The Main Types of Subjective Organization in a Literary Work and Their Aesthetic Possibilities

An essential facet of the construction of a work's artistic world is the correlation and alternation of speech bearers, as well as the perspectives from which they view the world around them and themselves. The correlation of speech bearers and their consciousnesses constitutes the subjective organization of a work. Korman's literal definition of a work's subjective organization runs as follows: «Subjective organization is the correlation of all fragments of the text that make up a given work with the subjects of speech – those to whom the text is attributed (formal-subjective organization), and the subjects of consciousness – those whose consciousness is expressed in the text (substantive-subjective organization)»

The functions of subjective organization: creating the stylistic, emotionally expressive unity of the work; a constructive function, a "world-modeling» one.

The various types and subtypes of subjective organization (narration on behalf of an impersonal author-narrator, a personal narrator, or a lyrical hero, and their manifold interweavings) are horizons that determine and motivate the scope of the work's artistic world – all its spatial and temporal scales, all its movements, its intellectual and emotional expanse.

In a literary text a distinction is drawn between the subject of speech and the subject of consciousness. The subject of consciousness is the one whose consciousness is expressed; the subject of speech is the one who speaks, that is, who possesses a particular manner of speech. The subject of speech and the subject of consciousness may coincide or may not coincide. Often the subject of consciousness can only be identified through analysis of the work (Chekhov's «The Darling»).

In lyric poetry, as a rule, the subject of speech and the subject of consciousness coincide. The lyrical hero is the subject of speech, and it is his consciousness that is expressed. Thus in a poem by Osip Mandelstam, the tragic consciousness of the lyrical hero is expressed in a single manner of speech

I am mortally weary of life,/I accept nothing from it,/Yet I love my poor land/Because I have seen no other.

In drama, as in lyric poetry, the subjects of speech and the subjects of consciousness most often coincide.

In epic, the most complex text in terms of organization, not only various manners of speaking are captured, but also the types of consciousness reflected in them. In such works the speech of the characters and the narration are clearly distinguished.

In contemporary literary scholarship there is no clear-cut definition of the concept of «narration». The entire body of utterances having representational tasks has come to be called «narration», while «description» and «reasoning» (characterization) have become its constituent elements

In the broad sense, narration is the totality of those utterances of speech subjects (the narrator, the storyteller) that carry out the function of «mediation» between the depicted world and the addressee of the work as a whole – a unified artistic utterance (the reader).

Types of narration. N.L. Leiderman distinguishes two types of narration: personal and impersonal. Personal narration is represented by two forms: on behalf of the lyrical hero (confession), and on behalf of the narrator-character. Impersonal narration is on behalf of the narrator, and the most complex form of impersonal narration is novelistic narration.

A.B. Esin speaks of several forms of narration. He distinguishes two main narrative forms – first-person narration and third-person narration.

First-person narration is characterized by the following features: 1. It heightens the illusion of authenticity of what is being told; 2. It often draws attention to the image of the narrator; 3. The author is almost always «hidden», his non-identity with the narrator emerging most clearly.

Third-person narration is a neutral form, characterized by greater freedom in conducting the story.

A special form of narration is free indirect discourse. «This is narration on behalf of a narrator who is, as a rule, neutral, but sustained wholly or partly in the character's manner of speech, without at the same time being his direct speech».

There are two types of narrating subjects: the narrator (povestvovatel) and the storyteller (rasskazchik). Consequently, literary scholarship faces the problem of distinguishing between the narrator and the storyteller.

Esin, Khalizev, and Leiderman distinguish personified and non-personified narrators. The non-personified narrator is characterized by a distanced depiction of events by an impersonal subject, often referred to in the third person. «It is natural to call personified narrators, who speak in their own, «first» person, storytellers», Khalizev holds. The personified narrator (or storyteller) possesses all the attributes of a literary character: a name, an appearance, and, in one way or another, participation in the action. For example, Rudy Panko in «Evenings on a Farm Near Dikanka». Pechorin in the last three tales of «A Hero of Our Time».

B.O. Korman characterizes the narrator as «a bearer of speech who is not identified, not named, dissolved in the text», and the storyteller as «a bearer of speech who openly organizes the entire text through his personality». According to this classification, one and the same type of subject may combine with different grammatical forms of organizing the utterance (first or third person). For example, the subject of «skaz» must be classified as a storyteller, regardless of whether the tale is told in the first or third person. Thus Leskov's skaz «Lefty» takes the form of third-person narration.

From Korman's point of view, the narrator is the subject of narration who in no way is identified with the author. He is a speech mask. The narrator is an artistic image just like the other characters. The narrator's possibilities are determined by the author, that is, by the boundaries of the entire artistic whole, which includes the depicted «event of the telling itself».

The storyteller is the subject of representation, sufficiently «objectified» and connected to a particular socio-cultural and linguistic milieu, from whose standpoint he depicts the other characters.

The image of the storyteller – as a character or, in M.M. Bakhtin's phrase, as a «linguistic persona» – is an obligatory distinguishing feature of this type of depicting subject.

In his outlook the narrator is close to the author-creator. The storyteller is close to the characters. The narrator is the bearer of a more neutral manner of speech, of generally accepted linguistic and stylistic norms, than the storyteller.