The Language of "The Heyday of Dag" by Whitehead

First of all, I should say that it's quite difficult to analyze the language of Whitehead's characters (and not only his ones but all the characters in general) if you're not a native-speaker. Probably, sometimes I will be running away analogizing from the context of Russian people and my set of mind. But I'll try to keep to the point.
Before starting to speak about "The Heyday of Dag" I'd like to say that my course paper (which I'm going to defend after returning from the USA) is closely connected with language and culture. There I research English phraseology and try to find out the national and cultural specific features of English-speakers. And I must admit that with the help of phraseological units you can really make kind of image of a person. There are a lot of phrases and sayings which belong to one particular nation, to one culture. If you know them, you can learn many new things about this country or its people. I gave one example in my course paper: in Turkish language there is a phrase "to have cow's eyes" which means that a person is good-looking, with very beautiful eyes. However, if you're compared with a cow in Russia, your feelings are hurt.
So, I wanted to say that every nation has some set phrases that are understood only by this certain nation, by this country.
Almost the same thing I've noticed in the Whitehead's story. There was mentioned "the Rock": children used to tell to each other "I'll race you to the Rock", or the parents used it in their speech: "Don't go past the Rock". So, such geographical names used in the characters' speech have become a kind of set phrases which, in their turn, can give us quite important and useful information about one or another culture.
One more point that has immediately striken my eyes while reading this story was its informal style. And, to my mind, that was one of the major things which the author wanted to point out. But, maybe, I've misunderstood the story and I'm wrong.
There are a lot of...