Introduction to English Novel
This part is divided into 3 questions:
Q.1. What is a Novel?
Q.2. Why Read a Novel?
Q.3. How to Write a Novel?
While the lecture continues we will try to answer these questions, and in this humble attempt we will understand most of the aspects related to the novel.
What is a Novel
The genre of Novel took its first widely acceptable[i - see footnotes at the end] form when Daniel Defoe wrote Robinson Crusoe in 1719. The word “Novel”, which means new (story), has been used for this particular genre quite aptly because it is just three centuries old unlike other genres that are thousands of years old. So, chronologically, the genre is a new one. But, the novelty of this genre is not just acknowledged in the terms of newly originated genre; rather it has many other features also that are counted as new. A novel roughly has following key features:
- Mostly Prosaic (we have poetic novels as well)
As we will proceed with other aspects of the genre, we will automatically start understanding what a novel really is. So, we should not invest all of our potentials right at this stage. Let’s discuss that why people write novels. Why this genre is so much used to express one’s thoughts?
Why Write a Novel?
Why writers write novels?Why a writer chooses to share his story in the form of novel?
Why should we write a novel?
All of the questions are the same, and quite interestingly, they can equally be posed to the painters and musicians -- why they create paintings and music? Why a painter chooses painting as a mode of expression instead of, let’s say, graphic designing on the computer? And by the way, when I say “a painter” I mean not that painter who uses colors to copy other people’s work and sell that copied painting for money, what I mean by “a painter” is a person who is a true genius, a creator, an inventor - whose paintings are a manifestation of his powerful imagination and not of his power of copying!
Back to the question: why we choose to paint to express ourselves?
Well, the choice is entirely personal to the painter – the creator. We paint, because we enjoy the process of painting itself - no matter how technical it gets at some stage, still we enjoy the created piece of work – the work that is the result of our creativity channeling through the colors spread on the canvas. Similarly, we opt to write in the form of poetry because we enjoy channeling our creativity through word-combinations. No matter, how difficult it becomes at times for a writer to write even a single one-line verse, he would still go for poetry – for he would cherish the natural rhythm, the sweetness of the music embedded in the poetry while and after creation!
Still cannot relate to the essence of writing novels? Ok. Tell me, why do you sing songs despite of the fact that you are no singer at all? (I think you got the answer now) You sing because you cherish the art of singing itself. Otherwise, you could have pronounced those simple verses just by speaking them out plainly without taking pains on your vocal chords.
Apart from personal choice, a writer opts for a particular genre because he exploits certain liberties in that form. Let’s take an example.
You know a life-long story of a man and you know it in such a great detail that nothing is hidden from you. You know what that man likes/dislikes what he does when he is angry or upset, and you know what adventures that man has been through. You want to tell this story to someone in the same way as you know it. You also want to include dialogues, and you are not particular about the time it would take the reader to read your story completely - it can take as much time it can. You are not particular about how lengthy it can go - all you want to do is to completely express your story in the greatest possible detail - with the greatest possible clarity - not letting your reader miss your details at any single moment - taking him with his arm introducing to your whole world of imagination and emotions you want the reader to enjoy the story with as much pleasure as you are enjoying it in your mind. You want the reader to completely understand your point of view while you keeping in mind that the modern-man more likes straightforward language rather than a poetic one.
What would you do now to express this man’s story that is at the moment hanging in your head? Would you choose to express yourself in the form of Drama, Poetry or Prose? You have to write a 600-words response to this question with elaborately expressed reasons of choosing your favourite genre.
Why Read a Novel?
(The answer to this question is given with the assumption that you are already familiar with the basics of literature in the course of Introduction to Literature)The reasons of reading a novel are partially the same as the reasons of reading literature in general – i.e for the purpose of pleasure, escape, catharsis etc. The reasons are partially the same because Novel is a part of Literature, and all the parts of literature share some common traits, these are listed below:
- Literature as a whole is Fiction + Facts (The philosophy of Art)
- Literature as a whole teaches and delights (Morality)
- Literature has power over human mind and emotions (Psychology)
- Literature provides a beyond-time-and-space insight to the civilizations (Sociology)
- Literature provides (scientifically unreliable) knowledge about human race (General Knowledge)
No matter how elaborate or sufficient these factors be in themselves to provide an answer to the question why we read literature, they are not sufficient to help us understand these questions:
Why we read novels?
What makes the novel-readers feel attracted towards novels?
Why should we care to read novels?
These three questions have the similar answers. As I have said above, if we have 10 reasons to read a novel, 5 of them are quite general and obvious – the remaining 5 are yet to be explored. Let’s investigate.
