A Study Of The Dual Narrative Voices In The Hundred Secret Senses

The Hundred Secret Senses is the third novel written by Amy Tan in 1995, which is considered to be a comparative skillful work. It tells a story between two sisters, describing their relationship from conflict to harmony. Through the story's telling, the work discusses the matter about Chinese American's cultural identity. Because of their two different cultural backgrounds and the marginalized social position, they commonly have identity anxieties. Fictions of Authority: Women Writers and Narrative Voice, written by Susan Sniader Lanser, is the masterpiece of feminist narratology, in which she has built the theory of narrative voice. During reading The Hundred Secret Senses, I discovered that the work adopted dual narrative voices to narrate the story, and the stories of the two sisters enhance and complement each other, pushing the plot of the novel to the climax gradually. This thesis, therefore, analyzes the narrative voices in The Hundred Secret Senses and the special functions and results produced, according to feminist narratology theory.The thesis comprises of five parts, including introduction and conclusion. Introduction presents a brief introduction to Amy Tan and her work The Hundred Secret Senses, scans their previous studies and proposes the argument of the thesis. Chapter One introduces feminist narratology and the concept of narrative voice. Chapter Two analyzes the dual narrative voices of the work, analyzing Kwan's voice, Olivia's voice separately, and the mutual conversion of the dual narrative voices. Chapter Three discusses the reasons and the effects of the dual narrative voices. The conclusion summarizes the meanings of using the dual narrative voices on the basis of summing up the whole thesis.