Narrate or describe?

Abstract

This article explores certain aspects of narrative construction in the light of theories and disciplines such as Structuralism and Narratology; and writers/thinkers including Marcel Proust, Balzac, Stendhal, Gérard Genette, Mikhail Bakhtin, and Georg Lukács. It investigates, inter alia, how certain kinds of narratives (in this case, ‘free-indirect discourse’) allow for a special, more fluid, means of registering and recording phenomena and presences in language, how such narratives come to be constructed, and how qualities such as lightness, speed, and multiplicity are harmonised to create the unique atmosphere, that is also the language, of a work of fiction. The essay looks at the techniques of narrative construction from several theoretical points of view, including, Structuralist, Postcolonial, and Marxist theory. The essay also deals with certain technical and stylistic considerations that may arise from the author writing outside his or her native language or tradition, and how, in at least the present case, employing ‘free-indirect discourse’ offered more creative freedom to negotiate the gaps between language and landscape while at the same time enhancing the texture of the narrative through multiple perspectives and temporal and spatial fluidity.