The pragmatic and rhetorical function of perfect doubling in the work of D. V. Coornhert

Abstract

Abstract The Early Modern Dutch writer D. V. Coornhert (1522–1590) was an influential figure in the key religious and linguistic developments of his times. Bringing together these two facets and combining both a linguistic (pragmatics/discourse studies and semantics) and a literary studies (rhetoric) approach, this intra-author variation study examines Coornhert’s use of have-doubling constructions (e.g., have had written) alongside simple perfects (e.g., have written). At the macro-level, we show that have-doubling was restricted to Coornhert’s argumentative and predominantly moral – theological prose. At the micro-level, we then firstly link Coornhert’s have-doubling to the well-studied double perfect of modern German which has been proposed to signal the absence of current relevance and have emphasis functions. Secondly, connecting these observations with the pragmatics of verb – tense variation, this article proposes that have-doubling parallels the historical present in functioning as a stance marker/evaluative device in Coornhert’s moral – theological prose.