An Analysis Of Ligh Thousekeeping From The Perspective Of Narratology

As a well-known contemporary female writer, Jeanette Winterson is extremelycomplicated. However, it is undeniable that her novels are being paid more and moreattention to. And scholars are interested in many aspects of her works.As the eighth novel of Winterson, Lighhousekeeping tells about a story betweenSilver, an orphan and the blind Pew, a lighthouse keeper. Pew, a master of storytelling,constantly tells Silver different stories which are intertwined with each other and theytogether form the novel. Scholars have done some targeted researches on the language,the narrative way, the image, the metaphor and the theme as well. And suchresearches are going on. The thesis aims to conduct a relatively comprehensiveresearch on the poetic language, the nonlinear narrative and the metaphoricalimplication of the novel, to discuss the effects and functions of these three aspects onthe theme.In addition to introduction and conclusion, the thesis consists of three chapters.In the introduction, the thesis firstly introduces the achievement of Winterson,then her life experience, and thirdly summarizes the previous studies on her novelsespecially on Lighthousekeeping.Chapter one makes an analysis of the poetic language used in the novel. It issubdivided into three parts. The first one defines the poetic language and lists itsfeatures. The poetic language of Winterson possesses the structure of poetry, conciseand profound, with rhythm of poetry. It is just like a long narrative poem when weread it. The second part is about the effect of the poetic language on the structure. Thestructure of Lighthousekeeping is complex just as same as the nonlinear narrative. It isnonlinear structure with confused fragments of stories. The order, even time are inconfusion. Under such circumstances, the poetic language plays an important role indistinguishing stories from each other. With the help of it, we can clearly make surewhere we get at. And some sentences possess the same form which can easily helpreaders to connect each part of the novel. The third part discusses the functions of the poetic language on images. Image is an important element of a novel and it can helpone understand the theme in a certain degree. But in some novels, image is very vagueand people can not master its meaning, so it is difficult for people to understand thenovel. There are also several images in Lighthousekeeping, but they can be easilyunderstood by people with the help of the poetic language. In addition, it is evenuseful to deepen people’s understanding of the theme.Chapter two, also subdivided into three parts, is about the usage of the nonlinearnarrative in the novel. The first part sums up the features of the nonlinear narrative. Itis on the opposite position of the linear narrative. The beginning, the middle and theend of the story are all mixed in order. Several different stories are interleaved witheach other. The scattered fragments of stories together build the whole structure, onestory contained in another one. The second part lists the purposes of Winterson inusing the nonlinear narrative. There must be three purposes for Winterson to employthis form of narrative. Firstly, she’d like to show her talent of language which she isfull of confidence. She can successfully attract the readers’attention by her poeticlanguage. Secondly, she believes in her ability of storytelling and she can make thefragments of stories together in order. Thirdly, Winterson wants to express her themeby such a subversive narrative and it indicates her deep meanings contained in thescattered fragments. The third part discusses the unity of the nonlinear narrative.Although the story is presented as fragments in the nonlinear narrative, they haveunity in common. On one hand, the narrators come into unity. There are two narratorsin the story: Silver and Pew. Silver just talks about her own story and Pew tells storiesabout the lighthouse, Dark and Molly, the Bible stories and people in history. At thebeginning of the novel, the stories of Pew are enclosed in quotation marks but Silver’snot. With the development of the story, quotation marks are all missing. Thus Silver’svoice is mixed together with Pew’s. The two narrators come into unity. On the otherhand, although the stories are all divided into fragments, the theme is still there. Theyall talk about love, loss and self-exploration which are finally unified in the theme.Chapter three is centered on the metaphorical implications in the narrative. Itconsists of three parts. The first part discusses the metaphorical implication of Silver. There is a literal interpretation about the word‘silver’in the text: It reflects 95% of itsown light. It is one of the few precious metals that can be safely eaten in smallquantities. From such an explanation, we can infer the metaphorical implication ofSilver. She stands for such a pious, potential pilgrim that needs to be guided toachieve salvation. The second part talks about the metaphorical implication of theblind Pew. In the narrative, he usually coincides with the lighthouse. In a sense, he isalso the lighthouse, giving people light and helping them out of hardship. He guidesSilver to grow by storytelling and he is an evangelist for the pilgrim, mysterious buttraditional. The third part analyzes the reflection of metaphorical implications on thetheme. Above we have discussed separately the metaphorical implications of Silverand Pew, and at last they all lead to the theme. The growth of Silver is a progress fullof love, loss and self-exploration with the theme contained. While in the storytellingof Pew, he also repeats the theme of love, loss and self-exploration. These twometaphors constantly enhance the theme, and in turn, the theme also returns to themand it makes the story of Silver and Pew more attractive.Then there comes the conclusion. From the above analysis, the thesis draws aconclusion that there is an inner relation among the poetic language, the nonlinearnarrative and the metaphorical implication, which separately interpret the theme fromdifferent perspective. The poetic language explains the theme, the nonlinear narrativeembodies the theme and the metaphorical implication reflects the theme. At last, adouble unity will be achieved, including unity of form and content, unity of structureand theme. It also provides a comprehensive theoretical basis for understanding of thenovel.