SELF-CONSCIOUS FICTION AND LITERARY THEORY: DAVID LODGE, B. S. JOHNSON, AND JOHN FOWLES (METAFICTION, NARRATOLOGY, POSTMODERNISM)

Self-conscious fiction, or metafiction, is generally regarded as an anti-mimetic mode of writing: reflecting its own existence as artifact, the text relinquishes its claims to function as a mirror to the world. Such a view, however, is based on a naive theory of realism discredited by modern literary theory. The text does not become less mimetic through its increased self-involvement; nor does the realistic mode exclude textual self-reflection. Metafiction is not a postmodern phenomenon; it has been present as a latent dimension ever since narrative fiction itself came into existence. The contemporary emphasis on textual self-consciousness may be better explained in terms of a politics of reading: the current involvement with literary theory favours a mode of reception which seeks out the theoretical aspect of creative as well as critical writing.; In the case of postmodern fiction, the foregrounding of literary-theoretical concerns functions as a major influence at the level of production as well as at the reception stage. The contemporary writer of metafiction is in most cases a member of, or working in close contact with, academic institutions, and the preoccupations of the academy are echoed by a strong metatheoretical tendency in his/her writing.; This thesis takes for its object of analysis a series of texts belonging to the contemporary British tradition. This tradition, it has often been argued, is distinguished by its close involvement with the mimetic mode, less popular with the more "experimental" types of self-conscious fiction practised in continental Europe and in the U.S. The metafictional theorising of the English novel is primarily concerned to examine the mechanisms which allow us to naturalise fictional narratives according to a representational mode. The main articulations of this study are intended to reflect some of the theoretical concerns central to a "metamimetic" inquiry: the role of the author and the question of authority; the relationship between reality and the literary artifact; the basic structures for a narratological analysis of the text. The authors and texts have been chosen for the wide range of their self-conscious investigation, and for their direct involvement with literary-theoretical issues.