Sometimes, Nwapa employs
this device together with the rhetorical questions, as evident in the second illustration,
below.
1. It was madness. The war was madness. We were not prepared for this war. We
shouldn’t have seceded. It was a big miscalculation. I had thought that Gowon
was not going to fight us. I had thought that the rest of Nigeria would have
been glad to get rid of the Ibos. (p.50)
153
2. Ugwuta was desolate and empty. Only a few days before, the place was
swarming with people. Now it was empty. It was a battle ground. Where were
the Nigerian troops who entered it barely three days ago? Where was
everybody? What folly! What arrogance, what stupidity led us to this
desolation, to this madness, to this wickedness, to this war, to this death?
When this cruel war was over, there will be no more war. It will not happen
again, never again. NEVER AGAIN, never again. (p. 73)
The repeated patterns in Passage 1 are:
a. It was madness.
The war was madness
The key word here is ‘madness’
b. I had thought that …
I had thought that …
The whole passage is a lament. The writer bemoans the war, and everything
associated with it. Hence each of the sentences in the passage has at least one word
connoting this terrible experience – ‘madness’, ‘war’, ‘seceded’, ‘miscalculation’,
‘fight’, ‘rid’.
Passage 2 shows how the devices of repetitions and rhetorical questions make
vivid the writer’s determination to refuse war and everything associated with war in
future.
The repeated items (including their synonyms/ connotations) are:
no more war
not happen again
never again
(no/ never) repeated 5 times
NEVER AGAIN
never again
154
empty
empty
thrice repeated
desolation
What folly
What arrogance
thrice repeated
What stupidity
This wickedness
This cruel war
twice repeated
These repeated patterns, combined with rhetorical questions, like “Where were
the Nigerian troops who entered it barely three days ago?”, “Where was everybody?”,
show the dazed, frustrated and almost deranged condition into which people have
been pushed by the war.
Come Thunder
Imagery is a significant stylistic device for intensifying, classifying, enhancing
and giving the listener or reader an insight into what is being described (Ntuli 221). It
is the dominant linguistic device employed in Come Thunder, where it seems
Enekwe’s major intention is to lay bare the brutal nature of the war. According to
Barnet and Cain (403), imagery is established by language that appeals to the senses,
especially the sense of sight. When the writer uses images, he creates mental pictures
for his reader who is able to see, clearly, the object being referred to.
155
The use of imagery is determined by the use of figures of speech such as
simile, metaphor, personification, symbolism, hyperbole and euphemism (M. Heese.
and R. Lawton (62); W. Nowottny (51); C. Brooks, J. Purser and R.P. Warren (51)).
The phrase, ‘come thunder’, used for the title, already is metaphoric. Enekwe uses
thunder here to represent the travails of war – death, bombs, blood, hunger,
homelessness, despair. This title prepares the reader for the portrayal of a dogged,
obstinate, almost irrational people ready for the worst.
Simile
Similes abound in the novel, Come Thunder. In simile, items from different
classes are explicitly compared by connectives, such as ‘like’, ‘as’, ‘than’, or by a
verb, such as ‘appears’ or ‘seems’. The comparison may be made with natural
phenomena, animals, cosmic objects and physical objects or places. This association
tends to clarify, emphasize or enhance the original object. Traditionally, a comparison
is identified when all the properties of the two objects/ phenomena are taken into
consideration, while stressing the one that is compared. Simile excludes all the
properties of the two objects except one which is made common to them. This means
that the comparison of two objects in simile is as a result of similarity in one or more
characteristics that unify the objects.
It should be noted that ordinary comparisons, for example, “He is as smart as
his father” (where objects of the same kind are compared) may not be considered as
simile. A good example of simile is when two objects that are not of the same kind are
compared: “The girls were as angry as jagged window glasses”. In the English
language, there is a long list of similes pointing out the analogy between the various
qualities, states or actions of human beings and the animals; for examples: treacherous
156
as a snake, busy as a bee, sly as a fox, blind as a fox, faithful as a dog, hungry as a
bear, to be led like a sheep, vain (proud) as a peacock. These combinations have
ceased to be genuine similes and are considered clichés, today.
Enekwe, in Come Thunder, consistently employs the linguistic device of
simile in painting several pictures of the “Balan” soldiers’ situations and dilemmas.
The following similes, for instance, depict Meka’s view of the harsh
environment/ military training he and other young volunteers are thrown into after
their recruitment. The objects/ situations compared in each case are seen in the
following table:
Actual Objects/ Phenomena
Similar Objects/ Phenomena
1. …whipped him
as one would whip cattle (p.2)
2. He felt
like a cock that has crossed the fence of a
strange surrounding (p.3)
3. luxuriant mustache (sticking out like the wings of a hawk in flight (p.3)
sideways)
4. Recruits (hunched)
like frogs (p.4)
5. (The sound of their feet on the like mangoes falling down from a tree
ground)
…kwatakwata…kwatakwata (p.6)
No. 5 in the table above indicates that it is not only the recruits that are finding
things difficult in their new barracks. The officer training them is also having a
difficult time getting the new recruits to march and respond appropriately. The lancecorporal likens the staccato landing of their feet on the ground (at the instruction
“halt!”) to the way mangoes land on the ground when they are being harvested,
kwatakwata …kwatakwata ….
157
Most of the images evoked by these similes, as we can see from the objects
compared, in the table, above, are familiar to indigenes of Nigeria – cattle, cock,
hawk, frogs and mangoes. Most families in Nigeria engage in some kind of farming,
rearing cattle or cocks/ fowls, or growing mangoes. The most common form of
animal-rearing in Nigeria is done by allowing the animals to wander about freely in
search of food. The cows are usually accompanied by the ‘rearers’ who devise several
ways of controlling them, like, whipping them; fowls, however, usually go
unaccompanied. Enekwe is a true Nigerian, who tries to incorporate such familiar
indigenous Nigerian images while using the medium of English.
There are more of such similes depicting Meka’s disappointments at the
way they are treated in the garrison, after their recruitment:
1. Back in the garrison, the recruits were ordered to sit on their hunches like
prisoners. (p. 14)
2. By the time the soldiers finished with the recruits, the latter were like vultures,
real vultures, as anyone who has seen vultures would agree; and they did this
in order to give them an indelible mark of soldiery. (p. 15)
Enekwe in his linguistic/stylistic use of similes has tried to depict the extent of
discipline and regimentation in the military profession. Regimentation is defined as “a
strict control over a group of people” (BBC English Dictionary); while discipline is
defined as “the force or fear or fear of force that restrains individuals or groups from
doing things that are deemed destructive” (Ibanga in a Lecture, citing Special and
Schultz). Concerning discipline and regimentation in the Nigerian Army, Ibanga, in
the Lecture, has further stressed that “Intensification of regimentation and training is a
necessary and effective antidote against indiscipline in the Nigerian Army. It is an
established fact that indiscipline thrives most during periods of inactivity.” In Come
158
Thunder, one gets a glimpse of the type of regimentation inherent in the army: their
daily wake-up whistle-blasts at five a.m., drilling marches, endurance trek across the
town and other physical and health parades. Thus, after such strict regimentation,
soldiers get used to obeying rules, even in the most difficult of circumstances
(discipline); as seen below:
The next set of guards struggled up from sleep like people who were trying to
free themselves from some invisible hands. (p. 76)
In the passage, above, Enekwe paints a picture of how the Balan soldiers in the
war-front, tired and sleepy, after digging their trenches and having to wait all day for
the enemy, still manages to rouse from their near-slumber to take turns to mount
guards at nights. This reminds us of the question posed by the officer to Meka during
his recruitment interview: “Do you think you can fight? Army is no joke” (p. 2).
A major disadvantage, however, of this strict regimentation found in the army
is seen in Come Thunder, where soldiers go ahead to implement the order to continue
fighting, even when most of them seem to know that the order will have disastrous
consequences (because they have no arms). For instance, Major Ndu (as seen in p. 67
of text) does not believe in the “mere wastage of human lives” brought about by the
frontal battles of the ill-equipped Balan army; he will have preferred a kind of
“guerilla operation”. Yet he still has to continue fighting, because loyalty to the
instructions of his seniors is unquestionable.
Other similes in the text can be grouped, according to the situations/objects
depicted, as shown in the tables following:
159
1. The city of Asa at the beginning of the war
S/NO
OBJECTS/PHENOMENA
SIMILAR OBJECTS/PHENOMENA
1
People …with faces glum
like bronze statues (p.27)
2
It was
like a ditch with phantom people (p.57)
3
Darkness stood
like guards in all corners (p.57)
4
The taxicabs … slugged as mice in a place invaded by cats (p.57)
… quietly
5
People …go to bed
as early as fowls (p.57)
2. The deadly episodes at the war fronts
S/NO
ACTUAL
OBJECTS/ SIMILAR OBJECTS/PHENOMENA
PHENOMENA
1
It was
like a thunderstorm (p. 41)
2
…cold [the dead]
just like a dead goat… and too heavy
(p. 46)
3
… the victim leaps into the like a tree (p.102)
air and crash …
4
Their muzzles turning and like the feelers of scorpions (p.102)
revolving
5
…Anya
staggered,
and like a wounded bull … (p.103)
screaming
6
…blood poured from his like wine from a leaking gourd
chest …
(p.104)
160
3. Images of despair, defeat, destruction
S/NO
ACTUAL
OBJECTS/ SIMILAR OBJECTS/PHENOMENA
PHENOMENA
1
Actual Objects/ Phenomena
Similar Objects/ Phenomena
2
…his heart pounding
like pestle and mortar (p.76)
3
Its sound was
like that of a motorcycle that has cast
off its rider while its engine kept
beating (p.78)
4
His voice sounded
like a punctured drum (p.76)
5
It was
like an endless night of storm (p.113)
6
His heart pounded
like a drum struck by a mad man
(p.104)
7
…howitzers
which like insatiable monsters
growled
8
…a Zagian machine gun like
creaked and kicked
The
Balan
a
high-powered
motor-cycle
riderless after a fatal accident (p.116)
bolt-action like stone on palm-kernels (p.116)
rifles crackled
Similes in Come Thunder are the writer’s major tools of foregrounding various
images of despair, death, and military discipline and courage.
161
Hyperbole
In rare cases in the work, the figure, hyperbole, has also been employed in
depicting the horrible war images:
The bombardment raked the battlefield with a million shrapnels (p. 113).
The shrapnels may not have actually been up to a million; but the number has been
given to show the alarming rate with which these deadly objects fly across the field.
There is no place to hide.
Figures of Indirectness
Come Thunder is indirect in all its references to the real Nigeria-Biafra War.
For instance, the country ‘Nigeria’ or the seceding part, ‘Biafra’, is never mentioned
directly. Nigeria is referred to as ‘Zagia’ and Biafra as ‘Bala’. In the same vein, the
real names of the personalities and towns involved in the war are omitted. This lack of
directness, in terms of characterization and setting, seems to be a strategy aimed at
protecting the author from any accusations from the real living people being discussed
in the novel.
Irony
Irony is a stylistic devise based on the simultaneous realization of two logical
meanings, dictionary and contextual, which stand in opposition to each other. In
Julius Caesar, Mark Anthony’s reference to the conspirators as ‘honourable men’ is
ironical, as he, contextually, means ‘dishonourable men’. There is another kind of
irony known as ‘dramatic irony’, where there is a discrepancy between what is
expected and what actually happens. Dramatic or situational ironies abound in Come
Thunder. For instance, at the beginning, the general excitement of the youths at the
162
prospect of joining the army is ironical when placed beside their horrible experiences,
eventually, in the army. Initially, some boys even offer bribe to ensure they are
recruited into ‘soldiery’, as suggested in the following conversations between the
spectators waiting for their own turn to be interviewed:
“They have disqualified the bastard,” ….
“Maybe the boy refused to give bribe.” (p. 2)
Also, the idea that the recruiting officer may “pity” Meka and recruit him,
notwithstanding his age (he is too young to serve), is remarkably ironical. It shows the
high hopes the youngsters have about the army:
“You think they will disqualify that little boy?” another said, pointing
at Meka.
“Yes. The boy is too young.”
“He is small but they may pity him.” (p. 2)
These youngsters are soon to be disappointed. The first shock is that Meka has
expected remarks like, “We praise you for coming to fight for your country. It’s a
heroic and patriotic act.” (p.3). Instead, the young recruits receive brutality and
insolence from the older soldiers training them. For instance, after striking Meka five
times for not knowing the meaning of “double”, the sergeant humiliates him further,
as shown in the passage, below:
“Wetin be your name, and what you find come here?”
“Meka Chinedu is my name. They just recruit me as soldier.”
“Who tell you say you be soldier? You no be soldier yet. You
be bloody civilian. A soldier no de walk like a hen. Run to that
place.” (p. 3)
163
It is also ironical that the Balans’ fear of sabotage among their soldiers, at a
point, almost supersedes their fear of the enemy – the Zagians. For every defeat
suffered, the soldiers turn to their officers, suspecting them of sabotage. The Balan
civilians are even worse in their own suspicion of their soldiers: “as Balan defences
crumbled, civilians became desperate and hostile against their own soldiers calling
them sabos.” The irony of the situation is embedded in this reflection by Meka:
Although these civilians don’t know any thing about war, … they are
more dangerous than the vandals, since they do not listen to reason or
command…” (p. 107)
Satire
Satire is intense irony which is meant to ridicule a situation and the people
involved in bringing about the situation. The irony concerning the issue of ‘saboteur’
in Come Thunder is so much so that it also provokes laughter – laughter at the
Biafrans (the Balans) and their war efforts. The civilians see their soldiers as
saboteurs; while the soldiers regard their officers as saboteurs. Below is Meka’s
musing on the former:
Unfortunately, the civilians had become all powerful. Anybody
accused by them of sabotage, rightly or wrongly, was doomed. So, the
officers tried to please them by claiming what could not be
accomplished by an ill-equipped army. (p. 113)
The satire of the soldiers’ suspicion of their officers is seen in the following passage:
As they marched, a Land Rover approached from behind and they
guessed it must be the new officer. One of the troops said,
“Another sabo.”
