A Study On The Narrators In Yan Geling’s Fictions

Yan Geling-- a writer whose artistic works are intimately intwined with her life experience-- depicts distinct narrators in most fictions in the wake of the actual ups and downs of her personal life, which can reflect the alterations in the author’s own thoughts as well as her literary ideas. By ushering in narrative theory and reading closely on the texts, however, this thesis will focus on the varied narrators in Yan Gel ing’s works, so as to analyze the narrative characteristics and grasp the changing route of her thoughts in both life and art.When we examine the representative texts--mainly those concerning military and immigrant themes in Yan Geling’s early stage of writing -- we can find a strong voice of the writer herself, which finds its root in the author’s life experience. The change of environment from home to abroad is not only reflected in the shift of Yan Geling’s themes and thinking, but also in the growing skillfulness of narrative technique after receiving formal training in creative writing. With her life entering a stable period after settling down in the United States in 1992, however, the narrative voice of Yan’s novels appears to be less sharp and direct as a consequence of her preference in this stage to hide her personal view in the juvenile perspective, instead of straightforwardly showing her voice as in her early writings. Having been immersed in a western culture which advocates humanity and individual freedom, Yan has become maturer when looking back on her motherland China across the Pacific Ocean. Thus, Yan turns to incorporate a juvenile narrator into the adult story, leading to an enhancing effect on both aesthetic and thematic levels, as well as a greater tension in temporal and spacial dimensions. Obvious change happens in Yan’s texts narrating in third person voice with the advent of the new century, in which the narrative skills and her personal voice are hard to detect. Hence, an apparent transition is made from conveying personal thoughts and insights of life to displaying the attentive care on the broader world and human beings at large. Rather than renouncing the narrator, Yan Geling nevertheless hints at the "absent presence" of the narrator by infiltrating his/her voice into every aspect of the text, especially by establishing a unique connection between the voice of the narrator and that of the character(s).