The Role of Prosody in Text Interpretation

Abstract

In this paper, an attempt has been made to show the indispensable role of prosody in the language of drama. Prosody as a reliable means of identifying the meaning in belles-lettres style (drama) is important not only in terms of articulation but also perception and cognition as speech is a bilateral process. As compared with other substyles of the belles-lettres style, the dialogue in drama occupies a leading place. The author’s remarks contribute to the correct choice of prosody enabling us to reveal the author’s intent. Though represented in the form of dialogues, the language of drama is in no way the exact reproduction of the norms of colloquial language. The playwright will reproduce actual conversation only as far as the norms of the written language will allow. Thus, the language of drama is marked by stylization of colloquial speech preserving the modus of literary language.