Narratology

Narratology: is a structuralist study of narrative and other literary texts. It deals with the function of narrative,
conventions and symbols. It seeks to expose the form, structure, media, function, history and evolution;
because without them, readers cannot think of any narrative text. What the narrator tells has to do with the
question of time and space because that the ways that stories and the meanings that stories express change
over time and from place to place.

Metafiction (William H. Gass): a literary style in which the narrator or characters are aware that they are part
of a work of fiction. It involves a departure from standard narrative conventions. It highlights the dichotomy
between the real world and the fictional world of a novel. It prevents reader expectations to reveal truths. The
way the writer interprets the story and in what way the readers interpret the story are more important in
metafiction.

Characteristics of Metafiction
Breaking the fourth wall: it is breaking boundary between writer and reader to get the reality. It is one of the
concepts of literature brought with it realistic, very simulated, and plausibility that are the most important
concerns of all artists. They acknowledge the existence of the audience and speak to them directly.
That is to say, both the presenters and audience are aware of that artificiality. (in city of glass, it is without
breaking the fourth wall)
Self-reflexive: used by writers to reflect on their own artistic processes in portraying both reality of the world
outside and the internal reality that the writer individually could experience it.
Experimental: writers want to invent something new in nature, fusing a number of different techniques
together to create an unconventional narrative.
Creating characters: it is the comments of writer on how to make characters. You don’t have the character or
the story, only the way of writer making character (6 characters in search of an author). Here characters make
the story.

Types of Metafiction
1-Explicit Metafiction (direct): the writer quite explicitly on the surface of a text, addresses the reader and
would say (Im going to write such and such).
2- Indirect Metafiction: establishes a meta reference within the text that is external to the text. (the writer
makes story like city of glass) (Shamela have meta-reference to Pamela)
3-Critical/non-Critical Metafiction: Critical metafiction aims to find the artificiality or functionality of a text in
some critical way. Non-critical metafiction does not criticize or undermine the artificiality or functionality of a
text.