| Fortune Smiles is a short story collection written by the modern American writer-Adam Johnson in 2015.The focus of this story collection is the marginalized people and their delimma.The present thesis aims to distinguish the factors which make the marginalized people unfortunate,judge the attitudes of the characters in the face of difficulties,and explore the way the marginalized people walk out of dilemma and achieve his/her own salvation.Adopting James Phelan's rhetoric narratology,this thesis tries to interpret the story collection from the perspective of unreliable narration,narrative progression and narrative judgment.Unreliable narration in the story collection are identified along the three axes of facts/events,knowledge/perception and ethics/evaluation.And the narrative proceeds by the introduction,complication and resolution of the instabilities at the story level and the tensions at the discourse level.The interpretative judgment,ethical judgment and aesthetic judgment are also made respectively.Disease,childhood trauma,natural disaster and political persecution are very often the causes of troubles for the marginalized people.People are suffering from the physical,emotional and cultural injuries.In order to elicit sympathy from readers,the narrators reports wrong or less facts than what is necessary.For example,the narrator in the story “George Orwell Was a Friend of Mine” reports unrealistically that his wife abandons him and elopes with a photographer.And for another example,the narrator in “Interesting Facts” is troubled by the illusion that her husband has a love affair with another woman when she has a breast cancer.Such unreliable and untrue narration is manipulated by the author to enlighten the reader that the characters are afraid of confronting the difficulties in life.As they are struggling,suffering and become hopeless in the dilemma,they resort to illusions as alternatives.Additionally,as the narration moves on,there appear some tensions among the characters and their situation.These tensions are the new obstacles to make the characters suffer more.Retrospection and action are the major means for the marginalized people to get out of the troubles.The narrator in “Nirvana” realizes that he should value and appreciate his paralyzed wife,then he creates a virtual Cobain togive his wife psychological support.To understand the stories,readers have to resolve the tensions and make narrative judgment,and in this way,they participate in the story development and become the dynamics of the stories.The marginalized people are suffering from the physical,emotional,political and cultural injuries.The characters make use of the unreliable narration to express their fear and hopelessness when they confront with the difficulties.By means of narrative progression and narrative judgment,the characters realize the importance of retrospection and action.By resolving the instabilities and tensions,they relieve their pains and construct a positive and meaningful life. |
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