Ambiguity is sometimes used to describe unclear language. The word "good" is ambiguous, and can be unclear, as in someone saying that society needs "good" schools. What a "good" school is can be anyone's guess.
However, literary ambiguity can be very clear, and help readers understand a text on multiple levels, according to multiple definitions which all apply, and illuminate the author's intentions.
Definition of the Literary Technique: Ambiguity
Ambiguity refers to the multiple meanings in a word. For example, a sentence can mean a grammatical unit with a subject and a verb, or it can be the punishment for a crime. Writers who are looking to both condense and expand their writing often reach for the tool of ambiguity.
Example of the Literary Technique: Ambiguity
In William Shakespeare’s play Romeo and Juliet, one of Romeo’s friends Mercutio has a sense of humor, and often makes jokes. This quality remains with him up to the point when he is fatally stabbed by Juliet's cousin Tybalt, while trying to defend Romeo in Act III, Scene 1.
Romeo, at first thinking that Mercutio’s wound is not serious, says “Courage, man; the hurt cannot be much.”
Mercutio replies, “No, 'tis not so deep as a well, nor so wide as a church-door; but 'tis enough, 'twill serve: ask for me to-morrow, and you shall find me a grave man…”
Mercutio’s short speech is both an attempt at his characteristic humor and a rebuke to Romeo for belittling the wound. Mercutio agrees with Romeo that the wound doesn’t look big, but he informs Romeo that the wound is big enough to kill him.
The word “grave” has multiple meanings: one being a person without humor and the other being the place in the earth where a body is buried. Mercutio’s last joke lies in the ambiguity of the word “grave.” Both meanings will apply to Mercutio. His sense of humor will be gone, and he will be in his grave.
How Ambiguity Differs from a Pun
Mercutio in the example above is playing with the meaning of the word “grave,” and thus this speech is often given as an example of a pun. In the loose meaning of the word “pun” as a play on words, then this example will work.
However, a pun is more properly two different words that sound alike. In the children's joke, "What's the biggest pencil in the world?" "Pennsylvania," the pun is on two different words that sound alike.
In the speech by Mercutio, he is using the same word, "grave," with two different meanings that both apply. This technique gives the dialogue a greater richness, with a combination of condensing the speech and expanding the meaning.
For further discussion, please see "The Oxford English Dictionary and Literary Ambiguity."
References
Shakespeare, William. Romeo and Juliet. Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The Tech. Jeremy Hylton, ED.
Shakespeare in Love. Film. Mirimax. 1998. Starring Gwyneth Paltrow, Joseph Fiennes, Geoffrey Rush, Judi Dench, and Ben Affleck as Ned Alleyn, playing Mercutio.
Teresa Knudsen - Teresa's writing appears in the British Library, Harvard, Yale, and Princeton. Online she has written for USA Today and E How.
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