Chapter 17. Verbless sentences in L’Étranger

Abstract : What is aspectual meaning without a verb? Focusing on sentences in which the typical marker of aspectual meaning – the verb constellation – is absent, we use translations to explore the aspectual meaning pragmatically implicated by verbless sentences. Retrieved automatically, they were analyzed from a monolingual, parallel-text and third-language perspective. Semantic annotation for situation and viewpoint aspect showed that while states are an important correlate, verbless sentences are also found in contexts that call for the use of dynamic situations. English verbless sentences tend to implicate the French present simple and require an indexical relation to the situation of utterance. In spite of its high frequency in the novel, the French passé composé is excluded from the conversational implicature of Russian and English verbless sentences.