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EMOTION IN DIALOGIC INTERACTION
 AMSTERDAM STUDIES IN THE THEORY AND
HISTORY OF LINGUISTIC SCIENCE
General Editor
E. F. KONRAD KOERNER
(Zentrum für Allgemeine Sprachwissenschaft, Typologie
und Universalienforschung, Berlin)

Series IV – CURRENT ISSUES IN LINGUISTIC THEORY

Advisory Editorial Board

Lyle Campbell (Christchurch, N.Z.); Sheila Embleton (Toronto);

Brian D. Joseph (Columbus, Ohio); John E. Joseph (Edinburgh)
Manfred Krifka (Berlin); E. Wyn Roberts (Vancouver, B.C.);
Joseph C. Salmons (Madison, Wis.); Hans-Jürgen Sasse (Köln)

Volume 248

Edda Weigand (ed.)

Emotion in Dialogic Interaction

Advances in the complex
EMOTION IN DIALOGIC
INTERACTION
ADVANCES IN THE COMPLEX

Edited by

EDDA WEIGAND
University of Münster

JOHN BENJAMINS PUBLISHING COMPANY

AMSTERDAM/PHILADELPHIA
 TM The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American
8

National Standard for Information Sciences — Permanence of Paper for Printed

Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1984.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

European Science Foundation Exploratory Workshop on “Emotion in Dialogic Interaction. Advances in
the Complex” (2002 University of Münster)
Emotion in dialogic interaction : advances in the complex / edited by Edda Weigand
p. cm. -- (Amsterdam studies in the theory and history of linguistic science. Series IV, Current
issues in linguistic theory, ISSN 0304-0763 ; v. 248)
“Most of the papers given at the Science Foundation Exploratory Workshop on ‘Emotion in dialogic
Interaction. Advances in the Complex’ held at the University of Münster in October, 2002”
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Dialogue analysis--Psychological aspects--Congresses. 2. Psycholiguistics--Congresses. 3. Emo-
tions--Congresses. I. Weigand, Edda. II. European Science Foundation. III. Title. IV. Series.
P95.455 .E88 2004
401’.41--dc22 2004041191
ISBN 90 272 4760 9 (Eur.) / 1 58811 497 X (US) (Hb; alk. paper)
© 2004 – John Benjamins B.V.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, by print, photoprint, microfilm, or any other
means, without written permission from the publisher.
John Benjamins Publishing Co. • P.O.Box 36224 • 1020 ME Amsterdam • The Netherlands
John Benjamins North America • P.O.Box 27519 • Philadelphia PA 19118-0519 • USA
 Table of contents

List of Contributors vii

Foreword ix

Part I
Addressing the Complex

Emotions: The simple and the complex 3

Edda Weigand
Universality vs. Culture-Specificity of Emotion 23
František Daneš
Emotions in Language and Communication 33
Světla Čmejrková
Emotions, Language, and Context 55
Carla Bazzanella
Body, Passions and Race in Classical Theories of Language and Emotion 73
John E. Joseph

Part II
Communicative Means for Expressing Emotions

Interjections in a Contrastive Perspective 99

Karin Aijmer
When Did We Start Feeling Guilty? 121
Wolfgang Teubert
Joy, Astonishment and Fear in English, German and Russian:
A corpus-based contrastive-semantic analysis 163
Valerij Dem’jankov, Andrej Sergeev, Dasha Sergeeva,
and Leonid Voronin
Ambivalence as a Dialogic Frame of Emotions in Conflict 179
Maxim I. Stamenov
 Table of contents

Part III
Emotional Principles in Dialogue

The Role of Emotions in Normative Discourse and Persuasion 207

Michael R. Walrod
Anticipation of Public Emotions in TV Debates 221
Jörn Bollow
Interpreting Emotions in Literary Dialogue 241
Elda Weizman
The Author-Reader-Text Emotional Bond in the Literary Action Game 255
Tamar Sovran
On the Inseparability of Emotion and Reason in Argumentation 265
Christian Plantin

General Index 277

JB[v.20020404] Prn:26/03/2004; 13:42 F: CI248LC.tex / p.1 (22-204)

List of Contributors

Prof. Dr. Karin Aijmer, Prof. Dr. Valerij Dem’jankov,

Göteborg University, Moscow State University,
English Department, Nauchno-issledovatel’skij
Box 200, 40530 Göteborg, vychislitel’nyj centr, MGU,
Sweden Vorob’evy gory, 119899 Moscow,
karin.aijmer@eng.gu.se Russia
vdem@srcc.msu.su
Prof. Dr. Carla Bazzanella,
Università degli studi di Torino, Prof. Dr. John E. Joseph,
Dipartimento di Filosofia, University of Edinburgh,
v. S. Ottavio 20, 10124 Torino, Deptartment of Theoretical &
Italy Applied Linguistics, Edinburgh EH8 9LL,
bazza@cis-unito.it United Kingdom
john.joseph@ed.ac.uk
Jörn Bollow, M. A.,
Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Prof. Dr. Christian Plantin,
Münster, Fachbereich 9: CNRS / Université Lyon
Philologie, Sprachwissenschaft, 2, 5, av. Pierre Mendès-France,
Bispinghof 2B, 48143 Münster, CP 11, 69676 Bron cedex,
Germany France
bollow@uni-muenster.de plantin@univ-lyon2.fr

Prof. Dr. Světla Čmejrková, Dr. Tamar Sovran,

Academy of Sciences of the Tel Aviv University,
Czech Republic, Czech Hebrew Language Department,
Language Institute, Letenská 4, 69978 Tel Aviv,
118 51 Prague 1, Israel
Czech Republic sovran@post.tau.ac.il
cmejrkova@ujc.cas.cz
Prof. Dr. Maxim Stamenov,
Prof. Dr. František Daneš, Georg-August-Universität Göttingen,
Academy of Sciences of the Seminar für Slavische Philologie,
Czech Republic, Czech Humboldtallee 19, 37073 Göttingen,
Language Institute, Letenská 4, Germany
118 51 Prague 1, mstamen@gwdg.de
Czech Republic
danes@ujc.cas.cz
 JB[v.20020404] Prn:26/03/2004; 13:42 F: CI248LC.tex / p.2 (204-276)

 List of Contributors

Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Teubert, Prof. Dr. Edda Weigand,

University of Birmingham, Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität
Centre for Corpus Linguistics, Münster, Fachbereich 9:
Department of English, Philologie, Sprachwissenschaft,
Birmingham B15 2TT, Bispinghof 2B, 48143 Münster,
United Kingdom Germany
teubertw@bham.ac.uk weigand@uni-muenster.de

Prof. Dr. Michael Walrod, Prof. Dr. Elda Weizman,

Canada Institute of Linguistics Bar-Ilan University,
at Trinity Western University, Translation Department,
CanIL/TWU, 7600 Glover Rd., 52900 Ramat Gan,
Langley, BC, V2Y 1Y1, Israel
Canada elda@bgumail.bgu.ac.il
walrod@twu.ca
JB[v.20020404] Prn:20/04/2004; 14:22 F: CI248FO.tex / p.1 (24-97)

Foreword

This volume contains a selection of papers given at the European Science Foun-
dation Exploratory Workshop on “Emotion in Dialogic Interaction: Advances
in the complex” held at the University of Münster in October 2002. Well-
known experts in the field were invited from different European countries
(Bulgaria, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Great Britain, Italy, Russia, Swe-
den) and from abroad (Canada, Israel). An interdisciplinary approach which
goes beyond academic boundaries was guaranteed by combining different lin-
guistic disciplines such as descriptive and historical comparative linguistics,
general linguistics, linguistics of different languages and related disciplines such
as psychology and philosophy.
In the literature, the complex network of ‘emotion in dialogic interaction’
is mostly addressed by reducing the complex and isolating individual aspects
which are analysed from a specific, for instance, psychological perspective. The
innovative claim of the workshop was to analyse emotion as an integrative com-
ponent of human behaviour in dialogic interaction as demonstrated by recent
findings in neurology. Human beings are purposeful beings, and they try to
negotiate their positions in dialogic interaction. They cannot separate their
abilities such as speaking, thinking, and perceiving, and they are inevitably in-
fluenced by emotions. The challenge of the workshop therefore was to address
the complex on the basis of a model which is able to deal with the complex,
such as the model of the Dialogic Action Game. Approaches which separate
emotions or those which define emotions by means of simple artificial units
were, as a result, not taken into account.
Human behaviour is in part culturally dependent. In this respect, the fo-
cus was on identifying a specifically European way of expressing emotions
and dealing with them in dialogue. The issue of identifying ‘Europeanness’
necessitates comparing different languages and cultures insofar as it is the
diversity of cultures and languages which makes up the general concept of
Western culture.
The workshop was structured according to three thematic parts which
form the structure of the present volume. Part I deals with the theoretical
 JB[v.20020404] Prn:20/04/2004; 14:22 F: CI248FO.tex / p.2 (97-141)

 Foreword

issue of “Addressing the Complex”. My own paper on “Emotions: The sim-

ple and the complex” highlights the modern view of addressing the complex
object of dialogic interaction by starting from the natural object-of-study
and deriving an appropriate model from it. The model of the Dialogic Ac-
tion Game sets up a new paradigm which is not restricted to rules but based
on principles of probability. The focus is on human beings acting and re-
acting in complex ever-changing surroundings on the basis of their abili-
ties. The minimal communicatively autonomous unit is considered to be the
cultural unit of the Dialogic Action Game which integratively comprehends
the essential components of interaction such as language, perception, cog-
nition, and emotion, and includes variables of different kinds which influ-
ence human behaviour, among them cultural conditions. The key concept
for opening up the complex of human behaviour is considered to be spe-
cific interests, in the end survival needs, and communicative, i.e. interactive
or dialogic purposes.
The papers by František Daneš on “Universality versus Culture-Specificity
of Emotions” and Světla Čmejrková on “Emotions in Language and Com-
munication” share this view of emotions as complex integrated phenomena
and focus on specific cultural dependencies. Carla Bazzanella in her paper
on “Emotions, Language, and Context” addresses the complex dependency
of emotions on contextual, especially cultural variables. John E. Joseph in his
paper on “Body, Passions and Race in Classical Theories of Language and Emo-
tion” outlines the historical background from a comparative point of view and
emphasizes the interrelationship between language, body and culture.
Part II focuses on “Communicative Means for Expressing Emotions”. True
to the integrating point of view the verbal means were not isolated, for in-
stance, as single words but analysed as means-in-use, words or grammati-
cal categories within the utterance, or the whole utterance as means for a
speech act. Karin Aijmer, in her paper on “Interjections in a Contrastive
Perspective”, analyses minimal verbal units such as interjections as expres-
sions for complex functions in different languages. Wolfgang Teubert poses
the question “When Did We Start Feeling Guilty?” and deals with the spe-
cific emotion of ‘guilt’ from a corpus-linguistic and discourse-analytic point
of view. A corpus-based comparative analysis of the vocabulary of “Joy, As-
tonishment and Fear in English, German and Russian” is given by Valerij
Dem’jankov and his group. Maxim Stamenov, in his paper on “Ambivalence
as a Dialogic Frame of Emotions in Conflict”, deals with ambivalent emo-
tions in intercultural communication with reference to Turkish loanwords in
Bulgarian.
JB[v.20020404] Prn:20/04/2004; 14:22 F: CI248FO.tex / p.3 (141-183)

Foreword 

Part III is devoted to “Emotional Principles in Dialogue”, i.e. cognitive

means and the issue of how emotions influence the sequence of dialogue with-
out being explicitly expressed. Michael Walrod emphasizes cultural differences
in expressing emotions and, in particular, deals with “the role of emotions in
normative discourse” among the Ga’dang people of the Philippine. In this way,
the difference between European and non-European cultures is highlighted.
The paper by Jörn Bollow on “Anticipation of Public Emotions in TV Debates”
aims at emotional strategies in political media dialogues. Elda Weizman and
Tamar Sovran interpret “Emotions in Literary Dialogue”, and Christian Plantin
addresses the “strategic use of emotion in argumentation” by focusing on “The
Inseparability of Emotion and Reason”.
Even if the workshop had a clear theoretical conception and was struc-
tured according to thematic guidelines, it goes without saying that not all
papers completely follow the same lines. In a vivid exchange of opinions, many
proposals and evaluations are brought forward. In general, however, the po-
sition of addressing the complex and of describing it by means of an open
model such as the model of the Dialogic Action Game has been approved
and accepted.
Concerning the issue of ‘Europeanness’ the starting assumption has been
confirmed, namely that Europeanness is characterized by internal cultural di-
versity and that some sort of unity becomes evident only from outside. The
general view of European identity as emerging from diversity gains more
concrete profile. European identity however is only partly grasped by a view
which looks at existing attitudes and features. As a great step forward it has
to be created, not only politically but also by decisions in other areas, for
instance, in the area of European law or management. As a result of the
discussions it can be considered necessary to create and develop a joint Eu-
ropean interest. The importance of interests which underlie all human be-
haviour is a crucial feature of the model of the Dialogic Action Game. They
should be highlighted as a point of orientation for future research on human
behaviour.
Finally, there remains the pleasant duty to thank all those who helped to
make the workshop and the publication of the papers possible: first of all, the
European Science Foundation which accepted and supported the project as an
Exploratory Workshop. Additional financial support was generously provided
by the Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster and the “Gesellschaft zur
Förderung der Westfälischen Wilhelms-Universität zu Münster e.V.”. Moreover,
I would like to extend cordial thanks to Jörn Bollow, the assistant coordi-
nator, and to a group of students, among them Stefanie Schnöring, Andreas
 JB[v.20020404] Prn:20/04/2004; 14:22 F: CI248FO.tex / p.4 (183-190)

 Foreword

Kurschat, Didem Özan, and Jana Köchling. I am especially grateful to Stefanie

Schnöring and Jörn Bollow who formatted the papers and produced a uni-
fied volume. Last but not least I would like to express my thanks to E.F.K.
Koerner and John Benjamins Publishing Company for accepting the volume
for publication.

Münster, March 2004 Edda Weigand

JB[v.20020404] Prn:18/02/2004; 16:06 F: CI248P1.tex / p.1 (22-37)

P I

Addressing the Complex

JB[v.20020404] Prn:29/03/2004; 16:43 F: CI24801.tex / p.1 (40-107)

Emotions
The simple and the complex

Edda Weigand
University of Münster

. The challenge of the complex

When we consider the history of modern linguistics in the 20th century, we

can distinguish two opposite trends: the search for the simple and the challenge
of the complex. I remember quite clearly the fascination exerted in the 70s by
the question as to what are the simplest so-called atomic predicates which were
supposed to make up the whole of meaning. We indeed believed we could em-
brace the whole range of linguistic meaning if we only were able to find out
about 30 atomic predicates such as be, become, cause, not, alive from which
to construct, for instance, the meaning of kill. The situation has completely
changed in recent years. Quite different key terms now attract our attention:
individuality, probability, principles, and performance have replaced the terms
of generality, fixed codes, rules, and system. We are on the track of adventures
in the complex which is a track that crosses academic boundaries from biology,
neurology, psychology to anthropology, philosophy, linguistics and cultural
studies. In his staircase model Gell-Mann (1994: 111f.) considers the different
disciplines as “part of a single connected structure” even if they “do occupy
different levels”:

↑psychology, linguistics, etc.

