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Proposes a new model for understanding narrative, grounded in the philosophy of Gilles Deleuze What is narrative? Ridvan Askin answers this question by bringing together aesthetics, contemporary North-American fiction, Gilles Deleuze, narrative theory and the recent speculative turn. Through this process he develops a transcendental empiricist concept of narrative. Against the established consensus of narrative theory he argues for an understanding of narrative as fundamentally nonhuman, unconscious, and expressive. Narrative and Becoming provides close readings of a number of contemporary North-American fictions, most prominently Ana Castillo's The Mixquiahuala Letters (1986), Michael Ondaatje's The Collected Works of Billy the Kid (1970), Colson Whitehead's The Intuitionist (1999) and Mark Z. Danielewski's House of Leaves (2000), showcasing their genuine metaphysical quality. Ridvan Askin is Postdoctoral Teaching and Research Fellow in American and General Literatures at the University of Basel.
List of contents
Acknowledgements
Abbreviations
Introduction: Differential Narratology
1. Intensive Narration: Ana Castillo's
The Mixquiahuala Letters2. Narrating Sensation: Michael Ondaatje's
The Collected Works of Billy the Kid 3. Sensational Realism: Colson Whitehead's
The Intuitionist4. Real Folds: Mark Z. Danielewski's
House of LeavesConclusion: From the Becoming of Narrative to the Narrativity of Becoming
Works Cited
Index
About the author
Ridvan Askin is Postdoctoral Teaching and Research Fellow in American and General Literatures at the University of Basel. His recent publications include two co-edited volumes, Aesthetics in the 21st Century, a special issue of Speculations (2014), and Literature, Ethics, Morality: American Studies Perspectives (Narr, 2015).
Summary
Ridvan Askin brings together aesthetics, contemporary North American fiction, Gilles Deleuze, narrative theory and the recent speculative turn to answer the question, 'what is narrative?'
