Arts and Literature in Canada:Views from Abroad, Les arts et la ...

The Jordans. Remembered and Invented Pastplural, places individual incident in a body of collective experience. Bothnovels provide an answer to Christa Wolf’s repeated question which forms theleitmotif of Kindheitsmuster: “How did we become what we are today?” (MC209) 32Notes1. Christa Wolf. A Model Childhood (1983). Trans. U.Molinaro and H.Rappolt, London:Virago 1988, p. 338. (My emphasis; further references are incorporated in the text [MC]).2. See “Interview with Alice Munro", conducted by Kay Bonetti for the American Audio ProseLibrary, June 1987. (AAPL 7052, IBSN 1 55644 187 8)3. For the metaphor, I am indebted to: J.R. (Tim) Struthers. Intersecting Orbits: a Study ofSelected Story Cycles by Hugh Hood, Jack Hodgins, Clark Blaise and Alice Munro. PhDDiss., University of Western Ontario,1982.4. Christa Wolf was born in 1929, Alice Munro in 1931. Lives of Girls and Women appeared in1971, Kindheitsmuster in 1976. Upon my request, Christa Wolf informed me that Munro’snovel was unknown to her and that any similarities could only be accidental.5. For the figure of speech, I am indebted to: Michael Riffaterre. Semiotics of Poetry (1978).London: Methuen l980, p.83. In the quoted instance, Riffaterre is referring to an extendedmetaphor in two poems by Ronsard and Magny.6. See Stanley Fish. Is There a Text in This Class? Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard UniversityPress, 1980.7. Manfred Pfister’s term “generische Systemreferenz” (which reflects and extends Genette’s“architextualité") refers to the same type of intertextuality. (See M. Pfister. “ZurSystemreferenz”. In: Intertextualität. Formen, Funktionen, anglistische Fallstudien, editedby Ulrich Broich and Manfred Pfister, Tübingen: Niemeyer 1985, pp. 52 58.)8. David Williams repeatedly uses the term “artist novel” to replace the more traditional term“Künstlerroman”. (See Confessional Fictions. A Portrait of the Artist in the CanadianNovel. Toronto: UTP 1991.) Whereas D. William’s artist-novels or confessional fictionscomprise the first-as well as the third-person form, F.K. Stanzel’s term “quasiautobiographical”novel refers exclusively to first-person narratives. In his description of thequasi-autobiographical novel Stanzel also uses the term “confessional form”. (See F.K.Stanzel. A Theory of Narrative. Cambridge University Press 1984, p. 98.)9. Christa Wolf. Kindheitsmuster (1976), Berlin: Aufbau-Verlag 1983. Further references areincorporated in the text (KM).10. See David Goldknopf. The Life of the Novel, Chicago 1972, p. 33.11. Alice Munro. Lives of Girls and Women (1971). Scarborough, Ont.: Signet 1974, p. 59, myemphasis. Further references are incorporated in the text (LG).12. This type of hypertextuality, an additional narrative dimension in Lives of Girls and Women(which has no parallel in Kindheitsmuster), constitutes one of the most conspicuous formaldifferences between the two novels.13. The recovery of their physical hometowns seems to be an indispensable necessity for bothNelly and Del Jordan, documented in their repeated attempts at reconstructing the place ofchildhood.14. “With such phrases [the I-narrator] refers to collective experiences that can be shared by allpeople”. (See W. Iser. Der implizite Leser. Kommunikationsformen des Romans von Bunyanbis Beckett. München: Wilhelm Fink 1972, p. 209.)15. W. Iser’s original terms are “der implizite Leser” and “der wirkliche Leser”. (See W. Iser.Der Akt des Lesens. Theorie ästhetischer Wirkung [1976]. München: Wilhelm Fink 1984.)16. See F.K. Stanzel. A Theory of Narrative, p. 92.17. Alice Munro. “The Ottawa Valley”. In: Something I’ve Been Meaning to Tell You (1974).Harmondsworth: King Penguin 1985, p. 233, my emphasis.18. See John Moss. Sex and Violence in the Canadian Novel. The Ancestral Present. Toronto:M&S 1977, p. 64.83