36.1738, Reviews: English Grammar for Literature Students: McGarry (2025)

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LINGUIST List: Vol-36-1738. Wed Jun 04 2025. ISSN: 1069 - 4875.

Subject: 36.1738, Reviews: English Grammar for Literature Students: McGarry (2025)

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Date: 03-Jun-2025
From: Theresa McGarry [mcgarry at etsu.edu]
Subject: General Linguistics, Linguistics and Literature: McGarry (2025)


Book announced at https://linguistlist.org/issues/35-2027

Title: English Grammar for Literature Students
Subtitle: How to Analyse Literary Texts
Series Title: Mouton Textbook
Publication Year: 2024

Publisher: De Gruyter Mouton
           https://cloud.newsletter.degruyter.com/mouton
Book URL:
https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.1515/9783111348896/html

Author(s): Laura Wright

Reviewer: Theresa McGarry

SUMMARY
True to its title, this textbook assumes literary interests on the
part of its readers but no linguistic background. It aims to provide
basic tools and concepts of stylistic analysis and is accessible to
literature students at graduate or upper undergraduate levels. The
format lends itself to learning of discrete points, as the content is
organized into 26 chapters of 5-10 pages each, each self-contained and
focusing on one grammatical category or stylistic feature. The book
opens with an introduction addressed to students, which explains the
essence of stylistic analysis and how it enhances literary analysis.
The author also argues that the book can be used as a way of learning
linguistics, specifically grammar and “discourse pragmatics,” or it
can be used to strengthen writing skills. Finally, she reassures
students that if grammatical analysis of literature seems hard to
them, the difficulty comes from the subject matter rather than their
own deficiencies.
Following the introduction, the first 18 chapters concentrate on word
and phrase categories and subcategories and related functions. A
chapter on nouns is followed by one on premodification in noun
phrases, one each on adjectives and articles, then one on personal
pronouns. Prepositional phrases are covered in one chapter. The focus
then shifts to verbs, with a chapter on tense and then one each on
auxiliary verbs, auxiliary “do” specifically, modal verbs, and aspect.
The next category is adverb; the chapter on the category is followed
by a chapter on “adverbials,” referring to any category functioning as
a verb or clause modifier. The next three chapters deal with clauses.
The first focuses on identifying clause boundaries and distinguishing
main from subordinate clauses, the next on how clauses are connected
with coordinators and subordinators, and the third on relative clauses
specifically. Chapter 18 then addresses the usages of -ing forms of
verbs.
The last eight chapters concern pragmatic, discourse, and rhetorical
features, starting with one each on anaphora and cataphora. Chapter 21
explains how focus and weight can cause elements to shift to the end
of clauses. The next chapter shifts to the more lexical concerns of
collocation and colligation, then Chapter 23 connects back to anaphora
in a discussion of coherence and cohesion. The final three chapters
take up pragmatic concepts: deixis, then conversational implicatures,
and finally speech acts.
Each chapter contains four sections: definition, demonstration,
literary exercise, and teaching points. As the introduction explains,
the first section is designed to introduce the linguistic feature at
hand and the second to demonstrate its usage in a short literary work
or excerpt. The literary exercise section is meant to engage the
reader in identifying the occurrence and effect of the feature in a
different work. It begins by presenting a literary text or excerpt
with a task related to the topic at hand, which is immediately
followed by a version of the text in which the features the student
has been asked to identify are indicated by means of color-coding.
Next is a sub-section called Analysis, which states results and trends
emerging from the feature identification. The section ends with a
sub-section called Commentary, in which the author provides an
interpretation relating the features to literary effect. The last
section, the teaching point, concludes the chapter in a very short
paragraph that comments on an important or unexpected point related to
the feature.
As an example, in the chapter on coordinators and subordinators, the
definition section defines each term with reference to their syntactic
functions, gives examples, both isolated and in clauses, and includes
a brief mention of the distinction between syndetic and asyndetic
coordination. The demonstration section asks students to identify
coordination and subordination in the 26-line poem “Columbus” by Ogden
Nash, then shows the poem with coordinators and subordinators
identified and discusses how the coordination works with the
rhyme-scheme to achieve the humorous tone of the poem. The literary
exercise section presents a 236-word extract from Titus Alone by
