Story and Discourse: Narrative Structure in Fiction and Film

by Seymour Chatman

Overview

"An important American contribution to the study of narrative theory."―Choice

This book is the first comprehensive approach in English to a general theory of narrative, both in verbal and in visual media.

The primary question to which Professor Chatman addresses himself is what narrative is in itself. Following such French structuralists as Roland Barthes, Tzvetan Todorov, and Gerard Genette, he posits a what and a way. "The what of narrative," he says, "I call its 'story'; the way, I call its 'discourse.'" Liberally illustrating his concepts with discussions of particular novels and films, he effects a synthesis of the latest Continental critical thinking about narrative and the Anglo-American tradition exemplified by Henry James, Percy Lubbock, Wayne Booth, and others.

A judicious and well-informed book, Story and Discourse should become a standard guide to narrative and to modern thinking about narrative.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780801411311
Publisher:	Cornell University Press
Publication date:	10/31/1978
Series:	4/2/1997
Pages:	288
Sales rank:	945,572
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x 1.00(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Seymour Chatman is Professor of Rhetoric at the University of California, Berkeley.

Table of Contents

Preface1. Introduction
Narrative and Poetics
Elements of a Narrative Theory
Is Narrative a Semiotic Structure?
Manifestation and Physical Object
Narrative Inference, Selection, and Coherence
A Sketch of Narrative Structure
A Comic Strip Example
"Reading" and "Reading Out"2. Story: Events
Sequence, Contingency, Causality
Verisimilitude and Motivation
Kernels and Satellites
Stories and Antistories
Suspense and Surprise
Time and Plot
Order, Duration, and Frequency
How Time Distinctions Are Manifested
Narrative Macrostructure and the Typology of Plot3. Story: Existents
Story-Space and Discourse-Space
Story-Space in Cinematic Narrative
Story-Space in Verbal Narrative
Story-Existents: Character
Aristotle's Theory of Character
Formalist and Structuralist Conceptions of Character
Todorov and Barthes on Character
Are Characters Open or Closed Constructs?
Toward an Open Theory of Character
Character: A Paradigm of Traits
Kinds of Character
A. C. Bradley and the Analysis of Character Setting4. Discourse: Nonnarrated Stories
Real Author, Implied Author, Narrator, Real Reader, Implied Reader, Naratee
Point of View and Its Relation to Narrative Voice
Point of View in Film
Narrators' and Characters' Speech Acts
"Nonnarrated" Representation in General
Nonnarrated Types: Written Records
Pure Speech Records
Soliloquy
Records of Thought: Direct Free Style = Interior Monologue
Stream of Consciousness = Free Association
Interior Monologue in the Cinema5. Discourse: Covert versus Overt Narrators
Covert Narrators Presupposition
Indirect Tagged and Free Style
The Manipulation of Sentences for Narrative Purposes: Presupposition as an Example
Limitation of Authority in Narrative Transmission
Shifting Limited versus Omniscient Mental Access
Overt Narration: Set Descriptions
Overt Narration: Temporal Summaries
Reports of What Characters Did Not Think or Say
Ethos and Commentary
Commentary
Implicit Commentary: Ironic Narrator and Unreliable Narrator
Commentary and the Story: Interpretation
Commentary and the Story: Judgment
Commentary and the Story: Generalization
Commentary on the Discourse
The NarrateeConclusionAppendix: Diagram of Narrative StructureIndexes: Author and Title, Subject

Editorial Reviews

"What I appreciate most in Chatman's study are the problem-solving activities and ambitions: again and again, he proves capable of defining areas to investigate (the borders between narrative and other temporal genres, for example, the typography of plots, the distinctive features of foregrounding and backgrounding) and of discussing narrative in terms of problems and solutions. When I opened the Chatman volume, I read the blurb first: 'A judicious and well-informed book, Story and Discourse should become the standard guide to narrative and to modern thinking about narrative.' The blurb is right."

MLN - Gerald Prince

"An important American contribution to the study of narrative theory."

Choice

An important American contribution to the study of narrative theory.

-- "Choice"

What I appreciate most in Chatman's study are the problem-solving activities and ambitions: again and again, he proves capable of defining areas to investigate (the borders between narrative and other temporal genres, for example, the typography of plots, the distinctive features of foregrounding and backgrounding) and of discussing narrative in terms of problems and solutions. When I opened the Chatman volume, I read the blurb first: 'A judicious and well-informed book, Story and Discourse should become the standard guide to narrative and to modern thinking about narrative.' The blurb is right.

--Gerald Prince "MLN"

From the Publisher