↑ .....................
↑biology
↑chemistry
↑physics
Figure 1
 JB[v.20020404] Prn:29/03/2004; 16:43 F: CI24801.tex / p.2 (107-161)

 Edda Weigand

For the humanities, I would however prefer a structure in which the different
disciplines of the humanities all concentrate on roughly the same object-of-
study: human behaviour while having a different primary scientific interest. As
linguists, who are aware of the challenge of the complex, we are, in my opinion,
interested in language as an integrated part of human behaviour.
Thus at least we seem to know the complex, namely effective language use
by human beings. The characteristic of ‘effective use’ means we have left the
traditional separation of two levels of competence and performance and have
arrived at competence-in-performance as the complex goal of our descrip-
tion. But where to begin? What can count as the simple? Here again the adven-
tures begin. One might think of the title of Gell-Mann’s book The Quark and
the Jaguar which identifies the simple in physics with the elementary particle
‘quark’ and the complex with the perfect wild cat ‘jaguar’. Having grasped the
complex in the humanities with human beings effectively interacting within
dialogue, we might suggest the ‘neuron’ or the ‘qualia’ as a candidate for
the simple.
I do not want to tackle the philosophical issue of qualia as simple sensory
qualities insofar as they seem to be based on the duality of mind and body (cf.
Levine 1983) which in my view can no longer be taken for granted. Reflect-
ing however on the much discussed mirror neurons, we discover an interest-
ing phenomenon: when we examine them more and more in depth, they con-
tinue to display even more complexity. Complexity does not come to an end,
there is no simple level of one substance ‘matter’ versus ‘energy’ but a complex
integrated whole from the very beginning:

 
the mirror neuron biological-physiological matter
 cognitive function 
perceptual function
Figure 2

When we trace the path of evolution of brain and language back to the begin-
nings, there do not seem to be simple units at the very outset insofar as there
are no units without a contextual function, no matter without energy. Neu-
rology tells us that there is no living brain without a mind, no mind without
a brain. What we find basically is a network of billions of neurons, firing and
exchanging signals, no separable simple pieces such as the alleged quarks, no
separable areas such as rationality, emotion and language. It seems to be the
case that while trying to find the simple we arrive at the complex. It is as if you
JB[v.20020404] Prn:29/03/2004; 16:43 F: CI24801.tex / p.3 (161-210)

Emotions 

are looking for the smallest possible points and they are always the universe.
There is no simple at the beginning. If we want to use one term, I would say, at
the beginning we find ‘function’ which is the integrated unity of function and
matter, of mind and brain which makes up life.
The picture radically changes if we follow another path in our search for
the simple: the path of abstraction which has been taken by Western thinking for
over two millennia. Via abstraction we leave the natural phenomenon of per-
formance and arrive at theory. It is the way of defining the complex in terms of
simple, in my view, artificial units such as atomic predicates or semantic primi-
tives in lexical semantics. Now we seem to have what we want to have: separable
simple units from which we can allegedly build up the complex according to
rule-governed patterns or fixed codes. We seem to be justified in doing so by
requiring that a theory has to reduce the complex to rules via abstraction. It
does not seem to bother us that in doing so we have totally left our complex
object, abstracted away essential features which can never be brought back. We
now have a theory but have forgotten what our theory is about.
Let us have a brief look at a few orthodox theories of emotion and their
techniques of description. There is the technique of ontological claims for the
simple. Wierzbicka (1996), for instance, constructs a semantic metalanguage,
i.e. an artificial language consisting of semantic primitives such as say, think,
know, want, feel, good, bad, and claims ontological existence for these
primitives insofar as she considers them as “innate human concepts” (p. 16;
also Enfield/Wierzbicka 2002: 17). Semantic primitives of this type strongly re-
mind me of generative semantics in the 70s: the desire for the simple seems to
live forever.
Next, there is the traditional technique of metaphorical explanation ap-
plied, for instance, by Kövecses (1990) which seems closer to performance in-
sofar as it refers to the motive of the speaker for using a metaphorical expres-
sion. There is a special affinity between emotions and metaphors. Kövecses’
primary interest however is not to describe how emotions are expressed but
how emotions are talked about (p. 3), emotions as a discourse topic, and to
explain why they are talked about by means of metaphors. The question of
the motive of the speaker might be interesting for creative language use. Dead
metaphors, however, such as, I was overwhelmed by fear, fear came over him,
she was carried away by fear (p. 78) are conventional ways-of-use. For language
use the question of why we say in English to fly into a rage and in German in
Ärger geraten misses the point. The conventions of use do not follow cognitive
configurations nor deep grammatical rules, they are simply there. Thus Kövec-
ses (1988: 42) in emphasizing that we speak of “deeply felt emotions” cannot
 JB[v.20020404] Prn:29/03/2004; 16:43 F: CI24801.tex / p.4 (210-265)

 Edda Weigand

explain why we have to say with high seriousness or with great seriousness and
cannot say *with deep seriousness.
Another technique pursued, for instance, by Harré (e.g., 1986) is based on
the thesis that emotions are socially constructed. In the light of recent neuro-
logical findings, however, the exclusive emphasis on the social construction of
emotions can – as we will see – no longer be maintained.
All these techniques and reference points, the linguistic, the psychological
and the social, are techniques which highlight and even isolate a special point,
a special compartment of the complex whole. If you, on the contrary, stress
the necessity of starting from the whole from the very outset, you have to be
prepared to face the criticism of academic imperialism by orthodox scientists
of different academic provenance. Rising to the challenge of the complex, how-
ever, is quite different from taking up the stance of academic imperialism. It is
simply acknowledging that “human nature is indeed hard to describe and full
of contradictions” (Damasio 2000: 64f.). What we are attempting in our ‘be-
yond enterprise’ (Dascal 1996) is a radical change in the concept of a theory. I do
not think that we have to give up the concept of a theory. There are not only the
two extremes: a rule-governed theory versus no rules, no theory at all. There
is a possibility in between, the possibility of mediating between order and dis-
order. Human abilities allow for this possibility insofar as human beings are
endowed not with an abstract competence restricted to rules nor with being
totally subject to chance but with the ability to deal with the complex, i.e. with
competence-in-performance, which is an ability to start with the attempt to
discover order and being able to adapt to disorder. Human beings in this sense
are ‘complex adaptive systems’, to take up a term introduced by Gell-Mann in
his physical explanation of the complex.
If we want to rise to the challenge of the complex in the humanities, we
have to focus on the way human beings orientate themselves in complex sur-
roundings. The different techniques they use – rules, regularities, conventions,
inferences, suggestions, suppositions, associations – are all techniques which in
the end are based on probability. Competence-in-performance can be executed
only on the basis of principles of probability. In order to understand this com-
plex ability of competence-in-performance we need to find a key to opening
it up and we need to know the whole framework within which competence-in-
performance with all its components works. The key concept in my opinion
are interests, needs, expectations which as a general drive are innate to human
beings. According to Damasio (2000: 24f.), it is “the organism’s advantage” or
“the service of the interests of a particular organism” from which all attempts
at explaining human behaviour have to start. This innate drive of human be-
JB[v.20020404] Prn:29/03/2004; 16:43 F: CI24801.tex / p.5 (265-333)

Emotions 

ings is influenced and shaped by their social and cultural surroundings. The
framework for investigating human communicative behaviour therefore has to
include all possible variables, social, cultural, personal, which have the power
to influence human actions. I call this framework the Dialogic Action Game
(Weigand 2000, 2002). In coining the term, a few fundamental assumptions
were crucial which I can only briefly mention here having dealt with them in
detail elsewhere:
– Communication is considered to be action, more precisely dialogic inter-
action.
– Human dialogic interaction is considered to be a game, not a closed
game like chess but an open game which allows for different ways of
playing, for individual ways as well as for well-trodden paths and con-
ventional routines.

In my attempt to study language use from a linguistic point of view I consider

the dialogic action game to be a cultural unit, taking the term culture in a
broadly-based comprehensive sense:

cultural unit of the dialogic action game

human beings interacting via principles of probability
mediating between order and disorder
order → principles → disorder
Figure 3

Human beings, dependent on their own innate abilities as well as on cultural

conditions, represent the complex in various respects. In this complex network
there is nothing simple at all, everything is interconnected. From the very be-
ginning integration is the name of the game (M. Dascal, personal communica-
tion; cf. Harris 1998).

. What emotions really are: New findings, new questions

Scientific studies on emotion are usually characterized by the fact that we have
to come to grips with varying, even controversial assumptions not only in dif-
ferent disciplines such as psychology, biology, or anthropology, but even in the
same discipline. Now with recent findings in neurology the situation seems to
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 Edda Weigand

have changed. We seem to be on the right track of getting to know what emo-
tions really are. New findings, especially those presented by Damasio (2000),
confirm that there is no simple at the outset but a complex network of func-
tions and matters ordered in the sequence of time. Damasio gives a very differ-
entiated and partly experimentally proven picture of human nature and specif-
ically of emotions as internal states. He distinguishes “three stages of process-
ing along a continuum” (p. 36f.): first, emotions which are outwardly directed
responses of the organism caused by internal or external events, second, feel-
ings of these emotions which are inwardly directed and private, mental expe-
riences, and third a state of feelings made conscious, i.e. known to the self.
“This perspective on emotion, feeling, and knowing is unorthodox. [. . . ] The
inescapable and remarkable fact about these three phenomena – emotion, feel-
ing, consciousness – is their body relatedness.” They all “depend for their ex-
ecution on representations of the organism. Their shared essence is the body”
(p. 283f.).
Moreover, Damasio clarifies the puzzle of what emotions, feelings, moods,
drives, motivations, affect really are, mainly by distinguishing between pri-
mary, secondary and background emotions. Primary emotions are innate emo-
tions: happiness, sadness, fear, anger, surprise, and disgust; secondary emo-
tions are social emotions such as embarrassment, jealousy, guilt, or pride.
Third there are background emotions “such as well-being or malaise, calm
or tension” (pp. 50ff.). “Background emotions do not use the differentiated
repertoire of explicit facial expressions that easily define primary and social
emotions.” The features of being ‘tense’ or ‘edgy’, ‘discouraged’ or ‘enthusias-
tic’, ‘down’ or ‘cheerful’ are detected “by subtle details of body posture, speed
and contour of movements, minimal changes in the amount and speed of eye
movements, and in the degree of contraction of facial muscles”. What is im-
portant for us is the fact that all these different internal states are ordered along
a continuum. It was Descartes’ error to separate emotion and reason, whereas
it is now experimentally proven that reason is influenced by emotion (for a
somewhat modified evaluation of Descartes’ position cf. Rorty 1992).
According to Damasio (2000: 57), it is simply wrong to maintain that emo-
tions are totally shaped by culture. Emotions are biologically determined pro-
cesses. Nevertheless, “regardless of the degree of biological presetting of the
emotional machinery, development and culture have much to say regarding the
final product [. . . ]: first, they shape what constitutes an adequate inducer of a
given emotion; second, they shape some aspects of the expression of emotion;
and third, they shape the cognition and behavior which follows the deployment
of an emotion.”
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Emotions 

We now have to pose the question what these new neurological findings
can tell us concerning our linguistic research and in general concerning re-
search in the humanities. The processing which takes place from the organism’s
reactions to conscious feelings is not the core issue for linguistics. If we focus
on language use, on what human beings do with language in dialogic interac-
tion we have to take account of the fact that they are inevitably influenced by
emotions. Emotions are a human condition which cannot be abstracted from.
In my view, however, it is not so important for linguistics to differentiate the
neurological stages of emotion, feelings, and consciousness. A broad concept
of emotion which does not distinguish between emotions as the organism’s re-
actions and feelings of emotions might be sufficient. We might differentiate
between conditions of emotion, i.e. the inducing internal or external situation,
and emotions as an ability, i.e. having feelings which might be conscious or un-
conscious. Thus we have arrived at the fundamental concept of human abilities
which in my view is central for our understanding of the world insofar as we
cannot go beyond the filter of our abilities (Weigand 1998). We perceive and
reason in a way that is preset by our abilities. Having emotions or feelings is
one of these abilities.
Accepting that we cannot go beyond our abilities highlights once again
that any ontological claim for an independent world structure, i.e. for absolute
truth, must be futile. We can understand and structure the world or the uni-
verse of meaning only through the filter of our abilities. It is however not so
easy to give a list of our abilities. As a first preliminary attempt I propose the
following:

universe of meaning

human abilities

perceiving thinking acting feeling

(5 senses)
consciousness knowing moving speaking learning
or relating-the- the object social
object-to-the-self behaviour

Figure 4

All these abilities are necessary for the species; even emotions serve human
beings’ survival (Damasio 2000: 54; Darwin 1892). They are not superfluous; a
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 Edda Weigand

clear example is fear: we need to know what fear means in order to understand
what danger means.
The next question to be tackled is the question how these abilities are in-
terconnected. How do they participate in the process of human dialogic inter-
action? I will come back to this question when dealing with the relationship
between emotion and language.
Let me now summarize the points which in my view are essential for
dealing with emotion in linguistics:
– First, we can distinguish a wide range of internal states at the neurological
level, emotions, feelings, moods, background emotions, etc. which we can
comprehend in a first step simply as emotions. In a second step we can
distinguish between primary innate emotions, secondary social emotions
and background emotions.
– Emotions in this wide sense as internal states are based on expectations and
needs in relation to the world or to other human beings. Thus, for instance,
anger, surprise, joy are feelings which precisely correspond to certain
expectations.
– Human abilities including emotions are based on survival needs. In this
sense, fear, for instance, indicates the need for protection. In the end, it
is the interests and advantages of human beings which induce and guide
human behaviour.
– Emotions are indeterminate concepts. They are describable to some ex-
tent, but cannot be defined. Here I think we have to come to grips with a
fundamental principle of the complex: basically there are no fixed, strict
definitions, only approximations, continua, probabilities, approaches to
determinateness within indeterminateness.
– Emotions are always present and cannot be switched off. They are in-
tegrated with other abilities, for instance, emotions with rationality and
learning, as a German proverb tells us: “Der Wunsch ist der Vater
des Gedankens.” Emotions are integrated with the body perhaps in a
deeper sense than we can nowadays imagine. The mind at a deeper
level seems to be “nature’s most complex set of biological phenomena”
(Damasio 2002: 9).
– Emotions are not totally controllable by reason, if at all, only in part. They
are strong enough to cancel rationality whereas the “controlling power of
reason is often modest” (Damasio 2000: 58).
– Emotions are in part innate and universal and in part culturally and socially
shaped. Insofar as they are grounded in the innate characteristics of human
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Emotions 

beings’ having needs and expectations, emotions belong to some degree

to universal human conditions. As is the case with most innate features,
they can be shaped by education, by cultural conditions and modified or
transformed by societal traditions.
– Finally, emotions in my view have a very specific quality which is connected
with indeterminacy: they resist being explicitly described. They are to some
degree the inexpressible. This is why they are often talked about by means
of metaphors or symbols (Weigand forthc.a). Emotions thus reach the lim-
its of language, arrive at communication above and beyond language, at
comprehension without words.

