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E-book Because of You : Understanding Second-Person Storytelling

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Penilaian

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Italo Calvino’s Se una notte d’inverno un viaggiatore is perhaps the best recognised and well-known second-person text among contem-porary readers. Published in 1979, the novel is a strange narrative collage composed of the beginnings of ten different novels which are interrupted by a second narrative strand in which a Reader (the pro-tagonist of the novel) is in search of some missing pages of the book he is reading, the same book that the actual reader (you or I) has in hand. Thematising the composition of his own book and addressing the Reader directly, Calvino surprised both the readers and critics of his time with the striking way in which he addressed formal ques-tions of narration through the operation of address, a gesture that caused a long-lasting debate on the style and literary virtues of Se una notte d’inverno un viaggiatore in general and second-person sto-rytelling in particular.Indeed, the suspicion and doubt expressed in relation to Calvino’s book is not something new when it comes to second-person fiction. Second-person novels have frequently been treated as experimental novelties that either deter a readership from engaging with them or, on the contrary, attract the attention of readers by their catchytechnique irrespective of their literary virtues. Paradoxically this technique that is often seen as tricky or even unpopular has been a narrative mode continuously employed throughout the history of literature, and in many instances even acclaimed in prize-winning novels such as Ilse Aichinger’s Spiegelgeschichte that was honoured with the Group 47 prize in 1952. Also puzzling is the fact that while many authors have reported problems getting their books published due to the employment of the second-person technique in the past, the situation lately seems to be completely reversed as we witness a rapid growth of second-person texts emerging on the literary scene, especially in the Anglophone world.In an attempt to defend his work, Calvino in December 1979 pub-lished an essay in the “Alfabeta” journal in which he rephrased the title of the novel as Se una notte d’inverno un narratore2in response to Angelo Guglielmi’s criticism of his novel’s challenging style and form. Five years later, at a conference held at the Institute of Italian Culture in Buenos Aires in 1984, he defended his novel and his com-positional choices, emphasising the self-reflective character of his book, the pleasure of reading and, of course, that of writing.

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Ketersediaan

Informasi Detail

Judul Seri

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No. Panggil

801 ILI b

Penerbit

Germany : transcript Verlag., 2019

Deskripsi Fisik

257 hlm

Bahasa

English

ISBN/ISSN

9783839445372

Klasifikasi

801

Tipe Isi

text

Tipe Media

computer

Tipe Pembawa

online resource

Edisi

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Subjek

Philosophy and Theory of Literatures

Info Detail Spesifik

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Pernyataan Tanggungjawab

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Versi lain/terkait

Lampiran Berkas

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