第十六章 CONTRAST, PARALLELISM和ANTITHESIS
16.1 Contrast
16.1A Contrast的含义和形式
1） Contrast，汉译“对照”，亦作“对比”，是突出差别的一种修辞手段。例如：
The twins are as different as two people can be. Sally, who is always hoping someone will have a party, has black hair, brown eyes, and an outgoing personality. She wants to be an actress or popular singer. Susan, more serious and studious, has blonde hair, blue eyes, and a somewhat shy manner. Since she has done well in all her classes in graphic arts and math, she plans to become an architect or an engineer.
上例中开头一句点出这对双胞胎姐妹完全不同，接着从形象特征、兴趣爱好、专长和志向等方面加以对照。
2） 最基本的对照结构由两个成分构成，它们之间意义上构成反衬，结构上互不相同。例如：
Let both sides explore what problems unite us instead of laboring those problems which divide us.
（John F. Kennedy）
Your knowledge of English “tells” you that certain strings of phonemes are permissible and others are not.
（Victoria Franklin）
上例中What problems unite us为名词性分句，与之对照的those problems which divide us为带后置修饰性分句的名词短语；certain strings of phonemes are permissible为完整的分句结构，与之对照的others are not为省略分句。
16.1B Contrast的使用
1） 在实际使用中，Contrast常和Comparison密切配合，其中Comparison用于论述不同事物的相同点或类似点，Contrast用于论述不同事物的不同点，如人们常说的similarities and differences, relative merits, advantages and disadvantages。例如：
Most Americans would say it is not really possible to establish an ideal society. But time after time, a small dedicated group of people will drop out of the mainstream of American society to try, once more, to live according to the group's concept of an ideal society. Most of these groups have believed in holding their property in common. Most have used the holding their property in common. Most have used the word family to refer to all members of the group. Many of these groups, however, have differed widely in their attitudes toward sex and marriage.
（Conlin）
从整个段落看，首先是most Americans和a small dedicated group of people之间的对照，然后是most of these groups的比较（common property, group as “family”）和对照（attitudes toward sex and marriage），结构严谨，思路清晰。
2） “对比”兼有对照与比较两种意思，是用来说明道理或事实的有力手段。1960年4月下旬，周恩来总理与印度谈判中印边界问题，印方提出一个挑衅性问题：“西藏自古就是中国的领土吗？”周恩来说：“西藏自古就是中国的领土，远的不说，至少在元代，它已经是中国的领土。”对方说：“时间太短了。”周恩来说：“中国的元代离现在已有700来年的历史，如果700年都被认为是时间短的话，那么美国到现在只有100多年的历史，是不是美国不是一个国家呢？这显然是荒谬的。”印方代表哑口无言。这里周总理用了700年与100年的对比，谁也无法否认前者而承认后者。
3）不论比较或对照，都应有共同基础，即可以进行比较或对照的内容；当然这种基础或内容有时并非一眼便可看到，而需要通过一定的分析才能得知。例如要在人和蜜蜂之间进行比较或对照，乍一听似乎是荒唐的，但事实并非如此，因为两者虽然在智能和身体结构等方面有天壤之别，却都属群居动物，并有自己的社会分工，这就构成比较或对照的基础。当两个对象十分类似时，就需要通过对照找出不同点，以便加以识别；当两个对象不太相似时，则可以通过比较发现共同点，以便从总的方面去把握，所谓同中见异，异中求同，这既是分析和了解客观事物的方法，也是文章写作的方法。
16.2 Parallelism
16.2A Parallelism的含义与形式
1） Parallelism汉译“平行结构”，是以语法结构对称（包括相同或相似的词、短语或分句）来突出意义的一种修辞手段。例如：
In its energy, its lyrics, its advocacy of frustrated joys, rock in one long symphony of protest.
上例中有介词in的3个平行宾语结构。
The Department of Justice began a vigorous campaign to break up the corporate empires, to restore the free and open market, and to plant the feet of industry firmly on the road to competition.
（Thurman Arnold）
上例句中campaign的3个修饰语为平行结构。
Here is where the hot wind blows and the old ways do not seem relevant, where the divorce rate is double the national average and where one person in every thirty-eight lives in a trailer.
（Joan Didion）
上例中用作主语的3个where分句构成平行结构。
2） 平行结构的各成分之间用并列连词and，or，逗号，分号等连接，笔者在《分析英语语法》16.7节“平行并列”部分也讲到这一点，下面再举几个例子说明：
Eskimos and native Americans, it is believed, came originally from Asia.
Immigrants to the United States have been compelled to leave their homelands because of religious, political, and economic constructions.
According to one woman, becoming drunkards, deserting their families, or committing suicide proved the only answers for some of their fellow immigrants.
（Parker）
3） 有一种特殊的平行结构，叫做“平衡句”（Balanced sentence），由两个平行的分句构成，用词对等或近似，且各分句中的字数相当；不过第二个分句中的某些词语可能省去。例如：
Many Mexicans immigrated to the United States after the 1910—1920 revolution, and many Cubans （immigrated to the United States） after the 1959 revolution.
