英美文学术语 A Structured Approach to the Short Story.docx

1、英美文学术语 A Structured Approach to the Short Story英美小说选读学习资料December, 2009Part II A Structured Approach to the Short StoryThe term structure as applied to a short story, or to any form of literary art, is a metaphorical expression referring to the architectural-like pattern of the work. Much like a bui

2、lding, a short story is an orderly arrangement of individual parts put together to form a cohesive whole. In a building, the constituent elements are physical and exist in space; in a short story, the elements are intangibles, but they too are arranged in accordance with a carefully conceived plan.

3、Instead of existing in space, these elements exist as ideas in the mind of the writer that are transferred to the mind of the reader through the medium of the printed page. The structure is then re-created in the readers mind as the story is read. Behind this concept of structure lies the assumption

4、 that the author has an awareness and understanding of the need for the structure in the work and that, in writing the story, has made deliberate choices in the selection of details and has carefully arranged these details into a meaningful, aesthetic pattern. A further assumption is that full of ap

5、preciation of a story by the reader demands some awareness and understanding of its structure.In its broadest sense, structure includes all the elements in a story: plot, character and characterization, point of view, language, which can be realistic, symbolic or allegory, and theme. In studying lit

6、erature from a structural point of view, one may deal with these elements separately, at first; however, the ultimate objective is to see the work as a whole and to become aware of how the parts are integrated to produce a composite effect.Elements of PlotSimply stated, plot is the arrangement of th

7、e events in a story into a causal sequences. Although the short story is one of the most flexible vehicles for the diverse elements of a plot, this flexibility and variety does not reduce the value of a systematic and even orthodox approach to plot construction. Among the formal elements of plot are

8、: exposition, background; conflict, the opposition of forces, internal or external; complication, the development of predictable or unforeseen contingencies in the action; foreshadowing, a hint of what is to come; reversal, a change in fortune experienced by the protagonist; denouement, the final ou

9、tcome of the sequence of events; and insight, recognition by the protagonist of his or her nature or fate.Character and CharacterizationCharacter and characterization are closely related but essentially different concepts. Character refers to one of the persons in the storythe end result of the auth

10、ors effort to create a fictional personality. Characterization, on the other hand, refers to the means by which the writer creates the sum of traits, thoughts, and actions which, taken together, constitute a character.At the simplest level, literary characters may belong to a number of stock types.

11、. With creative imagination, however, a writer may start out with commonplace characters and develop them into universal figures, far beyond the original cardboard dimensions of the stereotypes to which they are related. Don Quixote, Hamlet, or Huck Finn, to name a few, escape the confines of their

12、typesthe impractical do-gooder, the slow-to-act intellectual, and the boy who rebels against the mores of his societyand transcend their literary confines to become symbols of human aspirations.Another concept relating to character is that of flatness, or its opposite, roundedness. If the story is a

13、 short one, the author may create only flat characters, that is, characters whose essence may be summed up in a phrase. If the story requires it, as is usually the case, a writer may create a rounded character, that is, a character who is so complex as to require extended analysis. Both types of cha

14、racters may appear in the same story, depending on their importance and the length of the story.Literary characters have also been described as being static or developing, depending upon whether they remain the same from the beginning to the end of the story or whether they undergo some significant,

15、 internal change in the course of the events. The concept of developing suggests that the character achieves a different view of life as a result of some insight gained from conflict and is no longer quite the same person as before. The concept of static suggests the opposite.Point of ViewThe concep

16、t of point of view introduced in the discussion on character and characterization requires a more detailed explanation because of its importance to the structure of a story. There are several questions about the way a story can be told that will help lead us to an understanding of exactly what point

17、 of view is, what varieties there are, and how different purposes are served by these different varieties. Chief among these questions are the following: through whose eyes and ears do we know what is going on? How much does this observer-spokesperson, or narrator, know about the people and events i

18、n the story? Does he or she know all there is to know about everyone and everything or is the knowledge possessed less than total? Does the spokesperson see into the minds of all the major characters or into the mind of just one? For ease of naming and for the subsequent identification, we may ask:

19、in what person is the story being toldfirst or third? We also need to consider the degree of participation that the authors spokespersonobserver has in the action of the story. For example, is this spokesperson an agent in the events merely an observer at the periphery of the action, or an outsider

20、reporting second-hand information? Finally we might inquire: how does the point of view chosen serve the authors purposes and how is it better suited to the needs of the story than other options might have been when one considers the overall effect the author is attempting to produce? In asking all

21、of these questions, and particularly the last one, one should keep in mind that the point of view selected by the author should unify and give a sense of direction to the story. At the same time, it should also blend smoothly with all the elements of the story.For the purpose of convenient reference

22、, several different points of view have been traditionally distinguished and named. One of the earliest employed and most familiar is the first-person point of view, in which the narrator may be a major character, a minor character, or a bystander. The narrator may give a first-hand account, or one

23、mixed with conjecture and hearsay. The narrator may be at the edge of the action and basically objective in attitude, as is the case in “The Fall of the House of Usher.” Or the narrator may be at the center of the action and highly involved emotionally, as is the young man in “Im a Fool.” On the oth

24、er hand, the author may elect to use the third-person point of view, in which the reader sees and interprets everything through the mind of a single character, who may be at the center of the story, as with Miss Brill in the Mansfield selection; or at the periphery, as with the townsman-narrator in

25、“A Rose for Emily” (who are totally operates from the third person point of view, even though he employs the pronoun “we”); or outside the action entirely, as in “The Ministers Black Veil.” When a single character at the center of the action is used as the focus of impressions, the term central inte

26、lligence is often applied. In the central intelligence point of view, the character is aware of all that occurs in the story and every significant thought he or she has is made known to the reader. Although a central intelligence character is involved in or witnesses all that is happening, the chara

27、cter may be temporarily confused, self-deluded, or nave enough to be unaware of its full meaning. However, even in such instances, the reader may expect to be provided with the necessary information to allow a correct interpretation of the significance of what is going on. Sometimes this point of vi

28、ew is referred to as limited omniscience, since the author provides access to the mind of only one character in the story.Another possibility is the one in which the writer may choose not to invade the inner sanctum of the mind of any of the characters. Instead, the author may decide to function as

29、the “camera-eye” and “tape-recorder” and abstain from any judgmental comment, relying only on the careful selection of significant details, as Hemingway does in “The Killers.” This ostensibly objective point of view is variously referred to as “the stage-setting” or “scenic” technique of telling a s

30、tory because of its emphasis on straightforward representation and deliberate avoidance of explicit interpretation of motives and actions.Opposed to these points of view with varying degrees of limited knowledge is the omniscient point of view, one in which the author provides the access to the thou

31、ghts of any and all the characters, in any place at any time he or she chooses. Usually the author speaks in the third person, but the method may, once in a while, be used with a first-person narrator. Although writers of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries who employed this point of view often

32、indulged in comments made directly to the reader, modern writers using this method usually refrain from such statements. Instead, they maintain an aesthetic distance through irony, scrupulous attempts at impartiality, or some other tonal device, as in the case with Fitzgerald and Maugham.LanguageLin

33、ked as it is to the pattern of action, character and characterization, and point of view, language, besides being the medium, is also another important element in the structure of the story. As the term is used here, language refers to the way in which words are put together for the creation of special effects. Among these effects are: attitu