Unusual Forms of Prose
After modernism shook the old world with its novelties in methods of telling stories through unfiltered characters' thoughts and changing perspectives, common readers were ready for more experimentation. But were they ready for what postmodernism had in store?
Nowadays we will rarely be surprised by the stream of consciousness narrative of Joyce or collage-like precipitousness of Gertrude Stein. We have grown used to authors playing with words. But some writers still want to surprise us and what is left to experiment with is the form of the text itself. I would like to present to you some of the most unique books that I know. Your interest will be my reward!
A beautiful feature of postmodernism is the writer’s understanding of such things as tediousness, boredom, longevity and their effect on the reader. Authors use them to achieve a certain effect by design. And what is more tedious than a long chain of footnotes in a scientific paper? That is exactly what one of the parts of Dmitry Galkovsky’s The Infinite Deadlock represents. An enormous chain of comments for the previous 2 parts (essays mostly). There are even comments on the comments provided earlier. In total this section takes up to 87% of the final text. Did I mention The Infinite Deadlock is published in 2 volumes?
But let’s move to something more acceptable. Have you ever found a book given into bookcrossing? Strangers leave their finished books they want to share with others with a message to the next owner to send them further messages after they’re done. I adore things with history, especially books. Notes from previous owners may let us imagine how or who they were (why would they highlight this passage on forgotten love?; that’s a peculiar place for a “!”; what is this unintelligible scribble?). Such musings inspired filmmaker J. J. Abrams to create, with the help of a professional writer, a book filled with simulated notes and comments from two different people. This story is called “S.” and it consists of a main novel “The ship of Theseus”, but our main interest is the scribblings, highlighted parts and improvised bookmarks that are left by the “real main characters”. As a result we have two separate stories: the novel of a fictional writer Straka and dialogue of Eric and Jen, who never meet in the flesh and only communicate by swapping this book.
These instances I find rather original and interesting, but they are not really surprising if you are into experimental prose. What surprised me is the novel written by Mark Z. Danielewski The House of Leaves. If there is a text that resembles a maze – it is definitely this one. Each page makes you feel puzzled at what is going on and how to proceed. Flipped passages, mirrored letters, specifically shaped paragraphs serve a purpose of creating an unsettling setting that evokes claustrophobia and the feeling of getting lost. It doesn’t help that the story consists of 3 story lines all circled around the fictional movie tape. The novel itself strives for an academic style of writing to fool the reader. To fool the reader even further, the author drops in long chains of footnotes (a recurring motif over here) and links to fictional people, movies and other media, making his work not only look like a maze but feel like one. And the best part: it’s translated into Russian (Hey Santa…)! Why not take a look?
How rewarding it is to take a fresh look at reading, a classic form of passing time! Even such ordinary things as books may have some twists to surprise and entertain you with unsuspected tricks. Like in any other type of artwork, sometimes the form is the king and sometimes it’s the content. Lost in the mundane, you sometimes need something that breaks the common rules to think outside of the box. Of course it is still important to get acquainted with instances of more standard formulations. Will it be fair to ignore simple-looking novels or short stories? Often they are not as simple as they seem, and maybe the writer did hide something in there for you. Rather than just reading through a story, pay attention to the choice of words, sentence structures, etc. Let’s not forget though that even the texts that look plain still may have some secrets within them. Devour what comes your way.
Mr Viacheslav, Russian Language and Literature teacher.
