Topic 9 (session A) - Speech Presentation > Speech presentation checksheet

Speech presentation checksheet

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All sentences in the novel are either direct address to the reader or narration or the representation of character speech and/or character thought. This Guidesheet is devoted mainly to the presentation of character speech.

1. Speech presentation - Five basic kinds

1.1 Narrator's Representation of Voice (NV)

Completely under the narrator's control, and with a perspective so 'distanced' from the speech presented that all we know about that speech is that it occurred (e.g. 'They conversed quietly with one another.'), perhaps with some general indication of the topic of the talk (e.g. 'He was saying something about his trip.').

1.2 Narrator's Representation of Speech Acts (NRSA)

Completely under narrator control (like the narrator's characterization of events, states and actions); however, a particular act of speech is now being represented, although in a pretty minimal way.

"Speech Act" is the term used to designate ACTS performed by saying something e.g. complaining, instructing, questioning, pleading, arguing. cf. She insulted him. In the Narrator's Representation of a Speech Act (NRSA), we are told what act of speech was used. We may also get some indication of the subject matter talked about e.g. She told him about his bad breath. With NRSA, then, the report of the speech is minimal, and completely under the control of the narrator. NRSA usually contains:

• an indication of what speech act was used;

• (plus, optionally) what topic is talked about.

NRSA is the speech presentation category which connects the scale of speech presentation with the straightforward narration of action. Narrators represent actions (NRA). NRSA is speech action, action performed by saying things (e.g. 'He ordered the prisoner's execution', 'He stated his demands'.

1.3 Indirect Speech (IS)

In addition to the speech act(s) the character uses we are also given the propositional content of his/her utterance but in the narrator's words.

The Propositional content of a sentence is the core meaning or statement expressed independent of the words used to express it. For example, what is the core statement made in the following sentences?

It's raining heavily.
It's raining cats and dogs.
It's pissing down.
It's bucketing down.
Il pleut a verse.

You might say any of these sentences, and I could reasonably report them all in Indirect Speech as "You said that it was raining heavily".

Thus indirect speech, like NRSA, is speech filtered through the narrator. This results in relative distancing of the reader from the character compared with Direct Speech (see below). IS contains:

• what speech act was used;

• what proposition was conveyed by what was said.

1.4 Direct Speech (DS)

DS contains the actual words and grammatical structures which the character used in the original utterance, not those of the narrator. Hence, apparently, only minimal filtering through the narrator occurs (though, of course, in the novel, unlike real-life speech reporting, there was no original speech which is being reported by a third party - the author makes it all up). In the extreme versions of DS even the inverted commas and/or the introductory reporting clause can be omitted, thus reducing the amount of narrator filtering to zero. DS contains:

• what speech act was used;

• what proposition was conveyed.

• what words and structures were used by the character to utter the proposition.

1.4.1 The Relationship between Original and Direct/Indirect Speech

In the simplest forms of IS and DS there are two clauses, the reporting clause, which belongs to the narrator, and the reported clause, which is a representation of the speech being reported. The two clauses belong to two different discourse situations -- the reporting clause relates to the situation where the narrator is talking to the reader, and the reported clause relates to a previous discourse situation where a character said something to another character.

You can "translate" an original utterance into DS/IS by operating a series of rules:

Into DS

1. One normally repeats the exact words used by the original speaker in between inverted commas.
2. The reporting clause is used to identify the speaker (and, optionally, the addressee). It also gives the appropriate verb of speaking.

Into IS

1. No inverted commas occur around the reported clause and there is no comma separating the reporting clause, if there is one.
2. Introduce an introductory conjunction (normally that) at the beginning of the reported clause. Sometimes this conjunction is grammatically optional, sometimes obligatory.
   This change represents an important grammatical difference in the status of the REPORTED CLAUSE. It has main clause status in DS but subordinate clause status in IS.
3. Change any original non-statement grammar form (e.g. interrogative, imperative) to statement form (declarative) and remove related punctuation marks (e.g. question marks and exclamation marks).
4. Remove any specially coloured lexical items (e.g. swear words) and do not use abbreviated verb forms or deviant spellings which may otherwise in DS have been used to represent non-standard pronunciation, conversational style, etc.
5. Change all deictic markers (e.g. tense, pronouns, time references) which relate to the original speaker in the embedded speech situation so that they now relate to the narrator who is reporting the clause.

