| Abstract [eng] |
The dissertation focuses on literary wit in seventeenth-century creative oeuvre of the English playwrights, poets and prose writers. The analysis of literary wit encompasses different forms of literary composition (five dramas of different genres, twenty-seven poems, and two prose pieces) in order to reveal the diversity of expressive patterns of wit. Literary wit has been selected as a relevant and novel object of research as it has rarely been the object of literary criticism. Since wit is frequently identified as a subset of humour and studied from this perspective, there are very few extensive works exploring literary wit as a separate object of scientific inquiry. This thesis is among the few seeking to explore wit as a rational structural element of a literary work. It aims to reveal literary wit as a means of artistic communication in the selected seventeenth-century English drama, poetry and prose. The research is conducted by applying the methodological framework of the semiotics of culture developed by Yuri M. Lotman, the taxonomy of wit distinguished by Debra L. Long and Arthur C. Graesser (2009) and the three main categories (modes, devices, and functions of wit) developed by Donald D. Manson (1966). By examining the notion of wit and through applying a combination of methods for the analysis of the witty discourse of the selected seventeenth-century English literary works, the given research is a serious attempt at extending the boundaries of the field of scientific inquiry with regard to the scarcely-analysed phenomenon of literary wit and setting a methodological framework for the prospective investigation of this subject matter. |
