Language of Dominance, Language of Resistance: Cersei Lannister’s and Arya Stark’s Discursive Strategies Compared

Abstract

Fictional dialogue contains evidence about the conversational and rhetorical strategies that contribute to characterisation and plot development. Through their words, fictional characters not only create their identities, but also express the set of values they are meant to represent, since dialogues are constructed following the conventions of the community that produces and forms the audience of the fictional product. This paper analyses utterances and dialogue sequences by Cersei Lannister and Arya Stark, with a special attention to how they engage with their gender and related issues, showing the differences and similarities between these two iconic female characters.

1 Introduction

Research on the representation of gender in the very successful Game of Thrones TV series has been intense in recent years, although not necessarily from a linguistic viewpoint. The present paper attempts a step in this direction, by taking a pragma-linguistic perspective to look at the ways in which two central female characters in the series, Cersei Lannister and Arya Stark, construct their identity and their stance through language, particularly in relation to their gender.

Studies within gender theory have given considerable attention to these two characters, identifying Cersei as the archetype of the Smothering Mother and Arya as the Virgin Warrior (Frankel 2014, p. 38). A comparison with the book series by R.R. Martin shows that, in the TV series, Cersei is portrayed as more motherly, although she is still very oppressive with her children. Conversely, Arya is presented as the opposite of the chivalric heroine in being rather a tomboy, a feature that is even more apparent in the series than in the books (Jones 2012).

As impersonations of femininity, the two characters have quite different relations to their gender. It must be noted that Arya never rejects being female but, on the contrary, she stresses it, although ironically she will have to take on a male identity in order to advance (Frankel 2014), and she performs sarcasm on female stereotypical skills (for instance, fencing is referred to as “dancing” and her sword will be called “Needle”). Cersei, conversely, has been seen as the stereotype of the femme fatale who does not take up arms, like Arya, but resorts to mixing flattery, seduction and threat in order to gain power (Frenkel 2014, p. 88–91). She does not claim the right to do everything that men do, even though she complains about being condemned, as a female, to a less active role. They also show “masculine” features in their personalities and behaviour, which can be studied by looking at their language.

Fictional dialogue is very different from spontaneous conversation, but it is still constructed in such a way as to evoke the conversational norms that the speech community (in this case authors/screenplay writers and audience) can relate to and interpret. This leads to the audience developing the intended understanding about characters and dialogue dynamics well beyond the actual words pronounced (Culpeper and Kytö 2010, p. 8–9; Kytö 2010, p. 48–50). Pragmatics is the branch of linguistics that studies the ways in which speaker intentions and non-explicit statements are conveyed indirectly, and is therefore the most promising approach for the study of fictional dialogue. Paralinguistic signals, such as intonation, as well as proxemic signals, such as facial expressions and gestures, also play a role, but language is paramount in establishing characterisation and triggering certain inferences and expectations in the audience.

In this analysis, tools from Conversation Analysis, Politeness Theory and Impoliteness Theory, and marginally gender linguistics, will be used to look at how the two characters convey their attitudes towards gender and how they reveal their personalities. Briefly said, Conversation Analysis claims that there are typical ways in which a community organises conversational exchanges. Deviations from these types, e.g. replying to a question with an irrelevant statement or another question, rather than with an appropriate answer, or opposing a refusal to an imperative rather than complying, are encoded as dispreferred responses, and allow the interlocutor to draw conclusions about the speaker’s attitudes and intentions (Schegloff 2007).

Politeness Theory (Brown and Levinson 1987) studies the way in which social relations are encoded in language use, e.g. through the use of respectful terms of address vs. insults; the latter, as well as other speech acts such as contradicting or threatening, are considered attacks to the interlocutor’s “face” or social needs, and are thus indicative of a conflictive relation. As a later development, Impoliteness Theory was formulated (Culpeper 2011) to cater for the description of the active performing of face-threatening acts, not just as dispreferred responses but as a system to initiate and activate conflicts.

Traditionally, gender linguistics considers the language of women as containing more hedging or mitigation of statements, and as stressing support rather than conflict in interaction. Standard research (Lakoff 2004) has however shown that this is not a general rule, at least in the English-speaking world, and that women tend more and more to employ what once were considered to be typically “masculine” interactive strategies. A further model that can be useful is the notion of conversational power or interactive dominance, which is revealed in setting the conversational agenda, also through topic management (Locher 2004), thus leading to the expectation that the interlocutor’s arguments will not be accepted or that they will be interrupted or diverted.