On the basis of these new findings on emotions, new questions arise. In my

view, it is mainly the feature of interconnectedness which confronts us with
new issues: first, interconnectedness between innateness and culture or be-
tween biology and sociology; second, between the various human abilities, i.e.
between emotion, language, rationality, action, social behaviour; and third, in-
terconnectedness between emotion and the body. Being in part a physiologi-
cal phenomenon emotions have a bodily expression which becomes manifest
without the intention of human beings. Bodily expressions of emotion can
therefore be an essential indication in situations where we follow emotional
principles such as “hide your emotions”. I will however not focus on this causal
interconnectedness between emotions and the body but on the interconnect-
edness between emotions and language, and this includes the way emotions are
shaped by social, cultural factors.

. Emotions and language

My question is not as Wierzbicka (2002: 4) or Kövecses (1990: 3) put it ‘emo-

tion talk’ or how we talk about emotion which is a question analogous to how
we talk about nature, about the body, about teaching. Just as talking about
the body will not necessarily inform us about real essentials of the body, talk-
ing about emotion will not necessarily tell us essentials of emotion. Talking
about is quite different from expressing, doing, understanding. The question
how emotions are related to language is the question how they are expressed by
human beings in language.
To tackle this question we need to know the complex framework in which
emotions as well as language play their part. This framework, in my view, is
the cultural unit of the dialogic action game in which language plays its role
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 Edda Weigand

as an integrated part of human behaviour (Weigand 2000). The key question

to be posed is the question why human beings use language. Here I start from
the previously mentioned point that human beings normally use their abil-
ities in their own interest, to their advantage. They use language integrated
with other communicative means in order to fulfil communicative, and that is
dialogic purposes and needs. Thus we have arrived at a view of communica-
tion as dialogic interaction insofar as the correlation of means and purposes
constitutes action.
Action can be initiative or reactive. The basic minimal structure of the
action game is constituted by the sequence of action and reaction which can
be extended by sequencing principles of negotiation. The expected reaction is
functionally and rationally determined by the initiative action. Contrary to or-
thodox speech act theory, interaction does not result from single illocutionary
acts complemented by conversational principles. The speech act itself has to
be changed. Interaction is from the very beginning based on two intensionally
different acts: the initiative and the reactive act, i.e. an act which makes a com-
municative claim and an act which fulfils this very claim. Interaction is thus
the negotiation of the positions of the interlocutors which takes place in the
discourse between making and fulfilling a claim:

dialogic interaction

action ↔ reaction
making a claim ↔ fulfilling the claim

Figure 5

Interaction happens in different action games which belong to four basic types:
representative games which make a claim to truth and accept or reject it, direc-
tive games which make a claim to volition and consent to or refuse it, explo-
rative action games which make a claim to getting knowledge, and declarative
action games which make and fulfil the claim to changing the world by the
utterance (Weigand 1991, 2003).
Having thus sketched the framework in which the components work and
which as a whole is communicatively autonomous, we can now pick out the
utterance as a component. I take the term utterance not in the sense of verbal
utterance or utterance form but in the sense of the communicative means hu-
man beings use when acting. Language is part of the communicative means
human beings have at their disposal. These means are integrated means: ver-
bal means, cognitive means such as inferencing and having cultural knowledge,
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Emotions 

and perceptual means based on the ability of perceiving insofar as interlocutors

rely on what they can see and perceive in the situation. Human beings cannot
separate these abilities even if they wanted to.
The issue of the relationship between emotion and language can now be
put more precisely: it is the question where and how emotions enter the ut-
terance and influence the sequence of utterances which makes up dialogic in-
teraction. An utterance is functionally constituted by an action function and a
related state of affairs or proposition. Emotions enter or influence both parts:
the action function and the propositional function:

action function (proposition)

↑emotion ↑emotion
Figure 6

Moreover, they influence the dialogic sequence without being explicitly ex-
pressed (for examples and sample analyses of dialogic sequences cf. Weigand
1996; Daneš 1999).

. Words and concepts

Let us first address the complex area of emotional vocabulary and language
comparison and highlight a few particularly problematic points. One might
think we would find an example of the simple with the lexical means of sin-
gle words. Words or signs are traditionally considered as the correlation of an
expression with a concept, emotion words as the correlation of one word with
one emotion. A clear example of such an approach to the simple is Wierzbicka’s
semantic primitives approach (e.g., Wierzbicka 1996: 178ff.). In trying “to es-
tablish what the meaning of a word is” Wierzbicka arrives at the conclusion
that it is a definition “and, ultimately, a definition, too, has to stand on its own”
(p. 183). I think the artificial constructionist view of this approach becomes im-
mediately obvious. It is an approach which is unable to deal with competence-
in-performance. In language use, it is not the word which has a meaning by
definition but the speakers predicate with words how they perceive and con-
struct an image of the world. Lexical items in general are means for predicating,
not only within the propositional function but also within the action function
insofar as by using a speech act verb in an explicit performative utterance the
speech act verb predicates what type of action is meant (cf. Weigand 1998: 28f.).
Concepts thus are not ontological entities but are dependent on the speakers’
abilities to perceive and understand the world.
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 Edda Weigand

Isolated words are often considered to be polysemous. Polysemy however

is a problem of theory not of language use. When asked for the meaning of an
isolated word, native speakers will not be immediately aware of all the different
meanings the word might have in use. They have in mind a very rough com-
plex meaning which is in principle indeterminate. Thus, for instance, picking
out the seemingly simple verb fall we correlate it with some complex of mean-
ing which has to do with an object falling down but also with other events such
as hair falling on one’s shoulders, with an argument falling down, with los-
ing balance or collapsing, etc. and perhaps even with the the phrase falling in
love. The multiple other usages of fall do not immediately come to mind (cf.
Weigand forthc.b). We are able to use the word but we do not know all possible
usages. In this sense, the isolated word has a complex indeterminate meaning
which might be considered a prototype that includes different uses but is not
polysemous.
However communication is not the same as a configuration of proto-
types. It is based not on single words but on a network of multi-word units
or words-in-use (Sinclair 1998; Weigand 1998). Words-in-use are phrases, and
it is the phrase with which we predicate. The phrase normally makes up one
use, i.e., its meaning has become more precise. The specific conventions of use
or collocations often become evident only in language comparison.
Let me demonstrate the basic lines of this approach of a network-of-use
with the example sich freuen/to be pleased in a first preliminary analysis. The
first question of the emotion expressed by this verb is already a difficult one. Is
it joy, pleasure, happiness? Damasio conceives of happiness as a basic emo-
tion. Pleasure, however, according to him is like pain “a constituent quality of
certain emotions” (Damasio 2000:76). In a first attempt, I think, we can put
joy and happiness together and conceive of them as one basic emotion. This
basic emotion might occur as slightly different internal states for which the
individual languages have different sets of expressions such as

happiness
joy Freude gioia joie
happiness Glück felicità bonheur
pleasure Vergnügen divertimento plaisir
......... ......... ......... .........
Figure 7
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Emotions 

These expressions, joy, happiness, pleasure, etc., do not denote exactly sepa-
rable and definable emotions. We might consider them as language-specific
sets based on family resemblances, the whole family being some sort of a pro-
totype happiness. Thus we take account of the fact that these expressions
are verbal communicative means not God-given signs for ontological internal
states. In language use they can lose their specific meaning and can be used as
approximate equivalents. For instance, in German,
(1) es ist mir eine Freude, es ist mir ein Vergnügen

are different ways-of-use, even with a difference in meaning which however is

difficult to grasp. As conversational routines they are often used as approximate
equivalents. The same is valid for the English ways-of-use
(2) it gives me a great pleasure, I am happy, I am delighted, etc.

Examples like these tell us that we have to distinguish on the one hand different
internal states which are expressed by different words such as happy, delighted,
pleased, and on the other hand ways-of-use which are again made up of dif-
ferent words but with equivalent uses. The conventions of use would have to
be checked by a corpus linguistic analysis based on frequency of use. Artifi-
cial premises such as “meaning is defined” and “can be explicitly indicated”
are without relevance for a theory of performance. In my opinion, it is of little
help to contrast the meaning of “X feels happy” and “X feels joy” as Goddard
(1998: 92) does by contrasting “something good happened to me. I don’t want
other things now” for happy and “something very good is happening now”
for joy.
Now let us go into a bit more detail and compare the different ways of use
in different languages. In German we have an interesting usage of the verb sich
freuen which is usually not taken into account by cross-linguistic analyses: sich
freuen may relate to a present or to a future state of affairs:
(3) sich freuen auf versus sich freuen über

There is also a special derived noun Vorfreude correlating with sich freuen auf.
It seems to me that this way-of-use sich freuen auf has no precise correlate
in meaning either in English or in Italian. In English we need to take a quite
different verb, to look forward to which according to its literal meaning does
not denote an emotion. The noun Vorfreude would have to be translated into
English by anticipation. Whereas the verb to look forward to is always used in
a positive sense like sich freuen auf, anticipation in contrast to Vorfreude lacks
the positive aspect and is used in a neutral way. The situation in Italian is sim-
 JB[v.20020404] Prn:29/03/2004; 16:43 F: CI24801.tex / p.14 (737-792)

 Edda Weigand

ilar to English. There are compound nouns gioia anticipata, gioia dell’attesa,
attesa gioiosa which have a component denoting emotion but there is no verbal
phrase like sich freuen auf. Other stems are used such as essere in attesa, essere
contenti. One might think of the use of different prepositions: essere contenti
per versus essere contenti di but this formal difference does not seem to make
a clear difference in meaning. Again a comprehensive corpus analytic analysis
would be needed.
In French the situation seems similar to Italian insofar as other verbal
phrases such as attendre avec impatience, être content are used. However, there
is also the possibility of adding d’avance: qn se réjouit d’avance.
From examples like these it becomes evident that comparative analyses are
needed not only for translation purposes but also for knowing better how our
own mother language works. The presumed conventions-of-use we find out
must be verified by corpus linguistic analyses and the criterion of frequency
of use. For conventions-of-translation however the cross-linguistic gap will re-
main and cannot be closed by parallel corpora, which in the end rely on the
competence of native and quasi-native speakers.

. Utterances and speech acts

Now let us take as our next example the whole utterance as a communicative
means for carrying out speech acts. I think there are three speech act types re-
ferring to emotions: we can state the emotion we feel in constatives, we can
emphasize an overwhelming emotion in expressives and we can create social
relationships by declaring emotions to exist in declaratives such as:
(4) I love you. declarative
(5) I regret it (at court). declarative

The declaration of an emotion, in my opinion, has to be distinguished from a

statement:
(6) I love him. statement
(7) I regret it (in everyday talk). statement
(8) I am surprised. – I can believe it. statement

By declaring love the social relationship has changed (for the history of the
speech act of declaration of love cf. Schwarz 1984). By declaring regret at court
the circumstantial conditions of the case are changed.
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Emotions 

The statement of an emotion, in my view, does not represent an expressive

speech act. It is a representative speech act about an inner state of affairs. The
interlocutor has to believe it because there is no possibility for him to verify
it (examples 6, 7 and 8). I use the term expressive for speech acts which differ
from statements in that the emotion is expressed in an overwhelming manner.
Expressives, the genuine speech acts of emotion, aim at a reactive speech act of
empathy by the interlocutor (example 9):
(9) What a surprise! – Indeed. expressive

Now we might ask for the verbal means which, as components of the utter-
ance, can serve as speech-act-indicating devices. In general, it is the grammat-
ical structure of the utterance including intonation and not the lexical means
which constitutes action. Thus we have the pattern of the explicit performa-
tive utterance for the declarative speech act I love you which contrasts with the
representative speech act I love him. We have the specific sentence type of an
exclamatory sentence with a specific intonation contour What a surprise! which
contrasts with the representative speech act I am surprised. These grammatical
means however are integrated means, i.e., they are dependent on other means
and variables of the action game.
Besides these types of speech acts for declaring, stating, and emphasizing
an emotion, there is another type in which the emotion is only an accompa-
nying feature of the action. We might make a statement which does not refer
to any emotion at all but nevertheless the statement is accompanied by a feel-
ing. The feeling might be positive in the sense of joy or pleasure, or it might be
negative in the sense of anger. Thus the statement, for instance,
(10) You are playing the piano again.

may be intended as a confirming and encouraging speech act or as a reproach

or accusation. Intonation is an important means for expressing this difference.
Unfortunately, intonation is often not expressed in a sufficiently clear way.
Examples like this clearly demonstrate the need to open up the orthodox
model and to allow for a theory dealing with uncertainty. The interlocutor first
follows the technique of rules and identifies the grammatical structure of the
sentence type which indicates a statement. At this point however he/she has
to ask him-/herself what to do with this statement in this situation insofar as
intonation is not sufficiently clearly expressed and therefore of no great help.
That is the point where order, rules and generalizations come to an end. In-
dividual conditions and particularities of the specific unrepeatable situation
have to be accounted for. Principles of probability, inferences and suppositions
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 Edda Weigand

of what might be the reason for the utterance have to be used which inevitably
open up the risk of misunderstanding. Meaning and understanding have to be
negotiated in the complex interplay of order and disorder. In the end, the in-
terlocutor has to rely on suppositions insofar as the speaker alone knows what
he/she meant. Thus it becomes clear that in trying to arrive at a theory of per-
formance we are forced to include chance and individuality in order to describe
the human ability of competence-in-performance (cf. Weigand 1999).

. Principles of emotion

Finally, let us analyse a complex example which is a whole action game based
on a speech act which seems to demonstrate culturally dependent principles
of emotion. We thus arrive at the fundamental issue of ‘Euroversals’ of emo-
tion. Possible Euroversals become evident in contrast, in this case, to presumed
Americanisms.
Let me first describe the background situation of this extraordinary action
game. It was in New Orleans during a conference held over several days, on the
Saturday before Easter. With a few colleagues we left the building, a conference
centre, where we lived and were confronted by a striking sign skilfully painted
which was posted right in front of the entrance. On the sign we read (names
changed by E. W.)

(11) MIRIAM does still LOVE LARRY unconditionally.

My colleagues and I, from Northern Europe, were surprised and looked and
studied the sign. Larry was the name of the head of the conference centre, a
reserved type who was rather reticent. Apparently, it was he who was meant.
What struck us most was the fact that this was a declaration of love. A very
private individual love story had been deliberately made public. The sign was
intentionally installed at the entrance so that everybody noticed it and con-
nected it with the head of the conference centre. The writing was an explicit
performative speech act, however, very interestingly in the 3rd person.
Now we might reflect on universal versus culturally shaped emotions.
There is undoubtedly an emotion called love in America and in Europe and
everywhere else. But what is love? Is this a linguistic question at all? What is
the meaning of the verb love on the sign? It is not at all a defined concept but
a concept which varies and is indeterminate and different for every speaker. In
different cultures different principles are used to express it. Whereas in North-
ern Europe we often follow a principle such as “Hide your emotions in public”,
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Emotions 

such a principle does not seem to be pervasive in America. Love, a very private
emotion, is deliberately and without any reservation made public. We must
however admit that even in Europe teens declare their love by openly and pub-
licly writing I love you, however, at least partly in an anonymous way. In this
specific American action game Larry was a man in his fifties.
Even if we were always to be cautious in drawing general conclusions from
a single event, it seems to indicate that Americans deal differently with pri-
vate emotions. This is confirmed by other experiences during our stay in New
Orleans. For instance, while walking in a park, we passed a man sitting on a
bench phoning. ‘Hi’, he addressed us, ‘I am talking with my brother’, and then
followed the whole private story of his brother. Such behaviour is quite un-
usual to people from Northern Europe who would never start a conversation
with complete strangers by telling private stories except perhaps in a pub after
a few glasses of beer. The question has to be asked as to what remains private
for Americans.
The sign in front of the conference centre contains other very interesting
details which confirm the integrational view. Not only verbal means but also
perceptual means are used: different types of writing, capital letters, under-
lining, different colours, and mainly the painting of a heart above the word
love thus combining feelings with the body according to folk understandings
of emotion. All these perceptual means stress the urgency of the feeling and
expose privacy once more to the public.
Moreover, there is another intriguing point in the writing to be reflected
on. While standing around and wondering about it, a colleague from Britain
commented: “There must be a sad story behind it.” How do we know this?
Nothing is expressed explicitly. The fact that love still persists is expressed. We
could try to construct inferences which might lead from the declaration of love
to the sad story. We follow paths of probability and even only possibility in
order to grasp the complex we are confronted with. The way the declaration is
made must contain some hint of a story which is waiting to be fulfilled or worse
which seems to be unable to be fulfilled. Again we wonder why Miriam declares
her love in public, on the street, and not personally towards Larry himself.
Why does she use does love and not simply loves? Moreover, still might be a
means which expresses the fact that she is still waiting for her love to be fulfilled.
Also unconditionally is full of possible meanings and points to problems and
hindrances of a sad story.
In this way, by bringing different variables together and integrating them,
we try to make sense of a complex action game which only consists of one single
utterance. The problems of understanding this utterance as a component of the
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 Edda Weigand

action game are increased by the fact that we are only observers of the action
game. Naturally, Miriam and Larry could tell us more. But not even they as
speakers seem to be able to deal with their emotions in a satisfying way. Words
and communicative means come to an end, and the inexpressible remains.

