On Experimental Narrative Techniques In The Professor's House

Willa Cather (1873-1947) was a prominent modern writer in American literature. She has been known as a distinguished writer who created vivid images of characters who represented pioneering spirit of American western prairie. She also attached great importance to style and techniques of the novel. Daring experiments on narrative techniques can be witnessed in her fictional works, which have been not thoroughly studied by the critics and researchers, especially in China. The Professor's House, considered as her most experimental novel, is a sufficiently worthy object of investigation.The thesis will examine three aspects of narration of the novel: time, perspective and manipulation of narrative information in order to discover their roles of representing the theme and eliciting the reader's response. Cather combined the traditional techniques with the new techniques innovated by the modernist pioneers for creating a new way of expression to satisfy her need of thematic concern and emphasis on the reader's role. It will prove Cather's experiment on novel techniques furthers the development of novel. So she is a successful modernist novelist.It falls into five parts. The first chapter will be a general introduction of the novel and its writer. The literary background information will also be included.Chapter two will deal with the special time structure of the novel. Three kinds of temporality are discovered. Antinomic: there are two time threads, one extending into the future and the other moving backwards. Conflated: the conflated time threads form the juxtaposition of the past and present. Differential: the increased duration of memory enables the protagonist to experience time differently from others.Chapter three will examine the perspective. The dominant narrative mode is the dual perspectives, that is, the combination of omniscient and third-person limited perspectives. Not only the protagonist, the Professor, but some minor characters act as reflectors transiently. The artistic effects caused by the foregrounding of first-person narrative perspective in the second part of the novel will also be studied.Chapter four will concentrate on the manipulation of narrative information. Information delays and gaps will be found and the reason will be discovered. Then the thesis will show how it affects the reader's attention and response.The last chapter will be the summary and conclusion of the thesis. It will point out the possibility of further study.