For Friday: Culler, Chapter 6: "Narrative"

Remember, Paper #2 is due on Monday (no class on Monday). Please let me know if you have any questions or I can help you in any way with the Sonnet Drama! Don't forget to read Chapter 6 in Culler in preparation for starting Pride and Prejudice late next week! You can start now if you're a slow reader, though don't worry--it's not a very long book and we'll take it pretty slow.

Answer TWO of the following:

Q1: If a narrative plot can be translated into a different form (a comic, a TV series, a movie, a play, etc.), how does each change of angle change how we experience the plot? In other words, why does telling the same story from a different character's perspective, or in a different medium, change our experience of the plot, even if the story is exactly the same (same beginning, middle, and end)?

Q2: As Culler explains, "Feminist criticism has been especially interested in the way that European and American narratives frequently posit a male reader: the reader is implicitly addressed as one who shares a masculine view" (87). What does this mean? How can a book, or a film, which will be read by potentially millions of men and women be focused on a "male" reader? What makes it so? Can you think of an example of a text that does this?

Q3: Mikhail Bakhtin, a famous Russian theorist of the novel, claims that novels are "fundamentally polyphonic (multi-voiced) or dialogic rather than monological (single-voiced)"(87). Why do you think the novel is geared to expressing multiple voices/perspectives in a way that poetry is not? Related to this, why might novels have become the bona fide form of writing, considering that narrative takes other forms and a story doesn't have to be a novel? 

Q4: Traditionally, third-person omniscient storytelling was the norm, though since the 19th century first-person has become more and more popular, until today it is usually the most dominant perspective. Why do you think this is? Why do readers generally prefer a first-person approach, particularly in more popular forms of literature (YA, romance, horror, etc.)?

Q5: Culler writes that "narratives police," suggesting that a narrative can enforce social norms as often as they contest or challenge them. How can a narrative "police" a reader or a culture? Can you think about a text that does that, and was popular largely because it did this (whether consciously or subconsciously for the reader)?