F0411 Reading Narrative: Theory and Practical Analysis

The course intends to be an introduction to the theory of narrative or narratology which will not limit itself to theoretical problems but will always be seeking both to combine narrative theory with various trends of contemporary literary theory context and to apply concepts and analytical procedures to narrative texts. Thus, structural and recent narrative theory will be approached in the wider context of contemporary literary theory and subsequently tried onto 19th and 20th century novels and short stories, leading up hypertext narratives. Although the course has a Comparative approach the chosen narratives will either be translated into English or written originally in English.\r\n

The course would include both lectures on theoretical points and seminar discussions of narrative texts. Among the theory subjects to be studied there will be: narratology as a theoretical project, story and plot structure, the concept of action, the status of fiction, narrative communication, genre conventions, thematic interpretation, and the reading process.

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The course does only require some knowledge of the more general concepts of literary theory and a basic idea of the modern narrative tradition.

\r\nAmong the narratives discussed there would be some written by great 19th century short story European authors like Guy de Maupassant, Anton Chekhov, Aleksandr Pushkin or Edgar A. Poe, as well as some written by 20th century authors like J. L. Borges, J. Cortázar or G. García Márquez. From the 20th century there will be two novels Mrs. Dalloway, by V. Woolf, The Time of the Doves, by Mercè Rodoreda, and the novella The metamorphosis, by F. Kafka.