Mervyn Peake and asks the student to carry out the same analysis;
again, the author’s analysis immediately follows, with coordinators,
subordinators, and elements that they link identified and
distinguished by color-coding. The analysis section compares the
frequency of coordination and subordination, points out asyndetic
usage, and comments on a tricky element in the identification process.
The commentary section argues that the high frequency of both
coordination and subordination in the passage helps to achieve
development of the title character as he matures and may be felt by
readers as either increased drama or as melodrama. The teaching point
section summarizes in one sentence that a combination of coordination
and subordination creates an effect of more complexity than
coordination alone and then in three sentences encourages the students
to include attention to both types of connectors in their clause
analysis.
For the demonstration and literary exercise sections, and for some
examples in the definition sections, a wide range of sources is used,
including poetry, narrative, and drama from over 50 different authors.
A list of these primary sources is provided as end matter, followed by
a list of references for each chapter.
EVALUATION
Introductory texts such as Jeffries and McIntyre 2010 and Adamson
2019, while not plentiful, were already available as main texts for
stylistics courses. This book is well conceived in that it addresses a
need for supplemental stylistics texts accessible to graduate students
and advanced undergraduates in literature programs, with no linguistic
background, to promote stylistic awareness and skills that would
ultimately bolster their literary analysis and criticism skills. The
author does not specifically state whether she envisions the text
being used as a course main text, as a supplement, or for self-study.
Its design features, however, suggest that a book of this type could
be particularly useful as an ancillary text in a stylistics class or a
literary analysis class. Chapters can be assigned independently, since
there is a minimum of cross-reference in their context. Though
inevitably some chapters draw on concepts presented in other chapters,
e. g. the chapter on auxiliary “do” could be more easily understood if
the chapter on auxiliary verbs in general had been read first, the
shortness of the chapters would also make it easy to assign two or
three chapters together without imposing a heavy reading load. Another
advantage of the minimal length is that the instructor can bring a
chapter to class for in-class reading and analysis.
A further supplementary use could be to help students conceive and
design their own stylistics research projects or enhance their other
literary research projects with a stylistics element. The emphasis on
demonstration in the book, with at least two literary texts analyzed
in each chapter, can inspire students looking for research projects by
example. An instructor familiar with the text can recommend particular
chapters that might be helpful to students trying to shape a project.
The diversity of texts included, with regard not only to genre and
style but also to time period, author demographics, and linguistic
variety, illustrates the broad applicability of the concepts and can
engage students with varying interests. To give just a few examples,
analyses address works of Seamus Heaney, Jack Kerouak, Ben Okri,
Stevie Smith, Derek Walcott, and Jeanette Winterson.
In this first edition, the potential of the book is not yet realized,
and to achieve the purposes discussed above an instructor needs to be
prepared to scaffold the students’ understanding considerably,
particularly for undergraduates. To some degree, it is a matter of
necessity, given the brevity of the chapters, that much is left
unclarified or unexplored. This is on the one hand an advantage,
because an instructor using the text as a supplement could use the
questions raised to shape class discussion according to the students’
interests or the instructor’s goals. On the other hand, when assigning
chapters as pre-class reading, instructors would need to be aware of
limitations, such as some use of technical terms, e. g. “fossilize,”
without definitions. On a related note, while most terms are defined
in the definition section of each chapter, a glossary added to future
editions could be very helpful for quick reference and review, since
so much of the book’s content involves teaching new terminology.
More important limitations for the instructor to be aware of concern
accuracy and consistency of description and analysis. For example,
Chapter 17, On Clauses: Relative Pronouns, opens with the claim that
“[r]elative pronouns link main clauses to a type of subordinate clause
known as a relative clause.” While the premise that relative clauses
are a type of subordinate clause seems unarguable, the idea that
relative pronouns link the subordinate clause to a main clause leads
to confusion that could be avoided by specifying that relative clauses
are modifiers in noun phrases. Thus, among the nine examples that
follow, three clauses identified as relative clauses are actually