“How you sure this one be sabo?”
164
“I tell you. Almost every officer de support the vandals. Look that one
wey refuse to bring armoured car to help us. (p. 104)
Note Meka’s conclusion to all this:
Everybody seems to be a saboteur. People may die any time, as long as
sabos are all over the place. (p. 104)
The situation here is that the so-called ‘sabos’ are turning to be a bigger
problem to the Balan soldiers than the enemy soldiers they are fighting. Lt Anya, for
instance, is shot by one of the sergeants (in his platoon), who mistakes his superior
‘delay tactics’ in battle (considering that they have not enough arms) as sabotage (pp.
103, 104).
One may regard the entire text of Come Thunder as satire:
The civilians believed that the enemy could be liquidated by Balan
soldiers who were quite inferior compared to the enemy in numerical
strength and weaponry. (p. 113)
It is obvious, here, that Enekwe is subtly laughing at the Balans who have continued
to fight and delude themselves on winning the battle. Also, his assessment of the
civilian-army (civil defense) is ridiculing and sarcastic; as seen in these remarks by
Meka: “… an army with a mighty song. If songs could win a war, this band of
civilians could have driven the enemy out of town.” (p. 113)
1. Enekwe’s ridicule here can only be compared with that exhibited by Amadi in
his criticism of the Biafran Civil Defence: “Who were these men who went to
war in wrappers?” (p.69)
165
Parallelism
Linguistic parallelism, as discussed earlier in this chapter, is the use of
patterned repetition to create aesthetic effects. Many passages of Come Thunder have
some form of parallelism, as illustrated below:
He watched them, their lips opening and closing, their tongues rising and
falling, stretching and folding, chests heaving, eyes glowing and closing, legs
stamping the ground – an army with a mighty song. (p.113)
The structures which can be regarded as parallel and equivalents here are:
1. their lips (were) opening and closing
2. their tongues (were) rising and falling
3. (their tongues (were)) stretching and folding
4. (their) chests (were) heaving
5. (their) eyes (were) glowing and closing
6. (their) legs (were) stamping the ground
Coupling/ Compounding
With the exception of the fourth structure, above, each of the structures
enumerated in the passage contains the linguistic device of coupling/ compounding.
When grammatically or semantically equivalent lexical items occur in equivalent
positions, they are said to be coupled or compounded, depending on the number of
items involved. If they are only two, they are coupled, but when they are more than
two, they are regarded as compounded.
These structures would have been regarded as verbless clauses; but verbless
clauses, as defined by Oji (1994), are clauses that contain no verbal element and no
subject, which these structures all have. Therefore, one can regard the clauses above
166
as main clauses, whose auxiliaries “were” are recoverable. The structure of these
clauses would appear thus:
NP + VP (Genitive + NP + aux. + V-ing (2))
Or
SV
Example: their lips were opening and closing
Genitive + NP + aux. + V-ing
Or
their lips were opening and closing
S
V
All the other numbers listed above follow the same syntactic pattern. The only
exception is No. 6, where the verb ‘stamping’ is compulsorily transitive in the sense it
is used here. Hence, it is followed by an object – “the ground”. Its structure goes
thusway:
(their) legs were stamping the ground
S
V
O
Or: Genitive + NP1 + aux. + V-ing + article + NP2
Semantic Parallelism
There is also semantic parallelism in these same structures, above. All the ten
verbal items mentioned – opening, closing, risng, falling, stretching, folding, heaving,
glowing, closing, and stamping – belong to the same paradigm. They also share a
common semantic feature (+action). So, intratextually, all the items are equivalent,
since they indicate action.
Therefore:
Action = opening + closing + rising + falling + stretching + folding + heaving
+ glowing + closing + stamping.
167
Intra-textually, action is the super-ordinate, while the rest are hyponyms. The author
of the text employs these action-packed words to show the battle mood of these civil
defenders. Note that the many verbal items used in describing this one episode of the
Balan civil defenders marching is also a linguistic device called redundancy or
pleonasm, where more words than necessary are used for stylistic purposes. Here,
Enekwe uses redundancy in a theatrical way (satire), to mock the so-called Balan civil
defenders, and their war efforts.
Furthermore, the other lexical items mentioned – the NPs, lips, tongues,
chests, eyes and legs – all share the semantic feature (+ mortal organs). There is a
situational irony in these obvious images of moving hands, eyes, chests, legs, etc.
These active and lively organs may soon lie dead and dormant in the war field.
In the semantic parallelism here, one notices, again, that some of the parallel
lexical items are antonymous in their relationship.
opening versus closing
rising versus falling
stretching versus folding
glowing versus closing
Their opposition, however, seems to have been neutralized by their parallel structures.
All indicates movements taking place.
Rhythm
Again, rhythmic patterns exist in all the clauses found in the passage we have
been analyzing. The sounds evoked and the end rhymes of the clauses make the
passage like a piece of poem that should be sung. The phonological structure of the
coupled verbal items would look like this:
168
Example: “opening and closing”
/əupəniŋ/ /’n/ /kləuziŋ/
Note the end nasal sounds:
/-iŋ/ +/’n/ + /-iŋ/
In the NPs, lips, tongues, chests, eyes, legs, the sibilant /s/ sounds at the end positions
reinforce the relationship between these human organs. These rhythmic patterns have
their semantic imports, too. In these sounds, one could see the situational irony. There
is a difference between what these defenders intend to do – for all their action-packed
movements – and what they actually succeed in doing: eyes are opening, but they are
closing at the same time; tongues are rising, but they are falling, etc. the anti-climactic
end of each clause may be indicative of the defeats these soldiers would experience.
The ‘heaving’ chest is onomatopoeic, suggesting movements, of inner fear and
tension. In the same vein, ‘legs stamping’ the ground is indicative of weak limbs, as a
result of old age or anxiety. A more ‘solid’ expression would be “legs thudding the
ground”.
Linguistic parallelism, whether phonological, syntactic or semantic, has an
elocutionary force of grabbing the reader’s attention and drawing him to the hidden
message of the writer. For this, parallel constructions can be described as the main
foregrounded features on the syntactic level in Come Thunder. As Leech (1971)
proffers, the repeated pattern is fundamental if primitive devise of intensification is
needed. This devise, as Leech further states, presents a simple emotion with force, and
may further suggest a suppressed intensity of feeling, for which there is no outlet but a
repeated hammering, at the confining walls of language (p. 78-79).
In Come Thunder, many parallel structures are seen: structures repeating the
same proposition, or having the same syntactic patterns.
169
Half of a Yellow Sun
Some stylistic devices pointing to the natural and the supernatural, irony and
satire, parallelism, etc, have been brought to the attention of the reader of the text.
The Natural and the Supernatural
In the text, the writer pays particular attention to the environment (the natural),
and the unseen force (the supernatural) at sensitive moments, when characters are
worried. Then, both the physical and the spiritual worlds seem to respond to the
occasion or the character’s feelings. The passages, below, adequately illustrate how
Adichie resorts to nature and the supernatural in portraying her characters’ feelings.
References to the Natural Environment
1. At Richard’s irritation, because of Kainene’s remarks, the writer notes,
He stood up and began to pace the veranda. Insects were humming around the
fluorescent bulb (p. 81)
2. When Odenigbo’s mother drives Olanna out of her son’s (Odenigbo’s) house, the
writer captures it thus,
…she got into her car and drove away. She did not wave. The yard was still;
there were no butterflies flitting among the white flowers (p. 97).
3 Olanna’s disappointment at the way Odenigbo explains away his mother’s nasty
behaviour is expressed thus,
She walked into the living room without drying her hands. The flat seemed
small. (p. 102)
4. When eventually Odenigbo leaves her flat after their quarrel,
She thought she heard rustles in the ceiling. (p. 102)
170
5. At Richard’s condolence visit to Nnaemeka’s family,
They sat in silence. Dust motes swam in the slice of sunlight that came
through the window. (p. 165)
6. At Olanna’s realization that Odenigbo has cheated on her, by sleeping with the girl,
Amala, whom his mother brought for him,
…she went outside and sat on the backyard steps and watched a hen near the
lemon tree, guarding six chicks, nudging them towards crumbs on the ground.
Ugwu was plucking avacados from the tree near the Boys’ Quarters. (p. 224)
7. When Olanna, Ugwu and Baby are worrying over Odenigbo’s safety, the day he
attempted to cross over to the Biafran-Two side, when he hears about the death of his
mother,
Ugwu watched the sun fall. Darkness came swiftly, brutally; there was no
gradual change from light to dark. (p. 301)
References to the Supernatural
At certain occasions, the supernatural has been alluded to, as the passages
below indicate:
1. Ugwu sees a black cat, and becomes worried; “A black cat means evil’ (p. 104).
2. About Olanna, the writer has previously noted that “Odenigbo’s mother’s
medicine from the dibia – indeed, all supernatural fetishes – meant nothing to
her”. Yet when she worries about her future with Odenigbo, she longs “for a
sign, a rainbow, to signify security”. (p. 105)
3. After Olanna watches Richard leave, following his visit to Odenigbo’s house,
“she stood at the door, watching a bird with a blood-red breast, perched on the
lawn” (p. 106). This event prepares the ground for what is to happen between
171
Olanna and Richard: Olanna has used Richard (by seducing him) to get back
at Odenigbo.
4. Just at that point when Olanna, finally, accepts Odenigbo’s proposal of
marriage; “a bat swooped down” (p. 187)
5. Abba people rely on the dibia to foretell whether Abba will fall to the enemy
or not. Of course, the dibia says that Abba has never been conquered (p. 195).
6. Odenigbo and Olanna have found a rain-holder on their wedding day (p.
200).
7. When Baby becomes sick at the heat of the war, coughing with drawn-out
whistles, Olanna’s supernaturally explains that as evidence that “she could not
be harmed in an air raid” (p. 263).
8. In a frantic effort to find Kainene, who gets lost (probably, killed) a few days
before the war ended, Olanna, her twin-sister, resorts to the supernatural
approach. She asks her uncle, Osita, to go to the dibia, with a bottle of whisky
and a goat (p. 433). In addition, she throws in a copy of Kainene’s photo into
the River Niger. Again, she goes to Kainene’s house in Orlu and walks around
it three times. Disappointingly, though, Kainene does not come back the week
the dibia has stipulated.
9. “Our people say that we all reincarnate …. When I come back in my next life,
Kainene will be my sister”. (p. 433)
The writer of Half of a Yellow Sun, from her comments above, realize the
central role that nature and the supernatural play in the life of the average Igbo person,
the people about whose culture and language she writes.
172
Satire and Irony
Some passages in Half of a Yellow Sun depict the writer’s use of satire and
irony. The Biafran soldiers’ poverty – of body and mind – has been satirized in the
following passages/ incidents in the text:
1. The skinny soldiers – with no boots, no uniforms, no half of a yellow sun on
their sleeves – kicked and slapped and mocked Ugwu during physical training.
(p. 359)
2. Another satiric incident is that the soldier in charge of reconnaissance, HighTech (only thirteen years old) has difficulty in pronouncing this very office
where he leads: “rayconzar meechon’, he calls it. (p. 359-363)
3. Also, note how the untidy soldiers (in rubber slippers, ‘two of them were
barefoot’) easily hijack people’s vehicles (p. 363). There is also the
information that even their Commander’s jeep has been commandeered from
an “idle civilian” (p. 366)
Other Incidents of Irony and Satire
The devices of irony and satire have been depicted in several other places in the
novel. For example, there are many instances of children playing war games in the
novel. The irony is that these children are too innocent to realize that their piteous
situation has been brought about by the same war they are happy to play about. Their
war demonstrations can also be viewed as a cajolery of the people who fight wars.
1. They looked about ten or eleven years old, wore banana leaves on their heads,
and held mock guns made from bamboo. The longest gun belonged to the
commander of the Biafran side, a tall, stern child with sharp cheekbones.
‘Advance!’ he shouted.
173
The boys crept forwards.
‘Fire!’
They flung stones with wide sweeps of their arms and then, clutching their
guns, they rushed towards the other boys, the Nigerian side, the losers. (p.
290)
To add to the irony, these children here have some audience admiring and cheering
them. One man cheers thus:
“These boys are wonderful! Just give them arms and they will send the vandals back.”
These passages are devised to ridicule the Biafrans’ attempt at fighting
Nigeria. Also, the children’s plays serve as symbolism; that the whole issue of
“Biafrans fighting the war” is mere play, just like the children’s play. In actual fact,
there is not much difference between the war plays of these small children and the
war practice of the Biafran Boys Brigade. Adichie describes the latter this way:
“Some little boys in the Biafran Boys Brigade were practicing on the street, with
sticks shaped like guns, doing frog jumps, calling one another captain! and adjutant!
in high voices. (p. 199).
2. They ran sluggishly on the patched grass, holding sticks as guns, making
shooting sounds with their mouths, raising clouds of dust as they chased one
another. Even the dust seemed listless. They were playing war. Four boys.
Yesterday, they had been five. (p. 399-400).
