Author(s)

Xiran Tong ¹

Affiliation(s)

¹ School of English Studies, Xi'an International Studies University, Xi'an, China

Corresponding Author

Xiran Tong

ABSTRACT

Cries in the Drizzle [1]is a masterpiece of Yu Hua's novels. The success of Cries in the Drizzle lies in its use of cognitive metonymy. Yu Hua constructs unusual collocations with "Adj + N" constructions involving metonymy, such as "stupid slobber" and "clever smile" which abound in Cries in the Drizzle, so that the characters and plot in the novel are vivid and touching. The term "metonymic humanization" first appears in Zhang (2015)[2] modeling on psych "Adj + N" constructions, such as "a small reluctant hand". In the elaboration of this concept, Zhang (2023)[3] proposes that the vivid and touching description in a novel often emerges from embodiment of visual and auditory perceptions in metonymic humanization. According to Zhang, metonymic humanization shares the same mechanism with metonymy. Therefore, it is worthy of taking metonymic humanization approach to the analysis of literary texts. This study examines the unusual collocations with "Adj + N" constructions in Yu Hua's Cries in the Drizzle from the perspective of cognitive poetics, focusing on the mechanism of metonymic humanization. The findings of this study indicate that cognitive metonymy is an effective approach to literary texts and metonymic humanization is an effective way to analysis of unusual collocations in literary texts. And finally in the hope of revealing the hypothesis Zhang (2023)[3] proposed that both Chinese and English should be metonymic.

KEYWORDS

Cognitive poetics, metonymic humanization, Cries in the Drizzle

CITE THIS PAPER

Xiran Tong, Poetic Metonymy—Humanization in Cries in the Drizzle and Its English. Lecture Notes on Language and Literature (2023) Vol. 6: 55-58. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.23977/langl.2023.061510.

REFERENCES

[1] Yu Hua. (2012). Cries in the drizzle 3rd. Beijing: Writers Publishing House.
[2] Zhang, J. (2015). Animacy hierarchy effects on the second language acquisition of attributive psych adjectives. Applied Psycholinguistics, 36(2), 275-298.
[3] Zhang, J. (2023). Metonymic Humanization in the Great Gatsby and its Chinese Translation, Academic Lecture Paper on Foreign Languages and Applied Linguistics at Zhengzhou University. Feb, 2023, Zhengzhou, China.
[4] Tsur, R. (2008). Toward a theory of cognitive poetics. Amsterdam: North-Holland, 1992. 2nd ed. Brighton and Portland: Sussex Academic Press.
[5] Barcelona, A. (2000). On the plausibility of claiming a metonymic motivation for conceptual metaphor. In A. Barcelona (ed), Metaphor and Metonymy at the Crossroads. (pp. 31-58). Berlin/NY: Moulton de Gruyter.
[6] Radden, G. (2000). How metonymic are metaphors? In A. Barcelona (Ed.), Metaphor and Metonymy at the Crossroads. (pp. 93-108). Berlin/NY: Moulton de Gruyter.
[7] Yu, H. (1991). Cries in the Drizzle. Translated by Allan H. B. (2007). New York: The United States by Anchor Books.
[8] Feng, Z. (2021). Cognitive detours of metonymy from the perspective of semiotics. Foreign Languages in China, (01), 7-8. 
[9] Xiong, M. (2008). A new interface between linguistics and literary studies: Introductory remarks about two books on cognitive poetics, Foreign Language Teaching and Research, 40 (4), 299-305.
[10] Denroche, C. (2015). Metonymy and Language: A New Theory of Linguistics Processing. NewYork & London: Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group.
[11] Panther, K-U., & Radden, G. (Eds.). (1999). Metonymy in Language and Thought. Amsterdam: John Benjiamins Publishing Company.
[12] Huang, S. (1994). Chinese as a Metonymic Language. In M. Chen, & O. Tzeng (Eds.), In Honor of William S. Y. Wang: Interdisciplinary Studies in Language and Language Change, (pp. 223-252). Taipei: Pyramid Press.
[13] Song, S. (2011). Metaphor and metonymy——A tentative research into modern cognitive linguistics. Theory and Practice in Language Studies, 1(1), 68-73.

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