The Word Game (Week 14)

Theory seems to function only as well as it can be employed to perceive something anew about our realities. What happens to theory that seems too awkward or cumbersome to use? Does it fall to the wayside? It seems so. Note: this post is meant to reflect consideration of material new to my thinking. And this post represents a novice musing only.

Specifically, I wonder about what I am calling the word game in narrative theory. This is the seemingly continuous cycle of narrative theorists re-examining the same pieces to the puzzle and re-naming. “It’s not quite like this, so I am going to plant my flag over here and not there. Here, I say ole boy. Here.” (Yes, my ole boy narrative theorist is now Foghorn Leghorn. Talk about embodiment and masterplots.)

I understand some things about the politics of theoretical work. I have a novice’s understanding of the politics of publishing in academia. And I can even take into consideration the need to diversify meanings, especially with a concept as complex as the stories of humanity. Yes, as we do theory work and as we perceive with new eyes, meaning shifts, understandings become clearer and sometimes they do become murkier.

But, how many divergent definitions should one theoretical discourse have for plot? Not the suzjet, but the discourse. The story? No the plot. Forster’s definition of the plot or Genette’s? Is it time or events? Cumbersome.

Although to be fair, Heidegger didn’t found the idea of Dasein and that too has been argued to death by philosophers. Well, maybe not to death. We haven’t solved the puzzle of beingness yet.

What do you think your favorite author's personal theory of narrative is? (Week 15)

I don't really think I could tie down one theory of narrative for an author. I believe to do so would be to commit the fallacy. But, after thinking about your question, I have been thinking about all of the short stories I have read whose events I don't necessarily know to be constituent or supplementary events while reading, but then as I end the story, the events fall into place. These are the stories that catch. These are the stories that I end with “Aha. I see what you did there.”  

Patricia Highsmith is one of these writers. When reading a story like “The Terrapin,” part of the magic of the experience is the simultaneous reading and figuring. Where is his father? Is that important? How old is Victor? Oh, he’s 11. Is that important? She tossed the turtle into boiling water. How fast? Oh. nevermind.

Deciphering which are constituent events and which are supplementary events is part of the puzzling of the reading itself. Is that a feature of gothic stories? I experience the same while reading a Flannery O’ Connor story. Or an Edgar Allan Poe story. I have more thinking to do on this front. And that seems to be the fun of narrative theory.

Bodies in Narrative and Ethics of Feminist Narratology. Not far enough, yet.

A classmate and I were having a discussion about what we felt were the least useful theories we have read/learned/discussed this semester.  We both feel strongly that the feminist slant on narrative has not gone far enough. I am certain she will write her own opinion and it will, undoubtedly, look different than mine. We are both feminists, but have very different considerations therein, because, shocker, feminists don't all look at story through the same lens. That’s the wonder, for me, of feminist theories. Very often the theorizing is messy as hell. One must be able to hold ambiguity in their very hand in order to consider the theories and the academic and activist arguments therein. That is a hallmark of much feminist theory, for me. And it is wondrous.

But those doing feminist work through narrative theory OR, and I don't know which they consider themselves doing, those trying to bend narrative theory with a feminist perspective have so far seemed to remain in the safe and often less vulnerable waters of primarily white feminist theory. That’s a tragedy. There is so much more. And it is wondrous. And, my point in this post is to strongly urge that the more is absolutely important. Important absolutely.

In defining a corporeal narratology, Daniel Punday writes of some of the misguided thinking about bodies in narrative. For example he points to what should be an outdated consideration of narrative and reading, the concept that “Not only do we escape from the body while reading, but the experience of that escape, the suspension of corporeality, is part of what makes reading pleasurable” (V11). Do we really leave our bodies behind? Can we ever really leave our bodies behind? Especially considering that our identities are so closely connected to our embodiment. Punday suggests, “narrative, then first and foremost depends upon a corporeal hermeneutics – a theory of how the text can be meaningfully articulated through the body” (15). Punday also notes that much feminist narratology work so far is guilty of essentializing. Essentializing, as many feminist/womanist theorists have proven, is dangerous and re-inscribes marginalization.

I wonder aloud . . . How do we move away from such an essentializing way of looking to bodies and identities as presented in narratives without looking deeper into the feminist theories, like womanist theory, that speaks to embodiment? Important absolutely.