ABSTRACTS
GENERAL NARRATOLOGY
Wolf Schmid (Hamburg, Germany)
Mind Representation in Prose Fiction
Abstract. The methods of mind representation are divided into explicit and implicit ones (working with the help of initial signs and symbols). The first category is divided into overt and covert representation. The article offers a new typology covering six types of mind representation. The implicit mind representation is demonstrated on the example of “Anna Karenina” and “Student”.
Key words: typology of mind representation; explicit and implicit representation; overt and covert representation; initial and symbolic signs as methods of mind representation.
Valerij I. Tiupa (Moscow)
Crisis of Identity as Narratological Problem
Abstract. Based on the concept by P. Ricker, the author of the article refers to the problem of narrative identity, that understood as the tension between two poles — the identity of the character by which he is identified by others, and the self-identity, in the way he identifies himself. To note this type of “mental construct” in which the conflict between “I am for others” and “I am for myself” is removed, where narrative self-identity is achieved, the article proposes to use the concept of implicit auto-narrative.
Key words: narrative identity; crisis of identity; eventfulness; character; personality; implicit auto-narrative.
Andrej E. Agratin (Moscow)
“Embedded Narratives” and Narrative Identity: to the Formulation of the Problem
Abstract. “Embedded narratives” is a category of contemporary narratology, which was developed in the research of M.-L. Ryan. The researcher defines it as a set of ideas of the character about life, having a narrative structure (thoughts about past and present, future plans, fantasies, etc.). One of the most important functions of “embedded narratives” is providing the narrative identity of the hero (P. Ricoeur, A. McIntyre). This function is problematisized in the prose by A. P. Chekhov: the character positions himself within a certain “life script”, dealing with a range of contradictions.
Key words: “Embedded narratives”; narrative identity; “life script”; A. P. Chekhov.
Snezana Milosavljevic Milic (Nis, Serbia)
Virtual Narrative as Narrative Alternative
Abstract. The first monograph of the cognitive-narratologic science in Serbia is “Virtual narrative” by Snezhana Milosavljević Milić (Milosavljević Milić, Snežana. Virtuelni narativ: ogledi iz kognitivne naratologije. Niš; Sremski Karlovci, 2016). It was the result of her many years narrative research in the aspect of post-classical, predominantly cognitive narratological theories. The book consists of four sections devoted to cognitive-narratological theories, the theory of virtual narrative, the field of application of the theory of virtual narrative and the results of the virtualization of the narrative, the reader’s imagination and the process of immersion in the story world. The fragment of “Virtual Narrative as a Narrative Alternative”, offered to the attention of readers, refers to the section “The Theory of Virtual Narrative”, which provides a systematic view to its functions: extensible, rhetorical and interpretative.
Key words: virtual narrative; actual story; counter story; narrative alternative; genre expansion; interpretation.
INTERMEDIAL NARRATOLOGY
Victor A. Milovidov (Tver)
Pause as a Means of the Organization of Narration
Abstract. The article deals with the role of the pause as the means of the sense-making in the narration. Taking into account the available literature on the pause in drama, in particular, the author analyzes prosaic narration (A. S. Pushkin’s “Tales of Belkin”) in order to differentiate the pause in “the event of narration” and “the event narrated”, suggesting that in both cases the pause serves as the intensifier of sense-making.
Key words: narration; pause; segmentation of the text; semantics’ intensification.
Larissa E. Muravieva (Nizhny Novgorod)
Mise en Abyme in the Aspect of Intermediality
Abstract. The article refers to the study of the intermedial characteristics of mise en abyme narrative figure. In narrative text, mise en abyme entails medial differentiation, and the type of its discursive and/or modal representation is considered to be a medium. The article studies the ways of medial differentiation of the internal reduplication and its semantic value. It is proposed to subdivide narrative reduplications into homogeneous and heterogeneous reduplications (the terms borrowed from L. Hjelmslev and S. Fevry). The article finds a correlation between the medial representation of the mise en abyme figure and the oppositions of the primarily/secondary and the fictional/factual in narrative.
Key words: mise en abyme; reduplication; narrative; intermediality.
NARRATOLOGICAL READING
Nathalie A. Bakshi (Moscow)
Narrative Palimpsest in the Novel “Night Work” by Thomas Glavinic
Abstract. The article deals with pretexts of Thomas Gavinic’s novel “Die Arbeit der Nacht” (“Night Work”). This novel belongs not only to the tradition of robinsonade and science fiction, but also to the unobvious tradition of the Christian literature and Christian connotations. This kind of perusal permits us to identify new narration levels.
Key words: palimpsest; Robinsonade; narrator; God.
Olga A. Grimova (Krasnodar)
Adventurous Intrigue in Dmitrij Bykov’s Novel “Ostromov, or the Sorcerer’s Apprentice”
Abstract. Article is devoted to the research of functioning of an adventurous intrigue in the modern novel. The conception of adventurousness becomes complicated. The adventurous intrigue configures not only the row of external events, but also the level of verbalization of a narration and the sphere of communication of a narrator with the reader.
Key words: D. L. Bykov; modern novel; adventurous intrigue; narrator; reader; intrigue of the word.
Galina N. Ermolenko (Smolensk)
Narration Frame in “Dark Alleys” cycle by I. A. Bunin
Abstract. The functions of frame constructions in “Dark Alleys” cycle by I. A. Bunin are analyzed in the article. The author considers some of them, in situations when texts are emphasized, in the composition of cycle form a special group of framed novels. The framework also organizes and directs the reader’s perception, confronts various points of view, emphasizes the duality of character or protagonist and creates a mythopoetic context for the narrated story.
Key words: “Dark alleys”; framework; narrator; composition; cycle; microcycle.