The particular features of the characters investigated in this paper that are considered typically masculine are independence in thinking or action and acting as a leader (Zare 2019), linguistically reflected in the use of refusals to comply, contradictions, straight imperatives, as well as in the use of insults, direct threats and other face-threatening speech acts.¹ Previous research in the subfields mentioned lead to the following expectations: for Cersei, we expect higher assertiveness, use of threats and evasion, lack of hedges. For Arya, we also expect assertiveness, especially when it comes to prototypically gendered discourse, which she rejects, and a stressing of freedom, also at the linguistic level, including refusals to comply.

2 The Linguistic Establishment of Identity and Characterisation

As a first step, it can be interesting to see how the two characters are first presented in their own words, i.e. what are the scenes in which the characters speak for the first time and how their words contribute to their introductory characterisation, starting with Arya.

Arya’s actions show rebellion to stereotypes from the initial scenes of the first episode: she is impatient about having to engage in embroidery and she’s attracted to military practice, later she takes the shot away from her brother Bran during archery practice and then she literally pushes her way among her siblings to meet the king and queen. Furthermore, she snubs or ignores politeness conventions conventions by asking twice “Where’s the Imp?” when referring to the queen’s brother and she often receives scandalized reproaches for “misbehaving”, especially in contrast to Sansa’s vanity and meekness.

A scene in the second episode is the real first example of rebellion, in the sense of rejecting a stereotypical role but accepting, indeed embracing, her own identity:²

1 Arya: Thank you, Nymeria. Septa Mordane says I have to do it again. “My things weren’t properly

2 folded”, she says. Who cares how they’re folded?! They’re going to get all messed up anyway.

…

3 Jon: I have something for you. And it has to be packed very carefully.

4 Arya: A present?

5 Jon: Close the door. This is no toy. Be careful you don’t cut yourself.…

6 Jon: First lesson: Stick them with the pointy end.

7 Arya: I know which end to use.

8 Jon: I’m going to miss you… Careful… All the best swords have names, you know.

9 Arya: Sansa can keep her sewing needles. I’ve got a needle of my own. (GoT, S01E02, 14:30–16:35)

This is followed by a similar, but linguistically stronger case, when Arya’s wolf is accused of having attacked Joffrey. Arya denies all accusations emphatically, uttering the face-threatening epithet “Liar!” eight times in the space of one minute (GoT, S01E02, 50:03–25). This insistence on truth vs. lies will remain a typical feature in Arya’s utterances, especially the face-threatening and challenging ones, throughout the series.³

Rebellion will also continue to be a typical feature, but it is not expressed as a rejection of her femininity, but rather of the conventional gender role assigned to females of her social status, as exemplified below (in all examples, line 3 contains the most significant utterances) with exchanges occurring in various episodes of the first season.

1 Eddard Stark: Give it to me. I know this maker’s mark. This is Mikken’s work. Where did you get this? This is

2 no toy. Little ladies shouldn’t play with swords.

3 Arya: I wasn’t playing. And I don’t want to be a lady. (GoT, S01E03, 14:30–37)

1 Syrio: … Nine years Syrio Forel was first sword to the Sealord of Braavos. He knows these things. You

2 must listen to me, boy.

3 Arya: I’m a girl.

4 Syrio: Boy, girl… You are a sword, that is all. That is the grip. You are not holding a battle-axe. You are

5 holding…

6 Arya: A needle.

7 Syrio: Ahhh… Just so. Now we will begin the dance. Remember, child, this is not the dance of the

8 Westeros we are learning… (id., S01E03, 53:25–55:42)

1 Eddard: No. But someday he could be Lord of a holdfast or sit on the King’s Council. Or he might raise

2 castles like Brandon the Builder.

3 Arya: Can I be Lord of a holdfast?

4 Eddard: You will marry a high Lord and rule his castle. And your sons shall be knights and princes and

5 lords.

