Activating incomplete idiomatic expressions and semantic salience in "The Shadow of the Wind" by Carlos Ruiz Zafón,

Abstract

Activating incomplete idiomatic expressions and semantic salience in The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafón. Idiomatic expressions behave in different ways due to their morphological complexity, the rules of compositionality or non/compositionality governing them or the way meaning is inferred from them. In the novel The Shadow of the Wind, Carlos Ruiz Zafón experiments with the properties of these linguistic resources from precise lexical compounds whose components activate idiomatic expressions. The recovery of the idiomatic expression and its idiomatic meaning is possible by means of the semantic salience and contextual effects produced by the lexical units the text provides. In the article, this stylistic strategy is examined taking into account the mental processes involved in the identification of the modified expressions and the recovery of related idiomatic meanings, such as semantic salience or the relations with contextual components, as well as the relationships that come into play between the idiomatic expression and its context.