1.4. Means of Characterization

An image in art is a subjective reflection of reality. It is affected by the writer's power of imagination. It is, on the one hand, a generalization and is never a complete identity of a person, thing or phenomenon. There is always smtli left out by the writer, and srnth that is emphasized or even exaggerated. On the other hand, an image in art is concrete with its individual peculiarities.

It must be noted that the images of a literary work form a system which comprises a hierarchy of images, beginning with micro-images (formed by a word or a combination of words) and ending with synthetic images (formed by the whole literary work). Between the lowest level (the micro-images) and the highest level (the synthetic images) there are images which may be termed "extended images".

Character - images are both real and unreal. They are real in the sense that they

can be visualized, you easily see them act, you hear them talk, you understand and believe them. They are unreal in the sense that they are imaginary.

In most stories one character is clearly ccntral and dominates the story from the beginning up to the end. Such a character is generally called the main, central or major character, or the protagonist. The main character may also be called the hero or the heroine, if he or she deserves to be called so.

The antagonist is the personage opposing the protagonist or hero. The villain is the character with marked negative features.

Sometimes in a literary work the writer will give us two characters with distinctly opposing features,, we then say that one character serves as a foil to the other. The foil is so different that the important characteristics of the opposite personage are thereby sharply accentuated.

When a character expresses the author's viewpoint directly, he is said to be the author's mouthpiece. If a character is developed round one or several features, he becomes a type or a caricature.

A type is characterized by qualities that are typical of a certain social group or class. A caricature is the character so exaggerated that he appears ridiculous and distorted, yet recognizable.

Characters may be simple or complex. Simple characters are constructed round a single trait. Complex characters undergo change and growth; reveal various sides of their personalities.

The various CRs abstracted from a given text are seldom grasped as having the same degree of fullness. Already in 1927, Forster recognized this, distinguishing between "flat" and "round" CRs.

1) Flat characters are analogous to caricatures, types. In their purest form they are constructed around a single idea or quality and therefore can be expressed in one sentence. Furthermore such CRs do not develop in the course of action. As a result of the restriction of qualities and the absence of developments flat CRs are easily recognized and remembered by the reader.

2) Round CRs are defined as those that are not flat. Not being flat involves

having more than one feature and developing in the course of action.

Flat characters	Round characters
Simple and uniform	complex and manifold
Only one or two traits	Numerous traits
Characteristics can be summed up in a sentence	Characteristics need elaborate description
Stable	changeable
Undeveloping	Developing
Closed	Open-ended
more distant from actual human beings	closcr to actual human beings
Stereotypical	Not easily analyzable according to rigid formulations or preconceived notions
Harder to empathize with	Busier to empathize with
their actions arc	their actions are
Determinate	Difficult to determine in advance
Logically consistent with what was given earlier	Not always logically consistent with what was given earlier
Not surprising to readers most of the time	Surprising lo readers some of the time %

The characters may be described from different aspects: physical emotional, moral, spiritual, and social. The description of the different aspects of; character is known as characterization. There are two main types of characteri/ution direct and indirect. When the author rates the character himself, it is diivccharacterization. Direct characterization may be made by the character of the story. But when the author shows us the character in action, lets us hear him, watch him and evaluate him for ourselves, the author us<-s die indirect method of characterization. The various means of characterization are as follows:

• Presentation of the character through action. Action includes a thought, a word, a decision, an impulse, and the whole event.

A trait may be implied both by one-time (or non-routine) actions, and by- habitual ones. One-time actions tend to evoke the dynamic aspect of the CR. By contrast, habitual actions tend to reveal the CR's unchanging or static aspect. Both one-time and habitual actions can belong to one of the following categories: act of commission (something performed by the CR), act of omission (something which the CR should but does not do), and contemplated act (an unrealized plan or intention of the CR).

• Speech characteristics. When analyzing speech characteristics, one should be alert for

o style markers

o markers of the emotional state of the character' attitudinal markers

o markers of the character's educational level'markers of regional _t i and dialectal speech markers of the character's occupation markers of the

speaker's idiolect (i.e. his individual speech peculiarities)

• Psychological portrayal and analysis of motive.

• Description of the outward appearance, the portrayal of a character.

