Narrator In Control:Sherwood Anderson' S Narrative Strategy In Wineburg,Ohio

In the manuscript of Winesburg,Ohio,Anderson in one of the accounts has indicated the importance of the Winesburg stories as a turning point in his writing career.His innovative narrative style ensures him a place in modern American fiction as one of the forerunners.Generally,the novel leaves the reader with an impression of great spiritual confinement.Its characters,the small-town residents,are grotesque-all profound in psychological depth and burdened with overwhelming,tumultuous emotions deep down,yet appearing in an inert,mute state.And the impulse to communicate takes hold of the characters every now and then whereas the practice of communication invariably ends up in failure.By a careful examination on the form of the novel and Anderson,the narrator's narrative control over the characters,the story and the text time,this thesis intends to explain such grotesqueness and spiritual confinement within the matrix of Narratology.His point of view mainly serves to reinforce his authority of omniscience,with which he could effectively take his characters in control.The same process features a disempowering of the voice of his characters.They eventually emerge as insecure grotesques at loss and deprived of any knowledge and ability to perceive.By a masterly manipulation of sequence of events,narrative pace and duration of events,Anderson intends to highlight the character's present poignancy and empty,lonely life in Winesburg.A dynamical working of pause and scene keeps track of,though implicitly,communications all through the novel till a true one is really realized and at the same time reveals George Willard's mental growth from ignorance to understanding and sophistication.The depressing novel eventually ends on a hopeful note,signaling the healing power of writing and spiritual communication would eventually cure loneliness and grotesqueness.