The Hypnotic Effect of Reading Novels
If you look this from another perspective, you will realize that words have the power to keep every kind of secrecy of ideas behind it. The words are the veils of imagination, veils of ideas, and quit surprisingly they are at the same time windows into the hearts of human beings.
Had I put a picture of chair on the wall outside the furniture shop, there had been no mystery to reveal – everyone would have known that there are these types of chairs inside the furniture shop.
By the way, I am remembered of another example from the word “veil”. The veil of the women: until a woman is unveiled, there remains a mystery of appearance that “who is she?” “How does she look?” “She might be as beautiful as a fairy” etc. The mystery is there because the object is concealed in a veil. The moment all the curtains are put aside, the mystery, that suspense is gone. And, a novel is all “words, words, words”[ii - see footnotes at the end]. The more words you read, the more images you create in your mind.
What the writer has left for you on the pages?
Just Words!
What do you do with these words?
Create meanings – ideas – pictures – life!
So, who is the creator – the one who gave the tools, or the one who used the tools?
Actually – both of them are the creators - the reader and the writer both together create a novel. Had there been no well-crafted tools, there would have been no further creation!
Imagine - I am entering in a small dark room. And I cannot see anything there. It is a very dark room. I walk inside the room. Nothing to see except a painting hanging on that wall under a small spot light. I cannot see clearly what that painting is all about – it is too far, it is too blurred - so I am moving towards that painting.I am interested to know what does that painting has to show to me. It has blurry colors and lines, the picture is very vague and very blurred – I must go close enough to see. The moment I go near to discover what this painting is all about, the colors and lines start emerging on the canvas - slowly and gradually. Imagine these slowly and gradually emerging colors like a rainbow that appears on the sky – the closer you look into it, the clearer the colors become. Upon my every step towards the painting, these colors and curves get clearer than before – darker than before. I step forward.
The more I see of it, the more it gets clearer; the more close I get, the more complete it becomes.
I must go even closer – so now I can see the precise, carefully made lines that make the picture even clearer and vivid. It is so clear that it cannot be clearer than this – I can see each and every curve of the picture.
But it is not complete yet. It is still incomplete.
I want to feel the texture of this picture that is being painted by no-one else but me – I want to feel the coarse colors, so now I touch the canvas with my fingers, I feel the lines, the colors, the shades, the thickness of the paints, the dimensions of the painting; I am now closer than ever – so close to the picture that I have myself become a painting, and now I and my painting are one – as full as my mind, as complete as my thoughts.
Understanding Metanarratives through Novel Reading
What we can do in our personal capacity, and most of the times we do it without being aware of it, that we understand how do the people of a particular country or nation live and think. You get a very close insight to the people about whom the novel is about. Drama can also offer sufficient material for you to understand this, but that is also limited to only what has been presented on the stage or in the dialogues, because as I have previously said, drama is a genre where mystery of appearance is restricted and thus restricted is the imagination. Whereas, a novel is an open field of emotions and thoughts – go as far as you can.
We are always too busy in cramming facts and figures of history, current affairs, politics and are very little interested in human race – that how do people think, how do they live, how do they face challenges of life. This knowledge is also very important, perhaps, important than any other worldly knowledge; for the knowledge of the world will just show you a path to follow, while the knowledge of the life will enable you to create a path for yourself and also for others to follow. It takes you a thousand steps ahead of others!What do you think now, what should you read to get such an in depth knowledge of life? Give unprecedented reasons for your choice in a 600-words response.
How to Write a Novel?
It is often asked that how to write a novel – what are the rules for writing a novel, and then long, boring, hour-based lectures continue to address the curious minds that at the end get exhausted and bored, and many of those minds actually are bored to death!
A British writer from 1930s, W. Somerset Maugham, describes the rules of writing a novel: there are three rules for writing a novel. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are.
This isn’t said by a layman of the streets – it is said by one of the most popular personalities of his era, who was by occupation a playwright, novelist and a short-story writer. And he said it quite right. In literature there are no rules. Having no rules should not be confused with having no standards.
Having no rules mean that there is no set pattern of doing a task – all that is fundamental to writing a novel is the common sense that is we use in our routine conversation. That you should not sound unethical, unorganized, and incomplete in your thoughts – before speaking something out you must have done a little mental exercise of testing your statements that whether or not they are according to the context. You cannot sound cheerful at a funeral sight – unless you are an exception – and that is common sense. No one can expect you to weep while you are narrating a joke – that’s illogical. No one would listen to you if you are all the time gloomy, all the time talking about trivial things (like today I woke up and tried to remember my dream, oh, then I thought that why am I trying to remember - I often do not remember my dreams, why I am wasting time on this? Then I looked at the sealing, then at the fan, and I don’t know why) – please you must have mercy on our sensitive ears and temperaments – please!
