CENLIT | Elements of Fiction

Narrative

the telling of a story and a recounting of events in time

Fiction

• kind of narrative

• presence of a teller or a narrator

• In contrast to nonfiction narrative (biography, memoir, autobiography, history), narrative fiction, whether written in poetry or prose, features a telling of made-up events

Genre

the classification of literary texts according to their structure and form, i.e., prose, poetry, drama

Mode

the classification of texts according to their narrative/ poetic/ dramatic technique, i.e. sci-fi, gothic, speculative fiction

Motif

recurrent patterns or motifs in literary texts, i.e. manic pixie dream girl, reluctant hero

Story

a narrative of events arranged in their time sequence

Plot

events of a narrative, with an emphasis on causality

Freytag Pyramid

• to lay out the structure of the story

• to present the causal relationship or connections of events in a narrative

Freytag Pyramid Parts`

1. Exposition

2. Rising Action

3. Climax

4. Falling Action

5. Resolution

Exposition

• Unstable situation (exposition), a conflict that sets the plot in motion

• Explains the nature of the conflict

• Introduction of characters and description of the setting

• The beginning of the story

Rising Action

• Interconnection of events in the story

• A series of events, all related by cause

• one event causes another event, which in turn causes another event, which causes the next event or
  several other events

Climax

• The most intense event in the narrative

• The turning point of the story

• Determines whether the conflict will be resolved or not

Falling Action

• Resolution begins

• Events and complications start to fall place

• Denouement (unraveling of events)

Resolution

• The conclusion

• Final outcome of events in the story

• Point at which the conflict is resolved

Happy Ending

Everything ends well and all is resolved

Tragic Ending

Things do not end pleasantly, forcing the readers to contemplate the complexities of life

Characterization

the way characters are introduced and developed in the text through:

• direct and indirect revelations

• representations of characters’ thoughts

• and, in the case of first-person narrations, the stream-of-consciousness style

Flat Characters

have only one or two personality traits and are often recognizable as stereotypes—the shrewish wife, the lazy husband, the egomaniac, the stupid athlete, the shyster, the miser, the redneck, the bum, the dishonest used-car salesman, the prim aristocrat, the Wall Street hustler, the absent-minded professor.

Round Characters

have multiple personality traits and are thus more like real people. They are harder to understand and more intriguing than flat characters. No single description or interpretation can fully contain them.

Static Characters

characters who remain the same throughout a work

Dynamic Character

typically grow in understanding. The climax of this growth is sometimes an epiphany, a term that James Joyce used to describe a sudden revelation of truth experienced by a character.

Point of View

• the narrator’s relationship to the world of the work

• The term is a metaphor that indicates the location (point) from which the narrator sees (views) everything in the narrative.

• Another term that some critics prefer is perspective.

Third-person Omniscient

• a narrator from “outside” the story world tells the story.

• This point of view is “third person” because the narrator refers to all the characters in the third person as “he” and “she.”

• It is “omniscient” because the narrator assumes near complete knowledge of the character's actions, thoughts, and locations.

Third-Person Limited

• As with omniscient narrators, narrators of the third-person limited point of view refer to characters as “he” and “she” and still have more knowledge of the fictional world than we do of our worlds.

• But they restrict (limit) their perspective to the mind of one character. This character may be either a main or peripheral character.

Objective Point-of-View

• Narrators in the objective point of view refer to characters in the third person and display omniscient knowledge of places, times, and events.

• They do not, however, enter the minds of any character. We see the characters as we do people in real life or as we might observe them in a play (thus the term “dramatic”).

First-person Point-of-View

• one of the characters tells the story and uses the first-person pronoun, “I.”

• The narration is restricted to what one character says he or she observes.

• The narrator may be a major character located at the center of events or a minor character who observes the action from the sidelines.

Point-of-View | Things to Consider

• Multiple points of view

• Reliability of narrators and centers of consciousness

• Narratees

• Narrators and authors

Setting

• the physical, sensuous world of the work

• the time in which the action of the work takes place

• the social environment of the characters (the manners, customs, and moral values that govern the characters’ society)

• an effect of the setting

• refers to the interpretation of place, passage of time, perception of time, social environment, narrative atmosphere

Irony

• contrast between appearance and reality

• it exposes and underscores a contrast between:

  • what is and what seems to be

  • between what is and what ought to be

  • between what is and what one wishes to be

  • between what is and what one expects to be.

Types of Irony

• Verbal Irony (understatement or overstatement)

• Situational Irony

• Attitudinal Irony

• Dramatic Irony

Symbol

• an object that has meaning beyond itself

• The object is concrete, and the meanings are abstract.

Public Symbol

• They are conventional

• symbols that most people in a particular culture or community would recognize

Private Symbol

• Symbols that are unique to an individual or a single work. Only from clues in the work itself can we learn the symbolic value of the object.

Themes

• ideas about life outside the work —about the real world, our world— that we draw from works of literature—not just from fiction but from literature in all genres.

Factors Influencing the Themes

• Subject and theme

• Reference to reality outside the work

• Theme as dilemma

• Multiple themes

• A lack of themes

• A work’s theme vs. our values

• Themes and the author

Checklist in Interpreting Fiction | Plot

• Compare arrangements of events in the plot and story.

• Outline or draw the pattern of the plot—Freytag’s pattern or other patterns.

• Identify the major conflicts.

• Explain what the protagonists fight for and against what or whom (antagonists).

• Show how any embedded stories or frame stories illuminate the main plots.

• Indicate examples of summary narration and scenic narration. Speculate about why the author uses each.

Checklist in Interpreting Fiction | Characters

• Indicate which characters change and why.

• Show what method or methods the author uses to render the characters’ thoughts.

• Summarize epiphanies characters have. Explain what causes and leads to the epiphanies.

Checklist in Interpreting Fiction | Point of View and Setting

• Indicate the point of view—who narrates.

• Describe the narrator’s tone.

• Assess the reliability of the narrator.

• Describe the place of the setting. Indicate how the place affects the characters.

• Explain the time—historical period, the passage of time, perception of time—of the narrative. Characterize the social environment and how characters respond to it.

• Describe the atmosphere. Indicate what causes it.

Checklist in Interpreting Fiction | Irony, Symbolism, and Themes

• Explore how irony contributes to other elements—especially characterization, tone, and themes.

• Describe key symbols. Explain why you think they are symbols and what they represent.

• State some of the important subjects. Formulate themes that emerge from these subjects.

• Explore how irony contributes to other elements—especially characterization, tone, and themes.

• Describe key symbols. Explain why you think they are symbols and what they represent.

• State some of the important subjects. Formulate themes that emerge from these subjects.