Essay I wrote from 2010

Essay Question: How does Julian Barnes’s Flaubert’s Parrot utilise postmodern writing strategies?


The novel Flaubert's Parrot is a narrative about the life of Gustave Flaubert. It's use of theme, structure and writing style are all examples of postmodernism . This includes the use of maximalism, surrealistic writing, poetic language and fragmentation of voice. I argue Flaubert's Parrot is a key example of a postmodern novel in it's use of these techniques and it's modernist and dada influences. In this essay I provide examples from the novel and compare them to the literary movement of postmodernism. I will use readings from the internet, Mary Klages book, Karoui-Elounelli’s writing and Niall Lucy’s writing to support my argument .

Postmodernism in whole rejects western beliefs as being only part of the totality of knowledge (Herron, 2010 p. 54). Postmodernists claim there are other cultures that have a equally valid opinion about the nature of truth. The movement of postmodernism presents meanings as diverse and subjective. It claims that reality is in the signifier, rather than the object of discourse: the signified. This is seen in the ambiguous language used in Flaubert’s Parrot. In Flaubert's Parrot words take on multiple meanings and the discourse of the novel is diverse and varied. The novel is verbose and uses words in unheard of contexts. For example, the word 'bourgeoisphobe' is used to indicate a disapproval of communism as seen from a western perspective and is an example of verboseness (Barnes 1984 , Chapter 1). There is the use of satire. eg. ‘bibliophilic lust’ (Barnes, Chapter 1). This term is used to make fun of the literary canon and the ‘meta-narrative’ of western discourse.   Another example is: ‘Flaubert is a bald man with a drooping mustache.' (Barnes 1984, Chapter 1) This phrase could be seen to be ageist and sexist against men. A bald rights activist may see this phrase as derogatory. Flaubert’s Parrot therefore satires the western discourse which presents racism as bad and equality as good. 'You can define a net in two ways. A collection of lines, or a collection of holes' (Barnes 1984, Chapter 3) This is a example of fragmentation of the discourse of the dominant culture, in that words can have many meanings, not just one . In these ways Flaubert’s Parrot casts doubt upon the underlying structures of our civilisation and rejects western beliefs as only part of the larger picture, which is key philosophical ideal of postmodernism.

The movement of postmodernism is about fragmentation and paradox, which is seen in the literary movements which preceded it (Barth, 1998) (Holcombe, 2007). Postmodernist writings have their root in the movements of dada, surrealism, modernism and fluxus. Dada writers celebrated chance and parody and attacked the central role of the artist (Esaak, n.d.). Another key movement which postmodernism emerged from is modernism. This profound and progressive movement applied structural changes to modes of expression, such as stream of consciousness as displayed in Ulysses by James Joyce and To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf. The authors of these novels are writing from the first person point of view in order to describe the feelings and thoughts of the protagonists (Mepham, 2003). Postmodernism is the synthesis and transcendence of its antitheses, which is modernist writing (Fu Jen University, n.d.). In this way it takes on influences from the previous avant-garde movement: modernism and creates a new avant-garde, which emerged after World War Two. Modernist writing presents life as tragic and posits that reason can discover the whole of reality and life's ‘tragic’ nature, while on the other hand postmodernist writing is about abandoning universal meanings in favour of fun and iconoclasm (Klages, 2006). In this way it can be shown that Flaubert’s Parrot is influenced by modernist writing, in its use of the technique of stream of consciousness and first person narration.

The novel Flaubert’s Parrot uses many postmodernist techniques, including: surrealistic writing, intertextuality, absurd writing, circular writing and self-referentially  (Barth, 1998) (Holcombe, 2007). Early on in the novel the composition of a statue is described in mathematical terms (Barnes 1984, Chapter 1 Chapter 1). An example of the use of poetic and surrealistic language is the following line: ‘...the face of a political sage much admired in the desert’ (Barnes 1984, Chapter 1). This line in any other novel would make no sense, but in Flaubert’s Parrot the line serves the purpose of being mystical, fantastical and detached from reality. There wouldn’t realistically be many people in the desert who could admire a political icon, who is referred to as a ‘sage’. Another example of postmodern writing is: 'What chance did the biographer stand against the subject' (Barnes 1984, Chapter 7). This phrase is self-referential, absurd and circular. The real writer is Barnes, while Braithwaite is just a instrument of Barnes in order to create satire. The theory of intertextuality demonstrates that texts are: ’ a tissue of inevitable, and to an extent unwitting, references to and quotations from other texts’ (Allen, 2005). The narrative constructs mirror images of the key figures: Flaubert and Braithwaite. These examples show there are intertextual themes in the novel Flaubert's Parrot, which is key technique of postmodernism. In using all these techniques and writing style, Flaubert's Parrot is the perfect example of a postmodern novel.

