Repetition as a Persuasive Tool in Stylistics and Rhetoric

The current paper attempts to analyze repetition as a persuasive device in stylistics and rhetoric. This paper aims at showing the role and function of repetition as a stylistic and rhetoric device used for persuasive effect in Fitzgerald‟ novel: The Great Gatsby. Repetition is the recurring of one or several identical items in oral conversation or speech by a speaker and in a written text by the writer. In literary text, repetition is classified into many kinds considering its function, fulfillment, performance. Due to its persuasive purpose, repetition falls in different categories: anaphora, epiphora, anadipolsis, epanalepsis, and root repetition. Since it is a natural phenomenon that has a stylistic and rhetorical value, repetition has a wide application in writers' language. The present paper is arranged to deal with controversial matters such as identifying reasons for using repetition, the types and the structure of repetition in the text of The Great Gatsby novel, identifying the most pervasive category that is used as persuasive tool. It is hypothesized that Fitzgerald has employed different types of repetition as a persuasive strategy as a means of intensifying meaning through repeating the same items: structures, phrase, and words. The researcher uses a descriptive qualitative method of analysis of some randomly extracts chosen from Fitzgerald's novel: "The Great Gatsby" as stylistics and rhetoric text. Findings demonstrate that Fitzgerald depends on repetition to add force to the meaning of linguistic structures. In addition, different types of repetition are used to affect readers‟ emotion and repetition has been explored as a good means of achieving persuasion, creating a rhetoric and stylistics text.