For quite a long time, literary theory has been devoted to the temporal dimension of narrative. However, decades before the spatial turn in literary theory, two major critics, notably Mikhail Bakhtin and Jouri Lotman, have demonstrated that the spatial structures of the fictional world are fundamental to the production of meaning. Their reflections and contributions to the concept of space have enriched literary scholarship. For Bakhtin and Lotman, the organisation of fictional space is mirror-like in the vision of the world connected with it. The literary text – more than it faithfully recovers the spatial model from which reality is constructed – transforms and transposes it poetically. However, the approaches of the two theorists do not overlap. Lotman starts with the study of …show more content…
Bakhtin finds, in fact, that literature reveals, through its generic features, the spatiotemporal constellation or organisation that is specific to a certain historical epoch. The genre is based on chronotopes that Bakhtin defines as “the organizing centres for the fundamental narrative events of the novel [….] that to them belongs the meaning that shapes narrative” (Bakhtin 1981: 250). These chronotopes function as “primary means for materialising time in space” (Bakhtin 1981: 250). The chronotope allows the author to create entire worlds using the organising categories of the real world in which he lives. This means that the author makes sense of his time and transposes the world from which he comes into the narrative. In this respect, Roderick Beaton identifies the chronotope as “the distinctive configuration of time and space that defines ‘reality’ within the world of a text, as conceptualized within that world itself” (2000: 181; emphasis in original). Therefore, the Bakhtinian concept of the chronotope can be seen as the artistic-literary condensation of a "real"
This extract emphasises the lonely, outworld feeling that would have been felt living in such settings. This puts into perspective the feeling that will be felt during the coarse of the plot development.
Teresa De Lauretis defines the space-off as “spaces in the margins of hegemonic discourse, social spaces carved in the interstices of institutions and in the chinks and cracks of the power-knowledge apparati. And it is there that the terms of a different construction [...] can be posed (De Lauretis 232). This paper examines Angela Carter’s use of the space-off in “The Company of Wolves”. I begin by showing how Carter employs fairy tale convention in order to establish a fairy tale space, particularly in terms of gender norms and didacticism. I proceed to examine the ways in which she reveals aspects that are marginal to this space. Marginal, meaning that they exist peripherally, without supporting or contributing to the space, thus threatening the space and its place at the center, though they may never dismantle it. I finish by demonstrating how the elements come together in the creation of an alternative narrative.
Over the course of Kurt Vonnegut’s career, an unorthodox handling of time became one of many signature features in his fictional works (Allen 37). Despite The Sirens of Titan (1959) being only his second novel, this trademark is still prevalent. When delving into science fiction, it is often helpful to incorporate ideas from other works within the genre. This concept is exemplified by the “megatext,” an aspect of science fiction that involves the application of a reader’s own knowledge of the genre to a new encounter (Evans xiii). By working within the megatext, Ursula K. Le Guin’s The Dispossessed (1974) provides an insightful avenue in exploring the handling of time and its consequences in Vonnegut’s The Sirens of Titan.
...." Studies In The Literary Imagination 36.2 (2003): 61-70. MLA International Bibliography. Web. 6 Dec. 2013.
Schilb, John, and John Clifford. "Thematic Clusters of Literature." Making arguments about literature: a compact guide and anthology. Boston: Bedford/St. Martins, 2005. 273-279. Print.
Moretti, Franco. Atlas of European Novel 1800-1900. Theoretical Interlude II. Geography of Plot. New York/London. Verso. 1998. 70. Print. 6 March 2014.
...lves the confirmation of the boundaries of the social world through the sorting of things into good and bad categories. They enter the unconscious through the process of socialisation.’ Then, “the articulation of space and its conception is a reminder that time boundaries are inextricably connected to exclusionary practises which are defined in refusing to adhere to the separation of black experience.”
On Narrative and Narratives: II. New York: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1994-98. 503-26. Print. Vol. 3 of New York Literary History. 11 vols.
The main characteristic of the new literary form of the novel according to Ian Watt is "truth to individual experience" (4) and its new shape is created by a focus on the individual character. He is presented in a specific definition of time and space. The second section of this paper will show how far this is realized in both of the novels. In the third section I want to analyze the characters' individualism in connection with the claim to truth and their complexity in description.
It is noteworthy to be stated clearly at the outset of the present paper that literary theories are composed of a mere plethora of highly debatable ideas, concepts and assumptions. They are in other words, strikingly vague, opaque and of a typical flexibility. According to Wellek and Warren (1966, p. 30) }there are then, not only one or two but literally hundreds of independent, diverse, and mutually exclusive conceptions of literature, each of which is in some way right~. That is, the diversity of literary theories and even the contradiction between them sometimes, is something natural.
One particularly useful cross-disciplinary element employed in concrete poetry is the use of space. The poetry of Emmett Williams, Seiichi Nikuni, and Ilse and Pierre Garnier in particular, make use of spatial relationships in their poetry. The use of space can be employed in place of traditional grammar and syntax to convey meaning in concrete poetry, particularly when the spatial position of one element is taken into consideration with other elements of the poem. Another element that may arise from these spatial relationships is a temporal aspect that all poetry employs, but which becomes uniquely meaningful in the context of the concrete poetry of the twentieth century. Without these relationships concrete poems may appear as crude distortions of words on a page, with no significant sense or meaning to communicate. Therefore, the temporal/spatial relationships between poetic elements become necessary tools which the reader needs in order to fully understand the linguistically driven meaning behind many concrete poems.
“Books are the carriers of civilization” (ThinkExist, 2010, para. 1). The first part of a quote from Barbara W. Tuchman cannot be truer. It is why students study America’s classic novels to learn about the time period. Many authors intend writing for the future, while others just write for fun. They use literary techniques that are popular to the time period, making it obvious when the pieces were written. With the history, you also get the sentiment of the writer that only the novel can give you. The result of this is a great fusion between literature and history, and has its roots since the beginning of America.
Many of our today as “normal” considered values are everything but self-evident. One of the most striking aspects in the novel is time; and our relationship towards it. “ We yearned for the future. How did we learn it that talent for insatiability. ” In this particu...
“It was a new discovery to find that these stories were, after all, about our own lives, were not distant, that there was no past or future that all time is now-time, centred in the being.” (Pp39.)
History is no more confined to a monolithic collection of facts and their hegemonic interpretations but has found a prominent space in narratives. The recent surge in using narrative in contemporary history has given historical fiction a space in historiography. With Hayden White’s definition of history as a “verbal structure in the form of a narrative prose discourse” literature is perceived to be closer to historiography, in the present age (ix). History has regained acceptance and popularity in the guise of fiction, as signified by the rising status of historical fiction in the post colonial literary world.