6 Arya: No. That’s not me. (GoT, S01E04, 26:25–43)

The last excerpt is particularly interesting because line 6, “that’s not me”, will be repeated in a practically identical form and in a similar context towards the very end of the series, as we will see in Sect. 4. This utterance shows that Arya has some identity features she is well aware of already at an early age, and that she is also aware of the fact that these features differ from the common expectations connected to her gender and social level. Although reactions from other characters to this type of attitude are not the focus of the paper, it can be noted that Syrio accepts the gender-related statement and considers it ultimately irrelevant (at line 4, and then when he switches to the neutral term of address “child” at line 7). Conversely, Lord Eddard Stark, who represents traditional values, albeit in a positive way, reiterates the privileges of the male sex by using masculine gender throughout (lines 1–2 and 4), thus reaffirming a subaltern role for Arya, which she rejects at line 6.

This attitude will be reiterated until the end of the first season, when in a certain way Arya has to accept becoming the boy she claims not to be (see this progression in the examples below), while in the next seasons she will progressively have to become “no one” and take on different identities before being able to regain her own.

1 Yoren: Yoren, if it please. This must be your son. He has the look.

2 Arya Stark: I’m a girl! (GoT, S01E05, 27:35)

1 Yoren: Keep your mouth shut, boy. (takes out a knife)

2 Arya: l’m not a boy!

…

Elsewhere in King’s Landing, Yoren is taking Arya to safety, away from the city.

3 Yoren: You’re Arry now, hear me? Arry the orphan boy. No one asks an orphan too many questions, ‘cause

4 nobody gives three shits. What’s your name?

5 Arya: Arry. (GoT, S01E10, 2:30–35, 39:50–40:00)

With Cersei, things are more ambiguous—while one of her first significant utterances and portrayed actions is encouraging Jaime to kill Bran, in the second episode we get a glimpse of her motherly feelings (it will soon be revealed just how intense but also toxic these are), when she tells Catelyn Stark about her lost child. The predominance of ambition, and the power orientation of her type of motherhood is soon visible, e.g. in the example below, when she pushes her son Joffrey towards Sansa, at first by persuasion (lines 2–5), with a mixture of flattery and threat, and then counters a refusal with a direct command (line 7). This is followed by a session of training in ruling, concluded by the statement at line 11, “Everyone who isn’t us is an enemy”, which further reveals her possessive, exclusive concept of “family”.

1 Joffrey: Do I have to marry her

2 Cersei: Yes. She’s very beautiful and young. If you don’t like her, you only need to see her on formal

3 occasions and when the time comes, to make little princes and princesses. And if you’d rather fuck painted

4 whores, you’ll fuck painted whores. And if you’d rather lie with noble virgins, so be it. You are my darling boy

5 and the world will be exactly as you want it to be. Do something nice for the Stark girl.

6 Joffrey: I don’t want to.

7 Cersei: No, but you will. The occasional kindness will spare you all sorts of trouble down the road.

8 Joffrey: We allow the northerners too much power. They consider themselves our equals.

9 Cersei: How would you handle them?

…

10 Joffrey: So you agree… The Starks are enemies?

11 Cersei: Everyone who isn’t us is an enemy. (GoT, S01E03, 10:54–11:05, 12:15)

These strategies will continue to be predominant, alternating terms of endearment and coaxing with aggressive outbursts, accusations and cynical, direct, brutal imperatives, as the example below shows. Both with Janos and with Tyrion, Cersei marks her assertiveness through rhetorical questions (lines 1, 3 and 19), direct imperatives (lines 5 and 11) and plain statements that are aimed at reinforcing her point without directly addressing objections (lines 8, 17, 21) or denying her responsibilities (lines 13, 15). By blocking the interlocutor’s arguments with her rejecting conversational moves, particularly refusals and denials, and with her counter-moves, she is able to assert her conversational dominance and, at least temporarily, win the argument, as Tyrion’s flat repetition of her last statement shows.

1 Cersei: You command the City Watch, do you not, Lord Slynt?

2 Janos: I do, Your Grace.

3 Cersei: And are you not a Lord at my command?

4 Janos: I owe my title and lands to your generosity, Your Grace.

5 Cersei: Then do your job. Shut the gates to the peasants. They belong in the field, not our capital.

6 Janos: Yes, Your Grace.…

7 Tyrion: Yes., well, I, do believe the Hand of the King is welcome at all small council meetings.

8 Cersei: Our father is Hand of the King.

9 Tyrion: Yes, but in his absence…

Tyrion pulls out a letter. He hands it to Varys, who opens it, and begins reading it.

