Living in fictitious times: Habits of thinking about time in narrative and its theory

Contemporary studies of literary narrative have placed considerable emphasis on categories of temporality and the discursive use of non-linearity as a predominant feature of narrative's unique characteristics. This thesis argues that discussion of narrative temporality is built upon an assumption that time, is in, fact, linear. I argue that time is frequently essentialized and universalized within contemporary literary criticism and suggest that temporality discourses are steeped in history and ideology, leaving time as one of the few metanarratives still largely unexamined within literary studies.; Using an inter-disciplinary approach to examine the intersections of time and power, I read six novels of the past twenty-five years which take temporality as a central theme (Ian McEwan's The Child in Time; Margaret Atwood's Cat's Eye; Richard Powers' The Time of Our Singing; Audrey Niffenegger's The Time Traveler's Wife; Janet Frame's The Carpathians; and Jeanette Winterson's The PowerBook) by way of exploring the possible implications of this metanarrative. First, I argue that narratological terminology is far more embedded within assumptions of temporality than is often recognized. Secondly, I argue that temporality is implicated within structures of power and ideology, affecting what it is possible for us to "imagine." Finally, I extend my argument to the wider sphere of narrative's influence on concepts of knowledge across disciplinary boundaries, by way of highlighting the limitations of the linear world-view assumed by narrative theory.