Here, even sick and malnourished children (some, already suffering from
kwashiorkor) entertain themselves by playing war. Note that the absent boy being
referred to in the passage has, now, died of kwashiorkor after his play ‘yesterday’. His
mates used to laugh at him, and make jokes with his distended stomach: “afo mmiri
174
ukwa”, they called him. This is yet another irony, for these children are trivializing
serious matters, though innocently.
3. Olanna’s visit to Prof Ezeka’s residence exposes another ironical situation –
the big officers in Biafra and their families seem to be quite unaware of the
sufferings of the masses in Biafra. They live in an entirely different world:
Olanna sank into a plush red sofa. A dollhouse, with tiny, exquisite doll plates
and teacups, was set out on the centre table.
‘What will you drink? Mrs Ezeka asked brightly. ‘I remember Odenigbo
loved his brandy. We do have some rather good brandy.’
…………………………………………………………………………………
Pamela [the Ezekas’ daughter] began to whine, still tugging at the doll’s
clothes.
‘Come, come, let me do it for you,’ Mrs Ezeka said. She turned to Olanna.
‘She’s so restless now. You see, we should have gone abroad last week. The
two older ones have gone. His Excellency gave us permission ages ago. We
were supposed to leave on a relief plane, but none of them landed. They said
there were too many Nigerian bombers. Can you imagine? Yesterday, we
waited in Uli, inside that unfinished building they call a terminal, for more
than two hours and no plane landed. But hopefully we’ll leave on Sunday. We
will fly to Garbon and then on to England – on our Nigerian passports, of
course! The British have refused to recognize Biafra! Her laughter filled
Olanna with resentment as fine, as painful, as the prick of a new pin. (p. 341).
Mrs Ezeka’s flippant comments, here, reveal, among other things, that the socalled top government officials fighting for the ‘Biafran cause’ still keep Nigerian
175
passports. This is hypocritical, for these same officials often label other Biafrans as
saboteurs, even for frivolous reasons. Note the imagery the writer uses in describing
Olanna’s resentment of Mrs Ezeka’s careless feelings/laughter over the whole issue.
Her resentment is likened to the fine, painful prick of a new needle. Also, the stylistic
device of oxymoron is seen in this description of Olanna’s resentment. Here, the
semantic opposites, ‘fine’ and ‘painful’, have been juxtaposed; to indicate the sharp
pain Olanna experiences (psychologically) at that moment.
Humour
In the novel, Adichie employs this device of humour, such that readers find
themselves laughing, even in the midst of the pain, hunger and death being described.
One particularly humorous incident displayed is how somebody now runs a charcoal
over WCC, World Council of Churches, and scribbles “War Can Continue”. (p. 330)
Also, the idea of adults gathering to admire little children playing war (as depicted in
the sub-section, ‘Irony’) is another case of humour.
Parallelism
Parallelism seems to be a common device among creative writers. All the
novels examined so far have displayed elements of parallelism. In Half of a Yellow
Sun, the following parallel structures are depicted:
Neutralization of the Semantic Opposites
1. She was annoyed by his casualness and then she felt comforted by it. (p.276)
The parallel clauses have neutralized the semantic opposites, ‘annoyed’ and
‘comforted’.
176
Antithesis/ Chiasmus
2. I was told that Biafrans fought like heroes, but now I know that heroes fight
like Biafrans – the French ambassador’s statement.
This is a reversed parallel construction.
Repetition, Anaphora and Epiphora
3. Grief was the celebration of love, those who could feel grief were lucky to
have loved. But it was not grief that Olanna felt, it was greater than grief. It
was stranger than grief.
Notice the repetition, anaphora and epiphora, of grief. It is anaphora when the
repeated items appear in the earlier parts of the sentences; and epiphora when they
appear in the latter part of the sentences.
Imagery
Imagery is another important stylistic device found in Half of a Yellow Sun.
1. She watched the outline of the mango trees in the next yard. Some of them had
fruit drooping down like heavy earrings (p. 185).
Notice the feminine images of modern ear rings, in the passage. Adichie’s sex and age
are brought to bear in the imagery above.
2. The description of the air raid on Olanna and Odenigbo’s wedding day is
vivid, with images of dread, death, frustration and hopelessness:
Ugwu looked up and saw the planes, gliding low beneath the blue sky like two
birds of prey. They spurted hundreds of scattered bullets before dark balls
rolled out from underneath, as the planes were laying large eggs. The first
explosion was so loud that Ugwu’s ear popped and his body shivered
177
alongside the vibrating ground. A woman from the opposite house tugged at
Olanna’s dress ‘Remove it! Remove that white dress! They will see it and
target us! Okeoma yanked off his uniform shirt, buttons flying off, and
wrapped it around Olanna. Baby began to cry. Master held his hand loosely
over her mouth, as if the pilots might hear her. The second explosion followed
and then the third and fourth and fifth, until Ugwu felt the warm wetness of
urine on his shorts and was convinced that the bombs would never end; they
would continue to fall until everything was destroyed and everyone died. But
they stopped. The planes moved further away in the sky. (p. 202)
This is war. The happy wedding ceremony suddenly turns into a nightmare.
Half a Yellow Sun, in addition to Come Thunder, Never Again and Sunset in
Biafra, is a complex of linguistic, stylistic and rhetorical figures.
178
CHAPTER SIX
TEXTUAL AND CONTEXTUAL MEANINGS IN THE NIGERIA-BIAFRA
WAR NOVELS
This chapter is concerned with discovering the textual and contextual
meanings of the Nigeria-Biafra War novels. A comparative analysis of the
stylistic/linguistic elements discovered in the sample novels, as displayed in Chapters
Four and Five, shall help us here to arrive at some definite meanings of the war
novels. The research questions provided in Chapter One shall be of immense help
here, and shall be taken item by item.
The Dominant Stylistic Feature(s) in the Texts
Sunset in Biafra
In Sunset in Biafra, Amadi’s preferences are idiomatic expressions, questionsin-narrative/ rhetorical questions and sarcasm. About twenty-five idioms are
identified, twelve of them belonging to the class of phrasal verbs: ‘the rebels were
holding out’; ‘the bluff paid off’, etc. Some of the idioms are common expressions
usually found in everyday usage; example, ‘run into’, ‘bear the brunt of’, worked up;
others are found in more creative circumstances – to ‘cause a big stir’, ‘feathering
their nests’ ‘put paid to’, etc.
Again, ten illustrations have been made with rhetorical questions/ questionsin-narrative. However, the most prominent of the devices in Sunset in Biafra is
sarcasm / ridicule. The Biafran cause has been ridiculed in many forms in Sunset in
Biafra. Even the other linguistic devices in the novel can be taken as different aspects
of this sarcasm/ satire device. For instance, Amadi’s employment of repetitions, such
179
as “This is Biafra fish”, “It is Biafra land”, found all over the text, indicates his
intense cynicism of the Biafrans who, he feels, can cover every crime in the name of
‘Biafra’. Even the many idioms and rhetorical questions in the text are infused with
sarcastic elements.
For examples:
1.
As the days went by, people were worked up to a dangerously high
state of excitement (p.40)
2.
Although the crude bombs did little damage they caused a big stir (p.
47)
3.
Who were these men who went to war in wrappers? (p. 69)
By using the idiomatic phrasal verb ‘worked up’ (in No 1), Amadi implies that the
idea of Biafrans going to war is as a result of manipulation and propaganda from their
government. In No 2, above, Amadi sarcastically refers to the Biafran ‘crude bombs’
which does little damage, yet causes so much excitement among the people. The
rhetorical question (No 3) is also full of sarcasm.
Amadi’s contempt for the person of Ojukwu and his rhetorical antics is
evident in his text. Amadi seems to imply that the idea of Biafra was a grand construct
of a few ambitious people from one ethnic group who wanted to hijack the political
and economic affairs of the country, Nigeria.
Though Amadi’s views here may sound convincing, yet one cannot but
remember that Amadi belongs to the Ikwerre tribe, one of the minority tribes in
Biafra, who contributed in no small measure in undermining the ‘Republic of Biafra’.
Most people in the minority tribes, found in the riverine areas of Nigeria, did not
believe at all in the Biafran cause.
180
Never Again
For Nwapa, the civil war as it was fought on the Biafran side is nothing but
propaganda; hence, in Never Again, she satirizes the worrisome situation, where
nothing but false information is given to the populace. Like Amadi, she uses many
repetitive passages and words. The device of irony which she employs serves the
same satiric purpose. She depicts the Biafran citizens who would rather believe the
propaganda than face the truth – the truth is that they will lose the battle, for they have
no arms and ammunition. Anybody who ever voices the truth is dubbed a ‘sabo’. The
word ‘saboteur’ is a trope Nwapa uses to ridicule the falsehood in Biafra. Every
defeat suffered is blamed on saboteurs ‘who showed the enemy the way’. Thus,
Ezekoro, the mad man, in this vein, regards those evacuating from Ugwuta, when the
town actually came under siege, as saboteurs. The many repetitions of the word ‘sabo’
all over Nwapa’s text elaborate its significance as a satirical tool.
The syntactic device of simple sentences, some with punctuation errors
resulting in sentence splices, employed in Never Again is an indication of the chaotic
nature of war which has affected the protagonist’s psyche and stability.
Come Thunder
Imagery and satire are the major linguistic features in Come Thunder. Strong
images of the Biafran soldiers’ strict regimentation, the brutal experiences of deaths
and defeats in the fronts and the dread of the Zagian (Nigerian) military power are
depicted in the novel. Some of them appeal not just to sight but to hearing: “…a
Zagian machine gun creaked and kicked like a high-powered motor-cycle riderless
after a fatal accident (p. 116)”. Enekwe relies mainly on the device of simile in
making vivid his imagery. Some of the images evoked are familiar, indigenous, and
Nigerian – cattle, cock, hawk, frogs and mangoes, trees.
181
Features of irony and satire in the text centre on the issue of ‘sabotage’ or
‘saboteur’. At a point, the Biafrans’ fear of sabotage among themselves surpasses
their fear of the Nigerian soldiers. This is ironical, for the Biafran revolution, in the
first place, was born out of ‘brotherly love’, not ‘brotherly suspicion’. Enekwe aptly
depicts the situation where the Biafran civilians view their soldiers as saboteurs; and
the soldiers themselves view their officers as saboteurs. The climax of this situation
arises with the shooting of Lt Anya by one of the sergeants in Anya’s own platoon.
This sergeant has mistaken his officer’s ‘delay tactics’ (born out of the reality that
they need to conserve the little arms they have until an appropriate moment to strike)
for sabotage.
Enekwe, in the text, has also been able to subtly satirize the situation where
young boys/ soldiers are psyched and literally pushed into battle. It is not that the
soldiers do not believe in the cause. What they are not told is that there is nothing
(ammunition) with which to continue the fight. The few officers who knew could not
talk. Nobody would like to be branded a ‘sabo’, either by the superior officers, the
junior officers, or, worse still, by the crude, uninformed and overzealous civilians. It
is such an irony: the fear of sabotage is what actually prolonged the war. Every defeat
is blamed on saboteurs “who showed the way”.
After reading Enekwe, one is able to see beyond the so-called determination
and courage of the Biafran soldiers. These soldiers have no alternative: It is either
they fight or they are killed as saboteurs. Their only duty is, then, to go and pay the
supreme sacrifice of death “for fatherland”. Madiebo has been cynical over this issue
of fighting for fatherland. For Madiebo, the Biafran soldier fought for almost three
years, naked, hungry and without ammunition. All he had was his will to survive. The
182
soldiers’ predicament is captured in the following verse – the first four lines of a
popular frontline song of the Biafran Army:
Take my boots off when I die
Send my clothings to the camp
Give my gun to someone else
To fight for fatherland, etc. (Madiebo 118)
One possible ‘big’ irony which could be deduced from these texts is that even
Ojukwu’s efforts at continuing the fight (against all odds, without arms) may have
stemmed out of the “fear that he would be dubbed a saboteur” if he quits. After all, it
is all the Igbo leaders that first bade for secession and the birth of Biafra.
Half of a Yellow Sun
In Half of a Yellow Sun, Adichie’s main intention seems to be to sell the Igbo
world-view and language to the larger world. In the novel, one discovers such
consciousness on the part of modern-day Nigerian writers for cultural adaptation of
the English language. Otagburuagu’s Echoes of Violence is another contemporary
Biafran War novel displaying such indigenous Igbo features. In Half of a Yellow Sun,
there are instances of translations (Igbo-English/ English-Igbo), transliterations and
code-mixing which abound in the text. In addition, just as in the other texts studied,
there are elements of satire/ irony in Half of a Yellow Sun – the many pieces of
Biafran propaganda, the ‘kwashiorkored’ children playing war games, not knowing
that their condition has been brought about by the war, even adults, temporarily
putting aside all their war troubles, taking pride to watch the children’s war games. At
Professor Ezeka’s residence, another ironical side is seen. The families of the very
183
senior officers in the army live in plenty, as against the suffering masses who die
every day of lack of basic necessities.
From the findings, here, the commonest stylistic element used by novelists of
the Nigeria-Biafra War is satire. In this regard, one can surmise that the NigeriaBiafra War novels are nothing but satires. The satires differ in intensity and subject,
anyway. In Amadi’s text, the laughter is targeted at the Biafran leader, Ojukwu, and
his so-called soldiers and freedom-fighters. For Amadi, the whole thing called Biafra
is a sham. Nwapa, on her own part, satirizes the idea of Biafrans going to war without
arms, and rather than their facing that fact and its repercussions, they turn around,
pointing at every other person as saboteurs. The dilemma faced by the young
courageous Biafran troops who suddenly realize, in the middle of the battle, that they
have been misled into fighting, without being given the basic ammunition needed for
the fighting job is satirized in Enekwe’s Come Thunder.
