Rapport
| Résumé : | In this paper, I show that the boundary between two ‘varieties’ of quotation, direct discourse and pure quotation, is fuzzy in English. I start by identifying prototypical features of direct discourse and pure quotation as they emerge from the rich array of examples used in the relevant literature. This allows me to operationalise the notions ‘direct discourse’ and ‘pure quotation’ and identify typical profiles for each. Thus equipped, I consider data from both the quotation literature itself and from a personal corpus, and point up the existence of a broad range of quotations that do not fit nicely in either category, as they display composite profiles. I go on to draw some implications for two dominant views in quotation studies. The existence of cases intermediate between pure quotation and direct discourse is consistent with the predominantly formalist family of views that largely acknowledge a basic semantic and syntactic uniformity between these two varieties. By contrast, it may seem to compromise the predominantly functionalist family of views that insist on the semantic and sometimes syntactic kinship between direct quotation and indirect discourse. |