10 Varys: Your father has named Lord Tyrion to serve as Hand in his stead while he fights –

11 Cersei: Out! All of you out. …. I would like to know how you tricked father into this.

12 Tyrion: If I were capable of tricking father, I’d be emperor of the world by now. You brought this on yourself. …

13 Cersei: I’ve done nothing.

14 Tyrion: Quite right. You did nothing when your son called for Ned Stark’s head. Now the entire North has risen up against us.

15 Cersei: I tried to stop it.

16 Tyrion: Did you? You failed. That bit of theater will haunt our family for a generation.

17 Cersei: Robb Stark is a child.

18 Tyrion: Who’s won every battle he’s fought. Do you understand we’re losing the war?

19 Cersei: What do you know about warfare?

20 Tyrion: Nothing. But I know people. And I know that our enemies hate each other almost as much as they hate us.

There is a long pause. Cersei looks over at Tyrion.

21 Cersei: Joffrey is King.

22 Tyrion: Joffrey is King. (GoT, S02E01, 7:03–9:16)

Cersei also shows resistance when she has to accept imposition from others, as in the case of Myrcella’s departure in S02E03, where the rebellion is against the subaltern role connected with femininity, with comparison with herself (line 2), and is reflected by the uttering of threats (lines 2 and 8) and outright refusals (lines 11 and 13).

1 Tyrion: Myrcella’s a princess. Some would say she was born for this.

2 Cersei: I will not let you ship her off to Dorne as I was shipped off to Robert Baratheon.

3 Tyrion: Dorne is the safest place for her.

4 Cersei: Are you mad? The Martells loathe us.

5 Tyrion: That’s why we need to seduce them. We’re going to need their support in the war your son started.

6 Cersei: She’ll be a hostage.

7 Tyrion: A guest.

8 Cersei: You won’t get away with this. You think the piece of paper Father gave you keeps you safe. Ned Stark

9 had a piece of paper, too.

10 Tyrion: It’s done, Cersei.

11 Cersei: No.

12 Tyrion: You cannot stop it.

CERSEI sweeps glassware from the table in frustration. It hits the floor and shatters

13 Cersei: No! (GoT, S02E03, 33:45–34:40)

The second season shows, for both characters, an intensification of the above-mentioned rhetorical strategies. We again see Arya not rejecting her gender, as shown in the next example, but rather setting herself apart from a female prototype, stressing the fact that she is alternative to the commonly accepted model, as in the second example below.

1 Jaqen: A girl keeps her mouth closed. No one hears, and friends may talk in secret, yes? A boy becomes a girl.

2 Arya: I was always a girl. (GoT, S02E05, 23:31)

1 Tywin: Aren’t most girls more interested in the pretty maidens from the songs? …

2 Arya: Most girls are idiots. (GoT, S02E07, 13:32–39)

Cersei will also define her rhetorical strategies better after the first season, on the one hand by stressing feminine and motherly bonds whenever it is convenient for her manipulation, portraying herself as a victim (see the example below, lines 3–4), on the other hand by using rhetorical questions and sarcasm (line 10, “so very touching”) to exert conversational dominance. Further examples of these strategies can be found at S02E07, 47:08–48 and at S03E05, 16:06–45, confirming the recurrence of these rhetorical devices in Cersei’s speech.

1 Sansa: His Grace was not with you?

2 Cersei: Robert was hunting. That was his custom. Whenever my time was near, my royal husband would flee to

3 the trees with his huntsmen and his hounds. And when he returned, he would present me with some pelts or

4 a stag’s head, and I would present him with a baby. Not that I wanted him there, mind you. I had Grand

5 Maester Pycelle, an army of midwives, and I had my brother. When they told Jaime he wasn’t allowed in the

6 birthing room, he smiled and asked which one of them proposed to keep him out. Joffrey will show you no such

7 devotion.

SANSA looks down

8 Cersei: You may never love the king, but you will love his children.

9 Sansa: I love His Grace with all my heart.

10 Cersei: That’s so very touching to hear. Permit me to share some womanly wisdom with you on this very

11 special day. The more people you love, the weaker you are. You’ll do things for them that you know you

12 shouldn’t do. You’ll act the fool to make them happy, to keep them safe. Love no one but your children. On

13 that front, a mother has no choice. (GoT, S02E07,30:58–31:50)

So far, we have emphasised the different paths through which the two characters construct their linguistic identities. There are, however, also similarities between Arya’s and Cersei’s linguistic strategies, which are briefly mentioned in the next section.

