To Kill A Mockingbird Chapter 1 Language Techniques

caswell uses numerous techniques in chapter xx down…...firstly the use of italics is very prominent. caswell uses the italics on the baby's speech and myriam’s experiences as she tries to help ricky.by using the italics, the words stand out among the rest and it helps the reader's to know that the setting and time has changed to myriams experiences. also it keeps the reader more entertained due to the variation of speech style and putting emphasis on myriam’s recount and the baby’s speech. caswell also uses imagery in the chapter, especially when myriam is inside ricky’s mind. “the soundless voices of a million minds, crashing in waves against the fibre of her soul. it tore at her sanity, but she could not give into it.” is a prime example of imagery in the chapter.It creates a vivid image of the sea which is usually related to powerfulness and influence. imagery heightens the feeling shared with the reader. by describing the chapter with such detail, the reader's feel like they are experiencing the story themselves and that they are a part of the book and in turn it keeps the audience more focused. by saying that miriam is experiencing the
soundless voices of a million minds crashing in waves against the fibre of her soul, it emphasises that the voices are loud and overwhelmingly big compared to her soul which is described as the” fibre of her soul” with fibre usually related to being feeble and fragile. also the use of dialogue in the chapter provides realism and helps characterisation.
“what about the others? why were you so keen for me to see them? are they behaving -” “ why don’t you judge for yourself.” is a extract of a conversation between larsen and susan. the dialogue shows that susan is probing deeper into the conversation to try and get more information of larsen which he wasnt providing to her and larsen is getting frustrated as he knows he is doing something wrong but doesn’t want to admit it to susan as he has a large ego. by having the dialogue, we could get a better idea of what susan and larsen were like as people. while dialogue also provides further characterisation, the dialogue also helps keep the experience real for the reader's so they could understand and feel what each character were like as
people. also there is the presence of interior monologue and omniscient narration. an example of interior monologue is when myriam is talking about her experience.a short example would be, “ and there at last, she found him.” . by having myriam recount her experiences as an interior monologue it helps to communicate the thoughts passing through the protagonist which in this case is myriam. in the extract, myriam is feeling relief and achievement as she has finally found Ricky after much hard work and pain. it is the most effective in communicating to us the thoughts and experiences of myriam. in the chapter the omniscient narrator is susan. she has knowledge of all the events that are happening and jumps from scene to scene, following characters and evaluating the progress of the story. this helps to give an authentic viewpoint and judgement to the audience which they can follow. susan moves to each scene such as one of where she argues with larsen or the one where she interacts with the babies and she gives her personal feelings and opinions on each matter which at times could be uncharacteristically strong. examples include the feeling of a strong bond and pain and sadness for myriam and strong hatred and fury at larsen.