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Από τον λόγο στο ύφος
Σταθοπούλου - Χριστοφέλη, Μαίρη
Human language in all its achievements is a sensuous and an intellectual form of expression. Even in highly developed languages, there is a language of emotions side by side with conceptual language. Reason alone is a very inadequate mean to express human culture in all its richness. This inherent feature of language becomes a starting point for style: the two sources of language —emotional and conceptual— have an unlimited variety in their connection, which serves the variation and originality of linguistic forms. The interrelation of language and thought is another fundamental characteristic of language, which may also be a starting point for style. From early Greek thought the relation between language and thought was a crucial problem. Plato complained of the inadequacy of language, since for him the words are only the first step of knowledge. In recent centuries the problem was approached from another angle. Linguists and philosophers of our times empasized the decisive influence that language has upon thought — although this idea is not so modern. Anyway one must bear in mind that language and thought are interde¬pendent and constantly stimulate, activate and influence each other; in their parallel development the inadequacies of language as much as its power upon thought is a challenge for man΄s creativity to go beyond his mental powers and build up a new spiritual reality expressed in new linquistic forms.
Academy of Athens