The intensity of the satire on the whole issue of the Nigeria-Biafra War has
been revealed in Come Thunder. Enekwe’s satire of the war is explored through the
soldiers trying to live up to the expectations of their civilian brothers and organizers
of the war. The more recent Nigeria-Biafra War novel, Half of a Yellow Sun, also
contains ironical/ satirical elements, though to a lesser extent. She shows why some of
the Biafran war efforts seem to be crumbling – some senior military officers, from
their lifestyle, are distant from the suffering of the poor masses they claim to be
protecting. To make matters worse, they remain Nigerians to the outside world; they
all travel with Nigerian passports. Yet the military officers claim they are fighting for
Biafra and will defend Biafra even to the last man. This is mere hypocrisy.
184
The Blend of Fiction and History in the Narratives
A war novel describes a time in history, a particular period when a community
or a nation has witnessed a war. Hence, the primary action in such novels takes place
in a field of armed combat (war front), or in a domestic setting (home front) where the
characters are preoccupied with the preparations for, or recovery from, war (refer to
the section on the war novel, in Chapter Two). War novels have also been described
as fiction texts based on real historical figures and actual events. This implies that
though war novels deal with historical facts, they are still artistic creations, relying on
the story-telling techniques of the novelists. This reminds us of Stephen’s comments
(also cited in Chapter Two) that war novels “blur the lines between the traditional
academic disciplines of English Literature and History, and even the newer ones of
Sociology and Economics (270).” However, the degree to which the war novels
pursue historical fact as against fictive information may vary from work to work. That
is what this section seeks to find in the texts under study– ‘how close or otherwise the
texts are to the real historical Nigeria-Biafra War’.
Among the novels studied in this research, Amadi’s Sunset in Biafra may
contain the greatest percentage of fact when compared to others. Amadi’s text can
even be called a non-fiction novel, for the author calls it his civil war diary. One may
be deceived, however, if one takes all that is written in such autobiographical
accounts as fact, for it is probable that the author’s personal philosophies and
positions during the war may have coloured some of the facts he has given. After all,
Epplin, in ‘A Kernel of Truth’, has asserted that “all history is, in some way,
fictional”. Also, in this regard, the Spanish novelist Imma Monso, after writing an
autobiographical novel, has remarked, “I wrote a true story, but it was nevertheless a
fiction” (as cited by Epplin, ‘A Kernel of Truth’, web).
185
The researcher would have preferred to describe Amadi’s text as faction.
Emenyonu (1991) describes faction as the latest trend in the Nigerian novel, which
stems from a more urgent need to satirize more directly and lucidly, in order to reform
more effectively. For Emenyonu, faction is becoming increasingly popular due to a
felt inadequacy of the [fictional] novel to achieve its attributed purpose of reforming
and rectifying human foibles and injustices in the contemporary society. Thus, writers
are forced to be more factual. In this vein, the present researcher sees most of the
selected war novels, particularly Amadi’s, as faction. These novels, without any
exception, intend to criticize and reform society. Their message is simple – war is
stupid. It makes you lose your senses. Amadi, however, has an additional objective of
rationalizing his peculiar involvement in the Nigeria-Biafra War, hence his
autobiographical style.
The other texts studied in the present research, though more fictitious, in
terms of the names of the characters and the episodes described, all have their factual
sides. Nwapa’s story, for instance, revolves around the fall and recapture of Ugwuta,
Nwapa’s native town. There are also direct references to characters, like, Ojukwu and
Gowon, personalities who were at the center of the events during the Nigeria-Biafra
war. Adichie’s novel, Half of a Yellow Sun, seems to be moving intermittently from
the factual (history) to the fictive (story-telling). The fictive characters of Odenigbo,
Olanna, Kainene, Ugwu, Richard, etc, have been woven around some incidents that
happened in Nigeria and ‘Biafra’ at certain points in history. There are some real
broadcasts made by Ojukwu and Gowon captured in the story.
Enekwe’s Come Thunder is indirect in all its references to actual historical
settings or characters of the Nigeria-Biafra War, though the events described are
undeniably those of the Nigeria-Biafra conflict. In this regard, the text is similar to
186
Echoes of Violence by Otagburuagu. However, though Enekwe has not explicitly
mentioned it, his novel seems to be his own account of the war. The chief character,
Meka, in Enekwe’s text may have been Enekwe as a young recruit fighting for Biafra
during the civil war. In the same way, Onyekwere, the chief character in Echoes of
Violence, may be Otagburuagu in his youth during the civil disturbances in Nigeria.
It should be mentioned that, out of the four novelists studied, Adichie is the
only one who did not actually live through the experiences she narrates, for she had
not been born by that time. She was born in 1977, many years after the war. Yet, she
may have been writing another person’s biography. The looming figures of Olanna,
Odenigbo or Ugwu in the novel may have been any of Adichie’s relations whose story
she is narrating.
Therefore, one can conclude that all the civil war novels studied contain, in
varying degrees, some biographical information. While Amadi writes an
autobiography and directly refers to the issues as they happened; Nwapa seems to
write an account of her own experiences. Adichie’s own story seems to match with
actual historical information: she uses real names of some towns and eminent
personalities of the war. However, there are other fictitious sides to Adichie’s story.
For instance, she writes about a rail station at Nsukka, but in actual fact, it does not
exist. Only Enekwe has been indirect in all his references to the real historical event.
Points of View
The points of view of the war novels may also be of relevance when
considering historicity of the novels. Amadi’s Sunset in Biafra and Nwapa’s Never
Again have been written from the first-person points of view, Amadi’s ‘I’
representing he, himself, while Nwapa’s ‘I’ stands for Kate, the heroine in the story.
187
The other novels studied here have the third person view-points. It should be noted
that the third-person view-point has some subclasses, according to the kind of
freedom the writer grants to the narrator. Half of a Yellow Sun seems to have the
third-person omniscient where the narrator knows everything that needs to be known
about all the events and the characters, moving as she wishes in time and place and
shifting from character to character. This intrusive omniscient narrator is witnessed in
Henry Fielding’s Tom Jones (1749) and Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace (1870) where
the narrator goes as far as to interpolate essays suggested by the subject matter of the
novels (Ayo, in Oyeleye & Olateju, 2005). In limited third-person point of view, the
narrator confines himself to what is experienced, thought and felt by a single
character, or at most by a very limited number of characters within the story. This is
witnessed in Enekwe’s Come Thunder.
On the issue of point of view and the Nigeria-Biafra war novels, we can
conclude that writers like Enekwe and Adichie operate more freely with the historical
event, adding more imagination than fact, just to create a general feeling of the
military situation. On the other hand, Amadi’s and Nwapa’s novels are
autobiographical and near-autobiographical, respectively, implying more factual
information.
Military Registers in the Texts
Register implies that particular situations – sports, the military, medicine,
advertising, law – require certain characteristic linguistic features. Hence, Halliday
(1996) posits that register is determined by what is taking place, who is taking part
and what part the language is playing. Choosing the fitting register or diction is not a
simple task. Adequate use of a particular register depends on the background of the
188
writer – to what extent has the writer been exposed to that field about which he is
writing.
Now, because the present research is on war novels, military or war registers
are our natural interest, here. Military terminology refers to the terms and language of
military organizations and personnel. It is the researcher’s intention, here, to analyze
the extent to which the war writers have used the military terminologies. Bhatia’s
(1993) assertion that register analysis should focus mainly on “the identification of
statistically significant lexico grammatical features of a linguistic variety” will guide
our analysis, here. This means that the number of register items concerning the
military found in the war novels will be crucial in our assessment of each novel.
In Sunset in Biafra, some military jargons, numbering about nine, have been
identified and the passages where they are found analyzed. In Never Again, no
military jargon or register has been analyzed, as done in Sunset in Biafra. However,
the words, ‘saboteur’ and ‘propaganda’ are common words in the text, but have been
examined as satirical tools. Sixty-one military terms have been recorded in Come
Thunder. In addition, seven slang expressions in the text have been identified and
analyzed. In Half of a Yellow Sun, there has been no analysis or discussion of military
registers. However, a few military terms, like, ‘bunker’, ‘bombs’, ‘ogbunigwe’,
‘home-made rockets’, grenades, armoured cars and ‘combing’ will be found in the
text.
Of all texts studied here, Enekwe’s Come Thunder has the greatest number of
military terms. The reason is that Come Thunder is the only novel out of the selected
novels discussing the soldiers’ life at the war-fronts; not at the office-front (Amadi’s
Sunset in Biafra). Also, Enekwe’s language is more picturesque and dramatic than
most of the other novelists. Compare these two descriptions of an air raid:
189
Ugwu looked up and saw the planes, gliding low beneath the blue sky like two
birds of prey. They spurted hundreds of scattered bullets before dark balls
rolled out from underneath, as if the planes were laying large eggs. The first
explosion was so loud that Ugwu’s ear popped and his body shivered
alongside the vibrating ground. (Half of a Yellow Sun, p. 202)
A shell exploded beside Meka’s trench, covering him with dust. Some more
exploded all around him. He could hear them whistling as they streaked
overhead. The bombardment raked the battlefield with a million shrapnels.
Meka was deafened by the violent parting of the shells. It was like an endless
night of storm. (Come Thunder, p. 113)
From the latter passage, we notice military terms such as ‘trench’, ‘bombardment’,
‘battlefield’, ‘shrapnels’ and ‘shells’ (five terms). In the former passage, apart
from ‘bullets’, there is no other prominent military term. Note that ‘explosion’/
‘exploded’, is suggestive of military terminology. But as the terms are found in
both passages, it has been excluded.
Female versus Male War Authors
One prominent device employed by the female Nigeria-Biafran War novelists
is the creation of strong female characters, imbued with a lot of physical or emotional
strength. In Nwapa’s text, three strong women, including a goddess, are depicted:
Kate, who alone can see the untruths and hypocrisies behind the Biafran propaganda
and is bold enough to voice them out. There is also Madam Agafa, the strong woman
politician, who challenged the men to come out and fight: “I am a woman. I am not
afraid of shelling I am not afraid of any Vandal I am going to fight with my mortar
190
pistol… (P. 12)” Mrs Agafa, later, proves to be full of falsehood, despite all her show
of strength. Again, there is Kate’s aunt, who refused to run at the fall of Ugwuta.
Above all, there is the “Woman of the Lake”, the spiritual being whom the people of
Ugwuta ultimately trust: “the thunderer, the hairy woman. The most beautiful woman
in the world. [Sic] The ageless woman … (p. 56)” This woman would not allow
anything bad to happen to her people.
In the novel, too, Nwapa depicts the war efforts of the Biafran women,
generally:
The women especially were very active, more active than the men in
fact. They made uniforms for the soldiers, they cooked for the soldiers
and gave expensive presents to the officers. And they organized the
women who prayed every Wednesday for Biafra. In return for these
services, they were rewarded with special war reports exclusive to
them and them alone. (p. 7)
Like Nwapa, Adichie has also portrayed strong women in her text – the twin
sisters, Kainene and Olanna, and Odenigbo’s mother, among others. These women are
seen to be in charge of their destiny and those of the men folk around them. In the
university community, just before the war, it was the university women that organized
“In Case Of War” seminars, instructing people on actions to take to safeguard their
property and certificates (Adichie, p. 169).
One can contrast the portrayal of these powerful women in Nwapa’s and
Adichie’s texts with what happens in the other texts written by males. Amadi does not
have any major female character in his war novel; occasionally, he talks about his
crying wife who comes to visit him in detention. He also has mentioned some female
detainees, one of whom had her three year-old child with her and is usually
191
querrelling with the guards. The survival antics of these female prisoners (like the one
whom a car regularly comes to pick up at night) are only mentioned. However,
Amadi’s seeming lack of interest in female matters in Sunset at Dawn may not
classify him as a chauvinist; in The Concubine, one of Amadi’s novel, he dwelt
considerably on the strength of one major female character, Ihuoma. The only female
characters who have received some attention in Enekwe’s Come Thunder are Helen,
Meka’s mother, and Ada, girl friend and, eventually, wife to Lt Fred Umana). Ada’s
role has ended quickly, immediately her husband of a few months, Umana, gets killed
in the war front.
Again, the female war writers, here, seem to be more conscious of the
supernatural than the male writers. Adichie writes about the sacrifices made to the
gods and some thrown into the River Niger, in respect of Kainene’s return, while
Nwapa describes how the Uhammiri Lake Goddess is besotted for protection during
the war. Adichie also notes the supernatural sides which usually follow every major
event in her characters’ lives.
It is obvious that because Enekwe and Amadi have dealt with the soldiers’ life
in the front and office, they will be more concerned with military affairs and language
than domestic matters. It should be noted that Enekwe has written about the battle
fronts, while Amadi has written about the administrative aspects of the war, which he
fought from the Federal side, not the Biafran side. Amadi’s and Enekwe’s
involvements with soldiers’ lives have brought about their increased use of the
military registers; unlike in the female-authored texts where only propaganda items
were utilized for purposes of satire. As has been noted before (in answer to the first
research question), Enekwe’s use of military registers far outweighs Amadi’s use of
this register – Enekwe has used a total of sixty-eight military terminologies (including
192
jargons), while Amadi has employed about nine terms. The reason is not far-fetched;
Enekwe’s characters have been seen in the battle field, using these terminologies.
One prominent linguistic feature among the male novelists examined, but
lacking in the examined texts written by the females, is the use of formulaic language.
