Optional-Narrator Theory - (Frontiers of Narrative) by Sylvie Patron (Hardcover)

About the Book

Optional-Narrator Theory makes a strong intervention in (or against) narratology, pushing back against the widespread belief among narrative theorists in general and theorists of the novel in particular that the presence of a fictional narrator is a defining feature of fictional narratives.

Book Synopsis

Twentieth-century narratology fostered the assumption, which distinguishes narratology from previous narrative theories, that all narratives have a narrator. Since the first formulations of this assumption, however, voices have come forward to denounce oversimplifications and dangerous confusions of issues. Optional-Narrator Theory is the first collection of essays to focus exclusively on the narrator from the perspective of optional-narrator theories.

Sylvie Patron is a prominent advocate of optional-narrator theories, and her collection boasts essays by many prominent scholars--including Jonathan Culler and John Brenkman--and covers a breadth of genres, from biblical narrative to poetry to comics. This volume bolsters the dialogue among optional-narrator and pan-narrator theorists across multiple fields of research. These essays make a strong intervention in narratology, pushing back against the widespread belief among narrative theorists in general and theorists of the novel in particular that the presence of a fictional narrator is a defining feature of fictional narratives. This topic is an important one for narrative theory and thus also for literary practice.

Optional-Narrator Theory advances a range of arguments for dispensing with the narrator, except when it can be said that the author actually "created" a fictional narrator.

Review Quotes

"This is a strong contribution to a centrally important concept of narrative theory. The essays provide quite rich and varied reasons to question the assumption that every narrative has a narrator, and Sylvie Patron gives a detailed account of the background to this debate in her introduction. Her account is clear, thorough, indeed magisterial."--Ann Banfield, author of Unspeakable Sentences: Narration and Representation in the Language of Fiction-- (3/5/2020 12:00:00 AM)

About the Author

Sylvie Patron is a senior lecturer and research supervisor at Université de Paris. She is the author or editor of several books on narrative theory in French and English, including The Death of the Narrator and Other Essays.