A Study Of The Unreliable Narration In My ántonia

During the early decades of the twentieth century, among all the regional tales inAmerica, Willa Cather excellently evokes the spirit of rural pioneers. My ántonia is written infirst-person retrospective narration with plenty of storytelling parts inserted into the novel.The stories not only witness the narrator Jim Burden’s personal development, but alsorepresent a panoramic view of the European immigrants on Nebraska prairie. Moreover, thoseepisodes artfully imply that the narrator’s narration is unreliable. His contradictory languageand action, the misunderstood characters in the novel, and his problematic value system, allthese three factors confirm the unreliability of the narrator.Firstly, this thesis tries to make an analysis of the narrator’s inconsistent words andbehavior. In the story of killing the rattlesnake, the shifted focalizer and narrator expose hisself-deceptive nature. In the story of mate selecting, the narrator’s conflicted thoughts andbehavior further suggest his contradictory personality. Secondly, with regards to characters,the narrator’s narration and interpretation are also under suspicion. Erasing other characters’narrative voices, the narrator retells the story with his subjective judgments. Besides, as animmature listener, he takes the hardship of immigrants for granted. Taking advantage ofnarrative approaches, the narrator dramatizes their sufferings in his make-up version. Hismisunderstanding of characters illustrates his bias and limitation. In the end, the present thesismanages to explore possible value judgments in this novel. Confronted with the problem ofpersonal ownership, cultural inheritance and historical evolution, the narrator’s opinions areapparently different with another narrator in Introduction, heroine ántonia and the author herself.From the perspective of narrative reliability, the present author analyzes the storytellingparts in My ántonia. Thinking about narrator’s credibility, reader can reread the novelcautiously and appreciate it with critical thinking. Only when readers correctly recognizenarrator’s reliability can they understand the implied meaning of the whole novel.