‘Narrative Theory’ is an online introduction to classical structuralist narratological analysis. This preliminary section provides an introduction to the notion of level of analysis in narrative, and examines a number of theories bearing on the structure of the fabula (Aristotle, Tomashevsky, Bal) and of the story (Genette), with attention to the…[Read more]

This paper puts forward a theory of literary writing as a practice of ideological transformation. The example analyzed is the representation of the sexes in George Eliot’s novel ‘The Mill on the Floss’, a representation which is intertextually mediated, metafictional, and transformative, rather than merely “realistic” or spontaneous. This view of…[Read more]

This note reflects on the deconstructivist critique of the “logocentric” nature of narratology, and puts forward a strategic cognitive use of narratological concepts and of deconstructive strategies which enables both approaches to work together.

This paper offers a metafictional reading of William Faulkner’s novel AS I LAY DYING (1930), a reading which goes beyond the usual mimetic interpretation of this novel as an exploration of the characters’ psychology. Faulkner’s writing also explores and allegorizes itself, through the creation of paradoxical narrative forms which carry out an…[Read more]

Plausibilität spielt in allen Wissenschaftskulturen eine gewichtige Rolle – ob implizit oder explizit. Auffällig ist jedoch, dass es keiner spezifisch geschulten Kompetenz oder der Vermittlung eigenständiger Fähigkeiten bedarf, um einen Sachverhalt als “plausibel” zu beurteilen, während bei verwandten Begriffen wie etwa “logisch” je nach den meth…[Read more]

Samuel Johnson’s philosophical novel ‘The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abyssinia’ deals with “the choice of life.” This phrase, which is emphasized several times throughout the novel, is also its shortest conceivable summary. The issue of that choice, however, is not clear. In spite of Johnson’s well-turned aphorisms, Rasselas’ choice of life…[Read more]

This book-length paper is a Brown University dissertation in American literature and literary theory. A theoretical analysis of the concept of authorial intention in narrative fiction, and of its structural and communicational implications, is followed by an in-depth examination of Stephen Crane’s novella ‘The Monster’ (1898) as a case study in…[Read more]

This paper derives from an M.A. dissertation on Stephen Crane (“Reading ‘The Monster’,” Brown University, 1989). It examines the critical reception of Stephen Crane’s story ‘The Monster,’ with a special focus on the issue of racial representation and on the way authorial intentions bearing on this issue are constructed by critics. The critical…[Read more]

Many recent critics of ‘The Faerie Queene’ have established an artificial distinction between the narrator of ‘The Faerie Queene’ and Spenser, one which posits an olympian detachment of the author from the work, and of both from the historical circumstances in which the work was written. An analysis of the poem reveals the limited sense in which a…[Read more]