Language is not merely its syntactic form as Chomsky suggested, but should be viewed holistically and taking other features into account. Both stylistics and iconicity are highlighting this issue.
When we say John gave Mary the book, it might imply John met Mary in person and handed the book over to her, while in the second sentence, John and Mary are distant from each other, "the book" is the first uttered lexical word, and usually emphasized, it certainly depicts how the text-creater thinks.
Similarly, in sentences He brought the wine to the table and He bought the table the wine,
wine could be brought as the direct object, but not the table, which might also cause confusion.
I am not sure about the difference between the third sentence-pairs John gave the fence a new coat of paint and John gave a new coat of paint to the fence . Maybe the writer want to express he made changes to the fence, so the word fence is placed before a new coat of paint, or maybe paint is something that cannot be given directly, but needs to go through certain process and using some tools. As a second language speaker, to tell the subtle differences between these kind of writing and appreciate great works in western literature is consequently a great challenge. Thanks to the knowledge acquired in this course, it is difficult but still possible, and in the future I can enjoy classics written in Chinese with fresh eyes.
Iconicity is a semiotic notion that refers to a natural resemblance or analogy between the form of a sign and the object or concept. The similarity between sign and object may be due to cpmmon features inherent in both: by direct inspection of the iconic sign we may glean true information about its object.
Iconicity is a semiotic notion that refers to a natural resemblance or analogy between the form of a sign and the object or concept. The similarity between sign and object may be due to cpmmon features inherent in both: by direct inspection of the iconic sign we may glean true information about its object.