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In:Practising Stylistics: Essays in Honour of Paul Simpson
Edited by Clara Neary, Simon Statham and Peter Stockwell
[Linguistic Approaches to Literature 45] 2026
► pp. 36–44

Chapter 3: Vignette
Textual momentum

 | University of Nottingham
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Abstract
One of the standard protocols in stylistics, evident throughout Paul Simpson’s work, is the identification of an authentic readerly effect that has previously been only impressionistically described, in order then to provide an analytical textual account for that effect. In this short vignette, Peter Stockwell explores a humorous passage from a comedic memoir by tracing the cognitive poetic momentum in its texture. In the course of the analysis, other, more subtle tonal effects and ideological undercurrents are identified. The account is offered in the same spirit as Simpson’s (2000) analyses of dialogue in prose and script, and shows that stylistics not only has a sole explanatory function but can also have an exploratory and revelatory value as well.
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