Narrator, Voice, and Tone
What is the point?
What is the point?
In The Art of Fiction, David Lodge writes, "Unreliable narrators are invariably invented characters who are part of the stories they tell...There must be some possibility of discriminating between truth and falsehood within the imagined world of the novel, as there is in the real world, for the story to engage our interest." (154)
We might ask, then, what is the point? Why do writers invent narrators who fail to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth of their stories?
To the right is the image of for the film adaptation of Kazuo Ishiguro's novel The Remains of the Day, directed by James Ivory and starring Anthony Hopkins and Emma Thompson. Hopkins plays the butler Stevens. What can you infer from this image about his character?
"The point of using an unreliable narrator is indeed to reveal in an interesting way the gap between appearance and reality, and to show how human beings distort or conceal the latter. This need not be a conscious, or mischievous, intention on their part." (155)
An essential part of interpreting literature, then, is determining the reliability of the narrator. When we encounter a narrator that we suspect is obscuring the truth, we need to determine why.
The point is this: determining the reliability of the narrator is essential to explaining the overall meaning of the work as a whole.
We might ask, then, what is the point? Why do writers invent narrators who fail to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth of their stories?
To the right is the image of for the film adaptation of Kazuo Ishiguro's novel The Remains of the Day, directed by James Ivory and starring Anthony Hopkins and Emma Thompson. Hopkins plays the butler Stevens. What can you infer from this image about his character?
"The point of using an unreliable narrator is indeed to reveal in an interesting way the gap between appearance and reality, and to show how human beings distort or conceal the latter. This need not be a conscious, or mischievous, intention on their part." (155)
An essential part of interpreting literature, then, is determining the reliability of the narrator. When we encounter a narrator that we suspect is obscuring the truth, we need to determine why.
- In what way is the narrator distorting or concealing the truth?
- Why is the narrator distorting or concealing the truth?
- Why did the author invent this narrator to tell this story?
The point is this: determining the reliability of the narrator is essential to explaining the overall meaning of the work as a whole.
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grasps_the_narrator_-_remains_of_the_day.doc | |
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Reading Calendar
Due 11/21 R.A. #1: (pp. 3-126)
· Prologue July 1956 Darlington Hall pp. 3-20
· Day One Evening pp. 23-110
· Day Two Afternoon Mortimer’s Pond, Dorset pp. 113-126
Due 12/1 R.A. #2 (pp. 129-245)
· Day Three Morning Taunton, Somerset pp. 129-141
· Day Three Evening Moscomb near Tavistock, Devon pp. 145-20
Day Four Afternoon Little Compton, Cornwall pp. 205-245
Due 11/21 R.A. #1: (pp. 3-126)
· Prologue July 1956 Darlington Hall pp. 3-20
· Day One Evening pp. 23-110
· Day Two Afternoon Mortimer’s Pond, Dorset pp. 113-126
Due 12/1 R.A. #2 (pp. 129-245)
· Day Three Morning Taunton, Somerset pp. 129-141
· Day Three Evening Moscomb near Tavistock, Devon pp. 145-20
Day Four Afternoon Little Compton, Cornwall pp. 205-245