Abstract：Wuthering Heights is the major work of Emily Bronte and it has many dialogues between characters. On one hand, these clever dialogues not only convey the theme of the novel, but also show the characters’ personalities. On the other hand, the dialogues also to some extent reflect the author’s views, which can help readers have a better understanding of Wuthering Heights. In order to help the readers better understand Wuthering Heights, this paper analyzes the conversational implicature of some typical dialogues from Wuthering Heights from the perspective of violation of Cooperative Principle. Conversational implicature is pruduced by violating the quantity maxim, the quality maxim, the relation maxim and the manner maxim.

Keywords:  Wuthering Heights  conversational implicature  Cooperative Principle    

Contents

Abstract

摘要

Chapter One  Introduction-1

1.1 Background of the Study-1

1.2 Significance of the Study-1

1.3 Structure of the Study-1

Chapter Two  Literature Review-2

2.1 A Brief Introduction of Wuthering Heights-2

2.2 Previous Studies on Wuthering Heights-2

Chapter Three  Cooperative Principle and Conversational Implicature-3

3.1 Cooperative Principle-3

3.1.1 Conversational Maxims-3

3.1.2 Violation of the Maxims-3

3.2 Conversational Implicature-5

3.2.1 Definition of Conversational Implicature-5

3.2.2 Classification of Conversational Implicature-5

3.2.3 Characteristics of Conversational Implicature-6

Chapter Four  Conversational Implicature in the Characters’ Dialogues of Wuthering Heights-8

4.1 Conversational Implicature Produced by the Violation of the Quantity Maxim-8

4.1.1 Understatement-8

4.1.2 Overstatement-8

4.2 Conversational Implicature Produced by the Violation of the Quality Maxim-9

4.3 Conversational Implicature Produced by the Violation of the Relation Maxim-10

4.4 Conversational Implicature Produced by the Violation of the Manner Maxim-10

Chapter Five  Conclusion-12

Reference-13