These are the common sense things that work perfect with novel writing as well. Some people have nervous habits while having a verbal communication, try to get rid of them in your written communication at least.
So, these things are not rules, but etiquette. There are no rules in writing a novel, there is art. The art of story-telling – the art of narration.
Some people will tell the most interesting and adventurous stories in the most pathetic manner. For example, you have experienced a time travel into Jurassic era and there you encountered dinosaurs! You fought them with your guns and swords, and some way you got back to the future saving your life! These were the real incidents. And your friend might narrate it to someone like:
Well, we sat in this time-machine and went into the past. We saw dinosaurs. They were a bit crazy, but we managed to come back home.
Now, that is too laconic! No one would be intrigued or excited to listen to your story.
Some people just love to tell what they felt on their adventure – and they will keep on telling you for hours that how they felt, and the real story would be left far behind. And after an hour you will be like, “Ok.. I understand that you were very excited but … what happened NEXT when you saw the time machine!?” and you might burst up saying this. This technique of narration is called beating about the bush.
What is more important in writing is to be comprehensive – to give least importance to the things that are not contributing to your main story, and try to explain the things in more detail that directly influence your story: the major decision making moments– the moments where have you had decided the path B to travel, you would have been in an entirely different situation! Try to give more importance to these decision making moments.
| If you want to get an idea, that how story tellers keep their readers successfully engaged with them, you must read the opening chapters of “Heart of Darkness” by Joseph Conrad and “The Cracking India” by Bapsi Sidhwa. These two are easy reads. |
Read The Time Sweepers (http://www.eastoftheweb.com/short-stories/UBooks/Time898.shtml) Activity:
|
| Right your own 6000 words story on the title The Time Sweepers. |
In critical theory, and particularly postmodernism, a metanarrative (from meta‐narrative, sometimes also known as a master‐ or grand narrative) is an abstract idea that is thought to be a comprehensive explanation of historical experience or knowledge. According to John Stephens it "is a global or totalizing cultural narrative schema which orders and explains knowledge and experience".[1] The prefix meta means "beyond" and is here used to mean "about", and a narrative is a story. Therefore, a metanarrative is a story about a story, encompassing and explaining other 'little stories' within totalizing schemes.
The concept was criticized by Jean‐François Lyotard in his work, The Postmodern
Condition: A Report on Knowledge (1979). In this text, Lyotard refers to what he describes as the postmodern condition, which he characterized as increasing skepticism toward the totalizing nature of "metanarratives" (or "grand narratives," typically characterized by some form of 'transcendent and universal truth').
Examples of Metanarratives
Many Christians believe that human nature, since the Fall (Genesis 3), is characteristically sinful, but has the possibility of redemption and experiencing eternal life in heaven ‐ thus representing a belief in a universal rule and a telos for humankind. See also Universal History.
The Enlightenment theorists believed that rational thought, allied to scientific reasoning, would lead inevitably toward moral, social and ethical progress.
Muslims view human history as the story of divine contact through prophets like David, Abraham, or Jesus demonstrating rationally impossible feats for human beings (miracles) as proof of authenticity and sent to every people over time to teach purity of heart so that people may receive the guidance of the one true creator or God. These prophets or their messages are resisted when introduced, and distorted or corrupted over time necessitating new prophets, the final one being Muhammad and the uncorrupted Quran; victory ultimately being for those who have purified their hearts and accepted the divine nature of the world.
The Marxist- Leninists believe that in order to be emancipated, society must undergo a revolution. Just as the bourgeoisie (whose living depends on the control of capital or technology) took power from the noble class (whose wealth was based on control over land), they believe that the present system of capitalism will fall and the proletariat (who live by selling their labor) will take over. This change will be driven by the unstable and cyclical nature of capitalism, and by the alienation felt by the labourers who keep the system working.
Footnotes
[i] Ian Watts is that literary critic and historian who in his book The Rise of the Novel: Studies in Defoe, Richardson and Fielding (1957) considered Richardson and Defoe as the first novelist of English Language. You can read here in what words does Watts speak about Defoe.
[ii] “Words, words, words” is a quotation from Shakespeare’s play Hamlet.
[iii] http://www.megmitchell.com/course_docs/dig_foundFall09docs/reading/MetaNarratives.pdf
Posted by : Hassan Malik +
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