The guiding question of this study is how the theme of knowledge is realized in the genre of fantasy. Drawing from the research fields of literature and knowledge, theory of fantasy, narratology, and memory/orality studies, China Miéville, Terry Pratchett, Kazuo Ishiguro and the Ambivalence of Knowing: An Analytical Model for the Representation of Knowledge in Fantasy Literature furthermore investigates how societal struggles over knowledge are negotiated in contemporary fantasy literature, with specific foci on the depiction of technology and risk in China Miéville’s The Scar, culture and identity in Terry Pratchett’s Nation, and memory and repression in Kazuo Ishiguro’s The Buried Giant. The study finds that while the worldviews the novels espouse with regard to their attitude to knowledge differ considerably, they all contain the general notion that knowledge can be dangerous, in that the discovery or revelation of hitherto secret knowledge threatens the stability of the society itself or the personhood of individuals. Knowledge conflicts are staged by means of contrasting worldviews, which are realized through the novels’ character systems. This particularly pertains to the questions of whether it is better to remember or to forget, and whether the old or the new society is to be preferred. TABLE OF CONTENTS 1. Introduction .................................................................................................. 9 2. Literature and knowledge ............................................................................ 13 2.1 Preliminary considerations ............................................................................. 14 2.2 Ways of conceptualizing the relationship between literature and knowledge 15 2.3 Knowledge as a theme of fantasy literature .................................................... 19 3. Fantasy and genre ........................................................................................ 23 3.1 Defining fantasy ............................................................................................. 24 3.2 Fantasy and structuralism ............................................................................... 26 3.2.1 Fantasy as mode, genre, and formula .................................................. 29 3.2.2 Fantasy, structuralism, and character knowledge ................................ 30 3.3 Rhetorics of fantasy ........................................................................................ 32 3.3.1 The narrative trajectory of the portal-quest fantasy ............................... 33 3.4 Conclusion: Theorizing fantasy ...................................................................... 35 4. Narratology ................................................................................................... 37 4.1 Character ........................................................................................................ 37 4.1.1 Character knowledge ........................................................................... 39 4.2 Plot ................................................................................................................. 43 4.2.1 Story, plot, and fantasy ........................................................................ 44 4.3 Space .............................................................................................................. 45 4.3.1 The division of narrative space ............................................................ 48 4.4 Conclusion: Narratology ................................................................................ 49 5. The literary realization of individual and collective knowledge ............... 51 5.1 Memory in literature ....................................................................................... 52 5.1.1 Collective memory: Communicative and cultural memory ................. 53 5.1.2 The rhetoric of collective memory ....................................................... 55 5.2 Orality in literature ......................................................................................... 57 5.2.1 The constitution and forms of oral knowledge .................................... 58 5.2.2 The thematic integration of oral knowledge ........................................ 60 5.3 Conclusion: Memory and orality in literature ................................................. 63 6. The analytical schema .................................................................................. 65 7. China Miéville’s The Scar ...................................................................... 69 7.1 Character knowledge in The Scar ....................................................... 71 7.1.1 Krüach Aum ........................................................................................ 73 7.1.2 Bellis Coldwine ................................................................................... 75 7.2 The public discourse of knowledge ................................................................ 79 7.3 Reality and perception .................................................................................... 81 7.4 Places of knowledge ....................................................................................... 85 7.4.1 Armada ................................................................................................ 85 7.4.2 Grand Gears Library ............................................................................ 88 7.4.3 The island of the anophelii .................................................................. 91 7.5 Interim conclusion: Knowledge in The Scar .................................................. 95 8. Terry Pratchett’s Nation .............................................................................. 97 8.1 Character knowledge in Nation ................................................................ 99 8.1.1 Mau ..................................................................................................... 100 8.1.2 Daphne ................................................................................................ 108 8.2 Orality and story-telling in Nation ............................................................ 117 8.2.1 Pilu ...................................................................................................... 122 8.3 Collective memory and identity ..................................................................... 124 8.4 The reconciliation of science and belief ......................................................... 131 8.5 Interim conclusion: Knowledge in Nation ...................................................... 136 9. Kazuo Ishiguro’s The Buried Giant .......................................................... 137 9.1 Character knowledge in The Buried Giant ............................................. 141 9.1.1 Wistan and Gawain .............................................................................. 142 9.1.2 Axl and Beatrice .................................................................................. 144 9.2 Orality and story-telling in The Buried Giant ......................................... 150 9.3 Places of memory ........................................................................................... 156 9.4 Exhuming in the darkness .............................................................................. 159 9.4.1 Awakening in the light ........................................................................ 163 9.5 Interim conclusion: Knowledge in The Buried Giant ............................... 165 10. Conclusion ..................................................................................................... 167 Works Cited .......................................................................................................... 171weiterlesen