Postmodernism
 Language :
Language privileges certain terms.
We think that words just reflect natural order
of world, but it is the other way round!
Language creates this order.
Our idea of ʻreality’ is based on narratives
(stories). Again, we think that narratives just
reflect the natural order of the world, but it is
the other way round! Narratives create this
order.
The logic of this idea is that our ʻreality’ is
fictional, or, at least, has a lot in common
with fiction.
 Audience :
Postmodern fiction usually aims to be playful
and experimental, so it is quite light, but it is
not pure entertainment because it wants the
reader to think about the implications of what
it has to say about narratives
Realism
 Language :
The characters use ordinary, every-day
language. The narrator usually has a middleclass style
Lots of description and lots of details
(including background details) which build
up the ʻreality effect’
A focus on the difference between surface &
depth and appearance & reality
 Audience :
Mainly middle class people (with the
industrial revolution and the rise of
capitalism, the 19th century saw a huge rise
in the number of middle class people. They
had money, enough leisure-time to read and
wanted to read about people like
themselves).
 Narrative voices :
a first-person narrator who describes what
happened in his / her life or a third-person
narrator who describes what happens from a
position ʻabove’ or ʻoutside’ the story.
 Narrative Voices :
Postmodern narrators are often not only
unreliable, but also self-aware, aware, that is,
that they are a character in a fiction.
This is a form of meta-fiction that (1) reflects
the Postmodern idea that our ʻreal’ lives are
also fictional and (2) reminds the reader to be
cautious about the fact that he / she is
consuming literature, which may point
towards, but can never be the same as, real
life...
 Focus :
 Focus :
The relationship between people and
Ordinary things, people and places: a world
language / narratives.
that the readers can recognize as their own.
Realist novels present an every-day material
world.
 Agenda
Feminist, postcolonial and postmodern
 Agenda
discourses have in common the problem of
Capitalism, imperialism and colonialism
speaking as / for the Other
Relegion,
Alterity
 Genre
 Genre
Genre mixing
Epistolary / Adventure / Castaway fiction
Parody