Barnes has influences from other prominent postmodernist writers, such as Beckett and Pynchon. Pynchon's writing is random and sprawling, which is very similar to Barnes's writing. Some postmodernist writers use techniques such as the cut-up technique and Beckett’s disintegration of the narrative form, who won the Nobel prize for literature in 1969 (Finney, 1994). An example of this in Flaubert’s Parrot is the technique of Poioumenon, which means the story is about the process of creation. This is shown by the fact that Flaubert’s Parrot is about a writer (Braithwaite) who is writing about a writer (Flaubert). Postmodernism emerges out of the cultures technological progress and thus runs parallel to postmodernist movements in art and architecture, such as: post-painterly abstraction (which uses pastiche and collage, just like Barnes does) and outsider art (Wwar.com, 2009). An example of a pastiche is on pg. 64 in the absurd description of Flaubert meeting General Morandi, in particular the sentence: 'culumny put about by the british aristocracy that Byron had deteriorated morally while in Greece.' Thus, it can be shown that Flaubert’s Parrot draws influences from many movements, including art in its use of pastiche .

Postmodern literature blurs genres, transgresses them and mixes them (Perloff, 1988). Tristram  Shady is another example of a postmodern novel, especially in its use of blank pages and marbled pages, to draw attention to the void which is the writer of the text (Lucy, 2000). Postmodern typography cannot be isolated from its thematics (Lucy, 2000). Therefore, the blank pages, glossaries and test that are used to expand the scope the novel cannot be isolated from the novels diffuse message. The novel is not a closed system, it exists in relationship to what it opposes. Good has its opposition in evil and male in female. This theory is illumined by Derrida, who claimed that everything in western civilisation exists on the continuum of good and bad (Reynolds, n.d.). In its use of alternate ways of displaying writing Flaubert’s Parrot shows aspects of postmodernist literature in general.

In Flaubert’s Parrot the voice of the writer is not distinct and unlike traditional western literature does not become a trope of authenticity and authority (Karoui-Elounelli, 2010). The voice of the writer is split between Geoffrey Braithwaite, Julian Barnes, and Flaubert himself. Flaubert’s Parrot undermines the persistent oral paradigm in western literature and instead retreats into a bizarre world of jokes and literary games (Karoui-Elounelli, 2010). Postmodern Literature’s aim is to ‘...to upset the generic boundaries between fictional narrativity and poetry and to minimize the traditional plot and realistic thematics of the conventional novel.’ (Karoui-Elounelli, 2010). An example of this is the use of a timeline at the beginning of the novel, a glossary and a test towards the end of Flaubert’s Parrot. Julian Barnes draws attention to other key figures Flaubert’s life, including Jean-Paul Sartre (Barnes, Chapter 12). Barnes describes Flaubert as a anti-realist, saying he was like Galileo, in that he denied the underlying dogma of his time (Barnes, Chapter 12). Barnes makes jokes about Flaubert, and although he is not serious, these jokes are an attempt to question the traditional voice of the western novel. Thus in these ways Flaubert's Parrot presents a metanarrative and has a unconventional structure, which embody the movement of postmodernism.

Overall Flaubert's Parrot is a great example of postmodern writing. It uses techniques such as satire, aleatory writing, pastiche, intertextuality, and multiple perspectives in order to create a satire of itself. The movement of postmodernism is largely about fragmentation, paradox and atypical writing, which is seen in other postmodernist novels which can be compared to Flaubert's Parrot, such as: Gravity’s Rainbow. Flaubert's Parrot is a postmodern novel also because of how it is influenced and draws upon the movements that came before it, such as: dada and modernism. Through its synthesis of these influences, its structure and stylistic features it is a key example of what is called postmodern literature.










REFERENCES


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