Nonce-words in Dr. Seuss’ “If I Ran the Zoo”

Abstract

The paper deals with one of the vivid manifestations of nonsense: nonce-words. Nonsense that can be considered both as a genre and as a literary device is thought to be the traditional benchmark of the English literature. However, it is widely used by authors from other countries as well. The paper is based on “If I Ran the Zoo” by the American children’s writer Theodor Geisel, or Dr. Seuss, who turns to nonsense and nonce-words to describe the world he creates in the book. In the paper theoretical background of nonce-words is presented. The authors divide nonce-words into major groups in accordance with their meaning and analyze them by their type (phonetic, lexical, semantic and mixed) and way of word-building (affixation, contamination, compounding, nonce-compounding, mixed way and nonsensical way of word-building). Examples of normal words that gained new meaning in the book are presented. At the end of the paper a conclusion about how verse allows the author to make up nonce-words freely and how it helps the author to make the reader understand that the world should not be limited by the rules is made.