interrogative clauses functioning as modifier in the main clause., e.
g. “where the sun is shining” in “the plane is flying where the sun is
shining.” Further, in the demonstration section, two instances of
covert “that” in “I guess 0 da doc toll him 0 he bettah lay off da
cigs…” are classified as relative pronouns at the beginning of
relative clauses when they are actually subordinators at the beginning
of content clauses. Such misclassifications and conflations of
concepts are unfortunately numerous throughout the text, calling for
careful vetting by the instructor. Ideally, in addition to increasing
explicitness and consistence, the revision will specify the grammar
framework used. The uses of some terms, such as “subordinator,”
“preposition,” and “adverbial” differ from those of Huddleston et al.
(2022), for example, though perhaps not from other standard reference
grammars with which I am less familiar.
Some aspects of organization, design, and format could also profit
from rethinking. Particularly for undergraduates, the tasks could be
more specific, to help scaffold the analysis process. For example, the
task in Chapter 1, On Nouns, is “Identify the nouns – what is their
function?” It is unclear whether it is grammatical function, discourse
function, or both that are intended. Further, the author’s analysis
that follows distinguishes common nouns, compound nouns, and proper
nouns, which was not included in the directions. Many other tasks are
similarly vague, such as “Identify the relative pronouns in the
following poem. What is their effect?” from Chapter 17. Additionally,
the presentation of the author’s analysis, effectively an answer key,
immediately after the text for analysis in both the demonstration
sections and the literary exercise sections, is very conducive to the
reader’s not working through the analysis on their own but simply
going immediately to the solution. In the revision, an alternative
such as putting the author’s analysis in the back of the book might be
considered. Another consideration is the decision to use extensive
color coding to show the analyses. Color is a common accessibility
problem for vision-impaired students, and some of the shades are quite
subtle for even non-impaired readers to distinguish.
The topics are well chosen, as they involve features that are
foundational in stylistic analysis, which students could identify and
analyze in many works. Particularly helpful chapters include those on
phrasal verbs, auxiliary do, end focus and endweight, and cohesion and
coherence. A few chapters might be added. For example, there is a
chapter on the gerund-participle (-ing form) but none on the past
participle, and the passive, which comes up briefly in the chapter on
auxiliary verbs, might merit a chapter of its own, given the notorious
difficulty readers have identifying it. The book could also profit
from the addition of some end matter. In addition to a glossary,
mentioned earlier, an index could be very helpful. The author might
also consider supplemental short lists of published stylistic analyses
involving each feature discussed, for further reading.
A final concern about the book is the puzzling lack of thorough
editing. Mistakes involve punctuation, e. g. a semi-colon used where a
comma is needed, word choice, e. g. “amount” used where “number,” is
called for, format, e. g. poem titles are italicized instead of in
quotation marks, missing diacritics, a misspelled past participle,
etc.
Thus, to fulfill the goals of introducing students to linguistic
analysis, the book, in its current state, needs to be used with great
care. It would work best as a supplement to a main text, with
judicious selection and careful supervision by the instructor, and it
would be more effective for literature students, as the title implies,
than for linguistic students, to whom the linguistic framework is the
more important goal. Its main contribution is in its conception and
overall design. With the revision which the second revision will
undoubtedly have undergone, this book has the potential to be a
resource of great value to instructors and students of stylistics.
REFERENCES
Adamson, H. D. 2019. Linguistics and English literature. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
Huddleston, Rodney; Geoffrey Pullum; and Brett Reynolds. A student’s
introduction to English grammar, 2nd edition. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press.
Jeffries, Lesley, & Dan McIntyre. 2010. Stylistics. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
ABOUT THE REVIEWER
Theresa McGarry has an M.A. TESOL from Temple University Osaka and a
PhD in linguistics from the University of South Carolina. She is a
professor in the Literature and Language Department at East Tennessee
State University, where she coordinates the TESOL Graduate Certificate
program and teaches undergraduate linguistics, stylistics, grammar and
usage, constructed languages, and applied linguistics. Her research
interests include stylistics, pragmatics of World Englishes, and
Sinhala.



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