Metafiction and metafictions: on concept and typologies

Abstract

Narrative self-consciousness has been one of the most defining features of twentieth-century novel, aIthough its critical analysis did not begin until the second half of the century. In fact, the term metafiction sprang up in 1970, when William H. Gass used it for the first time. From then on, a number of attempts to define and categorize metafictional novel have followed one another. This essay reviews the main ones and proposes four basic aspects to be taken into account in order to elaborate a typology of metafictional forms: (1) distinction between metaleptic and non metaleptic forms; (2) provisional discarding of covert metafiction; (3) an approach to non metaleptic forms; and (4) delimitation of the meaning of three adjectives currently used as synonymous: self-consciousness, self-referential and self-reflexive.