Formulaic language refers to preferred sequences or chunks of words, such as idioms,
collocations and lexical phrases (Woods, 2002). Enekwe specializes in the use of
formulas, like the similes (a total of twenty-seven has been analyzed); while Amadi’s
formulas are the idiomatic expressions, chiefly made up of phrasal verbs (a total of 25
idioms are examined). None of the female writers studied has utilized the formulas as
effectively as the male writers studied. There are linguistic devices, however,
commonly shared by both the male and the female writers – satires, ironies, repetition
and parallelisms. Generally, though, Enekwe’s use of complex sentences with many
parallel structures is unequalled.
Linguistically, the female war writers differ. Nwapa’s language is chiefly
made up of simple sentences, with simple lexicons – “I meant to live at all costs. I
meant to see the end of the war. Dying was terrible. …” In contrast, Adichie has a
stock of both ethnic and English vocabularies. Her sentences are lengthier, complex
and better coordinated (with appropriate punctuation marks) than Nwapa’s (see
Chapter Four). Apart from the techniques of satire and irony, which both novelists
apply, Adichie has, in addition, used imagery, simile and parallelism in her story.
Being female and young, her imagery depicts this reality, as this passage shows: “She
[Olanna] watched the outline of the mango trees in the next yard; some of them had
fruit drooping down like heavy earrings” (p. 185).
Moreover, Adichie’s text, being a contemporary Nigerian novel, displays more
traditional Nigerian technique in her use of English. Refer above to the features found
193
in each of the novels and to Chapters Four and Five; for instance, about forty-one
Igbo expressions are found in Half of a Yellow Sun. This is in the renewed spirit of
African/Nigerian renaissance. Another contemporary war novel, Otagburuagu’s
Echoes of Violence, also exhibits this renaissance of African/Igbo feature in our use of
English.
Earlier and Later War Novels
An examination of the findings of the first research question will partly
provide the answer to this question. While the earlier novels employ more of satirical
devices, the later ones (with particular reference to Adichie’s text, studied here) are
preoccupied with indigenous Igbo stylistic techniques.
The Igbo tradition in Nigerian literature in English is a product of that long
controversy concerning the continual use of English in creative writing in Africa.
Theorists, like Wali (1963) and Thiong’o (1986), have argued that English is
absolutely antithetical to the indigenous writer’s expression of imperial resistance. It
should be noted that, for the African scholar or author of serious literature, writing is
always a political act. Cultural and identity erosion has been identified as a major
negative effect of colonization in Africa; hence, the major preoccupation of African
literature since its inception is how to remedy this. Some critics, chief among them
Chinua Achebe, in trying to balance the extreme views of Wali and Thiong’o (as seen
above), have advocated that English is not a foreign language in Nigeria: “By the
peculiar circumstance of her birth, Nigeria was born into English as mother tongue
[sic] (Achebe 149)”.
The utilitarian values of the English language in Nigeria can be summed as
follows: English serves as a uniting force for the component parts (ethnic groups) of
194
Nigeria; the language ensures mutual communication between African writers and the
reading populace at large; again, it is a useful “world language” which bestows
international intelligibility to all its users. However, as Achebe (1965) has cautioned,
the African writer should not attempt to write English as a native speaker might. “The
English language, and not the African writer, should be the one to bend and made to
serve the unique needs of the African author – but without sacrificing the language’s
mutual intelligibility”, Achebe asserts (18).
More recently, Gaurav (1993) has argued, like Achebe, that English is not a
purely Western language. In his view, English is capable of being appropriated and
successfully Africanised. Gaurav adopts a deconstructionist approach to language
systems on the whole, and debunks the possibility of ‘pure’ languages that contain
coherent meaning. In his analogy, Bakhtin suggests that despite the fact that the “the
world in language is half someone else’s, an utterance may become “one’s own”
when one “populates” it with one’s own intention, his own accent, when he
appropriates the word, adapting it to his own semantic and expressive intention (cited
in Gaurav 6).
Adejunmobi has revisited the issue of language use in West African fiction.
He challenges the claim that African literatures written in European languages should
be read as “a sign of the surrender of the culturally alienated elite to the culture of the
colonizers (36)”, and suggests that the movement of indigenous authors writing in
English is a larger continental move to “counteract the efforts of colonial
administrators […] to strip educated Africans of any claim to make political demands
[and to] deny cultural validity to any African anti-colonial texts being produced in
European languages” (36).
195
Some of the novels studied in this research can serve as models for teaching
the linguistic adaptation of the English language in Nigeria (new ‘Nigerian English’,
and the corresponding indigenous culture transfer). Enekwe’s Come Thunder and
Adichie’s Half of a Yellow Sun, in particular, have employed a lot of traditional
Nigerian/ Igbo proverbs (indigenous knowledge), Igbo/ English translations and,
generally, an interesting assemblage of English, Nigerian Pidgin and Igbo languages
(code-mixing/ switching). Otagburuagu’s war novel, Echoes of Violence, is another
example of such novels which could be studied and used in the African, Nigerian, and
Igbo culture transfer currently being preached.
196
CHAPTER SEVEN
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION
This Chapter sums up our discussion. The sub-headings here include:
Summary of Findings; Practical Consequences of Findings; New Contributions of the
Study; Suggestions for Future Research; and Conclusion/ Recommendation.
Summary of Findings
From the analyses and findings in Chapters Four, Five and Six, the following
summary can be deduced.
1. The Nigeria-Biafra War novels, from the samples studied, are all satires,
ridiculing the idea of a people going to fight, without preparation. Such
unprepared unequipped ventures are nothing but mere waste of human lives.
2. The novels blend history with storytelling. Even the stories which seemingly
have no real relationship with the war (like in Come Thunder, where the writer
has purposely neglected using any direct names which featured in the war) are
but historical tales of the war. Conversely, the biographical accounts which
seem like true records of the events have been tinged with some fictive
realities. An example is Amadi’s Sunset in Biafra, where Amadi, like a
superstar, goes through all kinds of dangers and comes out unscathed.
3. The war novels have deployed the military registers in varying degrees. The
setting of each novel (in terms of the nature of the place where the major
events happen) has determined the extent to which the writers have utilized the
military terminologies. Enekwe’s large stock of military language, for
example, is a fall-out from the war-front settings in his texts.
197
4. The female war writers are more concerned with events in the home-fronts,
unlike the male writers whose main interest is in the events that happen in the
war-fronts, in the offices where the war strategies are planned, in the training
or detention camps. Linguistically, the male writers have preferred formulaic
usages, mainly the similes and idioms. One cannot regard the linguistic styles
of Nwapa and Adichie as similar, though both writers are female. While
Nwapa prefers the simple English lexis and structure, Adichie has gone for
complex parallelism, embedding, and neologism. Most importantly, Adichie
has explored further into the adaptation of the Igbo/ indigenous Nigerian
culture in our literary writing.
5. The major stylistic difference between the older war texts and Adichie’s more
contemporary war text is in the latter’s Igbo/English linguistic adaptation. This
reality goes to support both Iroh’s and Feuser’s assertions in the late 1980s
that there had not been enough time to produce the sort of art that would have
sufficient distance from the suffering of the war (as cited in Hawley 18).
Adichie, being blessed with this distance, has been more exploratory in her
style (her linguistics and messages). While the earlier war novels are like
laments, the newer novel has been more objective in viewing the NigeriaBiafra War as just an accident of history, but something we should all learn
from.
198
Practical Consequences of Findings
1. Scholars of language and allied disciplines, and readers of the Nigeria-Biafra
War novels, in particular, can now understand the Nigeria-Biafra War novels
better, and, in addition, gain certain stylistic/ linguistic insights needed to
unravel the true meanings of various other texts.
2. Budding scholars of various fields will be inspired to develop the skill for
creative compositions, from the study. The various examples of creative
usages discussed in this study will serve as resource to them.
3. Writers, novelists, artists or media practitioners in search of a weapon to use to
subtly criticize society on any social vice can, following the findings of this
study, employ the device of satire.
4. The world’s youths who are tomorrow’s leaders would, from this thesis, gain
insights into ethical leadership and human behavior, especially in times of
crises.
5. The analysis on Adichie’s text, for example, would further inspire Nigerian
linguists, literary artists, writers, culture departments and policy makers to
develop or sponsor studies on the concepts of ‘multilingualism in Nigeria’ and
‘Nigerian English’ which may provide the answers to the national language
question in the country.
199
New Contributions of the Study
1. This study, by its nature, has opened up robust linkages between the
related and unrelated disciplines of linguistics/ stylistics, literature, history,
sociology, the military, political science, and leadership.
2. The study has proved that linguistic and literary theories blend in
contemporary practice of stylistics.
3. Leaders and scholars training for rhetorical/ linguistic/ stylistic skills
would find useful the various examples of creative and persuasive usages
discussed in this study.
4. The particular registers of the Nigerian military and their potentials in
further development of the Military ESP have been revealed by the study.
5. The prospects of ‘Nigerian English’, where English is made to suit the
cultural realities and need of Nigerians are exposed in the study.
Suggestions for Future Research
This research should inspire further studies in the following areas:
1. The Nigeria-Biafra War Novels as Satires”
2. “Stylistics and Leadership Arts”
3. “Stylistics and Creative Compositions”
4. “War/ Military ESP”, and
5. “‘Nigerian Usages in Literary Works of English”
6. “Multilingualism and the Nigerian National Language Question”
200
Conclusion/ Recommendation
This work confirms that stylistic-linguistics is a useful tool in the
interpretation of literary texts and by extension a requirement in the composition of
original texts. The researcher, therefore, advocates that academic institutions,
especially those of higher learning, in Nigeria embrace fully the subject of ‘Stylisticlinguistics’ in their Use of English Units, Language Departments, or better still, in an
autonomous department specifically devoted to it. In the same vein, considering all
the meanings and values inherent in Nigerian war literature, as exemplified in this
research, the researcher also advocates that ‘War Literature’ be developed as a
specialized area of study in the English and Literary Studies Department of this
University. Other universities in the country can also follow suit.
To this extent, I think that this study has been able to carve a niche for itself in the
field of stylistics as it relates to the Nigeria-Biafra War novels.
201
WORKS CITED
Analyzed Works
Amadi, Elechi. Sunset in Biafra: A Civil War Diary. 1973. London: Heinemann,
1982. Print.
Adichie, Chimamanda N. Half of a Yellow Sun. Lagos: Farafina, 2006. Print.
Enekwe, Ossie O. Come Thunder. Enugu: Fourth dimension, 1984. Print.
Nwapa, Flora. Never Again. 1975. Enugu: Tana Press, 1986. Print.
Secondary Sources
Achebe, Chinua. “English and the African Writer.” Transition 18 (1965): 27-30.
Print.
Adejare Oluwole. Language and Style in Soyinka: A Systemic Study of a
Literary Idiolect. Ibadan: Heinemann, 1992. 1. Print.
Adegbite, Adewale “Perspectives of Interpretation of Meaning in English.”
Perspectives on Language & Literature. Eds. Moji Olateju, and Lekan
Oyeleye. Ibadan: Obafemi Awolowo UP, 2005. 91-104. Print.
Adejunmobi, Moradewun. Vernacular Palaver: Imagination of the Local and
Non-native Languages of West Africa. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters Ltd,
2004. Print.
Agrawai, Nidhi. “Difference Between Literary and Stylistic Study in
Literature.” Articlesbase. Web. 5 Jan. 2010.
Ajdukiewicz, K. Studia Philosophica. 1 (1935): 1-27. Web.
Akinwale, O.T. “The Structure and Functions of English Idioms.” Perspectives
on Language & Literature. Eds. Moji Olateju, and Lekan Oyeleye. Ibadan:
Obafemi Awolowo UP, 2005. 147-56. Print.
202
Akwanya A. N. Verbal Structures: Studies in the Nature and Organisational
Patterns of Literary Language. Enugu: Acena Publishers, 1997. Print
____ Semantics and Discourse: Theories of Meaning and Textual Analysis.
Enugu: Acena Publisher, 1996. Print.
Ardat, Ahmad K. “Stylistics: An Over View of a Theory.” J. Coll. Arts, King
Saud Univ. 9 (1982): 33-41. Web.
Atofarati, Abubakar. “The Nigerian Civil War, Causes, Strategies, and Lessons
Learnt.” Web. <http://www.nigeriamasterweb.com>
Awhefeada, Sunny. “Hope and Despair in Enekwe’s Come Thunder.” Critical
Approaches: Onuora Ossie Enekwe. 1 (Ed. GMT Emezue. African Books
Network, Handel Books Ltd, Library of African Writing, 2008. 159-164.
Web.
Ayeomoni, Niyi. “The Role of Stylistics in Literary Studies.” Readings in
Language and Literature. 1st Ed. Ibadan: Obafemi Awolowo UP, 2003. 177190. Print.
Azuike, M.N. “Style: Theories and Practical Application.” Language Science.
14 (1992): 109 – 27. Print.
_____ “Character-code Concordance: A Stylistic Technique.‟ Work in Progress.
11 (2000): 1 – 18.
_____ “Style and the Mad Man.” The Anchor. 1 (2006): 78-82.
Bally C. Traite de Stylistique Francaise. 2 vols. 3rd ed. Geneva & Paris, 1951.
Web.
Bamgbose, Ayo. “Language and Nation Building.” Review of English and
Literary Studies 2.2 (1985): 95-108. Print.
____ “Language and the National Question in Nigeria”. African Notes. XIV.1.2
203
(1990): 70-80.