Example A:

Original: Are you coming back here to live next year?

DS: He asked his sister, "Are you coming back here to live next year?"

IS: He asked his sister whether she was returning to live there the following year.

(Note: the highlighted words are all deictic markers in the IS version which have been changed from the DS version)

Example B:

Compare also:

DS: "Why, it was only last night, Sir," whispered Kit's mother, "that I left him in little Bethel."

IS: Kit's mother whispered (that) it had been only the night before that she had left him in Little Bethel.

(Note how "why" and "Sir" have been removed because they are inappropriate to the IS representation.)

1.5 Free Indirect Speech (FIS)

Free Indirect Speech (FIS) is a mixture of DS and IS features. As a result it is often very ambiguous as to whether it represents faithfully the words of the character or whether it is the narrator's words which are being used. Very often there will be no reporting clause, and so the reported clause achieves main clause status as in DS. But usually the tense and pronouns, but not necessarily the other deictic markers, stay appropriate to the narrator, not the character. However, any mixture of DS and IS features counts as FIS.

Any of the following could be FIS representations of the Dickens quotation above.

1. It had only been last night that she had left him in Little Bethel
   [Tense and pronoun appropriate to IS, but main clause status of the speech reported and use of near deictic last night appropriate to DS]
2. Why, it had only been last night that she had left him in Little Bethel.
   [As above, but in addition, the use of the initial why, typical of speech, makes this FIS representation a bit more free than (1)]
3. Why, it had only been last night, Sir, that she had left 'im in Little Bethel.
   [This example is still a mixture of DS and IS features, and so counts as FIS, but it is even more free than (2), because of the addition of the vocative Sir, associated with speech, and the non-standard spelling IM, indicating dialect pronounciation]

Hence, examples (1) - (3) are increasingly more free, showing the range of FIS possibilities. FIS contains:

1. what speech act was used;
2. what proposition was conveyed.
3. ???????? What words and structures were used to represent that proposition ????????

A summary of speech presentation in prose style

2. Speech presentation and point of view

1. If the author wants to make his characters seem independent of the narrator, he will use direct speech. If a character says things which are patently false or silly, he will seem to condemn himself out of his own mouth.
2. Any move away from the DS end of the scale brings with it the feeling of narrator interference.
3. NRSA and IS feel like forms which are heavily controlled narratorially, because the words used are not those of the characters.
4. FIS has some narrator interference but also the feeling that some of the words at least are those of the character. This mixed characteristic thus gives the contradictory qualities of control and vividness, and is often, as a consequence, used as a vehicle for irony (though note, irony in a novel can be achieved in other ways too).

3. Thought Presentation

The same categories of presentation are available to an author when representing the thoughts of his characters. These categories [Narrator's Representation of Thinking (NT), Narrator's Representation of Thought Acts (NRTA), Indirect Thought (IT), Free Indirect Thought (FIT) and Direct Thought (DT)] can be defined in exactly the same way linguistically as for the equivalent speech presentation categories. But the effects of one mode choice or another are different from those for speech. Typically we tend to feel in the course of reading that Direct Thought is the representation of conscious thought on the part of the character, whereas Free Indirect Thought feels more like the representation of subconscious thought. Note that with DT or FIT, you feel that you are getting the character's process of thought represented, because of the assumption, borrowed from speech presentation, that you are getting (completely with DT, and partially with FIT) the "original" words and structures that the character used to do the thinking. This will not be the case with IT or NRTA, and so you will feel much less close to the character, and that the narrator is interposed between you and the character. We will not examine thought presentation in any detail on this course as there is not enough time. If you are interested in this area see section 4 of Short (1996) Exploring the Language of Poems, Plays and Prose (pp311-20) and section 2 of chapter 10 of Leech and Short (1981) Style in Fiction (pp 336-50).

4. Reading and a word of warning

The relevant reading in Style in Fiction for speech presentation is pages 318-36. However, that chapter makes a distinction between direct speech (DS) and free direct speech (FDS), which we now think is unnecessary. Hence, we have not made such a distinction in these notes, and we suggest that you ignore it.

5. Speech presentation: A summary overview

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