Postmodern Conceptualization of Focalization, Temporality and Spatiality as Three Narrative Aspects in Darren Greer's Just Beneath My Skin (2014)

Abstract

Although most of the existing postmodern and contemporary theories of narrativity may claim their great disparity from the earlier classic and modern ones, some of their narrative aspects seem to be at a very close distance from the earlier ones, especially those related to content such as themes and characterization. Other narrative aspects that have indeed undergone great deviance from the so long accepted modern interpretations are not paid a highly considerable attention in the field of literary studies, especially those concerned with form criteria such as narrative style, narrator, focalizer, point of view, temporal distortion and spatial form. Thus, this paper aims to explore three narrative aspects that cause a radical change in the classic and modern narrative theory, namely; focalization, temporality and spatiality. Besides, it examines postmodern conceptualization of these three aspects through some literary theories such as Gerard Genette's Theory of Focalization, Mikhail Bakhtin's Theory of Dialogic Novilistic Style, Louise Rosenblatt's Reader's Response Theory, or Literary Transaction Theory as she prefers to call it, and Mark Turner's and others' Cognitive Narratology Theory which is a branch of Cognitive Literary Critical Studies Theory. These theories provide the appropriate theoretical tools for the study and understanding of postmodern and contemporary fiction in general and the novel at study in particular. Since narrativity is the core of literary texts and non- literary media, Darren Greer's novel Just Beneath my Skin is chosen as a practical textual literary corpus where the forces of the three innovative aspects of narrative theory are seen at work.