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Wildean Maxims, Gricean Maxims: do the Characters in Earnest Cooperate? N. Saudo-Welby, Université de Picardie (CORPUS)

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Presentation on theme: "Wildean Maxims, Gricean Maxims: do the Characters in Earnest Cooperate? N. Saudo-Welby, Université de Picardie (CORPUS)"— Presentation transcript:

1 Wildean Maxims, Gricean Maxims: do the Characters in Earnest Cooperate? N. Saudo-Welby, Université de Picardie (CORPUS)

2 “it is much easier (…) to tell the truth than to invent lies.” Paul Grice

3 “Make your conversational contribution such as is required, at the stage at which it occurs, by the accepted purpose or direction of the talk exchange in which you are engaged. One might label this the Cooperative Principle.” Paul Grice, “Logic and conversation.” Studies in the Way of Words. Harvard UP, 1989, p. 26.

4 The Four Maxims of Conversation Quantity : Be as informative as is required, not more informative than is required. Quality : Try to make your contribution one that is true. Do not say that for which you lack adequate evidence. Relation : Be relevant. Manner : be perspicuous (clear). Paul Grice, “Logic and conversation”, p. 26.

5 The maxim of Manner is a supermaxim including: avoid obscurity of expression. avoid ambiguity. be brief (avoid unnecessary prolixity). be orderly. Paul Grice, “Logic and conversation”, p. 27.

6 Implicatures

7 Jack. The late Mr. Thomas Cardew, an old gentleman of a very charitable and kindly disposition, found me, and gave me the name of Worthing, because he happened to have a first-class ticket for Worthing in his pocket at the time. Worthing is a place in Sussex. It is a seaside resort. Lady Bracknell. Where did the charitable gentleman who had a first-class ticket for this seaside resort find you? Jack. [Gravely.] In a hand-bag. Lady Bracknell. A hand-bag? Jack. [Very seriously.] Yes, Lady Bracknell. I was in a hand-bag – a somewhat large, black leather hand-bag, with handles to it – an ordinary hand-bag in fact. Lady Bracknell. In what locality did this Mr. James, or Thomas, Cardew come across this ordinary hand-bag? Jack. In the cloak-room at Victoria Station. It was given to him in mistake for his own. Lady Bracknell. The cloak-room at Victoria Station? Jack. Yes. The Brighton line. Lady Bracknell. The line is immaterial. (Norton p. 19)

8 Jack. [Slowly and hesitatingly.] Gwendolen – Cecily – it is very painful for me to be forced to speak the truth. It is the first time in my life that I have ever been reduced to such a painful position, and I am really quite inexperienced in doing anything of the kind. (Norton, p. 43)

9 “It is much easier, for example, to tell the truth than to invent lies.” Paul Grice, “Logic and Conversation”, p. 29.

10 ALGERNON: You had much better have the thing out at once. JACK. My dear Algy, you talk exactly as if you were a dentist. It is very vulgar to talk like a dentist when one isn’t a dentist. It produces a false impression. ALGERNON. Well, that is exactly what dentists always do. (Norton p. 10)

11 Algernon. It is a great bore, and, I need hardly say, a terrible disappointment to me, but the fact is I have just had a telegram to say that my poor friend Bunbury is very ill again. [Exchanges glances with Jack.] They seem to think I should be with him. Lady Bracknell. It is very strange. This Mr. Bunbury seems to suffer from curiously bad health. Algernon. Yes; poor Bunbury is a dreadful invalid. Lady Bracknell. Well, I must say, Algernon, that I think it is high time that Mr. Bunbury made up his mind whether he was going to live or to die. This shilly-shallying with the question is absurd. Nor do I in any way approve of the modern sympathy with invalids. I consider it morbid. (…) Health is the primary duty of life. (…) I should be much obliged if you would ask Mr. Bunbury, from me, to be kind enough not to have a relapse on Saturday, for I rely on you to arrange my music for me. (Norton p. 14)

12 John L. Austin, How to Do Things with Words (1962). Oxford: OUP, 1992. Paul Grice, « Logic and conversation. » Studies in the Way of Words. Harvard UP, 1989, p. 22-40. En ligne sur http://courses.media.mit.edu/2005spring/mas96 2/Grice.pdf http://courses.media.mit.edu/2005spring/mas96 2/Grice.pdf Alexis Tadié, « “An Age of Surfaces” : le langage de la comédie dans The Importance of Being Earnest » (2005) repris in Pascal Aquien et Xavier Giudicelli, dir., The Importance of Being Earnest d’Oscar Wilde. Paris, Presses de l’Université Paris- Sorbonne, 2015, p. 135-55.


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