3 Similarities and Differences in Linguistic Characterisation

In spite of their playing such different roles in the plot, Cersei and Arya also share some linguistic actions, as was expected in connection with their “masculine” traits, as claimed in the Introduction. This can be seen in the ways in which they directly refer to their gender and related issues, for instance complaining about the disparity of treatment between boys and girls, with the difference that Cersei learns to use her stereotypical role (see first example below), while Arya rejects it. Cersei resents not having the power of being male (see second example below), while Arya flatly rejects the relevance of the topic, as in the third example below, where she firmly refuses to accept that her reasoning, her opinion and judgement may be measured on the fact that she is a girl. Notice that, in both the second and the third examples, the undermining of stereotypes is mostly performed through rhetorical questions.

1 Cersei: When we were young, Jaime and I, we looked so much alike even our father couldn’t tell us apart

2 I could never understand why they treated us differently. Jaime was taught to fight with sword and lance

3 and mace, and I was taught to smile and sing and please. He was heir to Casterly Rock, and I was sold to

4 some stranger like a horse to be ridden whenever he desired.

5 Sansa: You were Robert’s queen.

6 Cersei: And you will be Joffrey’s. Enjoy. I don’t think I know this one.

CERSEI walks over to SHAE.

7 Cersei: Pretty.

SHAE rises and curties.

8 Cersei: That’s the worst curtsy I’ve ever seen. Here, it’s not difficult. I mastered it when I was four.

9 Straighten your back and bend. (GoT, S02E09, 34:26–47)

1 Tywin: You’re still here.

2 Cersei: Yes.

3 Tywin: Why?

4 Cersei: Did it ever occur to you that I might be the one who deserves your confidence and your trust, not

5 your sons? Not Jaime or Tyrion, but me. Years and years of lectures on family and legacy – the same lecture,

6 really, just with tiny, tedious variations – did it ever occur to you that your daughter might be the only one

7 listening to them? Living by them? That she might have the most to contribute to your legacy that you

8 love so much more than your actual children? (GoT, S03E04, 26:20–50)

1 Arya: I don’t like that woman.

MELISANDRE, THOROS, and BERIC approach.

2 Anguy: That’s cause you’re a girl.

3 Gendry: (laughs)

4 Arya: What does that have to do with anything? (GoT, S03E06, 18:30–34)

The use of rhetorical questions as well as that of sarcarsm constitutes significant similarities between the two characters. Rhetorical questions, in particular, are extremely frequent in Cersei’s speech, but Arya also uses them, especially in her interaction with the Hound in season 4, as can be seen in the two examples below. Both strategies are typical of Impoliteness (Culpeper 2011, p. 165–169), a system of established verbal practices through which the interlocutor’s face can be threatened.

Both of these strategies appeal to the pragmatic competence of the interlocutor (and, in the case of fictional dialogue, that of the audience). Both of them are also examples of indirect communication, in which the opposite of what is said is conveyed (in sarcasm, which is a form of irony and therefore relies on meaning reversal) or a speech act is not performed genuinely (in rhetorical questions, which are not to be interpreted as “real” questions). In the first example, the Hound is ironic towards Arya, who replies in the same tone but adds an insult at line 2, and also counters his rhetorical questions (lines 3–4) with her own, the first two also insulting (lines 7, 9, 11). In the second example, she uses this strategy again (line 7), but also uses straight contradiction and refusal to comply (lines 1, 3, 9) in the same flat and direct manner that is also typical for Cersei.

1 Hound: The little lady wants a pony.

2 Arya: The little lady wants away from your stench.

3 Hound: Horses aren’t easy to come by. Even if they were, you think I’m gonna put you on your own horse?

4 Watch the only thing of value I’ve got in the world ride away?

5 Arya: Why don’t you have any money? Didn’t you steal anything from Joffrey before you left?

6 Hound: No.

7 Arya: You’re not very smart, are you?

8 Hound: I’m not a thief.

9 Arya: You’re fine with murdering little boys, but thieving is beneath you?

10 Hound: A man’s got to have a code.

11 Arya: You think I’m gonna escape? Where would I go? I’d be dead by nightfall without you. My family’s

12 gone. I’ve got no one. (GoT, S04E01, 49:10–45).

