Экзамен по стилистике Stylistics as a science and style as a main stylistic category

Epithets are used singly, in pairs, in chains, in two-step structures, and in inverted constructions, also as phrase-attributes. Pairs are represented by two epithets joined by a conjunction or asyndetically as in "wonderful and incomparable beauty" or "a tired old town". Two-step epithets are so called because the process of qualifying seemingly passes two stages: the qualification of the object and the qualification of the qualification itself, as in "an unnaturally mild day" (Hut.), or "a pompously majestic female". Phrase-epithets always produce an original impression. E.g..: "the sunshine-in-the-breakfast-room smell”. Their originality proceeds from rare repetitions of the once coined phrase-epithet which, in its turn, is explained by the fact that into a phrase-epithet is turned a semantically self-sufficient word combination or even a whole sentence, which loses some of its independence and self-sufficiency, becoming a member of another sentence, and strives to return to normality. Inverted epithets are based on the contradiction between the logical and the syntactical: logically defining becomes syntactically defined and vice versa. E.g. instead of "this devilish woman", where "devilish" is both logically and syntactically defining, and "woman", also both logically and syntactically defined, W. Thackeray says "this devil of a woman". Here "of a woman" is syntactically an attribute, i.e. the defining, and "devil"-the defined, while the logical relations between the two remain the same as in the previous example-"a woman" is defined by "the devil".
Oxymoron is a SD realized in the combination of two words (mostly an adjective and a noun or an adverb with an adjective) in which the meanings of the two clash (сталкиваться), being opposite in sense, e.g.: cold fire, brawling love, low skyscraper; sweet sorrow; pleasantly ugly face.
In other words oxymoron is a combination of two semantically contradictory notions, that help to emphasize contradictory qualities simultaneously existing in a described phenomenon as a dialectal unity. As a rule one of the two members of oxymoron illuminates the feature which is universally observed and acknowledged while the other one offers a purely subjective, individual perception of the object.
In oxymoron the logical meaning holds fast because there is no true word combination, only the juxtaposition (соприкосновение) of two non-combinative words. But we may notice a peculiar change in the meaning of the qualifying word. It assumes a new life in oxymoron, definitely indicative of assessing tendency in the writer's mind.
E. g. (O. Henry) "I despise its very vastness and power. It has the poorest millionaires, the littlest great men, the haughtiest beggars, the plainest beauties, the lowest skyscrapers, the dolefulest (унылый) pleasures of any town I ever seen."
Genuine imitation, good grief, almost exactly, sanitary landfill (свалка), alone together, silent scream, etc.
The most widely known structure of oxymoron is attributive. But there are also others, in which verbs are employed. Such verbal structures as “to shout mutely” or “to cry silently” are used to strengthen the idea. Oxymoron may be considered as a specific type of epithet.
It’s necessary to know that not every combination of words which can be called non-combinative should be regarded as oxymoron, because new meaning developed in new combinations does not necessarily give rise to opposition. Originality and specificity of oxymoron becomes especially evident in non-attributive structures which also are used to express semantic contradiction as in “the street was damaged by improvements”, “silence was louder than thunder”.
Oxymorons rarely become trite, for their components, linked forcibly, repulse each other and oppose repeated use. There are few colloquial oxymorons, all of them show a high degree of the speaker’s emotional involvement in the situation, as in “awfully pretty”. In such word combinations as “awfully nice”, “terribly glad”, “pretty awful” the adverbs are used as intensifiers.