Current Trends in Narrative Current Trends in Narrative Theory: International Theory: International

Perspectives Perspectives

April 29, 2008April 29, 2008

Conversational Conversational ThematicsThematics and Rhetorical Force in Narrative and Rhetorical Force in Narrative Fiction"Fiction"

AnnikenAnniken GreveGreveDepartment of Culture and LiteratureDepartment of Culture and Literature

Faculty of HumanitiesFaculty of HumanitiesUniversity of Tromso, NorwayUniversity of Tromso, Norwayanniken.greve@hum.uit.noanniken.greve@hum.uit.no

Unreliable Narration between Authors’ Intentions and Readers’ Cognitive Strategies

Current Trends in Narrative Theory:International Perspectives

Project Narrative, Ohio State UniversityApril 29, 2008

Per Krogh HansenUniversity of Southern Denmark

Wayne Booth:

“For lack of better terms, I have called a narrator reliable when he speaks for or acts in accordance with the norms of the work (which is to say, the implied author’s norms), unreliable when he does not. (Booth 1991 [1961]: 158f)”

Wayne Booth:

“For lack of better terms, I have called a narrator reliable when he speaks for or acts in accordance with the norms of the work (which is to say, the implied author’s norms), unreliable when he does not. (Booth 1991 [1961]: 158f)”

James Phelan, on unreliable narration:

“Narration in which the narrator’s reporting, reading (or interpreting), and/or regarding (or evaluating) are not in accord with the implied author’s.” (Phelan 2005: 219)

The rhetoricians… restricts the use of the

concept to fiction brings the reader’s role out of

focus

The rhetoricians… restricts the use of the

concept to fiction brings the reader’s role out of

focus

Unreliable narration is… more flexible than the

rhetoricians seem to acknowledge

primarily a diegetic issue historically and culturally

variable.

Implied author is… in general only relevant to

include if becoming visual as a narrative agent

Four forms of unreliable narration

Intranarrational unreliabilityInternarrational unreliabilityIntertextual unreliabilityExtratextual unreliability

Communication in unreliable narration

Implicit author

Stable Irony Reconstructive strategy

(Sedondary narrator/

character)Rejection ‘Proof-reading’

Author Character

Narrator Narration Narratee Reader

Approval ‘Misreading’

Omitted author

Unstable Irony

Constructive strategy

dreaming and narrative theory

Richard Walshtwo stages:

the case for viewing dreams as narrative, rather than hallucinatory experience

the consequences, if so, for narrative theory

two approaches not pursued

Dennett against dream experiences

Freud’s view of the dreamwork as representational discourse

dreams in the cognitive sciences

psychological accounts v. physiological accounts:

David Foulkes: operation of reflective consciousness in sleep

Alan Hobson: activation-synthesis model of sleeping brain states

restriction of the cognitive dimension of dreaming

Peirce and the percept as sign

dreams compared to memories

representational

narrative

percepts

dreampercept

s

memories

dreams

fictive

the relations between perceptions, memories and dreams

representational

narrative

percepts

dreampercept

s

memories

dreams

fictive

the relations between perceptions, memories and dreams

representational

narrative

percepts

dreampercept

s

memories

dreams

fictive

the relations between perceptions, memories and dreams

representational

narrative

percepts

dreampercepts memorie

s

dreams

fictive

the relations between perceptions, memories and dreams

representational

narrative

percepts

dreampercept

s

memories

dreams

fictive

the relations between perceptions, memories and dreams

the self in dreams

tension between the “I” who experiences dream events and the “I” who produces the dream

reflective consciousness in lucid dreaming

narrative immersion contrasted with immersion in a simulation

consequences for narrative theory

fictionality

narrativity

story and discourse

the narrator

voice

medium

narrative creativity

affective response

Distributed Cognition (Cog Sci Talk) Copes with the

Unsaturatable Context (Poststructuralist Talk)

Ellen SpolskyBar-Ilan University

Ellen SpolskyBar-Ilan University

Held and Hein’s cats

Pablo Picasso First StepsPablo Picasso First Steps

Dove’s nest in cactus

Pitcher

Picasso, Skull and Pitcher

Othello and Desdemona

Nimrud Lion Colossus

Current Trends in Narrative Current Trends in Narrative Theory: International Theory: International

Perspectives Perspectives

April 29, 2008April 29, 2008