Unfulfilled growing-up: The novel “The Lovely Bones” by A. Sebold

Abstract

The article studies the poetics of the novel “The Lovely Bones” by E. Sebold. We applied comparative-historical and structural methods. The scientific novelty of the article is our research into the novel as a work about a frustrated adulthood. We consider its ideological and artistic specificity: the narration of a dead person, the description of the world beyond and the type of the character (a teenager being on the verge of growing up). The article investigates the spatiotemporal structure of the narrative and distinguishes its earthly and heavenly places. We analyze the system of characters in the novel and prove that the protagonist’s maturation is associated with the internal evolution of minor characters whose story unfolds both in the novel’s present and in the past, which the reader discovers due to flashbacks. Our study considers the specifics of the narration: as the main character is no longer alive, she has an omniscient position – her ability of flowing into the consciousness of other characters. The novel is analyzed in terms of transformation of initiation novel’s genre structures: Suzy is simultaneously a “mentor” for her loved ones and experiences her own growing up. In the finale of the novel, the emotive aspect of the work becomes crucial: gloomy hopelessness is replaced by the motifs of hope, forgiveness and faith. The article concludes that the theme of the formation and internal evolution of a person plays a plot-forming role in modern American literature.