The Narrative Art Of Alice Munro’s Dear Life

Alice Munro was the first female writer who won the Nobel Prize for Literature due to her outstanding accomplishments in short stories.Her natural expression and unique narrative styles have drawn a lot of attention.Alice Munro’s unique narrative strategy makes every aspect of her narrative world worthy of serious studies.However,the studies of Alice Munro and her works at home still stay in the initial stage.And most domestic studies of her works focus on narrative time and focalization,while studies about narrative space abroad are flourishing.Dear life,as Alice Munro’s last short story collection,embodies multiple narrative techniques such as nonlinear narration,shifting space,and different kinds of focalization etc.Therefore,it is significant to analyze the narrative techniques of Dear Life from different perspectives.Based on Gérard Genette and Long Diyong’s spatial narrative theories and by adopting the research method like close-reading,this thesis intends to analyze Alice Munro’s Dear Life from the perspectives of narrative time,narrative focalization and narrative space.The purpose of the analysis is to have a deep understanding of the common features and distinctive charms of these stories and the effects of their narrative arrangement.In terms of the construction of this thesis,this thesis falls into five parts.Chapter One is the introduction,including the introduction of Alice Munro and her works,literature review on Dear Life at home and abroad,a general review of Gérard Genette and Long Diyong’ s spatial narrative theories,the significance,and structure of the thesis.Chapter Two explores the function of narrative focalization in shaping characters from three perspectives,including zero focalization in “Train”,internal focalization in “Dolly”,and external focalization in “Corrie”.The author finds that different focalizations influence the images of characters,and ultimately influence readers’ cognition and judgment of characters in the novel.Chapter Three analyzes“To Reach Japan”,“Dolly” and “Gravel” by using order,duration,and frequency respectively.This chapter aims to analyze the effect of different time order,duration and frequency on the pace of the narration and the effect of the flexible dimensions of time on the construction of the plot.They also pave the way for the occurrence of suspense and climax and greatly improve the reading experience.Chapter Four focuses on the narrative space.By using concepts like story space,psychological space,and formal space,this chapter makes a deep analysis of“Amundsen”,“In Sight of Lake” and “To Reach Japan”.Narrative space provides proper background information for the story,which makes characters better integrate with space and reveals the basic theme of the story.The last Chapter is the conclusion,including the summary of the content,the academic significance,and limitations of this thesis.