A semantic analysis of dual voice in a literary style

Abstract

This article proposes an account of dual voice in free indirect discourse (FID), a point-of-view narrative style used mainly in literary narrative for the representation of verbal events, and of verbal or non-verbal mental events (see Oltean, 1993). First, it sums up in a nutshell the issue of what constitutes FID, without dealing in detail with what distinguishes it from "normal" indirect discourse and direct discourse (see, for this matter, Ehrlich, 1990;McHale, 1978;Oltean, 1993). Next, it addresses the issue of dual voice associated with this discourse mode, after which it gives an outline of the analytical framework. Finally, it provides a description for an FID sentence selected from English literary prose, with a view to furnishing evidence for its dual nature.