An Analysis Of The Cannibal With The Theory Of Historiographic Meta-fiction

John Hawkes, as a famous pioneer writer of American postmodernism, achieved muchreputation. His creation is well known for bold, experiment and rebellious spirit. In1949,Hawkes published one of the best experimental novels in the background of the SecondWorld War, The Cannibal, which was recognized as the most profound and successful workby critics so far. This article will explore The Cannibal from the perspective of“historiographic metafiction”, and think that this novel both has the self-referencecharacteristics of metafiction and points to the external historical reality, at the same time, itsself-reference is not weakened but strengthens the function of textual reference to socialhistory. The novel projects the characteristics of historical fiction and narration through thetechniques of self-reference of metafiction in the process of telling history as a story andreveals narrative logic and ideology hidden in objective and true history texts, and discloseshow history and even the real world we live in are imagined according to the discoursehegemony. As “historiographic metafiction”, The Cannibal no longer indulges inself-reference, self-obsession, or separation from history and reality like radical metafiction,but strongly points to the operation of social power, discourse and ideological dialogue.According to this purpose, this thesis will be carried out as follows:The first part is introduction, briefly introduces Hawkes’s life, achievements and hismajor works, and summarizes the domestic and foreign research status of The Cannibal. Thesecond part is the theoretical framework, mainly introduces Linda Hutcheon’s decoding andencoding on the complex relationship among history, text and discourse, finally puts forwardthe definition of “historiographic metafiction”. This part also introduces the characteristics of“historiographic metafiction”: self-reference and point to the external historical reality; thecombination of metafiction and historiography. The third and the fourth parts analyze TheCannibal with the characteristics and function of “historiographic metafiction” mentioned inthe second part. The fifth part is the conclusion including the conclusion of the characteristicsof “historiographic metafiction” of The Cannibal, the subjectivity of history and the ideologyand power discourse relationship hidden in novels and history texts.