Bar-Hill, Yehoshua. “Four Lectures on Algebraic Linguistics and Machine
Translation+.” Automatic Translation of Languages: NATO Summer School
(1962): 1-26. Web.
Barnet, S. and W.E. Cain. A Short Guide to Writing about Literature. 8th
Edition. New York: Longman, 2000. Print.
Bartminski, J. Niebrzegowska-Bartminska S. Tekstologia. Warszawa, 2009.
Print.
Bateson, F.W. The Scholar Critic: An Introduction to Literary Research.
London: Routlege & Kegan Paul, 1972. Print.
Beaugrande, Robert De. “Closing the Gap Between Linguistics and Literary
Study: Discourse Analysis and Literary Theory[1].” Journal of Advanced
Composition 13.2 (1993): 423-448. Web.
___ “Text Linguistics at the Millennium: Corpus Data and Missing Links.”
Web. 11 May 2012. <http://www.beaugrande.com/textmillennium.htm>
___ “Ground Rules for Text Linguistics.” Web. 1 July 2012
<http://www.beaugrande.com/GroundRulesTextLinguistics.htm>
____ “Text Linguistics.” Discursive Pragmatics. Eds. Jan Zienkowski, JanOla Ostman, and Jef Verschueren. Amsterdan: John Benjamins, 2011.
____ and Wolfgang Dressler. “Introduction to Text Linguistics.” Web. 30
March 2012. < http:/beaugrande.com/introduction_to_text_linguistics. Htm>
____ Introduction to Text Linguistics. London: Longman, 1981. Print.
Bex, T., M. Burke, and P. Stockwell. Contextualized Stylistics: in Honour of
Peter Verdonk. Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2000. Print.
Bhatia, Vijay K. Analysing Genre: Language Use in Professional Settings. New
204
York: Longman,1993. Print.
Bhuvaneswar, Chilukun. “Proverbium 20 (2003): A Review of English
Articles.” Web. 12 Jan 2012.
Birch, D. Language, Literature and Critical Practice. London: Routledge, 1989.
Print.
Bloor, Thomas, and Meriel Boor. The Functional Analysis of English. 2nd ed.
London: Hodder Arnold, 2004. Print.
Brewton, Vince. “Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy.” Web.
[email protected]
Brooks, T, J.T. Purser, and R.P. Warren. An Approach to Literature. New York:
Prentice Hall, 1975. Print.
Brooke-Rose, C. A Grammar of Metaphor. London: Secker & Warburg, 1958.
Print.
Brown, G. & G. Yule. Discourse Analysis. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press,1983. Print.
Burton, D. “Through Glass Darkly: Through Dark Glasses.” Language and
Literature: An Introductory Reader in Stylistics. Ed. R.A. Carter. London:
George Allen & Unwin, 1982. Print.
Campbell, Karilyn, and Susan Huxman. The Rhetorical Act. Belmont CA:
Wadsworth, 2003. Print.
Carter. R.A. “Style and Interpretation in Hemingway’s “Cat in the Rain”.”
Language and Literature: An Introductory Reader in Stylistics. Ed. R.
Carter. London: George Allen &Unwin, 1982. Print.
Carter, R.A. Investigating English Discourse, Language, Literacy and
Literature. London & New York: Routledge, Web.
205
____ and M.N. Long. The Web of Words: Exploring Literature through
Language, Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1987. Print.
____ and J. McRae. Language, Literature and the Learner. London and New
York, Longman, 1996. Print.
Cartens, W.A.M. Afrikaanse Tekslinguistiek ‘n Inleiding (Africans Text
Linguistics. Pretoria: JL van Schaik Akademies, 1997. Print.
____ “Trends in Text/Discourse Studies in South Africa.” Organization in
Discourse. Proceedings from the Turku Conference Anglicana Turkuensia.
14 (1995): 187-200. Print.
Catano, James V. “Stylistics.” Web. <http://www.press.jhu.edu/books
/hopkins_guide_to_literary_theory/stylistics.htm>
Chatman, S. The Later Style of Henry James. Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1972.
Print.
Chomky Noam. Aspects of the Theory of Syntax. Massachusetts: MIT, 1982.
Print.
Chukwukere, Gloria. Gender Voices and Choices: Redefining Women in
Contemporary African Fiction. Enugu: Fourth Dimension Publishers, 1995.
Print.
Cockelreas, Joanne, and Dorothy Logan. Writing Essays about Literature: A
Literary Rhetoric. Toronto: Holt, Rhinehart and Winston, 1976. Print.
Cohen, B.B. Writing about Literature. Illinois: Scott, Foresman, 1973. Print.
Coles Notes. A Glossary of Literary Terms. London: Coles Publishing, 1957.
Print.
Cook, G. The Language of Advertising. London: Routledge, 1992. Print.
“Critical Theory and Practice.” Amnesia. Web. July 21, 2011.
206
Crowder, Michael. The Story of Nigeria. London: Faber and Faber, 1980. Print.
Crystal, David. An Encyclopedic Dictionary of Language and Languages.
Oxford: Blackwell, 1992. Print.
____ “Style: The Varieties of English”. N. d. 200-21. Web.
____ and Derek Davy. Investigating English Style. London: Longman, 1985.
Print.
Cuddon, J.A. A Dictionary of Literature and Literary Theory. Cambridge
Centre: Dubleday, 1991. Print.
Dathorne, O.R. African Literature in the Twentieth Century. London:
Heinemann,1982. Print.
Davie D. Articulate Energy: An Inquiry into the Syntax of English Poetry.
London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1955. Print.
Dijk, T. Van. Text and Context: Explorations in the Semantics and Pragmatics
of Discourse. London, Longman, 1977. Print.
DiYanni, Robert. Literature and Reading Fiction, Poetry, Drama and the Essay.
New York: McGraw Hill, 2002. Print.
Donnelly, C. Linguistics for Writers. Buffalo: SUNY Press, 1994. Print.
Dooley, Patrick K. “Criticism and Commentary.” Salem Press. Sept. 2010. Web.
2 Nov. 2012.
Durrant, A,, and N. Fabb. Literary Studies in Action. London: Routledge, 1990.
Print.
Eagleton, T. Literary Theory: An Introduction. Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1988.
Print.
Ebeogu, Afam. “Book Reviews: Theodora Akachi Ezeigbo and Liz Gunner.
Eds. The Literature of War. Spec. issue of African Languages and Cultures
207
4.1 (1991): 1-99.” Research in African Literatures. 24.3 (1993): 127-29.
Print.
“Elements of Fiction.” Buzzle.com. 26 March 2011.
http://www.buzzle.com/articles/elements/ -of-fiction. html
Elliot, Andrew. Universal Letter Writer. Surrey: Clarion, 2005. Print.
Ellis, Nick C., Rita Simpson-Vlach, and Carson Maynard. “Formulaic Language
in Native and Second Language Speakers: Psycholinguistics, Corpus
Linguistics, and TESOL.” TESOL Quarterly. 42.3 (2008): 375-96. Web.
Elugbe, B. “National Language and National Development.” Review of English
and Literary Studes 2.2 (1985): 165-78. Print.
Ene, M.O. “Akpalaokwu: “Igbo Idioms”.” Web. 13 Jan. 2012.
Emenanjo, Ernest. The Rise of the Igbo Novel. Ibadan: Oxford UP, 1978. Print.
____ Literature and Black Aesthetics ed. Ibadan: Heinemann, 1990. Print.
Emenyonu, Ernest. “Literature in a Second Language: Use of English in
Nigerian Fiction.” New Englishes: A West African Perspective. Eds. Ayo
Bamgbose, Ayo Banjo, and Andrew Thomas. Ibadan: Mosuro, 1995. Print.
____ Studies on the Nigerian Novel. Ibadan: Heinemann, 1991. Print.
____ “The Nigerian Civil War and the Nigerian Novel: The Writer as Historical
Witness.” Studies on the Nigerian Novel. Ibadan: Heinemann, 1991. Print.
____ Critical Theory and African Literature. Ibadan: Heinemann, 1987. Print.
Emezue Gloria. “The Stimulus of (Postcolonial) Violence: An Interview with
Peter Onwudinjo.” Postcolonial Text 5.1 (2009): 2. Web.
Enkvist, Nils Erik. Linguistic Stylistics. The Hague: Mouton, 1973. Print.
____ “Narrative Discourse: A Review.” Studies in Language. 6 (1982): 107-18.
Web.
208
____ “Literary Stylistics: Lecture Notes No. 1.”
<http://courses.nus.edu.sg/course/ellibst/lsl01.html>
Enkvist, N.E., J Spencer, and M.J. Gregory. Linguistics and Style: London:
Oxford UP, 1964. Print.
Ezeigbo, T. A Fact and Fiction in the Literature of the Nigerian Civil War.
Lagos, Unity Publishing & Research, 1992. Print.
____ and Liz Gunner. Eds. “The Literature of War.” Spec. issue of African
Languages and Cultures 4.1 (1991): 1-99. Print.
Fabb, Nigel. Linguistics and Literature in the Verbal Arts of the Word. Oxford:
Blackwell Publishers, 1997.
Fairclough, N. ed. Critical Language Awareness. London: Longman, 1992.
Print.
Fanon, Frantz. The Wretched of the Earth. London: Penguin, 1983. Print.
Fernando C, and R. Flavel. On Idioms and Idiomaticity. Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 1981.
Feuser, Willfried F. “Anomy and Beyond: Nigeria’s Civil War in Literature.”
Presence Africaine: Revue Culturelle du Monde Noir/Cultural Review of the
Negro World. 137-138 (1986): 113-51. Print.
Finch, Geoffrey. Linguistic Terms and Concepts. New York: Palgrave
Macmillan, 2000. Print.
Firth, J.R. Papers in Linguistics 1934-1951. London: Oxford UP, 1992. Print.
Fish, S.E. “What is Stylistics and Why are They Saying Such Terrible Things
About It?” Ed. S. Chartman. New York: Columbia University, 1973. Print.
Fisher, John H. “Language and Literature in an Articulate Society,” Web.
Fludernik, Monika. “Strange Bedfellows: Linguistic Theory and Practice in
209
Current Literary Scholarship.” European Journal of English Studies. 2
(1998): 431-435. Web.
Forsyth, Frederick. Emeka. Ibadan: Spectrum, 1982. Print.
____ The Making of an African Legend: The Biafra Story. Middlesex: Penguin,
1977. Print.
Fowler, Roger. The Language of Literature: Some Linguistic Contributions to
Criticism. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1971. Print.
____ Style and Structure in Literature: Essays in the New Stylistics. Ithaca:
Cornell University Press, 1975. Print.
____ Linguistics and the Novel. London: Methuen, 1977. Print.
____ “Linguistic Theory and the Study of Literature.” Essays on Style and
Language: Linguistic and Critical Approaches in Literary Style. Ed. Roger
Fowler. London and Henley: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1979. Print.
____ Literature as Social Discourse. London: Batsford, 1981. Print.
____ Linguistic Criticism. London: Oxford University Press, 1986. Print.
Frazer, B. “Idioms within a Transformational Grammar.” Foundations of
Language 6. (1970): 22-42. Print.
Freeman, D. Essays in Modern Stylistics. London: Methuen, 1981. Print.
Fries, Peter. “On the State of Theme in English: Argument from Discourse.”
Micro and Macro Conexity of Text. Ed. Janos S. Petofi. Humburg: Buske,
1983. Print.
Fromkin Victoria, Robert Rodman and Nina Hyams. An Introduction to
Language. 7th ed. Massachussets: Heinle, 2003. Print
Fulton, Gordon D. Styles of Meaning and Meanings of Style in Richardson’s
Clarissa. Quebec: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1999. Web.
210
Gardener Laura C. “Nigerian Literature: Oral and Written Tradition.” African
Postcolonial Literature in English in the Postcolonial. Web. 1991.
Garvin, Paul L. (ed.) A Prague School Reader on Aesthetics, Literary Structure
and Style. Washington: Georgetown Press, 1964. Print.
Gary N. A Discourse Analysis of Certain Root Transformations in English.
Reproduced by the Indiana University Linguistics Club: Bloomington:
Indiana, 1976. Print.
Gaurav, Desai. “English as an African Language.” English Today: The
International Review of the English Language 9.2 (1993): 4-11. Print.
Gbemisola, Adeoti. “The Military in Nigeria’s Postcolonial Literature; An
Overview.” Revista Estudios Ingleses 16 (2003): 6-29. Web.
Gerard, Albert S. “English: Nigeria.” European-Language Writing in SubSaharan Africa. Ed. Albert S. Gerard. Budapest: Akademiai Kiado, 1986.
Print.
Gibbons, Tom. Literature and Awareness: An Introduction to the Close-Reading
of Prose and Verse. London: Edward Arnold, 1979. Print.
Gorrel, R. “Rhetoric Theories of Application.” Web.
Graff, G. “Other Voices, Other Rooms: Organizing and Teaching the
Humanities Conflict.” New Literary History 21 (1990). Web.
Graves, Robert, and Alan Hodge. “The Reader Over Your Shoulder.” The
Modern Stylists. London: Collier-Macmillan, 1968. Print.
Gray, B. Style: The Problem and Its Solution. The Hague: Mouton. Print.
Green, Stephen J., and Chrysanne DiMarco “Stylistic Decision-Making in
Natural Language Generation.” Springerlink. Web.
Greenbaum, Sidney. The English Language Today. Oxford: Pergamon Institute
211
of English, 1985. Print.
Griswold, Wendy, and Misty Bastian. “A Bibliographic Listing of Nigerian
Novels: 1952-1990.” Journal of Commonwealth Literature 25 (1990): 21427. Print.
