Language and Characterisation

How do we construct an image of the characters we read about? Drawing together theories from linguistics social cognition and literary stylistics this is the first book-length study to focus on the role of language and characterisation in the dialogue of play texts. Containing numerous examples from Shakespeare's plays the book also considers a wide range of other genres including prose fiction verse films advertisements jokes and newspapers. <i>Language and Characterisation</i> is as practical as it is theoretical and equips readers with analytical frameworks to reveal and explain both the cognitive and the linguistic sides of characterisation.