On Indeterminacy In Alice Munro’s Runaway

Alice Munro is a contemporary short story writer from Canada, widely regarded as one of the most fruitful female writers in the world. She won the Noble Prize in literature in 2013 for her Runaway, awarded as the “master of the contemporary short story”. Runaway consists of eight stories which vividly show the ordinary life of women in different ages and express their deep desire to run away from the present life in the small town of Canada.According to the research on the former studies about Munro’s works at home and broad,the author finds that there are lots of studies on Munro’s works from different aspects such as feminism, narratology and textuality. But there are few studies on the collection from indeterminacy which is the typical feature of postmodernism. Therefore, the author finds out the research gap about this work and applies the indeterminate feature of postmodernism as a theoretical basis to analyze her writing skills. In order to analyze the work deeply, logically and systematically, methodology used in this thesis is the combination literature research with closing reading of the text. Then the author makes an analysis on Runaway from three aspects:indeterminate narration, indeterminate language and indeterminate characters. Applying the theories of indeterminacy of postmodernism, the deep and underlying structure of each individual story in Runaway is achieved and analyzed. Finally, through the detailed analysis of the text, the thesis draws a conclusion that Runaway does have the above postmodern features,which greatly enriches the meaning of the work itself and makes the readers have a better understanding of the indeterminate life in postmodern society. The author hopes that this thesis can provide a new perspective to interpret and reread the masterpiece of this remarkable Canadian female writer Alice Munro and offer a reference for her other related works.This thesis is made up of six chapters.Chapter one firstly gives a brief introduction to Alice Munro and her Runaway, then states the purpose and significance of this thesis and introduces the layout of the thesis.Chapter two is literature review and theories basis. Firstly it is the literature review on the works of Munro at home and abroad. At the same time, the thesis critically comments on the previous studies and finds the research gap. Then the literature theory on postmodernism and indeterminacy are briefly analyzed.There come the main parts of the thesis. Chapter three offers detailed analysis of indeterminate narration in Runaway from two aspects, that is, the indeterminate narrative strategies and indeterminate plots. Besides, indeterminate narrative strategies mainly include disordered time and space in narration, narrative point of view. Indeterminate plots contain theopen ending, the loss of plot and the plot in dreams.Chapter four mainly analyzes the indeterminate language, for it is the most important feature of indeterminacy in postmodernism. This chapter is divided into two parts. This first one is the games of language such as the use of uncertainty and repetitive words and phrases. The second one is the analysis of intertextuality which is regarded as a typical feature of postmodern literature from the angles of irony, parody and allusion in Runaway.Chapter five discusses indeterminate characters based on the stories. The complicated relationship in the stories indicates the indeterminate personalities of the characters, which shows the broken elements in postmodernism. Through the analysis of relationship between the lovers,couples, friends, parents and daughters, the indeterminate characters appear clearly. The obscure and dual characters’ images can be concluded.Chapter six is conclusion. The author gives a summary of this thesis that the work has the indeterminate features, that is, indeterminate narration, indeterminate language and indeterminate characters, and points out limitations and problems of this study, and finally puts forward some advice for future research.