Vladislav Sh. Krivonos (Samara)
The Petersburg Dreams in the Novel “Antichrist (Peter and Alexey)” by D. S. Merezhkovsky: Narrative and Symbols
Abstract. The article discusses the symbolic image of the Petersburg and the features of the organization of narrative and symbols of the Petersburg dreams in the novel “Antichrist (Peter and Alexey)” by D. S. Merezhkovsky. The author studies semantics and functions of the motifs of the violence and the death which bind the Petersburg dreams into a story chain. The idea of the author of the novel about the St. Petersburg dreaming space as a special metaphysical reality which opens the abyss of the nothingness is analyzed.
Key words: Petersburg; Petersburg dreams; dreamer; dreaming space; narrative; nothingness.
Ekaterina Yu. Sokruta (Moscow)
Point of View and Narrator’s Powers in Stories by Chekhov and Joys
Abstract. The article is devoted to the research of points of view system and the expansion of narrator’s powers in early short stories by Chekhov and Joyce. The proposed approach reveals the similarity of both authors, which does not reduce to general themes and situations, but reveals a common search for new narrative forms and techniques, that characterized the beginning of the twentieth century and the closeness of their artistic systems.
Key words: point of view; narrator; narrative distance; voice; new forms.
Oleg N. Sklyarov (Moscow)
“Unholy Saints” and Other Stories” by Arch. Tikhon (Shevkunov): Narrator. Addressee. The system of characters. Narrative strategies
Abstract. The article is devoted to one of the most popular books of the last decade. This book combines elements of artistic narrative and religious preaching. The subject of analysis is the narratologic specificity of the collection. Particular attention is paid to the instances of the narrator and the addressee, the character system and narrative strategies. The key problem of the study is the contradiction between the profound seriousness of the religious issues involved and the sharply perceptible “carelessness” of the narrator’s tone. The stratification of the narrator’s image into two hypostasis is established: the young neophyte hero, through trial and error discovering the world of Orthodoxy, and the wise man of experience memoirist. In passing, there is a genre layered text, the presence of fairy-tale and hagio-graphic allusions. Observations are made that the projected image of the addressee of the book bears the features of an obedient artist’s will. The subject of close attention is the polarization of all the characters on “their” and “strangers” by the criterion of their belonging to the church. The interaction of narrative strategies of the sacred legend, parable and anecdote is considered. The specifics of comic techniques and the function of laughter are analyzed. One of the most important conclusions sounding in the article concerns the effect of a peculiar disavowal of the tragic-dramatic seriousness of the issues raised by the carefree-imperturbable, sometimes playful, then peremptory, but generally unmistakable tone of the narrative.
Key words: “Unholy Saints”; narrative strategies; narrator; addressee; character system; peace ethos; consent top-os; sacred discourse; legend; parable; anecdote; architectonics; narrative picture of the world; role thinking; comic; fake anecdotality.
Nora Scholz (Munich, Germany)
“The essence has opened …”. Non-duality in V. Nabokov’s prose
Abstract. “The essence has opened” is the quote from Nabokov’s short story “Ultima Thule” (1939/40, the first edition in 1942). This essence can be characterized, like the main point of this article, as the phenomenon of non-duality. The text has a semiotic nature and retains it; non-duality, as we can see, moves in a non-semiotic, or rather in a-semiotic space, or even creates it (as we know, Jean Gebser distinguished the “perspective”, “non-perspective” and “aperespective”), then the question “how non-dual elements affect the dual environment” has a vital importance for narratology. Nabokov’s prose can be viewed as an illustration of the impact, actualized non-dual consciousness (as narrator’s consciousness) on the narrative text, which will be demonstrated on several examples.
Key words: non-duality; non-semiotics; Advaita; non-dualism; aperspective; non-perspective; Nabokov.
ACTUAL INTERNATIONAL NARRATOLOGY
John Pier (Tour — Paris, France)
«Why Narratology?»
Abstract. Narratology, born during the structuralist movement of the 1960s, sought to organize narrative analysis according to the principles of structural linguistics by regarding narratives of all types as modeled after Saussure’s langue, with individual narratives functioning as parole. Challenging the tenets of philology and of traditional literary criticism through the idea, for example, of the “death of the author” or the assertion that fictional characters are nothing more than “paper beings,” narratology brought about a revolution in the methodology of narrative study. Due to a crisis in structuralism, however, structural narratology began to look at new conceptual and methodological models (discourse analysis, possible worlds logic, cognitive sciences, etc.), resulting, at the turn of the century, in a split between “classical” and “postclassical” narratology. The new approaches are more context-friendly than their predecessors, giving rise to feminist narratology, for instance, while at the same time investigations into transgeneric and transmedial forms of narrative demonstrated the presence of narrative elements in a vast array of social artefacts. From the beginning, narratological research has thrived on international scholarly exchanges, so that any history of narratology must be comparative, taking account of the various national research traditions that have contributed to the formulation of the narratological method. In addition, narratology has become a resolutely interdisciplinary undertaking whose effects have spread to numerous other fields of knowledge, a development that calls for a reflection on the disciplinary status of narratological research.
Key words: narratology; classical and postclassical narratology; interdisciplinary researches; narratological revolution.
Hilary P. Dannenberg (Leipzig, Germany)
Ontological Plotting: Narrative as a Multiplicity of Temporal Dimensions
Abstract. The article is devoted to the problem of ontological plotting, analysis of alternative possible worlds in a fictional narrative, which make it deeper and more interesting. The author proves that the history of literature can be regarded as a representation of the spread of spatiotemporal structures and techniques of depicting multiple worlds.
Key words: ontological plotting; multiply possible worlds; alternative history; narrative.