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Narrative space and the location of meaning.

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Abstract

This essay presents a practical approach that focuses on three aspects of narrative space. The approach is exemplified with a reading of Janet Frame's "You Are Now Entering the Human Heart." This text is short and thus ideally suited for discussion in class. The reading of Frame's story demonstrates that space is crucial in situating literary meaning in specific cultural contexts.

Narrative, Time, and Space: From Theory to Analysis

When we analyze how narratives construct their literary spaces, we have to remember that, without such imaginative spaces, stories could, quite literally, not take place. However, while time has traditionally loomed large in the study of narrative - which is, after all, defined as the representation of a "succession of events" (Rimmon-Kenan 2, my emphasis) - space and place have been less frequently discussed, and they remain much more elusive analytical concepts (Bal 132). Mikhail Bakhtin was among the first who tried to make up for this deficiency. Bakhtin developed the concept of the chronotope (meaning "time-space") as a way of conceptualizing the "interwovenness of time and space" (Keunen par. 3):

In the literary artistic chronotope, spatial and temporal indicators are fused into one carefully thought-out, concrete whole. Time, as it were, thickens, takes on flesh, becomes artistically visible; likewise, space becomes charged and responsive to the movements of time, plot and history. (Bakhtin 84)

The concept of the chronotope does not, however, lend itself easily to a step-by-step analysis of literary space - partly, as Bart Keunen points out, because of "the minimalistic and rather fuzzy way" in which Bakthin defines the concept (par. 3).

Nevertheless, many critics accept Bakhtin's premise that we need to conceptualize space and time as interdependent rather than separate entities. Michel Foucault, for instance, posits that "it is not possible to disregard the fatal intersection of time with space" (22). Similarly, Yuri Lotman suggests that "culture organizes itself in the form of a special space-time and cannot exist without it" (133). [1] If narrative is by definition concerned with the succession of events and thus with time, and if time is intricately bound up with space, then it is inappropriate to analyze narratives without attending to the construction and function of space. I suggest that we can analyze the most important functions of space in any given narrative if we attend to the following three aspects:

a) the relationship between the places depicted in a text (similarities, contrasts, borderlines);

b) the way these places are described and perceived by the narrator(s) and/or character(s);

c) the semantic value of these places within culture (i.e. independently of the specific text). [2]

If we apply this approach to Janet Frame's "You Are New Entering the Human Heart," we realize that it is...

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