Gunner, Liz. “Power, Popular Consciousness and the Fictions of War: Hove’s
Bones and Chinodya’s Harvest of Thorns.” The Literature of War. Spec.
issue of African Languages and Cultures. 4.1 Eds. Theodora Akachi
Ezeigbo, and Liz Gunner. (1991): 1-99. Print.
Hall, Donald (ed). The Modern Stylists. London: Collier-Macmillan, 1968.
Halliday, M.A.K. “Descriptive Linguistics in Literary Studies.” Patterns of
Language. Ed. A. Mc Intosh, and M.A.K. Halliday. London: Longman,
1969. Print. (Reprinted in Freeman (ed.), 1970.
Halliday, M.A.K. An Introduction to Functional Grammar. London: Edward
Arnold,1985. Print.
_____ Language as Social Semiotic: the Social Interpretation of Language and
Meaning. London: Arnold, 1978.
_____ and McIntosh, Stephens. The Linguistic Sciences and Language
Teaching. London: Longman, 1970. Print.
_____ “Descriptive Linguistics in Literary Studies.” Linguistic and Literary
Style. Ed. Donald C. Freeman. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston Inc.,
1970. 65-80. Print.
_____ and Mathiessen. Construing Experience through Meaning: a LanguageBased Approach to Cognition. London Continuum, 1999.
Print.
Hartmann, R R.K. “Texte als Linguistisches Objekt.” Beitrage zur Textlinguistik. Ed.
212
W.D. Stempel. Munich: Fink, 1971 [1968]. 8-29. Print.
Hatch, E. Discourse and Language Education. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1992.
Hawkes, Terence. Structuralism and Semiotics. London: Methuen, 1985. Print.
Hawley, John C. “Biafra as Heritage and Symbol: Adichie, Mbachu, and
Iweala.” Project Muse: Research in African Literatures 39.2 (2008): 15-26.
Web.
Hawryluk, Nathan. “Military Linguistics: Russian in the Red/ Soviet Army.”
Journal of Military and Strategic Studies. 12.3 (2010): 214-35. Web.
Heese, M., and R. Lawton. The Owl Critic: An Introduction to Literary
Criticism. Elsies River: Nasou, 1975. Print.
Heywood, Christopher (ed). Perspectives on African Literature. New York:
African Pub. /University of Ife P. 1975. Print.
Hicks, Wynford. English for Journalists. London: Routledge, 1999. Print.
Hill, Archibald A. “An Analysis of a Windhover: An Experiment in Structural
Method.” PMLA. Ixx (1955): 968-78. Print.
Hjelmslev, L. Prolegomena to a Theory of Language. Madison: University of
Wisconsin Press, 1969 [1943]. Print.
Hodges, Hugh. “Writing Biafra: Adichie, Emecheta and the Dilemmas of Biafran War
Fiction.” Post Colonial Text. 5.1 (2009): 1-13. Web.
Hoey, M. On the Surface of Discourse. London: George Allen &Unwin, 1983.
Print.
Holcombe, John. “Literary Theory: A Summing Up.” Web.
<www.textet.com/theory/a-summing-up.html>
Hollingworth, G.E. A Premier of Literary Criticism. London: University
213
Tutorial Press, 1961. Print.
Holloway, J. Narrative and Structure: Exploring Essays. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press. Print.
Hough, Graham. Style and Stylistics. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1972.
Print.
Igboanusi, Herbert. “The Igbo Tradition in the Nigerian Novel.” African Study
Monograph. 22.2 (2001): 53-72. Web.
Iwamoto, Noriko. “Stylistic and Linguistic Analysis of a Literary Text Using
Systemic Functional Grammar.” Web.
<human.kanagawa-u.ac.jp/gakkai/publ/pdf/no162/16209.pdf>.
Jackson, Howard. Key Terms in Linguistics. London: Continuum, 2007. Print.
Joos, Martin. The Five Clocks: A Linguistic Excursion into the Five Styles of
English Usage. New York: Harcourt, Brace and World, 1961. Print.
Joyner, April. “Defining Global and Regional Literatures in Elizabeth Costello
and Disgrace.” Association of Young Journalists and Writers Universal
Journal. Web.
Katz, J., and J. Portal. “The Semantic Interpretation of Idioms and Sentences
and Sentences Containing Them” MIT Research Laboratory of Electronics
Quarterly Progress Report 70 (1963): 275-82). Print.
Kehinde, Ayo. “Post-Independence Nigerian Literature and the Quest for True
Political Leadership for the Nation.” <http://www.jsd-africa.com/Jsda/vion2Summer2008/PDF/ARC-kehinde-%20Independence.pdf->
____ “English and Postcolonial Writers’Burden: Linguistic Innovations in Femi
Fatoba’s My Older Father and other Stories.” West Africa Review. ISSN:
1525-4488. Web.
214
Kettle Arnold. An Introduction to the English Novel 1. London: Hutchinson,
1976. Print.
Killam, Douglas, and Ruth Rowe. The Companion to African Literatures.
Indianapolis: Indiana UP, 2000. Print.
Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English
Language. Amsterdan: Elsevier, 1971. Print.
Krishnamurthy Sarala. “Representation of Time; A Stylistic Analysis of Real
and Surreal Elements in Joseph Heller’s Catch 22.” Web.
Krishnan, Madhu. “Biafra and the Aesthetics of Closure in the Third Generation
Nigerian Novel.” Rupkatha Journal 2.2 (2010): 185-195. Web.
Labocha, Janina. “The Object of Study of Text Linguistics (Textology).” Studia
Linguistica. 128/2011: 59-68. Web.
Lamidi, Mufutau T. “The Structure and Texture of English Translation of
Yoruba and Igbo Proverbs.” Journal of Language & Translation 9.1. (2008):
61-90. Web.
Lecture 2. Web. <http://stylistics.minb.de/index.php?c=Lecture%20Notes%202>
Leech, Geoffery N. A Linguistic Guide to English Poetry. London: Longman,
1983. Print.
____ “Linguistics and the Figures of Rhetoric.” Essays on Style and Language:
Linguistic and Critical Approaches in Literary Style. Ed. Roger Fowler. London:
Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1979. Print.
Leech, Geoffery N., and Michael H. Short. Style in Fiction: A Linguistic
Introduction to English Fictional Prose. New York: Longman, 1995. Print.
Lindfors, Bernth. (ed) Critical Perspectives on Nigerian Literatures. London:
Heinemann, 1979. Print.
215
“Literary Stylistics: Lecture Notes No. 1.” Web.
<http://courses.nus.edu.sg/course/ellibst/lsl01.html>
Lyons, John. Introduction to Theoretical Linguistics. Cambridge: UP, 1968.
Print.
Mackay, R. “Mything the Point: A Critique of Objective Stylistics.” Language
and Communication. 16.1 (1996): 81-93.
Machiavelli, Niccolo. The Prince. Philip Smith (ed.). trans. N.H. Thomas. New
York: Dover Publications, 1992. Print.
Madiebo. Alexander A. The Nigerian Revolution and the Biafran War. Enugu,
Fourth Dimension Publishing, 1980. Print.
Mallon, Thomas. “History, Fiction, and the Burden of Truth.” Writing
History/Writing Fiction. Web. 26 June 2012.
Mattiessen, C.M. “Register Analysis: Theory and Practice.” Register in the
Round: Diversity in a Unified Theory of Register. London: Pinter, 1993.
221-92. Print.
____ and J.A. Bateman. Text Generation and Systemic-functional Linguistics:
Experiences from English and Japanese. London: Frances
and St Martin’s. 1991. Print.
McArthur, T. Oxford Companion to English Language. New York: UP, 1992.
Print.
McIntyre, Dan. “Using Foregrounding Theory as a Teaching Methodology in a
Stylistic Course.” Web. Spring 2003.
McLuckie, Craig W. Nigeria Civil War Literature: Seeking an “Imagined
Community”. Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen, 1990. Print.
Meyer, Michael. The Bedford Introduction to Literature. Boston: St Martin’s,
216
1993. Print.
Milne, John. “Recent Trends in Linguistics: General Survey.” The Morphology
and Syntax of Present-day English: An Introduction. Ed. Olu Tomori.
London. Heinemann, 1999. 96-104. Print.
Missikova, Gabriela. Linguistic Stylistics. Nitra: Filozaficka Faculta UKF, 2003.
Web.
Mitchell, Mark L., and Janina M. Jolley. Research Design Explained. 5th ed.
Canada: Wadsworth/ Thomson, 2004. Print.
Montgomery, M., Nigel Fabb, Tom Furniss, Alan Durant, and Sara Mills. Ways of
Reading: Advanced Reading Skills for Students of English Literature. London:
Routledge, 1992. Print.
Morrison Jago. “Imagined Biafra: Fabricating Nation in Nigeria Civil War
Writing.” <www.ariel.ucalgary.ca/ariel/index.php/ariel/article/viewFile/362/358>
Mtumane, Z. “Some Aspects of Imagery in the Poetry of S.M. BurnsNcamashe.” Literator. 25.2 (2004): 125-40.
Mukherjee, Joybrato. “Stylistics.” Web.
<www.uni-giessen.de/anglistik/ling/Staff/mukherjee/pdfs/Stylistics.pdf>
Nagar, Rishi K. “Foregrounding.” 18 April 2008. Web.
Ngara, E. Stylistic Criticism and the African Novel. Nairobi: Heinemann, 1982.
Print.
Ngonebu. Chinyere L. “A Stylistic Approach to Modern African Poetry.”
Journal of Liberal Studies 8.1 (2000): 156-163. Print.
Ngugi, wa Thiong’o. Decolonising the Mind: The Politics of Language in
African Literature. London: James Currey, 1986. Print.
Nigerian Governments: Yesterday and Today. Lagos: Nigerian Federal
217
Department of Antiquities. 1979. Print.
“Novel.” Landmarks Literature A ©English Department, Brooklyn College. Web.
<http://www.questia.com/library/1E1-novel/novel>
Nowottny, W. Language Poets Use. London: University of London, 1968. Print.
Nunan, D. Introducing Discourse Analysis. London, Penguin Books Ltd, 1993.
Print.
Nwahunanya, Chinyere. “A Harvest from Tragedy: Critical Perspectives on
Nigerian Civil War Literature.” Research in African Literature. September
22, 2000. Web.
___ Literary Criticism, Critical Theory and Post Colonial African Literature.
Owerri: Springfield Publishers Ltd., 2007.
Nwankwo, Chimalum. “The Muted Index of War in African Literature and
Society.” War in African Literature Today. Ed. Ernest Emenyonu. Ibadan,
James Curry, 2008: 1-14. Print.
Nwoga, Donatus. Visions and Alternatives: Literary Studies in a Transitional
Culture. Enugu: Novelty, 1977. Print.
Obiechina, Emmanuel N. Language and Theme: Essays on African Literature.
Ibadan: Heinemann. 1993. Print.
Odogwu Bernard. No Place to Hide: Crises and Conflicts Inside Biafra.
Enugu: Fourth Dimension, 1985. Print.
Ogu, Julius N. A Historical Survey of English and the Nigerian Situation.
Ibadan: Kraft Books, 1992. Print.
Ogungbesan, Kolawole. “Politics and the African Writer.” Critical Perspectives
on Chinua Achebe. Eds. C.L. Innes, & Bernth Lindfors. London: HEB,
1979. Print.
218
Ogunpitan, S.A. “Towards a Theory of the War Novel.” California Linguistic
Notes. XXXIII.1 (2008): 1-28. Web.
Oji, Nzebunachi. English Grammar for Advanced Students. Obosi: Pacific Publishers,
1994. Print.
Okeke-Ezigbo, Emeka. “The Role of the Nigerian Writer in a Carthaginian
Society.” Okike 21 (1982). Print.
Olaosun, Ibrahim E. “Aspects of Style and Meaning in Soyinka’s Kongi’s
Harvest: A Lexico-Semantic Approach.” Perspectives on Language and
Literature. Eds. Moji Olateju & Lekan Oyeleye. Ibadan: Obafemi Awolowo
UP, 2005. 91-104. Print.
Orwell, George. “Politics and the English Language.” The Modern Stylists.
London: Collier-Macmillan, 1968. Print.
Osundare, Niyi. “Caliban’s Gamble: The Stylistic Repercussions of Writing
African Literature in English.” Language in Nigeria: Essays in Honour of
Ayo Bamgbose. Ed. Kola Owolabi. Ibadan: Group Publishers, 1995. 340-63.
Print.
Otagburuagu E.J. and Anidi, O.C. “Indigenous Knowledge and Nigerian War
Novels.” Ikoro Journal of Institute of African Studies 9.1&2 (2012): 14-27
Otagburuagu, E.J., T.Y. Obah, and L.C. Ogenyi. Working with Ideas: A Text of
English Language Composition Skills for College and University Students.
Onitsha: Great AP Express Publishers, 2010. Print.
____ Echoes of Violence. Enugu: Bonak, 2004. Print.
____ Teaching and Learning the Writing Skill in the English Language:
Theories, Issues & Practice. Onitsha: Cape, 1997. Print.
Oyeweso Siyan. The Post-Gowon Nigerian Accounts of the Civil War: 1975-
219
1990: A Preliminary Review. African Peace Research Institute, Lagos,
1992. Print.
Palmer Eustace. Studies on the English Novel. Ibadan: African UP, 1986. Print.
____ The Growth of the African Novel. London: Heinemann, 1979. Print.
Palmer, F.R. Grammatical Roles. Cambridge: UP, 1994. Print.
Passler, David L. Time, Form, and Style in Boswell’s Life of Johnson. London:
Yale UP, 1971. Print.
