STYLISTIC DEVICES

In order to reveal the idea vividly and convincingly the author resorts to the following devices:

Lexical:

 Describing Aurlie’s life, Chopin uses zeugma: So she was quite alone in the world, except for her dog Ponto, and the negroes who lived in her cabins and worked her crops, and the fowls, a few cows, a couple of mules, her gun (with which she shot chicken-hawks), and her religion. Placing human beings, animals and inanimate objects in a row emphasizes how lonely she is.

The word combination “a small band of very small children” possesses an effect of gradation, emphasizing how tiny and helpless seem the children, about to be separated from their mother. Another example of gradation is “flutter that was almost agitation” , that describes Aurlie’s feelings after children are taken away from her.

In the expression “They were the children of her nearest neighbor, Odile, who was not such a near neighbor, after all.” Chopin uses pun, playing on the word meaning. She suggests, that the neighbor lived not far away, but was never a close person to her.

To describe the children’s first reaction to Mamzelle Aurlie, the writer uses the epithet “irresolute steps” and another epithet, based on metonymy “unwilling hand” (to my mind, it is based on metonymy, because not only his hand was unwilling at the moment, but the boy himself). The family then is described as “disconsolate” (also an epithet). On the contrary, when the mother returns, the epithet “beaming face” describes her emotions, and the epithet “sad disorder” shows how lonely it is again for Mamzelle Aurlie.

Consequently the way Aurlie treats children changes. The simile “little one's warm breath beating her cheek like the fanning of a bird's wing” compares the baby to something tender, soft ans fragile. The final implied similie “sobs that seemed to tear her very soul” emphasize the character’s realization of loosing something that is very important.

Syntactical devices:

In order to describe the character’s lifestyle, the author uses parallel construction: “Mamzelle Aurlie had never thought of marrying. She had never been in love. At the age of twenty she had received a proposal, which she had promptly declined, and at the age of fifty she had not yet lived to regret it.”

Another parallel construction is used to describe the duties, connected with the children: “What about the little white nightgowns that had to be taken from the pillow-slip in which they were brought over, and shaken by some strong hand till they snapped like ox-whips? What about the tub of water which had to be brought and set in the middle of the floor, in which the little tired, dusty, sun-browned feet had every one to be washed sweet and clean? ” (here we can also see the example of anaphor which contributes to the effect).

The author also uses antithesis in order to emphasize children’s frustration and sadness “She surveyed with the same calculating air Marclette mingling her silent tears with the audible grief and rebellion of Ti Nomme.”

Phonetic:

There are some cases of onomatopoeia in the text: “shooed the chickens”, and “chattering”, that contribute to the auditory image.

Graphic and phonetic:

In the mother’s colloquial speech we can find many examples of graphon, which reflects her accent and perhaps also plain background: "It's no question, Mamzelle Aurlie; you jus' got to keep those youngsters fo' me tell I come back. Dieu sait, I wouldn' botha you with 'em if it was any otha way to do! Make 'em mine you, Mamzelle Aurlie; don' spare 'em. Me, there, I'm half crazy between the chil'ren, an' Lon not home, an' maybe not even to fine po' maman alive encore!" Besides that, we can see French expressions in her speech (Dieu sait, encore).

Besides that, Chopin violates the rule, making the abstract noun “attention” plural (attentions), in such way emphasizing that children need a lot of it.

The vocabulary, used by Kate Chopin, is mainly colloquial, as she tries to represent conversational speech of the characters. The usage of foregn words (sich, armoire, encore, dieu sait) contributed to the same aim. There also are some poetic words, elevated, hight-flown vocabulary, that helps to create beautiful images. Besides that, there are some attempts of formal language usage, namely, scientific vocabulary: “critically studying their botanical construction”, that refers to a child and therefore creates some humorous effect and also emphasizes the child’s natural curiosity.