Reading Ian McEwan: An Introduction to Narratology

The short novel The Comfort of Strangers (1981) is used in the course as an entry point, Atonement (2001) as a turning point and The Nutshell (2017) as the terminal for our Narratological journey. Looking back from 2017, The Comfort of Strangers is a zero start and it can be used to study the basics of Narratology such as Action, Story, Tellability. To start tracing the devices McEwan uses in Atonement, we need a detailed knowledge of Focalization and Unreliability as key notions. We will end up with Tenses and Fictional Space as well as all imaginable types of Narrators to turn to an inconceivable one who tells The Nutshell story. The course will use interactive technics, collaborative work including Smolny Bard College, Berlin teleconference mixed classes, and much of our own writings to find innovative ways to study Narratology. Dr. James Harker, Bard College, Berlin and Dr. Valery Timofeev, Saint Petersburg State University are the leaders of the course. Prof. Paul Cobley, the author of Narrative (2001, 2015) will be joining us to discuss theoretical issues via teleconference as well as in person.