Object-Oriented Narratology - (Frontiers of Narrative) by Marie-Laure Ryan & Tang Weisheng (Hardcover)

About the Book

Object-Oriented Narratology explores the representation of objects from a narratological point of view, combining an object-centered approach with specific text studies and arguing for the cultural meanings of objects and their power and influence on the behavior of characters, while acknowledging the independence of their existence from human perception.

Book Synopsis

The quick spread of posthumanism and of critiques of anthropomorphism in the past few decades has resulted in greater attention to concrete objects in critical theories and in philosophy. This new materialism or new object philosophy marks a renewal of interest in the existence of objects. Yet while their mode of existence is independent of human cognition, it cannot erase the relation of subject to object and the foundational role of our experience of things in our mental activity.

These developments have important implications for narratology. Traditional conceptions of narrative define its core components as setting, characters, and plot, but nonhuman entities play a crucial role in characterizing the setting, in enabling or impeding the actions of characters, and thus in determining plot.

Marie-Laure Ryan and Tang Weisheng combine a theoretical approach that defines the basic narrative functions of objects with interpretive studies of narrative texts that rely more closely on ideas advanced by proponents of new object philosophy. Object-Oriented Narratology opens new theoretical horizons for narratology and offers individual case studies that demonstrate the richness and diversity of the ways in which narrative, both Western and non-Western, deals with humans' relationships to their material environment and with the otherness of objects.

Review Quotes

"Object-Oriented Narratology takes on a little-addressed yet crucial component of narratives: objects or things, not as part of some other function, but on their own merits. As such it helps us dig deeper into our reading of and immersion in storyworlds, and it creates a richer understanding of the objects that make up those worlds. It is clearly written and thought-provoking."--Annjeanette Wiese, author of Narrative Truthiness: The Logic of Complex Truth in Hybrid (Non)Fiction

"The authors raise stimulating philosophical questions, situating narrative theory within a broader, interdisciplinary debate on the status of the object."--Marco Caracciolo, author of Slow Narrative and Nonhuman Materialities

About the Author

Marie-Laure Ryan is an independent scholar. She is the author or editor of many books, including Narrative across Media: The Language of Storytelling (Nebraska, 2004) and Narrative as Virtual Reality 2: Revisiting Immersion and Interactivity in Literature and Electronic Media. Tang Weisheng is chair professor in the College of Foreign Studies at Jiangxi Normal University, in Jiangxi, China. He is the author of two books in Mandarin on narratology, A Study on Narrative of Thingness and Text, Context, and Reader: Study on Contemporary American Narratology.