. Conclusion: From patterns to adaptive human behaviour

With this last example, we completely left behind us the view that we might
discover the simple and build up the complex by combining simple units. We
are a long way from a view of language as a sign system. The complex cannot be
dealt with by adding item to item, neither can the jaguar be built up by adding
quarks. For a theory of performance, there is no simple item, only integration
of different phenomena from the very beginning.
Human beings have the ability to symbolize or to create and use signs.
It is however completely off the point to isolate this ability and to base the
image of the species on it. What is needed first is to come to grips with the type
of adaptive behaviour human beings demonstrate when mediating between
order and disorder. Scientific research which crosses academic boundaries is
needed in order to achieve a broadly-based understanding of the complex (cf.
Toulmin 2001: ix). Symbolizing has to be integrated with other abilities as part
of human adaptive and constructive behaviour. Only thus can we arrive at an
understanding of how human beings negotiate meaning and understanding in
dialogue, an ability which defines the species as the dialogic species.

References

Damasio, Antonio (2000). The Feeling of What Happens. Body, emotion and the making of
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Damasio, Antonio (2002). How the Brain Creates the Mind. The Hidden Mind. Special
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Universality vs. Culture-Specificity

of Emotion

František Daneš
Academy of Sciences, Prague

. Man and emotion

From the phylogenetic and even ontogenetic viewpoint, emotions represent the
most initial and elementary psychical apparatus, closely linked with the physi-
ology of the human organism and serviceable to its behavior. In Rost’s book on
emotions (1990) we find a witty remark that the ‘emotional brain’ evolved and
functioned earlier than the ‘rational brain’. Robert de Beaugrande (1996: 553)
rightly reminds us that the essential functions of the human organism make
emotions a universal, all-penetrating factor for survival and physiological well-
being. Nevertheless, in spite of the universal character of the phenomenon of
human emotion, we have to take into consideration that the contexts which
trigger emotions can vary from culture to culture (or subculture) so that the
theme of cultural specificity comes to the fore.
The plausible general statement that emotion holds a strategic position
between instinct (or drive) and cognition opens the rather complicated and
discussed topic of the relation between the two subsystems. In the relevant lit-
erature we find a number of more or less different formulations; nevertheless,
all of them have a common denominator, namely a close relationship, comple-
mentarity, cooperation or interaction, or even unity of the two subsystems.
As early as in 1927, E. Sapir (1927: 413) stated that these two things “are
never completely sundered except by a process of abstraction”. A similar for-
mulation we find in the Thèses of the Prague Circle (1929: 14), and a quite
similar stance can be found in Piaget (1961: 11) emotions and intelligence “in
no case represent two independent faculties”. Mowrer (1960: 308) also claims
that “the emotions do not at all deserve being put into opposition with ‘intel-
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 František Daneš

ligence’”; in fact, they are themselves “a higher order of intelligence”. Similarly

Izard (1977) finds that “some emotion is always present in ordinary state of
consciousness”, although “it is not always cognized or symbolized”. The recent
movement to elaborate integrative models of the ‘whole man’ ascribes to emo-
tions a quite extraordinary importance in the total economy of living organ-
isms and shows that the emotions in consciousness influence all perceptions,
cognition, and behavior. (Some years ago, I called this state of affairs “the ubiq-
uity or omnipresence of emotion” and consequently assumed that any utter-
ance and discourse unit of higher orders bears an “emotional value” (cf. Daneš
1990: 169).) Edda Weigand, in elaborating her concept of the Dialogic Action
Game, came to the concurrent conclusion that “emotions are a constitutive
component of human beings’ actions and are inseparably intertwined with the
other components” (Weigand 1998a: 47).

. Emotion vs. cognition

It appears that one of the crucial points in the ‘emotion vs. cognition’ dis-
cussion is the interpretation of the term cognition. The approach that treats
‘cognition’ in the sense of abstract conceptual entities appears as narrow and
one-sided. This propositional mode of cognitive structures is, in fact, neither
the only issue of human cognizance nor the only content of language signs and
speech utterances. As Dascal (1991: 161) pointed out, this mode of language
use should not even be regarded as the dominant and primary one. In fact it
derives from a more basic use, since “an utterance is naturally embedded in the
wholeness of concrete experience and it is immediately understood as such”.
He argued for a “pragmatic” conception of knowledge and cognition, “where
the relevant criterion is not accuracy of representation, but the ability of the
‘knower’ to play successfully the social game of justification”.
Let us preferably take up the complex basic notion of experiencing. Man
is always in a process of experiencing something in space and time, which in-
volves various modes of experience (be it perception, imagination, phantasy,
thought, etc.), and one of its essential characteristic properties is emotional in-
volvement with the object being experienced (cf. Hermans 1974: 14). From this
fact follows that emotion and cognition in no case represent two independent
faculties. Again, the said distinction appears rather as a heuristic device.
Thus we can conclude that emotion exerts, inter alia, a double function in
our experience. On the one hand, it brings forth a special kind of cognizance
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Universality vs. Culture-Specificity of Emotion 

of relevant information about the things we are confronted with, and on the
other hand, it takes an active part in the formation of our conceptual net.
Our assumption finds relevant support in some findings in neuro-
psychological research. H. Maturana (1982: 28) stated that the neurological
equivalents of thoughts and feelings are neither functionally, nor hierarchi-
cally organised. Rather, “they can be likened to an endless dance of internal
correlations in close network of interacting elements”. Is this not an excellent
argument for the interactive approach? Consequently, we have to expect that
in speech (discourse), the cognitive and emotional activities will also be com-
plexly related at some levels of its organization (cf. Arndt & Janney 1991: 529).
Since there is no commonly accepted determination and classification of
the vast field of emotion, I will subsume a set of more or less cognate phe-
nomena under this label which appear in psychological and other literature
with labels like feeling, affect, emotion, mood, passion, sentiment, emotional at-
titudes, personal traits, relational dispositions, as well as some other features rel-
evant to interaction. Emotions could be briefly characterised by the following
set of properties, contrasting with those of cognition (cf. also the contrastive
parameters of the two domains in de Beaugrande 1996: 555f.):
– Emotions are diffuse and variable, “hard to describe and harder to dif-
ferentiate and classify” (Simon 1982: 336).
– Emotions permeate the other domains of human experiencing.
– Emotions change, for the most part, continuously and are susceptible to
continuous gradation.
– Their gradual ‘more or less’ nature bears upon the fact that they are coded
in analogous terms (iconically), and consequently they are primarily mani-
fested in speech by means of prosodic and non-verbal features. This fact calls
for the necessity of specific decoding, evaluating, and inferencing procedures
on the partner’s side.
– Emotions are experienced (lived through) much more immediately,
deeply, and intensively than cognitive processes.
– Emotions have a personal character, and they are primarily spontaneous
and unintentional.
– In different societies and cultures there may be partly different norms
regulating the expression and manifestation of certain emotions. To what de-
gree there are also socio-cultural differences in the set of emotions itself is an
open and difficult question.
As for the interaction of emotion and cognition, two facts are of general
validity: cognition evokes emotion (it is ‘emotiogenic’), and emotion affects
cognition. They interact at all levels of cognitive processes, even in scientific
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 František Daneš

research. Clearly, we are experiencing various emotions at the stage of discovery

procedures and sometimes even when formulating our findings and presenting
them to others. After all, one might agree with Maturana’s somewhat radical
formulation that “we search constantly for the rational bases of our rational
systems, but it is finally very difficult for us to fully grasp the fact that every
rational system goes back to some irrational beginning” (1982: 31).

. Operating of emotions

In their catalytic (non-informative) function, emotions may promote, or, in

turn, inhibit or damp down cognitive and other discourse processes, both on
the producer’s and recipient’s side. In different languages, one finds locutions
telling that fear or joy can paralyse a person’s tongue or speech. After all, the
influence of emotion on the speech behavior of participants in all kinds of di-
alogue, debate, or conversation is evident and often of significance. The same
holds, in a way, for contact between a speaker or actor and his/her audience,
and the like. In all such instances we have to do with mutual influencing,
with feedback – and let us add that these emotional functions often occur
simultaneously, though in different dominance relations.
In the above list of characteristic features of emotion, I have mentioned
its spontaneity. But this simplified statement needs a significant modification.
Besides spontaneous manifestations of emotions we also have to reckon with
their strategic employment. This distinction goes back to Anton Marty’s (1908)
distinction of emotional communication and emotive communication. Accord-
ing to him, the emotional one is a type of spontaneous, unintentional leakage
or bursting out of emotion in speech, whereas emotive communication influ-
ences the partners’ interpretations of the situation. It has no automatic or nec-
essary relation to the speaker’s real, actual affective state and is rather related to
self-presentation, aiming at the partner, and has a persuasive character.
Marty’s dichotomy later appeared in the Prague School Thèses from 1929
and was further elaborated and refined by Mathesius (1937). Along his line, I
arrived at the following conclusion:
Seen from the producer’s side, we might reckon with the following possi-
bilities. First, the speaker shows (pronounces) his/her emotion automatically,
fully spontaneously. Second, the speaker wants to conceal his/her emotion and
tries to suppress it; nevertheless he involuntarily lets it out (the emotion will
then be revealed by various features of the speaker’s utterance and/or by other
communicative behavior). Third, emotion is manifested by the speaker inten-
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Universality vs. Culture-Specificity of Emotion 

tionally (communicated in the true sense). In this case the emotion may be
either genuine, really experienced by the speaker, or merely performed. In this
case, the speaker may want to influence the hearer or a third person in order
to achieve a desired effect or to present him/herself in a certain light. A special
and typical emotional strategy is the producer’s endeavour to evoke a certain
emotional state or attitude in the recipient, or to change his/her current state.
In languages we find a set of expressions labelling such changes (enrage, horrify,
soothe, etc.).

. Classification of emotion

The very crucial problem of any research in the field of emotion, having prac-
tical research consequences, is the lack of a satisfying and currently accepted
classification, connected with the basic relevance of their metalinguistic labels.
In any language there exists a large set of such labels designating those emo-
tions that the members of a given culture recognize as particularly salient. But
these labels are rather imprecise, vague, overlapping in part, and in no case do
they map the field systematically. Moreover, a contrastive cross-cultural analy-
sis of emotions in different languages is severely hampered by the fact that the
meanings of many alleged equivalents do not fully agree.
There has been presented, to date, a number of different classifications of
emotion, using diverse criteria of division. As an eligible sample let us briefly
survey, at least, Izard’s (1977) well-known scheme of ‘basic’ emotions, based on
the primary criterion of motivation, which seems to me relatively convenient
and hence preferable:
1. Event-triggered emotions, lasting for a shorter time. They are either ame-
liorative (interest, excitement) or neutral (surprise, startle), or pejorative
(contempt, fear, disgust).
2. State-triggered emotions, lasting for longer terms (how the self is assessed
by others): happiness, sadness, distress.
3. Action-triggered emotions (agent’s attitudinal assessment of his/her own
actions: pride, shame, guilt).

There are also complex (combined) emotions: anxiety, depression, love, hate,
envy.
Mees (1991) also proposed a relatively similar division. He, too, established
three classes: 1. emotions based on events, 2. emotions based on an act or ac-
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 František Daneš

tivity of the bearer of emotion, 3. emotions based on a person or an object

(so-called relational emotions).
Such classifications, though serviceable, fail in cases when a certain emo-
tion may be provoked by more than one of the triggers. Let us take the label
to be angry in the following phrases: he was angry with his brother, with himself
for having been late, he was angry at her for accusing him, people often got angry
about many foolish things, she was angry at being kept waiting, she will be angry to
learn that... The following definition quoted from the Collins Cobuild English
Language Dictionary prompts a clear semantic analysis of the term: “Someone
who is angry feels or shows strong emotion about an action or situation which
they consider unacceptable, unfair, cruel or insulting, and about the person re-
sponsible for it” (underlined by F.D.). (A contrastive analysis of ‘anger’ in three
European languages was proposed by Weigand 1998b.)