（ibid）
In good weather, the passage from England to America could take twenty days; but in bad weather, it could take more than two months.
（ibid）
平衡句中配上回环（亦称逆序反复，参见13.1D），往往构成工整的回环句，例如：
Some people believe that too many people have been admitted to America lately — they want emigration of immigrants rather than immigration of emigrants.
（ibid）
16.2B Parallelism的使用
1） 平行结构形式上精致、工整，声调上富于韵律，因而能给读者或听话者深刻的印象；同时能以较经济的表达方式突出含义。例如：
We must somehow take a wider view, look at the whole landscape, really see it, and describe what's going on out there.
（Annie Dillard）
句中主语和助动词后跟4个动词短语组成平行结构，既经济，又紧凑。
According to the 1980 census, the largest number of immigrants that have come to the United States have been of German origin, and the second largest, of Italian origin.
（Parker）
例中第二个分句省略了“number of immigrants that have come to the United States have been”，而通过逗号，读者很容易看出平行结构中省略的内容。这样不但不会造成理解困难，而且由于用词经济，使基本含义更为突出了。
2） 平行结构有重复强调的功能，往往通过一连串动词短语的平行出现，表示说话者或写作者的雄辩口才或特别情感，如 John F. Kennedy的这席话就颇具鼓动性：
Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and success of liberty.
又如，在Thomas Jefferson对 George III的指控里，愤怒之情溢于言表：
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
平行结构中动词短语的连续出现，如同画家挥动手中的彩笔，或摄影师放出的镜头，由单个动作或画面构成一幅幅活动的景象或情节，格外生动逼真。例如：
Hilland valley followed valley and hill; the little green and stony cattle-tracks wandered in and out of one another, split into three or four, died away in marshy hollows, and began again sporadically on hillsides or at the borders of a wood.
（Robert Louis Stevenson）
She laid two fingers on my shoulder, cast another look into my face under her candle, turned the key in the lock, gently thrust me beyond the door, shut it; and left me to my own devices.
（Walter de la Mare）
3） 避免不对称平行结构（Faulty parallel structure），即应注意平行结构中各个成分形式上的一致。例如：
Glittering white horses lend romance and a nostalgic air to Cinderella's Golden Carrousel; it was originally built for a Detroit amusement park in 1917.
句中romance为名词，nostalgic为形容词，应将romance改为romantic，构成对称的平行结构“... lend a romantic and a nostalgic air ...”。又如：
I am interested in the folklore of Howard Hughes, in the way people react to him and in what words and expressions they use when they talk about him.
这原是 Joan Didion的一个平行结构，斜体部分为被改动后的形式，并因而破坏了原平行结构的对称，其原句是这样的：
... in the way people react to him, in the terms they use ...
16.3 Antithesis
16.3A Antithesis的含义与形式
1） Antithesis汉译“平行对照”，可看作是Contrast+Parallelism，因为构成此辞格的成分之间须结构上对称，而意义上对照，例如：
The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract.
（Abraham Lincoln）
What is written without effort is in general read without pleasure.
（Samuel Johnson）
The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here.
（Abraham Lincoln）
上述例句说明，平行对照格的成分可以是词，短语或分句。
2） 平行对照的两个成分可以是某个对象的不同方面的对比，也可以是两个对象的不同方面的对比。例如：
If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich.
（John F. Kennedy）
Why are some people argumentative and domineering, while others are shy and hesitant? ... Why are some people greedy, selfish, and cynical, while others are kindly and easy to get along with?
（Gordon R. Lowe）
上述第二个例句还表明，除了由两个成分构成的平行对照外，还可能由这个平行对照结构同另一个类似的平行对照结构组成新的平行对照关系，可视作并列平行对照。又如：
In Australia, where people are few and rabbits are many, I watched a whole populace satisfying the primitive impulse in the primitive manner by the skillful slaughter of many thousands of rabbits. But in London or New York, where people are many and rabbits are few, some other means must be found to gratify primitive impulse.
（Bertrand Russell）
16.3B Antithesis的使用
1） 平行对照格形式整齐匀称，音律节奏铿锵，内容既适于重复强调，又适于反衬对照，从音、形、义各方面看，都具有鲜明的修辞功能，在富于形象、音乐美的诗歌和充满逻辑辩证力量的论说文章和演说中特别常见。例如：
Though much is taken, much abides; and though
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are:
One equal temper of heroic hearts
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
（Tennyson）
Paine argued that Kings of England did not rule by divine right and wrote persuasively of the prospects for forming an independent government without any king at all, Americans, many of whom had hesitated to think such thoughts even as they had gone about the business of setting up idependent governments, found in common sense an ideological justification for their actions. The pamphlet was read in every city and hamlet in the colonies. It was read in taverns and at hearthside, denounced by furious loyalists and praised by friends of liberty, among whom it set in motion a groundswell of support for independence.
（Diana Karter Appelbaum）
It will not be easy. It will require sacrifice. But it can be done and done fairly. No choosing sacrifice for its own sake, but for our own sake.
（Bill Clinton）
在劝说性的格言及现代广告中，都会经常出现平行对照格。它们用语简练，结构工整，往往通过鲜明的对照把深邃的哲理说得明白动听。例如：
There is more danger from a pretended friend than from an open enemy.
