[lit-ideas] "I shall have an Augean stable to clean there" (Schuyler) --implicature embedded
- From: Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Wed, 24 Oct 2007 09:11:22 EDT
The Augean Stables (Or, How to Bed an Implicature)
"I shall have an Augean stable to clean there."
P. SCHUYLER (1775) in Sparks
Corr. Amer. Rev. (1853) I. 4,
"I shall have an Augean stable to clean there."
Thanks to John McCreery for the correction.
It all originated when Geary said he had 'a couple (_two?_) jobs' which will
take him like 'a _couple_ (two?) weeks.
This reminded me of Heracles and his 'labours' ('jobs' -- his twelve _odd_
jobs), including indeed the Augean stables.
Incidentally, Grice uses this example as a case of ... well, let me quote
him:
"The question which at this point particularly best me
was whether it is required that a conversational
impllicature should be given maximal scope."
"when a sentence which used in isolation
standardly carries a conversational implicature
p+>q
is EMBEDDED in a certain linguistic context, for
example appears within the scope of the negation
sign
~(p+>q)
must the embedding operator (~) be interpreted
only as governing not only the _sense_ portrayed
by the logical form, but also the conversational
implicature of the EMBEDDED sentence?"
"Only if an embedding operator (such as ~) may
on occasion be taken as governing not just
the _sense_ portrayed by the logical form, but
also the conversational implicature standardly
carried by the embedde sentence can my
first version of my account of 'the' and 'if' be made
to work."
"It certainly does not seem reasonable to subscribe
to an ABSOLUTE ban on the possibility that
an EMBEDDING locution may govern the standard
conversational implicature rather than the sense
conveyed by its logical form of the logical form."
"If a friend were to tell me that he had spent the
summer clearning the Augean stables, it would
be _unreasonable_ of me to respond that he
could not have been doing that since he spent
the summer in Seattle and the Augean stables
are not in Seattle". [but in Elis-on-Alpheos, Greece, where Augeias kept his
3,000 oxen]
"But where the limits of a license may lie which
allows us to relate embedding operators to
the standard implicature rather than to the sense
conveyed by the logical form, I have to admit that I
do not know."
So from what I understand, Grice is saying that if a friend says
(1) I have spent the summer cleaning the Augean stables.
the friend, unless he _is_ Heracles_ has to be interpreted as being engaged
in an 'engaging' (if I may repeat) _hyperbole_ -- i.e. where only the
conversational implicature (what the dictionary has as 'fig[urative]' has a
role
and totally overrides the sense and logical form which would include
something like
_a dyadic_ relation, "C" -- for 'clean'
a deictic reference to "I"
a definite description for 'the stables'
a marker for the plural in 'stables'
the proper-name behind 'Augean'
S(t1>t2 C(I, (i)stable-Augean), summer.
This _is_ processed, but in contrast with other implicatures where the
logical form is retained, it is here overriden by the implicature.
More on the logical form below, and thanks again to McCreery.
Perhaps someone may explain to me the 'implicature' behind the first
idiomatic use of this in the OED, by an American (?) uttered in 1775 -- one
year
before the Indepence.
Cheers,
J. L. Speranza
Buenos Aires, Argentina
-----
[f. L. <NOas, Gr. : see -AN]. Abominably filthy; i.e. resembling the stable
of Augeas, a fabulous king of Elis, which contained 3,000 oxen, and had been
uncleansed for 30 years, when Hercules, by turning the river Alpheus through
it, purified it in a single day.
1599 _MARSTON_
(http://0-dictionary.oed.com.csulib.ctstateu.edu/help/bib/oed2-m2.html#marston)
Sco. Villanie III. Proem 210
To purge this Augean oxstall from foule sinne.
1775 P. SCHUYLER in Sparks Corr. Amer. Rev. (1853) I. 4,
"I shall have an Augean stable to clean there."
1866 _ALGER_
(http://0-dictionary.oed.com.csulib.ctstateu.edu/help/bib/oed2-a.html#alger)
Solit. Nat. & Man IV. 389
"To cleanse the augean bosom of the world by turning through it a river of
pure enthusiasm."
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