Palindromes and Palimpsests: Strategies of Deliberate Self-contradiction in Postmodern British Fiction
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.26754/ojs_misc/mj.200210233Keywords:
Postmodernism, Palinode, Palimpsest, G. Swift, J. Barnes, M. Amis, A. Carter, D.M. Thomas, A.S. ByattAbstract
This paper sets out to argue that contemporary British fiction, by using palinodes, palindromes and palimpsests both on the micro- and macro-structural levels, favours a logic of association of contraries which ipso facto deconstructs any monologic reflexion and conception of the world. To combine and superimpose contrary ideas means to eschew the monolithic. It also expresses the composite, heterogeneous, and yes eclectic, nature of postmodernism and its fundamental incredulity towards any singular ideology and aesthetic tradition. Ultimately, if contemporary fiction flaunts its contradictory syncretism, it is to claim the right to simultaneously and oxymoronically defend opposed tendencies, beliefs and influences.
Downloads
References
AMIS, Martin. 1984. Money. Harmondsworth: Penguin.
—.1991. Time’s Arrow. London: Jonathan Cape.
BARNES, Julian. 1984. Flaubert’s Parrot. London: Picador.
BERTENS, Hans. 1995. The Idea of the Postmodern: A History. London and New York: Routledge.
BYATT, A. S. 1993. Angels and Insects. London: Vintage.
COMPAGNON, Antoine. 1990. Les cinq paradoxes de la modernité. Paris: Seuil.
CARTER, Angela. (1968) 1995. Several Perceptions. London: Virago.
—. (1974) 1988. “Reflections”. Fireworks. London: Virago.
CROPLEY-GONZALEZ, Madalena. 1996. “Time’s Arrow: A Terminal Fiction?”. In Duperray, Max: 119-134.
DUPERRAY, Max. 1994. Historicité et métaficition dans le roman contemporain des îles britanniques. Aix-en-Provence: Publications de l’Université de Provence.
—-. 1996. Fiction et entropie: Une autre fin de siècle anglaise. Aix-en-Provence: Publications de l’Université de Provence.
GENETTE, Gérard. 1997. Palimpsest: Literature in the Second Degree. Trans. Channa Newman and Claude Doubinski. Lincoln and London: University of Nebraska Press.
GERMANOS-THOMAS, Lailla. 1994. “Historicité et métafiction dans Ever After de Graham Swift”. In Duperray, M.: 207-216.
GUIGNERY, Vanessa. 2001. Postmodernisme et effets de brouillage dans la fiction de Julian Barnes. Villeneuve d’Ascq: Presses Universitaires du Septentrion.
GUTLEBEN, Christian. 2001. Nostalgic Postmodernism: The Victorian Tradition and the Contemporary British Novel. Amsterdam and New York: Rodopi.
HASSAN, Ihab and Sally HASSAN. (eds.). 1983. Innovation / Renovation: New Perspectives on the Humanities. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press.
HUTCHEON, Linda. 1988. A Poetics of Postmodernism. History, Theory and Fiction. London and New York: Routledge.
LODGE, David. 1981. Working With Structuralism: Essays on Nineteenth- and Twentieth-Century Literature. London: Ark.
LYOTARD, Jean-François. 1983. “Answering the Question: What Is Postmodernism?” In Hassa, I. and S. Hassan. (eds.).: 329-341.
MOREL, Michel. 1995. “Time’s Arrow ou le récit palindrome”. Jeux d’écriture: Le roman britannique contemporain. Cahiers Charles V 18: 45-61.
O’DAY, Marc. 1994. “Mutability is Having a Field Day’: The Sixties Aura of Angela Carter’s Bristol Trilogy”. In Sage, L. (ed.).: 24-59.
OLSEN, Lance. 1990. Circus of the Mind in Motion: Postmodernism and the Comic Vision. Detroit: Wayne State U.P.
RUSHDIE, Salman. 1983. Shame. London: Picador.
SAGE, Lorna. (ed.). 1994. The Flesh and the Mirror: Essays on the Art of Angela Carter. London: Virago Press.
SWIFT, Graham. 1981. Shuttlecock. Harmondsworth: Penguin.
—. 1988. Out of this World. London: Viking.
—. 1992. Ever After. London: Picador.
THOMAS, D.M. 2000. Charlotte: The final journey of Jane Eyre. London: Duckworth.
WARNER, Marina. 1994. “Angela Carter: Bottle Blond, Double Drag”. In Sage, L. (ed.).: 243-256.
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