1 Arya: No one’s going to kill me.

2 Hound: They will if you dance around like that. That’s no way to fight.

3 Arya: It’s not fighting. It’s water dancing.

4 Hound: Dancing? Maybe you ought to put on a dress. Who taught you that shite? …

5 Arya: The greatest swordsman who ever lived. Syrio Forel, the First Sword to the Sealord of Braavos.

6 Hound: Braavos. (SCOFFS) Greasy-haired little bastard, I bet. They all are.

7 Arya: What do you know about anything?

8 Hound: I bet his hair is greasier than Joffrey’s cunt.

9 Arya: It was not. (GoT, S04E05, 28:24–52)

Challenging authority thus remains one of the main features in Arya’s speech, while for Cersei, as the seasons pass and she becomes more and more bitter, dismissal and direct exertion of power through imperatives become more frequent, although rhetorical questions and sarcasm continue to be central. Refusing to comply with a directive speech act remain very frequent for both, as confirmed by examples such as the one below.

1 Tywin: Not another word. We’ve been over this, the matter’s closed.

2 Cersei: I’m opening it again.

3 Tywin: You are betrothed to Loras Tyrell. Still betrothed to Loras Tyrell and you will marry Loras Tyrell as

4 soon as Tommen marries Margaery.

5 Cersei: I will not. (GoT, S04E10, 15:15–22)

It must be noted, however, that Arya’s refusals, exemplified above, are directed at her captor, but also, as mentioned in Sect. 2, at her father and at Jon. Although they are very different in their ideologies and stance, both Cersei and Arya reject being pushed into conventional roles, even when conveyed by authoritative family members. It must be kept in mind, however, that the father-daughter relations are constructed in very different ways for the two characters, not least because of Arya’s very young age at the time of their portrayed interactions, and thus the comparison cannot be carried too far.

4 Conclusion: Arya’s and Cersei’s Last Words

This brief conclusion looks at the ways in which Cersei and Arya take their leave as characters. Do they show substantial changes in their linguistic characterisation, as they do in other respects,⁴ or do they show consistency in their linguistic selves, so to speak? The very last seasons show some divergence, revealing that, while Cersei remains true to herself by reiterating her rhetoric almost until the very end,⁵ Arya comes to terms with herself by showing that she has matured, overcoming her phase of “being no one”. She does this by advocating her role and coming to terms with the more stereotypical version of herself that she could have been but never was or wanted to be (see first and second examples), in order to be true to her nature and personality (see third example).

1 Arya [to Sansa]: We both wanted to be other people when we were younger. You wanted to be a queen. To sit

2 next to a handsome young king on the Iron Throne. I wanted to be a knight, to pick up a sword like father

3 and go off to battle. Neither of us got to be the other person, did we? The world doesn’t just let girls decide

4 what they are going to be. But I can now. With the faces I can choose.

…

5 I can even become you.

…

6 I wonder what it would feel like to wear those pretty dresses. To be the Lady of Winterfell. All I’d need to

7 find out is your face. (GoT, S07E06, 1:03:33–1:04:45)

1 Arya: I was never going to be as good a lady as you. So I had to be something else. I never could have

2 survived what you survived. (GoT, S07E07, 1:12:53–1:13:04)

1 Arya: I’m not a lady. I’ve never been, that’s not me. (GoT, S08E04, 22:00–05)

Cersei’s consistency is also reflected in manipulative emotional exploitation, alternatively playing on motherhood and seduction until the end, while Arya’s consistency (and here comes the repetition of a line from S. 01, “that’s not me”, in the third example) is the consequence of changing identity and roles several times. Cersei is not truly changed by loss, ordeals, tragedies, and thus remains trapped in herself, while Arya progresses to become the independent, free-thinking individual she started to be as a child.

The observation of recurrent linguistic patterns can thus be helpful in gaining a deeper understanding of the characters and of their interaction with others. Screenplay writers count on the fact that the audience of the series will share the same pragmatic “rules” of interpretation and will thus be able to decode the intentions and stance of the characters through, but also beyond, their words. A pragma-linguistic approach can thus deepen our understanding of fictional dialogue and of how it contributes to the plot and to the development of individual characters.