Delay and the representation of speech

As shown in section 5.2.3, James alters the style of his prose considerably when depicting direct speech. Figure 5-13 shows the instances of delay as seen in Figure 5-12, but this time separated into those which occur in speech sentences and those in narrative sentences. In both parts of the HJPC, speech is marked by including fewer instances of delay. There is a greater differentiation between the two types of discourse in GB – the ratio of speech to non-speech instances of delay is 1:3.2 in WS and 1:4.38 in GB. This shows James’s greater effort in the later novel to represent natural conversation between his characters, which may be partly the result of his work in drama which he undertook in the 1890’s. In non-speech James uses 2.19 instances of delay in GB for each instance in WS, whereas in speech the ratio is only 1.6. This reinforces the finding that it is in non-speech sentences where James’s late style is mainly seen, both in terms of dependency and delay.

Figure 5-13 Instances of delay in speech and non-speech

0.005 0.016 0.008 0.035 0.000 0.005 0.010 0.015 0.020 0.025 0.030 0.035 0.040

Delay in speech Delay in non-speech

p er w o rl d WS GB

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5.4.2 Exceptional sentences

As with complexity, sentences with a very large amount of delay are likely to have a disproportionate effect on the reader. Table 5-4 shows the sentence in each chapter with the highest delay score. Note that this is not a count of instances of delay as in Figure 5-12 and Figure 5-13, but rather the table shows the count made of how many words are used to cause delay in the sentence overall, which may occur in one or more syntactic constructions. This is recorded at the beginning of each sentence in markup code, as ICECUP does not provide a counting facility for custom-made annotations. This makes it possible to scan a chapter picking out the exceptional sentences. The text of the sentences is shown below the table with the delay code included to clarify the calculations.

The contrast between the two novels is clear. The highest scoring sentence in WS has a delay score of 27, but this is quite exceptional with the other high scores being 13 or 15. The average of this collection of exceptional sentences is 24.2. This is far lower than any of the highest scoring sentences in the chapters from GB. Here the range is from 38 to 55 with an average of 47.5. Like the instances of delay figures, GB scores at approximately double the level of WS.

Table 5-4 Exceptional sentences (2)

Sentence number Highest delay score

WS01:23 15 WS02:4 13 WS16:27 13 WS18:112 13 WS31:31 27 Average 24.2 GB01:55 55 GB20:28 38 GB22:2 47 GB38:75 50 Average 47.5

In these examples the words causing the delay are underlined. The code in grey after the delay indicates the number of words causing it and the function of the word which has been delayed. A key to the abbreviations for word functions

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included in these sentences is provided immediately after them. The code <Dx> in grey at the beginning of each sentence consolidates the individual delay scores in the sentence, with x being the total delay score for that sentence. For further details, see section 4.4.3.

<D15> Of course his easy domestic situation saved him a good deal of 39)

drudgery, and his wife's affiliation to the “best people” brought him a good many of those patients whose symptoms are, if not more interesting in themselves than those of the lower orders, at least more consistently <delay> <15> <MVB> displayed.45 _(WS01:23)

<D13> She bloomed herself, indeed, and was a comely, comfortable, 40)

reasonable woman, and a favourite with her clever brother, who, in the matter of women, even when they were nearly related to him, <delay> <13> <VB> was a man of distinct preferences. (WS02:4)

<D13> Mrs. Penniman was silent a little, and her smile beneath the shadow 41)

of her capacious bonnet, on the edge of which her black veil was arranged curtain-wise, <delay> <13> <VB> fixed itself upon Morris's face with a still more tender brilliancy. (WS16:27)

<ds> <D13> “There is one thing you can tell Mr. Townsend, when you see 42)

him again,” he said, <delay> <7> <OD>“that if you marry without my consent, <delay> <6> <SU> I don't leave you a farthing of money. (WS18:112)

<D27> The letter was beautifully written, and Catherine, who kept it for 43)

many years after this, <delay> <8> <VB> was able, when her sense of the bitterness of its meaning and the hollowness of its tone had grown less acute, <delay> <19> <AJPO> to admire its grace of expression.(WS31:31)

<ds> <D9> “I don't feel, my dear, if you really want to know, <delay> <8> 44)

<OD> that anything much can now either <delay> <1> <MVB> hurt me or help me. (GB01:55)

<D38> What any one “thought” of any one else -- above all of any one else 45)

WITH any one else -- was a matter incurring in these halls <delay> <3> <OD> so little awkward formulation that hovering Judgement, the spirit with the scales, <delay> <5> <VB> might perfectly <delay> <1> <AVB> have been imaged there as some rather snubbed and subdued but quite trained and tactful poor relation, of equal, of the properest, lineage, only of aspect a little dingy, doubtless from too limited a change of dress, <delay> <20> <FNPPO> for whose tacit and abstemious presence, never betrayed by a rattle of her rusty machine, <delay> <9> <SU> a room in the attic and a plate at the side table were decently usual. (GB20:28)

<D47> Its general brightness was composed doubtless of many elements, but 46)

what shone out of it as if the whole place and time had been a great picture, from the hand of genius, <delay> <5> <FNPPO> presented to him as a prime ornament for his collection and all varnished and framed to hang up --

45 _{A version of this sentence with less delay could be: ‘…whose symptoms, if not more interesting in}

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what marked it especially for the highest appreciation <delay> <42> <VB> was his extraordinarily unchallenged, his absolutely appointed and enhanced possession of it. (GB22:2)

[Within the long delay in this sentence is a shorter one occasioned by the phrase from the hand of genius. As if is counted as one word in ICECUP, forming a two part subordinator.]

<D50> Charlotte 's one opportunity meanwhile <delay> <1> <NPPO> for the 47)

air of confidence she had formerly <delay> <1> <MVB> worn so well and that agreed so with her firm and charming type <delay> <16> <VB> was the presence of visitors never, as the season advanced, wholly <delay> <5> <VB> intermitted -- rather in fact, so constant, with all the people who turned up for luncheon and for tea and to see the house, now replete, now famous, <delay> <21> <AJPO> that Maggie grew to think again of this large element of “company” as of a kind of renewed water-supply for the tank in which, like a party of panting gold-fish, <delay> <6> <SU> they kept afloat. (GB38:75)

Key to abbreviations in these sentences:

FNPPO floating noun phrase postmodifier

MVB main verb

OD direct object

SU subject

VB verbal (verb phrase)