The Genre of Trolls - Doria

absolutely necessary ingredient. Obviously, this conclusion is only tentative,
since the research material is limited and the analysis fairly brief, but it
might give an indication of the import of this aspect in the construction of
the narratives. Though I have attempted to single out a miscellany of texts
in which the ratio of unfinalizability and finalization varies, the selection is
not entirely representative; my ambition has been to provide a sample of
the possible approaches to unfinalizability, not an exhaustive catalogue.
To summarize, my assumptions about the importance of unfinalizability
in stories of the supernatural appear to have been quite correct, but the
question would merit a more thorough analysis. The rather extensive occurrence
of finalization surprised me somewhat, and the very pronounced
dominance of monologue was also slightly unexpected.—It might be added
that the predominance of monologue is largely due to the definition of dialogue
employed. The utilization of the original, Bakhtinian conception of
dialogue accounts for the divergence of my findings and Lotte Tarkka’s for
example, since Tarkka works with a different conceptualization of dialogue
based on her notion of metaphor and metonymy. The metonymic element
connecting the poles of the metaphor, the human sphere and the otherworld,
creates a dialogical relation between the worlds (Tarkka 1994: 293–
294), but that dialogue is on another level than the one discussed here.
It is also pertinent to consider how well-suited Bakhtin’s theories are for
the investigation of the indeterminacy of the troll. Evaluating each aspect
in turn, it is apparent that the notion of unfinalizability as the malfunction
of finalization is quite apt for describing the characters’ reactions to the encounter.
The emphasis on the failure of outsideness in several of the stories
is in line with this observation. Notwithstanding, when outsideness does
work, it emerges as a prerequisite for truly helping the other, as in text 2
(R II 336), for instance, thereby filling one of its main functions in Bakhtin’s
scheme of things. That particular narrative confirms two other important
points as well; it demonstrates the significance of aesthetic love in achieving
finalization, a finalization, moreover, that is a gift from the self to the other.
In many of the other stories, consummation is not a gift, it is a strategy
for containing and incapacitating the troll. Bakhtin’s later, negative view of
finalization as a reductionist practice would seem to be more appropriate
for these texts.
The conception of spatial and temporal (corporeal and spiritual) unfinalizability
is crucial in scrutinizing the construction of indeterminacy. The
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The Problems of Unfinalizability and Dialogue