（Aesop's Fables）
They that sow in tears shall reap in joy.
（Holy Bible）
Small sorrows speak: great sorrows are silent.
— Proverb
Warehouse Clearance.
Pentax Importer Overstocked.
Their Loss, Your Gain.
（New Zealand Herald, May 10, 1991）
2） 平行对照格常常和明喻与隐喻（见8.1 和8.2）、逆论（见11.2A）、矛盾修饰法（见11.2B）、头韵（见17.1A）等辞格并用，从而使该辞格所具备的形式美、音韵美和内容上既有同向强调又可反向对照的特色得到更加充分的表现。例如：
False Eloquence, like the Prismatic Glass,
Its gaudy Colours spreads on ev'ry place;
The Face of Nature we no more survey,
All glares: alike, without Distinction gay:
But true Expression, like th' unchanging Sun,
Clears, and improves whate'er it shines upon,
...
（A. Pope）
Hope is a good breakfast, but it is a bad supper.
（Bacon）
More haste, less speed.
— Proverb
Why then, O brawling love!
O loving hate! O anything, of nothing first great!
（W. Shakespeare）
Many are brash, but few are brave.
练习十六 （Exercise Sixteen）
I. Preview Questions:
1. Is the figure “Contrast” used to intensify differences or similarities?
2. Does Parallelism require that elements in the figure must be parallel in structure?
3. Antithesis can be regarded as a combination of Contrast and Parallelism that the elements of the figure are parallel in structure and contrastive in meaning. Do you agree with this statement?
4. Can you tell Contrast from Comparison in use?
5. What does a Balanced Sentence refer to?
6. Can you tell how to avoid Faulty Parallel Structures?
7. Can you cite examples to indicate how Antithesis is used with other figures of speech?
II. Identify what figures of speech are used in the following:
1. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flame of withering injustice.
（Martin Luther King, Jr.）
2. It is certain that if you were to behold the whole woman, there is that dignity in her aspect, that composure in her motion, that complacency in her manner, that if her form makes you hope, her merit makes you fear.
（Richard Steele）
3. To complain of the age we live in, to murmur at the present possessors of power, to lament the past, to conceive extravagant hopes of the future, are the common dispositions of the greatest part of mankind.
（Edmund Burke）
4. Maintain its independence, uphold its constitution, preserve its union, defend its liberty, let it stand before the world in its original strength and beauty, securing peace, order, equality and freedom to all within its boundaries, and shedding light and hope and joy upon the pathway of human liberty, and Washington needs no other monument.
（Robert C. Winthrop）
5. My only love sprung from my only hate.
Too early seen unknown, and know too late.
（Shakespeare）
6. Let us be ruthless in our criticism, cruel to personal vanities, indifferent to age, rank or experience if these stand in our way. Let all theories be subjected to the bright clear light of practice.
（Norman Bethune）
III. Identify faulty elements in the following and revise them:
1. These books are not primarily for reading, but they are used for reference.
2. Gary is not a good track man, and neither is his swimming.
3. We used to root for the Indians against the cavalry, because we didn't think it was fair in the history books that the cavalry's winning was a great victory, and when the Indians won it was a massacre.
4. When you know a thing, to hold that you know it, and when you do not know it, admit that you do not — this is true knowledge.
5. To know that we know what we know, and we do not know what we do not know, that is true knowledge.
6. Anaheim's recently rebuilt Fantasyland once looked like a cartoon collage; now the Tudor buildings make it resemble a small village. （Change some words in one of the clauses so that it is parallel in structure to the other.）
IV. Read the following statements and comment them with examples:
1. Antithesis is a figure which assumes a balanced structure and emphasizes a contrast in meaning by arranging antonymous elements （words, phrases, clauses, etc） in parallel construction, generally for a tuneful rhythm and wisdom of brevity.
2. “Contrast” points out difference;“compare to” points out likenesses; “compare with” does both. In the figure of Contrast, opposite ideas are expressed by structures which are different to each other （or one another.）
3. In rhetorical parallelism, the writer uses similar structures in separate sentences to express related ideas. The parallel sentences may occur one after the other, or they may be separated by other sentences or by whole paragraphs. Like rhetorical questions, Parallelism is common in argumentation and persuasion because it can help the writer emphasize important points.
4. Balanced constructions have similar form and function and approximately equal length, and they usually occur in the same sentence — occasionally in successive ones. Unlike parallel constructions, however, elements in balanced constructions do not necessarily relate grammatically to the same thing. Balanced elements may be played against one another, sometimes repeating the same idea, sometimes expressing contrasting ideas. When the contrast is sharply pointed it is called Antithesis: antithetical constructions are simply balanced phrases or clauses expressing opposed ideas.
第十七章 ALLITERATION, ASSONANCE, CONSONANCE 等韵格
17.1 几种主要韵格的含义与形式
17.1A Alliteration
1） Alliteration汉译“头韵”，指一组词，一句话或一行诗中重复出现开头音相同的单词。例如：
Promise, Problem and Provision