Peer, W. (van) “But What is Literature? Toward a Descriptive Definition of
literature.” Literary Pragmatics. London: Routledge, 1991. Print.
Pratt, M.I. “Conventions of Representation: Where Discourse Meet.” The
Taming of the Text. Ed. W. van Peer. London: Routledge, 1992. Print.
Quirk, Randolph, and Sidney Greenbaum. A University Grammar of English.
Delhi: Longman, 2000. Print.
____ Practical Criticism. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1929.
Richards, I.A. Principles of Literary Criticism. London: Routledge and Kegan
Paul, 1963. Print.
Richards, J.C., and R. Schmidt. Longman Dictionary of Language and Applied
Linguistics. 3rd ed. London: Pearson, 2002.
Roberts, Edgar V., and Henry E. Jacobs. Literature: An Introduction to Reading
and Writing. New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, 1989. 1649. Print.
Rooney, Caroline. “Mothers of the Revolution: Zimbabwean Women.” The
Literature of War. Spec. issue of African Languages and Cultures. 4.1 Eds.
Theodora Akachi Ezeigbo, and Liz Gunner. (1991): 1-99. Print.
Roscoe, Adrian. Mother is Gold. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1971. 75. Print.
Saeed. John I. Semantics. Second Edition. U.S.A. Blackwell Publishing, 2006.
220
Print.
Salvador Vicent. “Pragmatics and Stylistics.” Noves SL. Revista de
Sociolinguistika (2003): 1-7. Web. <http://www.gencat.cat/llengua/noves.
Winter 2003>.
Saussure, Ferdinand De. Course in General Linguistics. Trans. Wade Baskin.
New York: McGraw Hill, 1967 [orig.1916]. Print.
Schmidt, S.J. Foundation for the Empirical Study of literature: The Components
of a Basic Theory. Hamburg, Buske, 1982. Print.
___ Texttheorie. Munich: Fink, 1982. Print.
Scott, A.F. Current Literary Terms: A Concise Dictionary of their Origin.
London: Macmillan, 1977. Print.
Scott, H.L. Military Dictionary. NY: Greenwood Press Publishers, 1968. Print.
Sekula, Halima. Ben Okri and the Convention of Nigerian Prose Fiction. Web.
<http://www.mtis.ca/issue5/writings-essay-sekula.php.>
Semino, Elena, and Jonathan Culpeper (eds). Cognitive Stylistics: Language and
Cognition in Text Analysis. Amsterdam: Benjamin, 2002. Print.
Shaw H. Dictionary of Literary Terms. New York: McGraw Hill, 1972. Print.
Short, Michael. Exploring the Language of Poems, Plays and Prose. Essex: Longman,
1996. Print.
____ and C. Candlin. “Teaching Study Skills for English literature.”
Reading, Analysing and Teaching literature. Ed. M. Short, New York:
Longman Group,1988. Print.
Simpson, Paul. Stylistics: A Resource Book for Students. New York: Routledge,
2004. Print.
___ Language, Ideology and Point of View. London: Routledge, 1992. Print.
221
Sinclair, J. McH. “Taking a Poem to Pieces.” Essays in Style and Language. Ed.
Roger Fowler. London and Henley: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1966. Print.
Sinclair, John M. Corpus, Concordance, Collocation. Oxford: Oxford UP. 1991.
Print.
___ Trust the Text: Language, Corpus and Discourse. London: Routledge,
2004.
Sova, Radim. “Genesis of Two Algebraic Theories of Language.” Linguistica
Online 30 Jan. 2006. Web.
Stephen, Martin. English Literature: A Student Guide. 3rd ed. Essex: Pearson,
2000. Print.
Stockwell, Peter. “Language and Literature: Stylistics.” 1/10/06 Web.
www.academia.edu/719004/Stylistics_language_and_literature
Strasster, J. Idioms in English: A Pragmatic Analysis. Tubingen Verlag, 1982.
Print.
Stubbs Michael. “Language and Literature.” Sage (2005): 1-24. Web. 5 October
2008.
Sullivan, Joanna. “The Question of a National Literature for Nigeria.” Research
in African Literatures 32.3 (2001): 71-85. Web.
Tallapessy, Albert. “The Relationship Between Lexico-grammar and Theme in
Poetry: A Stylistic Study.” JIBS (Jurnal limu Bahasa dan Sastra) 2.1
(2002): 220-28. Web.
Terino, Jonathan. “A Text Linguistic Study of the Jacob Narrative.” Vox
Evangelica 18 (1988): 45-62. Web.
“The Novel.” Web. <http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/english/melani/cs6/novel
.html>
222
Thorne, J.P. “Generative Grammar and Stylistic Analysis.” New Horizons in
Linguistics. Ed. Harmondsworth, Penguin, 1970. Print.
Todorov, T. Introduction to Poetics. Trans. Richard Howard. Minneapolis:
University of Minnesota Press, 1981[orig. pub. 1968/73]. Print.
Tomori, Olu (ed.). The Morphology and Syntax of Present-Day English: An
Introduction. London. Heinemann, 1999. Print.
Toolan Michael. Language in Literature: An Introduction to Stylistics.
Hachette: Hodder Education, 2009. Print.
____ “Narrative Progression in the Short Story: First Step in a Corpus Stylistic
Approach.” Narrative 16.2 (2008): 105-120. Web.
Ugochukwu, Francoise. “A Lingering Nightmare: Achebe, Ofoegbu and Adichie
on Biafra.” Matatu-Journal for African Culture and Society. 39 (2011): 25372. Web.
Ullmann, Stephen. Semantics: An Introduction to the Science of Meaning.
Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1961. 99. Print.
______ Language and Style, Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1966. Print.
Umaisha I. Sumaila. “History of Nigerian Literature.” EverythinLiterature.
14 Dec, 2010. Web. <http://everythinliterature.blogspot.com/2010/12/history-ofnigerian-literature.html>
Uwasomba, Chijioke. “War, Violence and Language in Ken Saro-Wiwa’s
Sozaboy.” African Journal of History and Culture. 2.2 (2010): 18-25. Web
Verdonk, P. “Poetic Artifice and Literary Stylistics.” Linguistics and the Study
of Literature. Ed. T. D’haen. Amsterdan: Rodopi, 1986. Print.
Wales, K. (ed.) Feminist Linguistics in Literary Criticism. London: D.S. Brewer.
1994. Print.
223
Wali, Obiajunwa. “The Dead End of African Literature.” Transition 10 (1963):
330-35. Print.
Walters, Alisha R. “The English Language and Nigerian Prose Fiction.” 2007.
Web.<http://homes.chass.utoronto.ca/~cpercy/courses/eng6365walters.htm>
Webb, Hugh. “Chapter 12: The Novelistic Autobiography.” Passionate Spaces:
African Literature & the Post-Colonial Context. Web.
<http://wwwmcc.murdoch.edu.au/Reading Room/litserv/Webb/ch12.html>
Weber, Jean J. (ed.). The Stylistic Reader: From Roman Jacobson to the
Present. London, Arnold, 1996. Print.
Werlich, E. A Text Grammar of English. Heidelberg: Quelle & Meyer, 1976.
Whitelaw, Casey, and Shlomo Argamon. “Systemic Functional Features in
Stylistic Text Classification.” Web.
Widdowson, Henry G. Stylistics and the Teaching of Literature. London:
Longman, 1979.
Widdowson, Interview with Henry G. Widdowson. ELTNEWS. com Web. 30
March 2012. <http://www.eltnews.com/features/interviews/2005/12/
interview_with_henry_g_widdows.html>
William, James D. Preparing to Teach Writing. New Jersey: Lawrence
Erlbaum, 116, 117. Print.
“Wilheim Meyer-Lubke.” Encyclopaedia Orbis Latini. Web.
Wiśniewski, Kamil. “Stylistics.” Anglozof.com, Aug 7th, 2007. Web.
Wood, David. “Formulaic Language in Thought and Word: Vygotskian
Perspectives.” Cahiers Linguistiques d’Ottawa. 30. (2002): 29-48. Web.
Yahaya, Ibrahim Y. “The Development of Hausa Literature.” Perspectives on
224
Nigerian Literature 1700 to the Present, Vol 1. Ed. Yemi Ogunbiyi. Lagos:
Guardian Books, 1988. 14. Print.
Yankson, Kofi E. An Introduction to Literary Stylistics. Obosi: Pacific, 1999.
Print.
Yeibo, Ebi. “Nativization of English in African Literary Texts: A LexicoSemantic Study of Transliteration in Gabriel Okara’s The Voice.”
International Journal of Humanities and Social Science. 1.3 (2011): 202-08.
Web.
Zelma. “Lecture 2: The methods of stylistics. Levels of stylistic analysis.
Contexts of Stylistic Analysis.” 19 Jan 2010. Web. 21 Dec 2011.
Zyngier, Sonia. “Towards a Cultural Approach to Stylistics.” CAUSE, Revista
de Filologia 24 (2001): 365-80. Web.
Unpublished Theses and Papers
Agemo, Oluwatosin Stella. “A Stylistic Analysis of Some Selected Poems of
Wole Soyinka.” Thesis (B.A.), Department of English, University of Ilorin,
May 2011.Web.
Al-Bataineh, Afat B. “The Modern Arabic Novel: a Literary and Linguistic
Analysis of the Genre of Popular Fiction, with Special Reference to
Translation from English.” Thesis (Ph.D), School of Languages, Heriot-Watt
University, 1998. Web
Anidi. Ojel C. “Leadership and Rhetoric: A Study of Emeka OdumegwuOjukwu’s Style at the Nigeria-Biafra War.” Paper delivered at a Conference
on “Global Mindset Development in Leadership and Management” at
California, U.S.A., 21-22 September 2012. Print.
225
Anyachonkeya Emmanuel. “Style and Linguistic Structures in Chukwuemeka
Ike’s Novels.” Thesis (Ph.D), Department of English, University of Nigeria,
Nsukka, 2005. Print.
Bamgbose, Ayo. “Language in National Integration: Nigeria as a Case Study.”
Paper Presented at the 12th West African Languages Congress, University of
Ife, Ile-Ife, Nigeria, March 15-20, 1976. Print.
Harris, R. ‘Will Stylistics Ever Grow Up?” Paper delivered at the XX
International Poetics and Linguists Association Conference at Goldsmiths
College, London, on July 1, 2000.
Ibanga, I. “Discipline, the Basis of Military Professionalism.” Lectures and
Discussion During 82 Div. NA Study Period, 24 Sept., 1998.
Iheka, Cajetan N. “Postcolonial Ecocriticism and African Literature: The
Nigeria Civil War Example.” Thesis (M.A.), department of English
Language and Literature Central Michigan University, February 2011. Web.
Madu, Uchechukwu E. “African Literatures as a Tool for the Expression of the
Indigenous Knowledge: A Study of Chimamanda Adichie’s Half of a
Yellow Sun.” Paper presented at a Conference on “Indigenous Knowledge”
organized by the Institute of African Studies, UNN, June 2011. Print.
Maka, Fa. “Military Ethics, Traditions and Customs as Influenced by Situation
or Circumstances.” Lectures and Discussion During 82 Div. NA Study
Period, 24 Sept., 1998.
Mey (De), Joke. “The Intersection of History, Literature and Trauma in
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Half of a Yellow Sun.” Thesis (B.A.) 20102011 Academiejaar, Universiteit Gent. Web.
Nnadi, Isidore C. “A Linguistic Stylistic Analysis of Chukwuemeka Ike’s
226
Novels.” Thesis (Ph.D), Department of English Language, University of Jos,
October 2010. Web.
Ntuli, D.B.Z. The Poetry of B.W. Vilakasi. Thesis: Ph.D. University of South
Africa, 1978. Print.
Orabueze, Florence. “The Dispossessed in Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Purple
Hibiscus and Half of a Yellow Sun.” Thesis (Ph.D), Department of English
and Literary Studies, University of Nigeria, Nsukka. Print.
Quirk, Randolph. “Charles Dickens and Appropriate Language.” Inaugural
Lecture of the Professor of English Language delivered in the Applebey
Lecture Theatre on 26 May 1959. Web.
Reeves, Kate. “Laughter and Madness in Post-war American Fiction.” Thesis
(Ph.D.), Department of English and Comparative Literary Studies,
University of Warwick, 2000. Web.
Saito, Yoshifumi. “Style and Creativity: Towards a Theory of Creative
Stylistics.” Thesis (Ph.D,), University of Nottingham, 1997. Web.
Uchendu, Egodi N. “Anioma Women and the Nigerian Civil War, 1966-1979.”
Thesis (Ph.D), University of Nigeria, Nsukka, 2001. Print.
Newspapers
Ihekweazu, Edith. ‘Book Reflections on the Nigerian Civil War.” The Guardian,
Jan. 27 1986. Print.
Isiguzo, Ikeddy. “Ojukwu Beyond the Civil War.” Nigeria News. No Pag. Web.
29 Nov. 2011. Web
227
Encyclopedia/ Wikipedia Citations
The Columbia Encyclopedia. “The Novel.” 6th ed. Web. June 30, 2012.
Wikpedia. “Fiction.” Web.
Wikipedia. “Irony.”
Wikipedia. “Novel.” Web.
Wikipedia. “Proverb.”
Wikipedia. “Registers.”
Wikipedia. “War Novel.”
228
APPENDICES
Appendix I: Request for Instrument Validation I
229
Appendix II: Request for Instrument Validation II
230
Appendix III:
231
Appendix IV: Validation of Instrument by Validator 1
232
Appendix V: Validation of Instrument by Validator II
233