Volume : 6, Issue : 5, May - 2017

An Application of H.P. Grice�s Theory of Implicature to Somerset Maugham�s Short Story The Punctiliousness of Don Sebastian

Sashi Kala Govindarajulu, Dr. B. Krishnamurthy

Abstract :

<p>&nbsp;<b style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:200%;&#10;font-family:&quot;Times New Roman&quot;,serif">Purpose: </span></b><span style="text-align: justify; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%; font-family: &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, serif;">Somerset Maugham was successful with well-received novels, notable essays, crowd-drawing plays and more than a hundred short stories.&nbsp; But unfortunately his critics anded him a &lsquo;commercial&rsquo; writer and an artistic failure.&nbsp;</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:&#10;justify;line-height:200%"><b><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:200%;font-family:&quot;Times New Roman&quot;,serif">Methodology:</span></b><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:200%;font-family:&quot;Times New Roman&quot;,serif">&nbsp; Paul Grice introduced the technical notions of Cooperative Principle and &lsquo;conversational implicature&rsquo; to arrive at the right meaning of an utterance.&nbsp; This study applies Grice&rsquo;s theory of conversational implicature to interpret the language of Somerset Maugham in his short story </span><i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:200%;font-family:&quot;Times New Roman&quot;,serif;&#10;mso-fareast-font-family:&quot;Times New Roman&quot;;mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">The Punctiliousness of Don Sebastian</span></i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;&#10;line-height:200%;font-family:&quot;Times New Roman&quot;,serif"> to show his language gifts.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:&#10;justify;line-height:200%"><b><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:200%;font-family:&quot;Times New Roman&quot;,serif">Findings: </span></b><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:200%;font-family:&quot;Times New Roman&quot;,serif">This minute analysis exposes explicitly the complexities of Maugham&rsquo;s use of language.<o:p></o:p></span></p>