Ever sincc the beginning of narrative fiction, external appearance was used to imply CR-traits, the mctonymic relation between external appearancc and CR-traits has remained a powerful resource in the hand of many writers. One should distinguish in this connection between those external features that are grasped as beyond the CR's control, such as height, colour of eyes, length of nose, and those which at least partly depend on him, like hair-style and clothes. While the first group characterizes through contiguity alone, the second has additional causal overtones.

Description of the world of things that surround the character.

• The use of a foil.

• The naming of characters.

Ail the means of characterization writers resort to enable the reader to visualize and understand the characters, to think, to feel and worry with them ar they face their problems, to trace the changes and growth in their personalities.

1.5. Narrative Method

The narrative perspective (NP) presupposes the interaction of the narrative, compositional, temporal and spatial organization of the text, dependent on the author's communicative strategy. A.K.Domashniev, l.P.Shishkina, Yc.A.Goncharova group various types of NP into two main ones:

- omniscient, or unlimited NP - the implied author distances himself from the narrated events, he is above the characters, he is free to switch from one episode to another, to transcend time and space, to establish cause and effect relations as he sees fit.

- limited, or concentrated NP - suggests the description from the point of view of either the narrator identified in the text and having some reference to the story or one of the characters who, at the same time, is the narrator.

On the other hand, both Russian and foreign critics mention the so-called

- constant NP, or fixed localization, tied to a single focalizer throughout the

novel,

- variable, or changeable NP (focalization). when it varies between two or more positions. ^

They also note that from Dickens onwards, there has been a well-established tradition of using more than one focalizer as refracting lenses through which events are apprehended.

The narrative method involves such aspects as a) who narrates the stop, and b) the way the narrator stands in relation to the events and to the other characters of the story.

The author may select any of the following four types of narrators:

• the main character

• a minor character

• the omniscient author

• the observer- author

When the main character tells his story, the events of the story are presented to the reader through his perception. The author in this case places himself in the position of the main charactcr and tells of things that only the main character saw and felt.

^^^^Wl^^^nnor character, who participates in I^^f^-MtiimfiLi^^iiJjL⁶ events are described through the perception of this character. The author places himself in the position of this character and gives this character's version of the events and personages.

The author may narrate his story anonymously, analyzing and interpreting the character's motives and feelings. The reader then is guided by what is known to be the omniscient (or analytic) author. The omniscient author reproduces the characters' thoughts and comments on their actions.

The story may be told in such a way that we are given the impression of the witnessing the events as they happen- we see the actions and hear the conversations, but we never enter directly into the minds of any of the characters. In this case the reader is guided by the observer-author. The observer-author merely records the speech and actions of the characters without analyzing them.

The narrative method determines the dominant point of view. Depending on who tells the story the dominant point of view may be either that of the character (if he tells the story), or that of the author (if the story is told by the author). The dominant point of view does not rule out the possibility of introducing other viewpoints into the story.

To sum up, NP shows the narrator's position as regards the story as a whole and its specific minor aspects, in particular. Two cases are possible here:

1. The narrator is outside the story, outside the world of the characters, he does not participate in the story he narrates (heterodiegetic narrator);

2. The narrator takes part in the story, and at least in some manifestations of his 'self he is similar to other characters of the story (homodiegetic narrator). Two sub­types can be found in this last case:

a) the narrator is in the centre of the story, i.e. he is one of its main characters or a protagonist;

b) the narrator is on the periphery of the story, he is a witness rather than a character.

On the other hand, the relationship between the narrator and the implied author should be taken into consideration. That also can be of two types:

1. The narrator - who is above or superior to, the story - is not opposed to the author in certain essential characteristics of his ideological position (extradiegetic narrator)

2. The narrator is evidently different from the author; he is a fictitious figure, created by the author (intradiegetic narrator).

Those two pairs of characteristics, when combined, yield four various ty pes of narrator:

1.1. The narrator who is not opposed to the author and does not belong to the story (textual world) - authorial, omniscient, extra-heterodiegetic;

1.2. The narrator who is not opposed to the author but is inside the story, either in its centre or on the periphery - extra-homodiegetic.

2.1. The narrator who is opposed to the author and is outside the story - intraheterodiegetic;

2.2. The narrator who is opposed to the author and is a fictitious story-teller inside the story, either (a) in its centre or (b) on its periphery -intra-homodiegetic.