Storytelling As a Tool for Developing Understanding : A Narratological Analysis of “Story of Your Life”

Sammanfattning

In the science fiction novella “Story of Your Life,” Ted Chiang questions the metaphysics of time and the subsequent role of determinism through the conceit of an invented language. The protagonist narrator of the story, Louise Banks, is a linguist tasked with communicating with alien visitors who perceive time simultaneously. As she becomes proficient in their language, Louise comes to acquire this ability. This essay employs Genette’s narratological tools of order, voice, and mood to show how Chiang gives the readers an experience of this simultaneity in the text. Chiang employs examples from several different disciplines: linguistics, physics, mathematics, and philosophy to help readers understand this alien worldview. Chiang’s selection of narrator and narratee, a mother and her daughter, deepens the intimacy of the narrative. Interspersed throughout the, at times, technical language are anecdotes of the daily life of families which further engages readers, making the foreign and bizarre almost familiar. Chiang’s use of mimesis and diegesis heighten the reader’s ability to identify with the protagonist Louise and the shift in perception that she undergoes. This analysis of the narrative tools utilized by Chiang shows that through language and storytelling one can gain an understanding of those who are vastly different.