NARRATOLOGYG.M. Adhyanggono, S.S.,M.A.

The study of how narratives (stories) make meaning, and what the basic mechanisms and procedures are which are common to all acts of story-telling.

◦ Narratology ≠ the reading & interpretation of individual stories, but the attempt to study the nature of ‘story’ itself, as a concept and as a cultural practice.

Definition

Story/fabula/histoire◦ “The actual sequence as they happen; the

story has to begin at the beginning, then move chronologically without nothing left out.”

Plot/sjuzhet (pronounced ‘soojay’)/discourse/recit ◦ “A version of the story that can begin in the

middle of a chain of events, and that can also provide us with flash back and flash forward.”

Key words

Aristotle (Aristotelian analysis) Vladimir Propp (Proppian analysis) Gerard Genette (Genettian analysis)

Three main theories of Narratology

‘Character’ and ‘action’ are essential in a story. They must be revealed through elements of plot.

Three key elements in plot:◦ The hamartia

◦ sin, flaw that induces tragic flaw in tragedy◦ The anagnorisis

◦ ‘recognition’ or ‘realization’◦ appear when the truth of the situation is

recognized by the protagonist = a moment of self-recognition

◦ The peripeteia◦ ‘reversal’ of fortune or a ‘turn-round’

Aristotelian analysis

Proposes a 31- function that some of them may construct or form a tale.

Not a single tale/story has all functions. Yet, the order of the function is fixed

because events tend to have a due order. This method basically wants to show that

beside its ‘multiformity’ lies ‘a uniformity’. From 31-function, Propp classifies them

into “seven spheres of action” as roles, not the characters.

Proppian analysis

1. The villain2. The donor (provider)3. The helper4. The princess (a sought-for-person)

and her father5. The dispatcher6. The hero (seeker or victim)7. The false hero

Propp’s seven spheres of action

Gives weight more on how the story is told.

Proposes 6 areas:1. Is the basic narrative mode mimetic

or diegetic?◦ Mimetic – ‘dramatizing’/ ‘showing’ , with

direct speech and dialogue – slow telling◦ Diegetic – ‘panoramic’/ ‘summarizing’,

without trying to show it as it happens before our eyes – rapid telling

Genettian analysis

2. How is the narrative focalized?◦ Point of view:

External focalization – from outside, focus on what the characters say and do.e.g. Thelma stood up and called out to Mario.

Internal focalization – from inside, focus on what the characters feel & thinke.g. Thelma suddenly felt anxious that Mario was not going to see her and would walk by oblivious on the other side of the road.

Zero focalization – omniscient narration

Genettian analysis

3. Who is telling the story?◦ Covert/effaced/non-intrusive/non-

dramatized/authorial persona Not identified at all as a distinct character

with name or personal history, remains as a voice or tone – zerofocalized.

◦ Overt/dramatized/intrusive Heterodiegetic – one distinct character

telling others. Homodiegetic – one distinct character telling

himself/herself.

Genettian analysis

4. How is time handled in the story?◦ Flash back = analeptic◦ Flash forward = proleptic◦ Analeptic & proleptic rarely begin in the

beginning, usually in the middle (in medias res, a theory of the classical times)

Genettian analysis

5. How is the story packaged?

Genettian analysis

Frame/primary/ narrative

Embedded/secondary/meta/main narrative

Double-ended

Single-ended

Intrusive

6. How are speech and thought represented?

◦ Direct & tagged ‘What’s your name ?’ Mario asked her. ‘It’s

Thelma’, she replied.◦ Direct & untagged

‘What’s your name ?’‘Thelma’.

◦ Direct & selectively tagged ‘What’s your name ?’ asked Mario.

‘Thelma’.

Genettian analysis

◦ Tagged indirect speech He asked her what her name was, and she told

him it was Thelma.◦ Free indirect speech

What was her name? It was Thelma. Thelma, was it? Not the kind of name to launch a thousand ships. More of a suburban, lace-curtain sort of name, really.

Genettian analysis

1. They look at individual narratives seeking out the recurrent structures which are found within all narratives.

2. They focuses more on the teller and the telling; disregard the content.

3. They take categories derives mainly from the analysis of short narratives which are expanded later on novel-length narratives.

4. They foreground action and structure than character and motive.

What narratologists do