. Dimensions and culture-specific aspects of emotion

It is a truism that the universal human property of emotion occurs in various

modifications, alterations, variations, depending on specific conditions. But it
is not self-evident and apparent how to identify and characterize these varia-
tions. Since emotion is a rather complex and multi-faceted phenomenon, we
have to search for them along particular dimensions.
The possible dependent variables operate on dimensions such as the type
of the bearer of emotion (individuals, or groupings of various types and their
position on the diatopic, diastratal, diachronic, and some other axes), further,
varying responses to a particular target, emotional vs. emotive communica-
tion, the context of situation, and last but not least the particular emotion unit
or its type. Of course, also the ways and means how people disclose, show or
demonstrate their emotions vary according to the said circumstances. (Natu-
rally, the issue of the inner experience of emotions is hardly accessible to our
sociolinguistic research.)
The phenomenon of emotion has its historical dimension. The cultural
determinants could foster new emotions or rather new responses to them,
they might change their interpretation, of course, with differences in diverse
cultures, as well as in one and the same culture in different periods.
Let us dwell, for a moment, on the topic of the changes and differences in
emotional behavior. The situation of present-day Western Societies is charac-
terised by rapid changes, and our approach to the study of emotion needs to
take into account this dynamic movement: The value standards and hierarchy,
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Universality vs. Culture-Specificity of Emotion 

as well as the systems of attitudes are under reconstruction, the social norms
are, in turn, under deconstruction and are losing their obligatory power, many
of the older taboos are no more valid, and an inclination to laxity begins to
prevail. These tendencies concern the use of words and locutions, the choice
of themes or topics in many kinds of written and spoken discourses. It also
concerns the optical sphere of pictures and video materials, as well as further
aspects of human behaviour, not last emotions, to be sure. We might say that
‘showing’ is becoming a favourite phenomenon.
There appears a marked tendency to show emotions openly and without
discrimination in public, and to respond even to various triggers of ‘unclassi-
cal’ types. We might perhaps say that a new emotional atmosphere or climate
is arising. To be sure, the climate does not involve the given society as a whole
and in the same manner, rather we might reckon with a number of ‘climatic
zones’ and ‘sub-zones’. One of such sub-zones could be, for instance, the do-
main of various talk shows. The entertainers often tell jokes and anecdotic sto-
ries, mostly with a sexual topic, freely using expressive words that have not been
acceptable, so far, in a ‘polite society’, being evaluated by its members as inde-
cent, lascivious, or wanton. As for the talk-show audience, they evidently enjoy
it and respond with laugh and applause. On the other hand, some other people,
watching such TV-performances, may be shocked by them. They clearly live in
another emotional (sub)zone.
Now back to the classical sociological or anthropological treatment of emo-
tion. The social life of humans in the context of a certain cultural environment
creates life conditions that differ in particular cultures and thus generates spe-
cific needs and emotional response to them. For example, members of different
cultures have to learn to be afraid or to enjoy different things. This fact issues
in the existence of different cultural behavioral patterns, standards, and cer-
tain norms that admit, demand, or prohibit expressing this or that emotion in
a certain way. The psychological and sociological study of the cultural deter-
mination of emotional behavior mostly paid attention primarily to this nor-
mative aspect. But this approach seems to be somewhat narrow and simplified
and takes into account rather the globalization view, neglecting the tendencies
to diversification, fractalization, and individualization.
Let us start with an example. There exists a trivial conviction that in the
Italian culture a free and loud or noisy expression of emotions belongs to its
characteristics, whereas the Englishmen are said to be reserved and cool in their
emotional behavior. One speaks of two different types of temperament (the
notion of temperament also belongs to the rubric of ‘emotion’, in the broad
sense). Classical examples of the English coolness may be found, for instance,
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 František Daneš

among the personages in Galsworthy’s Forsyte Saga. (The figure of Soams is

especially interesting.) But what is also interesting is the rather hot emotional
behavior of English football fans, of the visitors of disco-clubs, of the excited
crowds of people in various stadiums listening to popular singers, as well as of
the very lively debating members of the Parliament.
Two pieces of knowledge may be drawn from these observations. Firstly,
Galsworthy’s presentation may hold good for a special class of the society in a
certain period only. Secondly, the social differences between emotions should
be sought for not only between cultures as wholes, but also between sub-
cultures, people categories and various groups in one and the same culture,
as well as between sub-cultures and the like within different cultures. It seems
to me that it is just this ‘sub-cultural’ research what could represent a very
interesting and rewarding field of study.
The sub-cultures, categories or groups are, of course, of diverse charac-
ter, the differentiation takes place on diatopical, diastratal, diachronical, and
other levels. I am well aware of the fact that we could find out a vast number
of possible particular groupings, established according to various features, in a
given society. And the number of things that are able to trigger an emotional
response is simply immense. It is evident that such detailed microanalyses in-
evitably presuppose a threshold of termination, practically, a reasonable choice
of significantly relevant social categories and of the kinds or types of particular
emotion triggers.

. “No word – no feeling?”

Finally, let us return to the basic problem of classifying and labelling emo-
tions. In the relevant literature we often find attempts to identify a set of fun-
damental human emotions, universal, discrete, and presumably innate. Such
candidates I have listed above in Izard’s classification: mostly it will be reck-
oned with items such as interest, joy, surprise, sadness, anger, disgust, contempt,
fear, shame/shyness, guilt. I will leave aside here the problem of identifying cri-
teria employed in the establishing of such sets (cf. Weigand 1998b); instead
I will point at the fact that the authors identify the emotions by employing
English words.
As the well-known Australian scholar (of Polish origin) Anna Wierzbicka
(1985) critically remarked in her article “Human emotions: Universal or
culture-specific?”, the English terms of emotion constitute, in fact, a mere folk
taxonomy. Such folk taxonomies may be found in the vocabularies of any lan-
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Universality vs. Culture-Specificity of Emotion 

guage and they reflect more or less diverse empirical differentiations and con-
ceptualizations of the particular domain of the real world. Thus Wierzbicka
came to the true conclusion that even English words are language specific and
culture specific. But “if we want to posit universal human emotions we must
identify them in terms of a language-independent semantic metalanguage, not
in terms of English folk terms”, she says (Wierzbicka 1985: 585). The solution
Wierzbicka proposes is a semantic and lexicographic one, namely to analyse
the semantic content of language specific labels in terms of semantic features
that she calls ‘semantic primitives’. She takes for granted that English words
such as say, want, good, bad express universally valid concepts and may repre-
sent those ‘primitives’, and she believes that by means of the suggested analysis
one could establish, at least, hypothetical universals or near-universals. We can
only speculate about the feasibility of a large-scale implementation of the pro-
posed procedure, of course with the proviso that the semantic content of those
English words does really represent universally valid ‘primitive concepts’.
One can agree with the statement that “there are countless emotions that
can be perceived as distinct and recognizable” (Wierzbicka 1985: 587). But
I have doubts whether the differentiation into individual units of particular
emotions is a satisfying representation of the structure of the component of
the human organism called ‘emotion’. Perhaps it would be more adequate to
use the metaphor of a field or space of fluctuating fuzzy elementary emotional
states, i.e. a “diffused continuum” (to use Trudgill’s (1986) wording) with rela-
tively “condensed islands”, more or less different in various cultures and iden-
tified by them by means of particular labels. To the question brought up by
Wierzbicka “No word – no feeling?”, I only find a negative answer.

. The envoy

Let me conclude by expressing my genuine view on emotion in the social as

well as individual life: The recent trend toward ‘anti-emotionism’ is incompat-
ible with cultures and societies that foster the ideal of humanism. Emotions,
being one of the most elementary human abilities, are inseparable from our
personal life and social interaction. Nevertheless, to be sure, they should not be
left growing as wild plants. They need to be pruned and cultivated as beneficial
flowers.
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 František Daneš

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JB[v.20020404] Prn:19/02/2004; 9:40 F: CI24803.tex / p.1 (37-91)

Emotions in Language and Communication

Světla Čmejrková
Academy of Sciences, Prague

. Introduction

The fact that in everyday communication we also express emotions, feelings

and attitudes has always been acknowledged in linguistics. However, linguis-
tics has focused on language as a code and studied those linguistic meanings
that are discrete and recurrent, and reflected as such in linguistic conscious-
ness. Even in this perspective, emotions, feelings and attitudes have not been
omitted by linguistic descriptions. It has been suggested that emergence of lin-
guistic meanings and establishment of a sign system in linguistic consciousness
involves the thetic phase, i.e. identification of the object and its differentiation
from other objects, and the qualification phase, producing evaluations of the
object from the viewpoint of the subject.
These two phases have been related to the semantic dichotomy of denota-
tion and connotation or the objective and subjective components of language.
The relation between cognition and emotion figures not only in the entan-
gled complex of problems of denotation and connotation of a language sign
but also in the dichotomies of neutrality and markedness, explicitness and
implicitness, said and unsaid, text and subtext, language and paralanguage,
words and gestures and other dichotomies formulated in theoretical reflections
on language.
Though the dichotomies just mentioned do not coincide, there is one fea-
ture they share. One of their poles is considered the primary one while the other
is treated as additional. Thus, in traditional semantics, connotative meaning
is a secondary, usually weakly (socially) coded meaning which a sign may
have in addition to its primary, standard, essential denotative meaning which
 JB[v.20020404] Prn:19/02/2004; 9:40 F: CI24803.tex / p.2 (91-138)

 Světla Čmejrková

is mandatory, i.e. strongly coded. However, what is supplementary and even

peripheral may become central and crucial under specific circumstances.

. The study of emotions in poetics and stylistics

The study of emotions as well as that of connotations has always been the do-
main of stylistics, poetics and aesthetics. These disciplines have shown that
any separation of primary and secondary components of meaning is only ar-
bitrary. In more holistic and semiotic reflections on meaning in stylistics and
poetics, connotations are not regarded as supplementary values attached to de-
notations, and analogously, emotions are not viewed as supplementary values
attached or added to cognition. Difficulty connected with the distinction be-
tween primary and secondary aspects of meaning has led many semioticians
to reject the denotation-connotation dichotomy altogether (Nöth 1990: 102).
Barthes, in his later writings, saw nothing but one of its many connotations in
the denotation of a sign. Also, it has been claimed that the connotation of a
symbol is essential in contrast to its denotation meaning.
The relation between emotion and cognition must be approached differ-
ently across text types, genres, styles, periods of intellectual development and
respective cultures. For example, it is well known that the Romantics claimed
primacy of the heart over the mind and of the irrational over the reason and
consequently considered poetry the primary form of emotive expression. How-
ever, in poetics, stylistics, aesthetics, and literary theory, the relation between
cognitive and emotive components of the text has been studied not only with
respect to such genres as lyric poetry (in Goethe’s opinion, lyrics is “a natural
form” for the expression of emotion) but with respect to other genres – both
written and spoken – as well. These theories have always recognized that the
whole in which cognitive and emotive elements are intermingled is superior
to its parts, and claimed the primacy of suprasegmental phenomena over the
segments, intonation over notional elements and gestures over words.
Can linguistics accept such a holistic approach to meaning or is it obliged
to study discrete elements only? An attempt to study emotions through lin-
guistics presupposes to define the recurrent meanings of their vehicles. This
is possible when emotions are named. An attempt to treat emotions linguis-
tically as discrete and recurrent semantic primitives can be found in Anna
Wierzbicka’s article (1973: 499) on expressions of emotion where she makes a
componential analysis of such words as joy, sorrow, regret, fear or irritation.
When Wierzbicka discusses emotions described by Tolstoy in Anna Karen-
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Emotions in Language and Communication 

ina, she analyzes their direct formulations, such as They were happy, He felt
depressed or She felt almost ashamed.
But literature gives us also more variegated examples of rendering emo-
tions, e.g., the expression of emotions through indirect means. Correspond-
ingly, poetics provides us with examples of their more complex analysis. In The
Overcoat, one of Gogol’s grotesque Petersburg stories (Gogol 1952), emotions
of the hero are not described explicitly but rendered by features of his speech,
motions and gestures. The narrative structure of The Overcoat is created by a
distorted, nearly aphasic language doubting the competence of the hero to give
things their proper names and, consequently, to give them their proper place in
his life. While his ability to speak clearly is destroyed, his ability to keep things
under control and to influence actively the course of events fails him, too.
Out on the street, Akaky Akakievich walked along as one in a dream. “What
do you know?” he said to himself, “I really didn’t even think that it could turn
out, you know. . . ” And then after a short silence: “So there you are! Look how
finally turned out, and really, I couldn’t even have supposed that that’s how
it would be.” After this another long silence ensued; then he said aloud: “So
that’s how it is! There is a really unexpected one for you, I mean. . . there’s one
you couldn’t have. . . What a situation!”
(Gogol 1952: 139f., English translation quoted from Fanger 1967: 118)

This is how the hero muses over the tailor’s statement that his old overcoat
is beyond repair. His speech consists mostly of interjections, particles, deictic
pronouns, empty words, unfinished and incoherent utterances, pauses and ex-
clamations. This text was called a masterpiece of inarticulateness, of hemming
and hawing, of timid stammering. As Fanger (1967: 117–118) states, English
does not have so many equivalents for the numerous prefixes, suffixes and in-
fixes on which the Gogolian effect depends, nor for the particles that can give a
sentence phonetic bulk while leaving it semantically weightless. Gogol first cap-
tures the hearing of a Russian reader, and the analysis of his prose is connected
with the attempts at acoustic linguistics.
The story was analyzed by one of the outstanding Russian formalists Boris
Eikhenbaum (1924) in his brilliant essay “How Gogol’s ‘The Overcoat’ Was
Made”. He identified the role of intonation in this prose and called this kind
of stylistic device based on typical acoustic features of oral narration a ‘sound
gesture’. Today, we would probably use the term ‘paralanguage’, i.e. the term for
an index of personality traits and affective states. The concept of vocal gesture
has later also been used by Sapir (1949: 535) to refer to the expressive function
of language in general. In poetics, a theory of language as a gesture has been
 JB[v.20020404] Prn:19/02/2004; 9:40 F: CI24803.tex / p.4 (190-241)

 Světla Čmejrková

developed by Blackmur (1952: 3), based on the argument that “when the lan-
guage of words most succeeds it becomes gesture in its words”. And in a still
broader sense, gesture has been used by some authors as a fundamental term
for any act of communication.

. Premises following the stylistic analysis

A. An adequate account of emotive communication needs to pay equal attention

to verbal, nonverbal, vocal and kinetic aspects of vehicles of communication.

The introduction of the notion of ‘sound gesture’ and the relation between
‘sound gesture’ and ‘motoric gesture’ is the first reason why I used the example
of Gogol’s device and its stylistic analysis made by Eikhenbaum. Emotions are
not named in the story but alongside the hero’s distorted speech and its sound
gestures they have another vehicle – the motion of the hero. The state of the
hero’s mind may be inferred from his motions and from his motoric gestures
that become symptoms of his emotions.
B. An adequate account of emotive communication displayed in the 1st person
behavior needs to pay equal attention to its effect on the 2nd person as well
as on the 3rd person who may be an observer to the given communication
act. The display of emotion can easily serve as material for play and become
subject to caricature or destruction.

Another reason why I used the example of Gogol’s story is to show that the
effect of emotions is less predictable than we would expect. The range of po-
tential meanings of emotions and their interpretations by different people is
rather wide. As addressees and observers, we depend on assumptions about
what emotive signs in fact signify and we can evaluate them differently. In liter-
ary texts, apart from the voice of the hero, there is also the voice of the narrator,
the author and the reader. And for them, the emotions displayed may have dif-
ferent significance. It may come as a surprise that in The Overcoat, emotions
of the hero do not become an object of the author’s empathy but rather the
object of his irony. Although there are several traces of humanistic strain in
The Overcoat, the relationship between the author and his hero is rather that of
romantic, grotesque irony (Schooneveld 1973: 481n). Through the narrator, of
course, Gogol applies his ironical destruction of the hero, verbally constructed
as a speaking mute from the very outset of the narrative, to the poor, grotesque
end of Akaky Akakievich, to his death. As the narrator himself notes, “Akaky
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Emotions in Language and Communication 

Akakievich explained himself for the most part in prepositions, adverbs, and,
finally, such particles as have absolutely no significance” (Gogol 1952: 37). The
hero’s sound gesture is a device that deflates him (Fanger 1967: 117).
C. An adequate account of emotive communication needs to pay attention to the
notion of norm.

The third reason why I used the introductory example was to mention the phe-
nomenon of deviation from the norm. Both notions of the norm and a devi-
ation from this norm play an important role in Russian formalism and Czech
structuralism. It was also the experience of Russian formalism with the analy-
sis of literary texts that was significant for Jakobson’s view of language devel-
oped later in the period of Prague structuralism. Jakobson incorporated the
study of poetic works into the science of language. To Bühler’s (1934) model,
recognizing three functions of language (cognitive or referential; appellative
and expressive), Jakobson added three more: phatic, metalinguistic and poetic
functions. Similarly to Bühler, Jakobson saw message as dominated by one or
another language function. Thus, our literary example is featured by the dom-
ination of the emotive function that overrides the representative function of
the hero’s message and distorts its structure, signaling deviation from accepted
norms: the lack of sense, non-semantic words, incoherence.
D. An adequate account of emotive communication needs to consider the balance
with cognitive requirements of a genre.

