Viewpoint and construction grammar: The case of past + now

Abstract

The combination of a past tense verb with a proximal deictic has been identified in the literature as one of the formal markings of free indirect style (Adamson, 1995). In this article, I examine corpus-derived, non-literary occurrences of the pattern, arguing that construction grammar can provide an adequate, all-encompassing framework for both literary and non-literary uses. Defined as conventional pairings of meaning and form, constructions can accommodate all kinds of semantic, pragmatic, discoursal and textual information as part of their meaning. In the case of the past + now pattern such specifications include a particular discourse or text type, namely narrative, which is the licensing context, and whose conventional association with the particular form constitutes precisely a distinct (discourse) construction. Within this constructional context, the past tense makes a predictable, compositional contribution while the present deictic suppresses part of its meaning signalling instead an anchoring to the current experience, thought, perception of the other. Where present, the progressive aspect enhances further this shift in perspective in a way fully consistent with its basic (non-truth conditional, cognitively defined) semantics. I attempt to show that a constructional approach to past + now may therefore pinpoint the source of the viewpoint effect associated with the pattern in all its uses, and illuminate the relationship of free indirect style with constructions of non-literary discourse.