An Interpretation Of The Narrative Structure In The Country Of The Pointed Firs From The Perspective Of Feminist Narratology

In American literature,Sarah Orne Jewett is considered one of the famous Local Colorists in late 19 th century.The novella The Country of the Pointed Firs is her masterpiece.In the novel,Jewett paints a simple and sweet daily life picture of Maine to the readers.So far,the various research about her masterpiece has been made from the perspective of nature,Darwinism,feminism,regional literature,Buddhism and narrative space while the study from feminist narratology is very few.Therefore the endeavor of this thesis is to interpret the narrative structure of the novella from the perspective of feminist narratology so as to reveal the woman writer's narrative characteristics which,in every sense,keenly sharpen the female consciousness of these women characters and help establish female narrative authority.A detailed examination of the three kinds of narrative structure reveals that Miss Jewett challenges the male-dominated narrative tradition by her unique narrative skills.She treats the linear structure as the longitude line for weaving the narrator's growth;she designs three interruptions to create the unique narrative pattern.What's more,she also arranges the circular and network narrative structures to create the uniqueness and strengthen the cohesion of her work.Meanwhile she succeeds in establishing a clearly defined female narrative authority.