If we consider appropriateness of the text and observation of the norms, it is

necessary to take into account requirements of the genre and linguistic func-
tions expected to be met in this genre. For example, there is a difference in the
amount of emotion allowed in the inner speech and outer speech, in private
speech and public address. It is often claimed that classic functionalist models
of language, and the Prague model among them, were mainly content-oriented
(Caffi & Janney 1994: 336). It is necessary to admit that this is true. Interesting
distinctions in accents had already been made by older scholars who had in-
spired the Prague functionalist thought. Bühler remarked that whereas Wundt
concentrated on language mainly as Ausdruck (emphasizing emotional expres-
sivity), and Husserl, in his strong opposition to Wundt, focused mainly on lan-
guage as Darstellung (emphasizing the referential function), Marty dealt with
the Ausdruck (emotional) and Appell (emotive) functions but ignored aspects
of language related to Darstellung (cf. Caffi & Janney 1994: 336).
In Bühler’s and also in Jakobson’s definition of the expressive-emotive
function, as well as in Mathesius’ definition of emphasis, emotive choices are
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 CHAPTER XIV.

This decree of the doctor’s threw the household into a great bustle. I
was requested to call on the Don’s landlord, explain his long
absence, and have his trunk sent up to Leigh Street. The girls were
in a great flutter at the prospect of breakfasting with the mysterious
stranger next morning; which announcement they had no sooner
heard than they flew across the street to give Mary the news; and
the air grew misty with interjections.
“We have arranged it all, Mary. Mr. Whacker and Mr. Frobisher, who,
as you know, are to leave our house this evening, will come up to
breakfast with the Don, of course, and you will just make the party
complete. Proper? Of course, Mary. Why, there will be just one
apiece,—so nice! You and Mr. Frobisher, Lucy and—ahem!—Mr.
Whacker, and the Don and myself. No! that’s the way it shall be. Of
course I’ll let you girls look at him,—even exchange a few words
with him,—but I!—” And dropping into a chair by a table, she made
as though mincing at an imaginary breakfast, whilst ogling, most
killingly, an invisible gallant by her side.
That day, the girls thought, would never end. They could neither talk
nor think of anything save the coming breakfast, wandering
aimlessly from room to room, and from story to story, romping,
yawning, giggling, and were so exhausted by nightfall that they all
went to bed at an early hour, just as children do on Christmas Eve,
to make the morning come sooner.
You must remember that they were hardly eighteen years of age.
The morning came. Charley and I met Mary at the front door and we
entered together. “I am so excited,” said she. “It is all so like a real
adventure.”
A few minutes afterwards Mrs. Carter begged me to go up and assist
the Don down-stairs, if necessary. He walked down-stairs very well,
however, and we entered the dining-room, where I expected to find
the whole family, but the girls had not yet put in an appearance.
Alice, it seems, had gotten the other girls into so hilarious a state by
her mad drolleries—enacting scenes that were to take place between
herself and the Don—that they had to remain some time in the
upper chamber in order to resume control of their countenances;
and her performances in the halls and on the stairways were such
that they had to call a halt several times before they reached the
dining-room door. We were all seated at the table, and breakfast had
begun, when the door was partly opened, then nearly closed, then
opened a little way again, while a faint rustling of female garments
was the only sound that broke the stillness. Presently, Mary, followed
by Lucy, popped into the room with a suddenness that suggested a
vigorous push from some one in the rear, while their features, of
necessity instantly composed, were in that state of unstable
equilibrium which may be observed in the faces of boys when the
teacher reappears in the school-room after a few moments’ absence.
Alice followed, demure as a Quakeress.
The introductions over, and Alice and Lucy having thanked the Don
for his gallant rescue of them from danger, the girls took their seats,
Alice next the Don. It will be easily imagined that, under the peculiar
circumstances of the case, no word, no gesture, no look of our new
friend passed unobserved. No bride, coming among her husband’s
relations, was ever more searchingly scrutinized. Naturally, we
compared notes upon the first occasion that offered, and it was
interesting to observe that, various as were the estimates placed
upon our enigma, each of the ladies held, in the main, to her first
impression. It is no secret, in fact, that if a woman sees a man
passing in front of a window at which she is sitting, or hears him
utter three sentences, the impression formed upon her mind is often
next to ineradicable.
“I do not know,” said Mrs. Carter, “when I have seen a manner so
elegant and distinguished. It shows the combined effect of gentle
birth and much travel. How charming—and how rare nowadays—is
that deference towards our sex that he manages to combine with
perfect dignity and repose of manner! By the way, Mr. Whacker, did
you not notice how subdued Alice was throughout breakfast? I have
never seen her so quiet and demure.”
“Never mind,” said Alice, “I am feeling my way. Wait till I get a little
better acquainted with him. I must say, however, that I don’t think
our hero promises much in the way of fun. I doubt whether he
would know a joke if he met one on the highway.”
“No,” said Mary, “his nature is too absorbed, too intense, for—”
“And his eyes too starry. Did you not observe, Mary, how they dilated
when first they bended their light on the dish of stewed oysters?”
“Alice, I believe that if you could, you would jest at your own
funeral.”
“No; at that pageant you may count on me as chief mourner.”
“Ob, Alice!” said Lucy, reprovingly.
“Never mind, my dear; I am not so wicked as I seem. Besides, I am
rather reckless and desperate just at this moment.”
“Why, what is the matter?”
“All my aspirations dashed to the ground during one short
breakfast!” Alice rested her chin upon her hand, and gazed pensively
upon the floor.
“What new farce is this?” asked Lucy, amused.
“And it is you who ask me that!” And Alice raised her eyes with a
sad, reproachful look to those of her friend. “And you call it a farce?
You!” And she sighed. “Of course,” resumed Alice, quickly raising her
head and looking from face to face,—“of course you all noticed it. It
was perfectly obvious. Yes, this Miss from the rural districts has
swooped down and carried off the prey without an effort.”
“I, at least,” said Lucy, coloring, “saw nothing of the kind. In the first
place, I sat at one end of the table and he at the other, and I am
sure I hardly exchanged a dozen words with him.”
“Alas!” sighed Alice, “it is precisely there that the sting lies. I sat by
him and had every advantage over you,—and I used every
advantage. Didn’t you remark the tone in which I called his attention
to the omelet? Could a siren have urged upon him, more seductively,
a second cup of coffee? And how gently did I strive to overwhelm his
soul with buckwheat cakes! And was the marmalade sweeter than
the murmur in which I recommended it? And yet,”—Alice paused for
a lull in the tumultuous laughter,—“and yet,” she continued, “strive
as I would, I could not keep his eyes from wandering to your end of
the table.”
“It is very strange,” said Lucy, wiping her eyes, “that all this was lost
on me.”
“And then,” added Alice, “your most—some one will please attend to
the fat lady; she seems in a fit—your most trivial remark, even
though not addressed to him, seemed to rivet his attention. To
confess the humiliating truth, Mary, I don’t believe he would
recognize either of us, should he meet us in the street; but every
lineament of Lucy’s face is graven—you know how they say it in
novels. It is a regular case of love at first sight, my dear.”
Alice’s eyes ran along the circle of faces surrounding her as she
spoke, and it so happened that when she paused at the words “my
dear” she was looking Charley full in the face. Charley, as I have
before remarked, had seen very little of young ladies, and I had
several times observed that when Alice was speaking in her
sparkling way he would watch her all the while out of the corners of
his eyes, with an expression of wondering interest. Charley rarely
laughed. I think his self-control in this regard amounted to
somewhat of an affectation, and he had acquired a sort of serene
moderation even in his smiles. But Alice’s bright, rattling talk seemed
to have a sort of fascination for him, and to hurry him out of himself,
as it were. And on this occasion I had been slyly watching his
features moving in sympathy with the changing expression of her
exceedingly mobile countenance. Entirely absorbed as he was in
watching the play of her countenance, and thinking of I know not
what, when he found her bright eyes resting full upon him, and
himself seemingly addressed as “my dear,” he was suddenly startled
out of his revery, and not knowing what to say:
“I beg pardon,” said he, quickly, “were you speaking to me?”
A shout of laughter greeting this ingenuous question, Charley’s face
reddened violently, Alice’s generally imperturbable countenance
answering with a reflected glow.
“Not exactly,” said she; “my remarks were addressed to the company
at large.”
“Oh!” said he, blushing more deeply still.
“But, Mr. Frobisher,” continued Alice, willing to relieve the
embarrassment of the woman-hater, “don’t you agree with me?
Wasn’t the Don obviously captivated by Lucy?”
“I am sure, if he was not, it would be hard to understand the reason
why. But the fact is, Mrs. Carter’s capital breakfast—”
“Oh, you monster!”
Half an hour later, finding myself alone with Lucy: “So you do not
claim or even admit,” I happened casually to remark, “that you have
made a conquest.”
“No, indeed!” replied she, with a frank look in her eyes. “Far from it.
Alice is all wrong.”
“But Miss Alice was not alone in her observation of the facts of the
case. We all saw what she described. I did most certainly.”
“And so did I.”
“Well?”
“I saw, of course, how often he glanced towards me, and I was
conscious that even while I was speaking to others his eyes were
upon me. But there are looks and looks. You men don’t understand
anything about such matters.”
“And where, pray, did you learn all this mysterious language of looks
and looks?”
“I am a woman.”
“So is Alice.”
“Ah, yes; but, Alice—well, girls like to say that kind of thing to each
other,—it’s encouraging, you know. Why do you smile? It is pleasant,
of course, to be told that we have destroyed some man’s peace of
mind, though we know it to be highly improbable in point of fact. I
shall reciprocate, at the first opportune, by telling Alice with what
sweet pain she has filled the breast of dear good Mr. Frobisher.”
“Do you think so?” I exclaimed. “That would be too good! The
woman-hater! Capital!”
“Stranger things have happened. Did you not see how he blushed
just now? But as to the Don, do you know he is a greater mystery to
me now than ever? Every woman instinctively knows what a man’s
looks mean.”
“Well, what did the Don’s glances signify?”
“I cannot for the life of me imagine.”
“What! Although every woman instinctively knows, and so forth.”
“Ah,” said she, smiling, “I meant that they always knew when the
looks meant—pshaw! you know very well what I mean.”
“You would have me to understand that the Don’s looks, though
they meant something, did not mean nascent love.”
“Yes. Do you not remember that sudden and intense look he gave
me when we met him on the sidewalk? Well, when I came to turn
that incident over in my mind I came to the conclusion that he
mistook me for some one else. Now I am all at sea again. He knows,
now, that I am Lucy Poythress, and not any one else.”
“Naturally.”
“Don’t be silly,—and still—”
“And still?”
“And yet—oh, you know what I mean.”
“Upon my word I do not.”
“Well, he seemed to me to be studying me as a kind of problem,—
no, not that,—he appeared—ah, this is my idea—he seemed to me
to survey me just as I have seen mothers look at their sons after a
session’s absence. ‘Has he grown? Has he changed? Has he
improved?’ Do I make myself clear?”
“Perfectly.”
“What are you laughing at? What do I mean, then?”
“I gather from all you say that your impression is that this Mystery,
this Enigma, this Sphinx, this Don Miff—longs to be a mother to
you.”
“Mr. W-ha-c-k-e-r!”
I could never understand why a man must not laugh at his own
witticisms; and my hilarity on this occasion immediately drew the
other girls and Mrs. Carter into the front parlor, where Lucy and I
were sitting. By rapidly interposing a succession of chairs between
that young woman and myself, I succeeded in giving the ladies an
enlarged and profusely illustrated edition of Lucy’s views of the state
of the Don’s feelings and intentions in regard to herself, when,
seizing my hat, I fled, leaving the three girls in uproarious glee, and
Mrs. Carter collapsed in an arm-chair, weeping, while voiceless
laughter rippled along her rotund form. As I passed in front of the
window Lucy’s head appeared.
“Say your prayers twice to-night,” said she.
 CHAPTER XV.

“Jack,” said Charley that night at my rooms, “have you any message
for the old gentleman? I am off for home to-morrow.”
“Indeed! Why this sudden resolution?”
“Too many people in Richmond for me.”
“It seems to me that you like some of them a good deal. Isn’t she
bright?”
“P-p-p-pass me the tobacco.” He filled his pipe very deliberately and
walked across the room. “Where do you keep your matches? Ah,
here they are. Who,” added he, striking one—“puff—do you—puff,
puff—think so—puff, puff, puff—bright? Confound the thing!—puff—
puff—it has gone out!” And he struck another. Lighting his pipe, and
throwing himself upon a lounge, he looked the picture of content.
“Say, old boy,” said I, “own up. Those hazel eyes—”
“Do you know, Jack-Whack” (whenever he called me that he was in
the best possible humor), “that you are making a howling ass of
yourself?” And he shot a pillar of smoke straight towards the ceiling,
following its eddying curves with contemplative eyes.
“‘Howling ass’ is a mixed metaphor.”
“Yes, but an unmixed truth, my boy. Did it ever occur to you, Jack,”
said he, removing the Powhatan pipe, with its reed-root stem, from
his lips, “that cigars are essentially vulgar? You never thought of it?
But they are. So are dress-coats. You have only to put them into
marble to see it. Look at the statue of Henry Clay in the Square. Was
ever anything so absurd! Posterity will inevitably regard Henry as an
ass.”
“Of the howling variety?”
“Of course. Now, just picture to yourself Phidias’ Jove with a cigar
stuck into his mouth.”
Charley shot upwards a circling wreath of smoke, watched it till it
dissipated itself, and then turned his head, with a little jerk, towards
me: “H’m? How would the Olympian Zeus look with a Parian Partaga
between his ambrosial lips?”
“I have seen lips that—”
“Howling and so forth.” And he turned over on his back and
commenced pulling away at his pipe.
“I think she likes you.”
Charley pursed up his mouth, and, taking aim, with one eye, at a
spot on the ceiling, projected at it a fine-spun thread of smoke. I
detected a tremor in his extended lips.
“I may say I know she likes you.”
With an explosive chuckle the pucker instantly dissolved. I had taken
him at a disadvantage. His features snapped back into position as
suddenly as those of a rubber mask.
“I was thinking,” said he, “how great a solace and bulwark a pipe
would have been to Socrates, during his interviews with Xantippe,—
and it made me smile.”
“Yes,” said I, carelessly.
“Yes!” said he, rising up on his elbow,—“what do you mean by
‘yes’?”
“I merely meant to agree with you, that a pipe would have been a
great solace and bulwark to Socrates during his interviews with
Xantippe.”
He fell back on the lounge. “Let’s go to bed,” said he.
“Good!” said I; and I began to remove my coat. “So the Don is to
leave the Carters to-morrow and go to his own quarters.”
“Yes,” said he, rising from the lounge. “I like that chap.”
That was a great deal for Charley to say. It was the very first
expression of his sentiments towards the Don.
“I am glad you do,” said I; “I thought you did.”
“Yes, he is a man. Do you know what I am going to do? I shall invite
him to Elmington. Uncle Tom will like him. He says he is fond of
hunting, and this is just the time for that; and he will be strong
enough soon. Suppose we go up to-morrow, before I leave town,
and invite him jointly. You will be down for the Christmas holidays,
you know. By the way, I hope he will accept?”
“I am quite sure of it. He has betrayed an unaccountable interest in
Leicester County on every occasion that I have alluded to it,
notwithstanding an obvious effort to appear indifferent. He has a
way of throwing out innocent, careless little questions about the
county and the people that has puzzled me not a little. Who the
deuse is he?”
“Roll into that bed! it is too late for conundrums. Here goes for the
light!” And he blew it out.
“Jack!” said he, about half an hour afterwards; “Jack, are you
asleep?”
“H’m?”
“Are you asleep?”
“H’m? H’m? Confound it, yes!”
“No, you’re not!”
“Well, I was!” And I groaned.
“Jack, I suppose Uncle Tom will have his usual Christmas party of
girls and young men at Elmington this Christmas?”
“S’pose so, umgh!”
“I say—”
“Don’t! Don’t! Those are my ribs! Good Lord, man! you don’t know
how sleepy I am. What on earth are you talking about?”
“Do you know what girls Uncle Tom is going to have to spend
Christmas with us this winter?”
“And you woke me up to ask me such a question as that? Thunder!
And you see him to-morrow evening, too! Oh, I understand,” said I,
being at last fully awake, and I burst out laughing. “You want me to
say something about Alice with the merry-glancing hazel eyes.”
“About whom? Alice? That’s absurd,—perfectly absurd! Why, she
thinks me an idiot because I don’t jabber like one of you lawyers. All
women do. Unless you gabble, gabble, gabble, you are a fool. They
are all alike. A woman is always a woman; a man may be a
philosopher.”
“My dear boy, your anxieties are misplaced.”
“Who spoke of anxieties?”
“Don’t you—a philosopher—know that talkative girls prefer taciturn
men? I am perfectly certain that Alice thinks your silence admirable,
—dotes on it, in fact.”
“Jack-Whack,” said Charley, rising up in bed and—rare sight—though
I felt rather than saw or heard it—shaking with laughter, “you are
the most immeasurable, the most unspeakable, the most—”
Down came a pillow on my head. Down it came again and again as I
attempted to rise. We grappled, and for a few minutes no two
school-boys could have had a more boisterous romp.
“Now just look at this bed,” said Charley, out of breath; “see what
you have done!” And he fell back exhausted, as well with the
struggle as from his unwonted laughter. “We have not had such a
tussle since I used to tease you as a boy. Whew! Let’s go to sleep
now.”
“She’s a bewitching creature.”
“Idiot!” said Charley, turning his back to me with a laugh, and
settling himself for the night.
“Poor fellow! Well, he got me to pronounce her name, at any rate,
by his manœuvring.”
“Do you know this is rather coolish? Where on earth are the
blankets? Find one, won’t you? and throw it over me.”
“Here they are, on the floor! There! Sleep well, poor boy!
‘Oh don’t you remember sweet Alice, Ben Bolt?
Sweet Alice with h-a-i-r so brown.’”
“You rhyme with the sinners who came to scoff, but remained to
pray. You seem to yourself to sing, but appear to me to b-b-b-bray.”
“Good! There is life in the old boy yet!”
 CHAPTER XVI.

