What is a monologue in literature: examples

2024 Author: Leah Sherlock | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 05:25

What is a monologue in literature? This is a fairly important writing technique, with which you can clearly place accents, express your position, and demonstrate your convictions. Many writers use monologue in their writings to express their most cherished thoughts by putting them into the mouth of the hero.

Difference between monologue and dialogue

If people communicate together, this is a dialogue. If a person talks to himself - this is a monologue. This is a short description of the difference between dialogue and monologue.

But if you approach the issue academically, trying to figure out what a monologue is in literature, then this topic requires more substantive study. A monologue is a certain way of constructing artistic speech. It is, as a rule, a form of reflection, an assessment of certain actions or a person, a call for a particular action. The reader may agree or internally argue with the main character, but there is no opposition in the text itself.

Dialogue in a literary work involves a dispute or discussion, the interlocutors can either complement each other with their remarks, or express completely opposite views and ideas, trying to find the truth.

General patterns of the monologue

This stylistic device has been used by authors for a very long time. If you carefully study what a monologue in literature is and analyze a variety of works, you come to the conclusion that with all the variety of approaches there are common patterns.

No matter what literary works we take a monologue, its text will always obey certain rules:

1. This is the speech of a speaking person who does not expect an answer and does not imply objections, clarifications or additions. In fact, this is the internal manifesto of the protagonist.
2. Always the monologue is directed at the intended interlocutor. The hero mentally addresses either one person, or a group of people, or all of humanity.
3. This is not a way of communication, but rather a verbal self-expression. The hero, pronouncing a monologue, does not aim to communicate. His main task is to express his pain and express himself.
4. There are features in terms of style, what is a monologue. In the literature, it is a single speech fragment both in its structure and in its semantic load. If the dialogue consists of replicas, then it is possible to compose a monologue to make it beautiful and correct only from a single coherent text.

Own experiences and general idea

A variety of literary devices are used to build a monologue. The list of them is quite wide, but, as a rule, this is a speech in the first person, which has semantic completeness. In Griboedov's comedy"Woe from Wit" the main character - Chatsky - quite often resorts to monologues:

I won't come to my senses… I'm guilty, And I listen, I don't understand, As if they still want to explain to me. Confused by thoughts… expecting something.

This is the beginning of a monologue, which from the first lines characterizes the general mood of the hero - confusion, bewilderment, an attempt to find the truth. Further, the hero talks about human feelings, talks about deceit and his own delusions, and finally comes to the understanding that you need to escape from this society:

Get out of Moscow! I don't come here anymore.

I'm running, I won't look back, I'll go looking around the world, Where the offended feeling has a corner! -Carriage to me, carriage!

This monologue contains not only personal experiences. The author managed to compose a monologue so well that he put the main idea of the work into the mouth of the protagonist.

Stylistic tricks

The author always tries to ensure that the monologue, the test of which is very important for understanding the essence of the work, is written organically and justifiably. Well, he will not simply declare some values or ideas for no reason. Therefore, the approach to building a monologue is very serious. There are certain literary techniques, the list of which is known even to novice writers:

• The presence of pronouns, addresses and verbs of the 2nd person. Heroes often mentally refer to their imaginary interlocutor, sometimes just "you", sometimes even by name.
• Depending on the purpose of the monologue, its speech types are distinguished. It could bea story about an event, confession, reasoning, self-characterization, and so on.
• Authors often use a conversational style, use expressively colored vocabulary, sometimes even carry on an internal dialogue with the intended interlocutor.

Inner monologue

Monologue, the definition of which can be expressed briefly as a detailed statement of one person, can also be internal. This technique was first actively used by such writers as Marcel Proust and James Joyce.

The internal monologue in the literature is also called the stream of consciousness. It was first used by Proust in 1913 in the novel Toward Swann. And more thoroughly internal monologues began to be used by J. Joyce in the novel "Ulysses", which was published in 23 issues of an American magazine from 1918 to 1920. The stream of consciousness of the protagonist is built in the same way as an internal monologue with himself. A person dives into reality and mixes it with his inner experiences. An internal monologue, as a rule, describes the processes of thinking, conveys the subtlest movements of thoughts, and demonstrates feelings. Sometimes it's hard to separate reality from fiction, experience from fantasy.

The most famous monologues in world literature

Anton Chekhov mastered the art of monologue in his works. In the play "The Seagull" the heroine Masha utters a touching monologue, the text of which is dedicated to her future husband. The conflict is that he loves her, but she does not love him. Another hero of this play, Konstantin,talks aloud about his relationship with his mother. This monologue is sad and tender.

William Shakespeare often used monologues in his plays. In the play The Tempest, the hero Trinculo, who has an excellent sense of humor, delivers a passionate address. He tries to hide from the storm, interspersing his speech with such juicy details and funny twists that the reader is acutely aware of his disgust with reality.

Lermontov, Ostrovsky, Dostoyevsky, Tolstoy, Nabokov organically fit monologues into their works. Very often, the monologues of the main characters reflect the personal position of the author, which is why they are so valuable in the works.