Next morning Charley and I called at the Carters’ to give the Don the
invitation to visit Elmington, but found he had gone out for his first
walk since his accident, to test, at Mrs. Carter’s instance, his
strength before going into his own quarters. Charley was compelled,
therefore, to leave the city without seeing him. In the evening I
called at his rooms. Knocking at his sitting-room door, I was invited
to enter, and found him sitting by a table reading a small book,
which he closed, but held in his hand as he rose and came forward
to greet me.
“Reading?” began I, bowing and glancing casually towards the little
book, the back of which was turned away from me.
“Yes,” replied he, but without looking at the book; “getting through
an evening alone I find rather dull work after my recent charming
experience. Take a seat. Will you have a pipe, or do you prefer a
cigar? A pipe? You will find the tobacco very good.” And walking to a
small set of shelves near the door, he placed the little book upon it,
—a circumstance too trivial to mention, did it not afford a
characteristic example of the quiet but effectual way the Don had of
nipping in the bud any conversation which was about to take a line
he did not wish it to follow. I suppose we had been chatting for half
an hour before I alluded to my errand.
“Mr. Frobisher wished to see me particularly, you say?”
“Yes; Charley heard you say one day that you were fond of shooting;
and as there is fine sport to be had in Leicester, he thought it might
be agreeable to you to—”
The smile of polite curiosity with which he heard that Charley had
had something to say to him rapidly faded as I spoke, and there
came into his countenance a look of such intense seriousness, nay,
even of subdued and suffering agitation, that, for a moment, I lost
my self-possession in my surprise, but managed to finish my
message in a stumbling sort of way. As for the Don, anticipating,
apparently, from my opening words what that message was to be,
he seemed hardly conscious that it was ended. He sat, for a
moment, with his head resting in the palm of his hand, his piercing
eyes fixed upon the floor; but seeming suddenly to realize that this
was a queer way of meeting a courtesy, he quickly raised his head.
“Thanks, thanks,” said he, with a forced smile, but with apologetic
emphasis. “Charley—I beg pardon—Mr. Frobisher is very kind,—very
kind indeed! Yes, I should immensely enjoy having a tilt once more
at the partridges.[1] Very much indeed.”
“Then I may hope that you will accept?”
“Oh, certainly, with very great pleasure. Please present my warmest
acknowledgments to Char—Mr. Frobisher, and say that I shall be at
his command so soon as I shall have recovered my strength
somewhat.” He paused for a moment; then, throwing back his head
with a little laugh: “By the way,” he continued, “I beg you will not
misinterpret my singular way of receiving the invitation. It was such
a surprise, and I am still a little weak, you know.”
“You must allow me to add how much gratified I, too, am at your
decision. You know—or do you not?—that the invitation is to my
grandfather’s place, Elmington.”
“Elmington?”
“Ah, I see—very naturally, you don’t understand that Charley lives
with my grandfather.”
“With your grandfather? Why, how can that be? I thought his place
adjoined your—” And he stopped suddenly. “Please be so good as to
explain,” he added, in a low voice.
“Well, this rather peculiar state of things came about in this way. My
mother died before I was a month old, and my father, my
grandfather’s only son, survived her less than a year; so that I was
brought up by the old gentleman. Now, Charley’s place adjoined
Elmington, my grandfather’s, their respective residences being not
over a half-mile apart; and so Charley got into the habit—however, I
must mention that Charley lost his father years ago, and, about ten
years since, his mother died.”
“His mother? His mother is dead?” asked the Don, in a low tone, and
without raising his eyes from the floor.
“Yes. They say she was a lovely woman.”
“And she is dead, you say—your friend’s mother?” he repeated, in a
mechanical sort of way; and, resting his head upon his hand, he
fixed his eyes upon the window with a look so grim that I paused in
my narrative.
“Yes,” I presently resumed, “she—Charley’s mother; that is—”
“I beg pardon,” said he, abruptly turning to me, and, as the Latin
hath it, serening his face with an effort,—“please go on.”
“Well, Charley was at the University at the time of his mother’s
death; and during the following vacation he seemed to find his own
desolate home—he was singularly devoted to his mother—
unendurable; so he would frequently drop in on my grandfather and
myself at tea, walking home, when bedtime came, across the fields;
but my grandfather, remarking the sad look that always came into
his face when he arose to depart, would frequently insist upon his
spending the night with us. The poor fellow could scarcely ever
resist the temptation, to my great delight; for to me, a boy of
thirteen, Charley, who was eighteen, and a student, was a sort of
demi-god. I suppose, in fact, that apart from my grandfather’s
personal liking for the young man, and his sympathy with him under
the circumstances, he was very glad to give me the society of some
one younger than himself. And so, to make a long story short,
Charley’s visits becoming more and more frequent and regular, it
came at last to be understood that he was to spend every night with
us,—during his vacation, of course. At last, at the end of three years,
Charley left the University with the degree of Master of Arts in
pocket.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes. You are surprised, no doubt. He is so unassuming, one would
hardly suppose that he had attained an honor which is reached by
hardly more than one out of every hundred of the students at the
University. To continue. When he returned from college and took
charge of his farm, it soon appeared that the tables were turned. It
was Charley’s companionship now that had grown to be a necessity
to the old gentleman. ‘We shall expect you to dinner,’ he would say
every morning, as Charley rode off to look after his farming
operations. Charley often protested against this one-sided
hospitality, and, as a compromise, we would dine with him
occasionally; but at last my grandfather proposed a consolidation of
the two households, all of us wondering why the plan had not been
thought of before. That is the way Charley came to live at
Elmington. The two farms are separate, though from time to time
worked in common, as occasion demands,—in harvest-time, for
example. Each farm contributes its quota to the table, though not in
any fixed ratio. My grandfather, for example, is firmly persuaded that
the grass on his farm—notably in one special field—imparts, in some
occult way, a flavor to his mutton that Charley’s does not possess;
while, on the other hand, an old woman on Charley’s place has such
a gift at raising chickens, turkeys, and ducks, that we have gotten in
the habit of looking to her for our fowls.”
The Don smiled.
“It is rather a singular arrangement, isn’t it? but I have gone into
these details that you might see that Elmington is, for all the
purposes of hospitality, as much Charley’s as my grandfather’s. I
hope it will not be long,” I added, rising, “before you will be able to
go down and see how the arrangement works, though I am sorry I
shall not be able to join you till Christmas week, being detained by
professional engagements, or, rather, the hope of such, as I have but
recently opened a law office.”
“You may rest assured that I shall not lose a day, when once my
physician has given me leave to go. Can’t you sit longer? Another
visit yet? Ah, I am sorry.” And he accompanied me to the door of his
sitting-room.
As we stood there for a moment, exchanging the customary civilities
of leave-taking, my eye fell upon the little book the Don had laid
upon a shelf of his book-case.
It was a copy of the New Testament.

[1]
The quail is unknown in Virginia—both bird and
word.—Ed.
 CHAPTER XVII.

At about the hour at which I was taking leave of the Don my

grandfather was sitting alone in his dining-room, reading; his snow-
white hair and beard, as they glistened in the lamp-light, affording a
strong contrast to the vivacity of his dark eyes and the ruddy glow of
his complexion. But the book before him was hardly able to fix his
attention. Every now and then he would raise his eyes from its
pages, with the look of one who fancied that he heard an expected
sound. Several times he had risen from his seat, gone to the door,
opened it, and listened. Something like this he had been doing now
for nearly a week. “Dick!” called he at last, opening the door: “Dick!”
Uncle Dick emerged from the kitchen, where, for several days past,
he had had orders to sit up till ten o’clock in the hope that Charley
might arrive.
“Yes, mahster!”
“Dick, I thought I heard some one coming.”
Uncle Dick, who very naturally (and correctly) supposed that this
was another false alarm, threw his head into an attitude of
pretended listening.
“Do you hear anything?” asked the old gentleman.
“Ain’t dem de horses a-stompin’ down at de stable?”
“I believe you are right,” sighed the old gentleman, as he turned to
re-enter the dining-room.
“Marse Charley ain’t sont you no letter, is he?” asked Uncle Dick,
advancing deferentially towards my grandfather, across the space
that separated the kitchen from the “Great-House.”
“Why, no; but I thought he might come. He wrote me a week ago
that the gentleman was getting well.”
“Adzackly!” replied Dick, scratching in the fringe of white wool that
bordered his bald head. “Jess so! Does you think it rimprobable,
mahster,” he began again after a moment of seeming reflection, “dat
Marse Charley would come without he writ fust and ’pinted de day,
and de ferry ’most twenty miles from here, and nothin’ to hire dere
’cep’n ’tis dat old flea-bitten gray, and he a-string-halted?”
“True enough.”
“Dat ain’t no fitten animil for de likes o’ Marse Charley, and he a-
used to straddlin’ o’ de very best dat steps.”
“But listen, Dick! what’s that?”
“Lor’, mahster, dat ain’t nothin’ but de old m’yar and colt out d’yar in
de pasture.”
“Well, what in the blue-blazes makes them all stamp so to-night?”
replied the old gentleman, not without a little petulance.
“Dat’s jess what I say! leastwise d’yar ain’t no flies to bite ’em dis
weather; but dey will do it, mahster, dey will do it. Every dog have
he day, dey tell me.”
Uncle Dick was strong on proverbs, though hardly happy in their
application. Sometimes, in fact, just as doctors will, when they don’t
know what is the matter with a patient, prescribe pills of several
remedial agents, in the hope that if one shall miss another may hit,
so our old hostler, carriage-driver, and dining-room servant would
not scruple, when aiming at a truth, to let fly at it an aphorism
compound of the head of one proverb and the tail of another.
“Yes,” said my grandfather, applying Dick’s saying for him, “every
dog will have his day, and I suppose that is why your Marse Charles
is staying so long in Richmond.”
Uncle Dick was a year or two his master’s senior, and many a
“wrassle” had they had together as boys. He was, of course, a
privileged character, and he now gave one of those low chuckles
beyond the reach of the typographer’s art to represent to the eye.
“Yes, mahster, I hears ’em say dat d’yar is some monstrous pretty
gals, nebberdeless I should say young ladies, up d’yar in Richmond.
Howsomever, pretty is as pretty does. Dat’s what old Dick tells ’em.”
“You think Charley is in love, I presume?”
Old Dick drew himself up as became one consulted on family affairs,
and, dropping his head on one side, he assumed, with his knitted
brows and pursed lips, an eminently judicial air.
“Well, mahster, ef you axes me ’bout dat, I couldn’t ’espond pint’ly,
in course; for I ain’t seen Marse Charles a-noratin’ of it and a-
splanifyin’ amongst de Richmond f’yar sect; but old Dick ain’t been
a-wrasslin’ and a-spyin’ ’round in dis here vain world for nigh on to a
hundred year for nothin’ ef you listen to Dick; and ef you believes
me, mahster, dey all of ’em most inginerally gits tetched with love
onetimeornuther.”
“I believe you are quite right, Dick.”
“Why, Lor’ me, mahster,” began Dick, encouraged, and assuming an
attitude worthy of the vast generalization he was about to utter, “I
really do believe into my soul dat people is born so; dey is pint’ly,—
specially young folks.” And he stopped in mid-career. “What dat?
’Pear like I hear the far gate slam. But Marse Charley, he are a
keener, he are, and the gal what catches him will have to be a
keener too, she will pint’ly. Marse Charley worse’n a oyster at low
tide; soon as a young ’oman begins a-speculatin’ and a-gallivantin’
round him, he shets up, he do.” And the old man chuckled.
“Howsomever, he am pint’ly a keener, ef you hear Dick—”
“Listen, Dick!”
“I do believe I hear a horse snort! D’yar ’tis again! Somebody comin’
through de gate. ’Fore de Lord, I believe ’tis Marse Charley! Lemme
look good! Sure enough, d’yar he is! Sarvant, Marse Charles! I
knowed you was a-comin’ dis very night, and I hope I may die ef he
ain’t on old Hop-and-go-fetch-it! Lord a’ massy! Lord a’ massy! Well,
it’s an ill wind what don’t blow de crows out o’ some gent’mun’s
cornfield. Lord a’ massy, Marse Charley, what is you a-doin’ up d’yar
on dat poor old critter, and de horses in de stable jess a-spilin’ to
have somebody fling he leg over ’em?”
“Well, my boy, is that you?”
“Yes, here I am again, and glad to be back at home. How are you,
Uncle Tom?”
“The same old seven-and-sixpence,—always well; and how are you?”
“Sound in wind and limb, and savagely hungry.”
“Well, get down, and we’ll soon cure that ailment.”
“I am very sorry,” said Charley, as they entered the dining-room,
“that I had to stay away so long, but it seemed right that I should
help nurse him. Ah, what a noble fire!”
“Well, you are at home again, at any rate. Polly will soon have some
supper for you, and you know what is in the sideboard.”
Old Dick, meanwhile, was carrying out his share in the programme.
“Well, I s’pose I’ll have to feed you,” said he to the flea-bitten,
surveying him from head to hock.
No true negro feels any doubt whatever as to his words being
perfectly intelligible to horse, mule, cow, or dog.
“Ef ever I see a poor-folks’ horse, you is one. Git up! git up! don’t
you hear me? You needn’t be a-standin’ here a-thinkin’ Dick gwine to
ride you to de stable. Aha! you hear dat word stable, did you? Bound
for you! You been d’yar befo’, and you know d’yar’s corn in dat ’ar
stable; and a heap mo’, besides you, know dat d’yar is pervisions a-
layin’ around here, and dey ain’t horses neither, nor yet mules. Git
up, I tell you! Ain’t you got no more sense, old as you is, than to be
a-snatchin’ at dry grass like dat? But Lor’, Dick don’t blame you! No,
honey, Dick ain’t got a word agin you. Who is you, any way, I ax you
dat? Is you blood? Is you quality? Dat’s what’s de matter, ef you
believe me. You needn’t be a-shakin’ your head; you can’t tell Dick
nothin’. Anybody can see you ain’t kin to nobody. ’M’h’m! yes, chile!
you needn’t say a word, Dick knows dat kind far as he can see ’em,
be dey man or beast. Howsomever, Dick don’t mount no sich. Nigger
property is too unsartin for dat. Nebberdeless, Marse Charles, bein’
as how he belongs to his self, he mought. Nebberdeless, you fotch
him home, and pretty is as pretty does, dat’s de way old Dick talks
it. Polly! Polly!” shouted he to his wife, the cook, as he passed the
kitchen door; “Polly! git up, gal! Marse Charles done come and want
he supper. I would say,” continued he, not content with the
colloquial phrases in which he had announced his young master’s
arrival and the state of his appetite,—“I would say, Polly,”—and
enveloped in darkness as he was, and invisible even to his spouse,
the old man threw himself into an impressive pose, as he always did
when about to adorn his language with phrases caught up from the
conversation of his master and his guests,—“I would say de Prodigy
Son have arrove, and he as ravenous as de fatted calf.” Hearing Polly
bustling about within the kitchen: “Polly,” inquired he, in a stately
voice, “did you hearken to what I rubserved?”
“I hear you, Dick.”
“But did you make me out, chile, dat’s de pint, did you make me
out?”
“G’long, man, and put dat horse in de stable. Marse Charley want he
supper, course he do. What’s de use o’ talkin’ about fat calves, when
you know as well as I does d’yar ain’t no sich a thing in de kitchen.
Marse Charley want he supper, I know dat, and I’se gittin’ ready to
cook it fast as I can.”
“I b’lieve you. Well, put my name in de pot, chile.” And the old man
went his way. “Well,” said he, soliloquizing upon the much-longed-for
return of his young master, “dey tell me chickens, like horses
[curses?], always does come home to roost—git up, I tell you!
—’cep’n onless dey meets a free nigger in de road, den good-by
chickens—for you’re gwine to leave us.”
 CHAPTER XVIII.

“Why, what’s all this, Uncle Dick?” exclaimed Charley, as that

venerable servitor entered, with hospitably beaming countenance,
bearing a tray. “Roast oysters! why, this cold turkey was enough for
a prince.” And he brushed from his yellow moustache the foam of a
glass of Bass’s ale.
The old man, complimented by Charley’s surprise, placed the
smoking oysters upon the table with a bow of the old school.
“Why, they are beauties! Ah, I am glad you will join me, Uncle Tom!
I never saw finer.”
“Dey is fine, Marse Charley, dat’s a fac’. Polly she save ’em for you
special. You know, young mahster” (another bow), “de old-time
people used to say you must speed de partin’ guest.”
“That’s true. By the way, Uncle Dick, what do you say to a little
something to warm up your old bones?”
“Since you mention it, Marse Charley, I believe de frost has tetched
’em a little.”
“Well, get that bottle out of the sideboard,—you know where it is.”
“Know whar ’tis? I wish I had as many dollars as I know whar dat
bottle sets!”
“Or would you prefer ale?”
“Thank you, young mahster; whiskey good enough for Dick.”
“There, ’tisn’t more than half full; take it out and give Polly her
share.”
“Sarvant, mahster!”
“Take some sugar?”
“Much obleeged, young mahster; seems like ’most everything spiles
whiskey. Somehownutther nothin’ don’t gee with sperrits ’cep’n ’tis
mo’ sperrits.”
“But Aunt Polly might like sugar with hers.”
“Dat’s a fac’, Marse Charley, dat’s a fac’; but Lor’ me, women don’t
know; but den again dey tell me it’s a wise man as knows his own
father, so d’yar ’tis.”
“Well, Uncle Dick, I can make out without you now, so good-night;
and present my compliments to Aunt Polly, and you and she drink
my health.”
“We will pint’ly, Marse Charles, we will pint’ly.” And even after the old
man had closed the door, you might have heard muttered fragments
of his amiable intentions, as he trudged back to the kitchen.
“Well,” began my grandfather, rising from the table to fill his pipe,
“you made a long stay of it in Richmond. How did you leave the
young man?”
“Ah, he is nearly well again,” said Charley, deftly removing a side-
bone from the fowl before him. “By Jove, I did not know how hungry
I was. That early dinner on the boat seems to me now like a far-
away dream of a thing that never was. I wonder whether this turkey
really is the best that old Sucky ever raised? How good that tobacco
smells!”
Charley was happy. The bright fire and good cheer, after his long,
cold, and tiresome ride, the intense consciousness of being at home
once more, but, above all, the look of beaming satisfaction on the
face of the venerable but still vigorous old man, who sat smiling
upon him and enjoying his appetite and high spirits, filled him with
ineffable content.
“Let me settle with this august bird, Uncle Tom, and then I shall be
ready to talk to you about Mr. Smith,—Don Miff, as the girls call him.”
“Don Miff?—what girls?”
“The—ah, we gave him that nickname. I’ll explain when I get even
with this noble fowl and light my pipe.”
“Did you,” asked my grandfather, advancing cautiously as a
skirmisher, “meet any nice people in Richmond?”
“Oh, yes, very nice people up there,—too many of them; made me
talk myself nearly to death,—but very nice people, of course, very.
Look at that chap,” added he, holding up on the end of his fork a
huge oyster.
“You spoke of girls,—did you meet any?” And a pang of jealousy
shot through the old man’s heart, as he recalled Dick’s aphorism on
the universal liability of young folks to a certain weakness.
“Oh, lots!—I’ll have to cut this fellow in two, I believe.”
“Who were they?” asked the old man, trying to smile.
“Who? the girls?”
“Yes; you did not mention any in your letters.”
“Of course not. When did you ever know me to write about girls? As
I said, I met lots of them at the various houses at which I visited. It
seems to me that there are girls everywhere.”
“Thank God for it, too.”
“Well,—yes,—as it were; but you can’t expect a fellow to remember
all their names. Oh, there was Lucy Poythress, of course.”
“Yes, I knew she was in Richmond.”
“And then—and then there was a schoolmate of hers,—Miss Mary
Rolfe. You know her father, Mr. James Rolfe. Brilliant girl, they say,—
talks beautifully—very accomplished, you know, and all that sort of
thing.”
“Yes, I have heard she is a really charming girl. What do you say to
our having her as one of our Christmas party?” The old man
removed his pipe from his mouth. “What do you say, Charley?” And
he glanced at the young man’s face with a look that was too eager
to be shrewd.
“A capital idea!” exclaimed Charley, spearing another oyster with
emphasis.
The old man drew vigorously on his pipe several times, and finding it
had gone out, rose for a lighter. “You think,” said he, puffing
between his words as he relit his pipe, contemplatively watching the
tongue of flame darting down into the bowl, “that we should have
her of the party?”
“Most assuredly. She is a fine girl,—you would like her. In fact, we
must have her here if possible.”
“Yes,” said the old man, “yes.” And he gazed at the bright coals. He
felt that he had not landed his trout. “So you didn’t lose your heart?”
“My heart? Who, I?” And Charley gave a loud laugh.
“The very idea amuses you?”
“I should think so! I suppose you suspect that old Cousin Sally’s
niece—or Cousin Sally’s old niece—whichever you please—captivated
me?”
“No, I was not thinking of Sarah Ann. In fact, I didn’t know that any
one had captivated you—till you mentioned it.”
“Well, upon my word, I have finished the last of these oysters,—and
there is not so much turkey as there was.”
“Well, now we will have an old-time whiff together; and now begin
your story. However, before you do, can you think of any other girl
who would be an acquisition for Christmas?”
“Who? Bless me, Uncle Tom, what could have put such a notion into
your head? Oh, I’ll tell you,—leave it all to Jack-Whack; he’s the
ladies’ man of the family, you know.”
“Very well; and now fill your pipe and tell me all those strange things
about that strange Mr. Smith, that you promised me in your letters.”
Charley told the story, with one omission. He failed to allude to his
having invited the Don to visit Elmington. Omissions to state all
manner of things that ordinary mortals would make haste to
mention was one of Charley’s idiosyncrasies,—so that I suspect that
his silence on this point was premeditated. Another was, as I have
already hinted, an aversion to expressing an opinion of any one,
good or bad. But Mr. Whacker felt instinctively that Charley had
conceived a genuine liking for this mysterious stranger. A tone here,
a look there, told the tale. Charley’s likings, being rare, were
exceedingly strong. Moreover, they were never, I may say,
misplaced, and my grandfather knew this. So, when Charley had
finished his narrative, “You have,” said he, “interested me deeply.
Who can he be? But be he who he may, he is obviously no common
man.”
Charley puffed away slowly at his pipe.
“He is a remarkable man,” continued my grandfather, warming up.
“He has points about him,” said Charley, driven to say something.
“Yes, and characteristic points, highly characteristic points,” said the
old gentleman, with a sort of defiant emphasis.
“He has, beyond question.”
“Charley,” began Mr. Whacker, rising and taking a lighter,—for he had
suffered his pipe to go out,—“don’t you think”—and he lit the taper
—“what do you say,” he continued, in a hesitating manner, which he
tried to cover up under pretence of strict attention to the feat of
adjusting the blaze to the tobacco,—“how would it do to invite him
here,—just for a week or so, you know?”
It is, I dare say, a mere whim on my part, but I must now beg the
contemporary reader to obliterate himself for a few pages.
I must tell you, my descendant-to-the-tenth-power—no, you will be
that much of a grandson,—my descendant-to-the-twelfth-power,
therefore—I must tell you, as a matter of family history, why your
ascendant-to-the-fourteenth-power hesitated.
Our common ancestor was a Virginian,—which means, you will
doubtless know, that he was hospitable. Again, he was a Virginian of
Leicester County,—and that is as much as to say, as I trust a dim
tradition, at least, shall have informed you, that he was a Virginian
of Virginians. But, lastly and chiefly, he was Mr. Thomas Whacker of
Elmington. What that amounts to you can learn from me alone.
Our common ancestor was, then, the soul of hospitality,—hospitality
in a certain sense boundless, though it was strictly limited and
exclusive in a certain direction. No dull man or woman was welcome
at Elmington. But his nets seemed to bring in all the queer fish that
floated about Virginia. I suppose there must have been something
inborn in him that made odd people attractive to him, and him to
them, but I have no doubt that this trait of his was in part due to the
kind of Bohemian life he led in Europe for several years, when he
was a young man, mingling, on familiar terms, with musicians,
actors, painters, and all manner of shiftless geniuses,—so that the
average humdrum citizen possessed little interest for him. If a man
could only do or say anything that no one else could do or say, or do
it or say it better than any one else, he had a friend in Mr. Whacker.
All forms of brightness and of humor—any kind of talent, or even
oddity—could unlock that door, which swung so easily on its hinges.
And not only men of gifts, but all who had a lively appreciation of
gifts, were at liberty to make Elmington their headquarters; so that,
as my memory goes back to those days, there rises before me a
succession of the drollest mortals that were ever seen in one Virginia
house. Now, I need hardly remind you that company of this
character has its objections. Men such as I have rapidly outlined are
not always very eligible visitors at a country house. It happens, not
unfrequently, that a man who is very entertaining to-day is a bore
to-morrow,—the day after, a nuisance; so that our grandfather, who
was the most unsuspicious of mortals, and who always took men for
what they seemed to be on a first interview, was frequently most
egregiously taken in, and was often at his wit’s end as to how to get
rid of some treasure he had picked up. In fact, Charley used to
dread the old gentleman’s return from the springs in autumn, or the
cities in winter; for he was quite sure to have invited to Elmington
some of the people whom he had met there; and they often proved
not very profitable acquaintances. In fine, wherever he went, he
rarely failed to gather more or less gems of purest ray serene, many
of which turned out, under Charley’s more scrutinizing eyes, very
ordinary pebbles indeed.
Unqualified, however, what I have written would give a very
erroneous idea of the people our grandfather used to gather around
his hospitable board; for I must say that after all deductions have
been made, he managed, certainly, to get beneath his vine and fig-
tree more really clever and interesting people than I have ever seen
in any one house elsewhere. And then, too, as there were no ladies
at Elmington, I don’t know that his mistakes mattered much. Still,
they were sufficiently numerous; and he had begun to lose, not
indeed his faith in men, so much as in his own ability to read them.
And just in proportion as waned his confidence in his own judgment
in such matters, he placed an ever-heightening estimate upon
Charley’s; so that, in the end, he was always rather nervous upon
the arrival of any of his new-found geniuses, till his taciturn friend
had indicated, in some way, that he thought them unexceptionable.
Now, Charley had seen Mr. Smith; our grandfather not. Here was a
chance. He would throw the responsibility upon Charley. In this
particular case he was especially glad to do so, for there was
undoubtedly an air of mystery surrounding Mr. Smith, and mystery
cannot but arouse suspicion.
Our grandfather continued: “H’m? What do you say? For a week or
so?”
There was positively something timid in the way he glanced at
Charley out of the corners of his eyes. And now you may dimly
discern what was most probably Charley’s motive for refraining from
alluding to his having himself invited the Don to Elmington. In a
spirit of affectionate malice he had deliberately entrapped his old
friend into making the proposition. So I must believe, at least.
“By all means,” replied Charley, with a cordiality that surprised Mr.
Whacker.
“What! Do you say so?” cried our grandfather, rubbing his hands
delightedly; and taking out his keys, he began to unlock his desk.
“How should the letter be addressed?” continued he, turning and
looking at Charley. His face reddened a little as he detected an
imperfectly suppressed smile in Charley’s eyes. He was somewhat
afraid of that smile.
“What are you grinning at?”
“I grinning?”
“Yes, you! Didn’t you say we should invite him?”
“Certainly.”
“Then what’s the matter?”
“It’s past eleven,” said Charley, glancing at the clock.
“Is it possible!”
“And then the mail doesn’t leave till day after to-morrow.”
“Oh!” ejaculated our impulsive ancestor, “I had not thought of that!”