Narration or narrative text is the account given by someone of something, of a sequence of events. This succession of events is called a plot, and considers a period of time and space (when and where it happens).
Whoever assumes the role of narrating, telling or relating something is called a narrator. The narrator reports the events experienced by the characters.
Narrative Types
Among the types of narrative, we mention:
- Tale: short narrative that revolves around a real or fictional event.
- Chronicle: informal narrative with the theme of everyday life.
- Fable: narrative that conveys a moral message.
- Novel: long narrative that revolves around a main character.
- Romance: long narrative that involves several plots.
read Cavalry novels.
narrative structure
The narration follows the following structure:
- Presentation: is an introductory part, in which the main characteristics of the context are presented, such as the characters, the place and the period of time.
- Development: is the part that presents the succession of events.
- Climax: It's the most exciting part because it's the moment when something is revealed.
- Outcome: is the concluding part, from when the final directions of the narration are taken.
Narrative elements
Storyteller
There are three types of narrator. It is this element that determines the narrative focus, that is, the perspective of history.
- Narrator character: he is part of the story told. In this case, the narration is done in the 1st person singular (I) or plural (we).
- Observer Storyteller: he is not part of the story, he just observes it. The narration is done in the 3rd person singular (he) or plural (they).
- omniscient narrator: he knows all the details of the narration: the present, past and future of the story, as well as the characters and their thoughts. Most of the time the narration is done in the 3rd person, sometimes in the 1st.
Characters
According to their importance, characters are classified into major and minor.
The main ones are called protagonists, while the minor ones are supporting ones.
narration examples
Narrator character:
"The next day I went to his house, literally running. She didn't live in a townhouse like me, she lived in a house. You didn't send me in. Looking straight into my eyes, he told me that he had loaned the book to another girl, and that I would come back the next day to get it. Openmouthed, I left slowly, but soon hope again took over and I started walking in the street again, jumping, which was my strange way of walking through the streets of Recife. This time I didn't even fall: the promise of the book guided me, the next day would come, the following days would be later the my whole life, love for the world awaited me, I've been jumping around the streets as usual and I haven't fallen down once.
But it didn't just stop there. The secret plan of the bookstore owner's daughter was calm and diabolical. The next day there I was at her door, with a smile and my heart beating. To hear the calm answer: the book was not yet in his possession, let me return the next day. Little did I know how later in life the “morning after” drama with her would repeat itself with my heart pounding.
And so it continued. How much time? I do not know. She knew it was indefinite time, as long as the gall didn't run all over her thick body. I had already begun to guess that she had chosen me to suffer, sometimes I guess. But, even guessing, sometimes I accept it: as if whoever wants to make me suffer is sorely needing me to suffer.
How much time? I went to her house every day, not missing a day. Sometimes she said: because the book was with me yesterday afternoon, but you didn't come until morning, so I lent it to another girl. And I, who wasn't given to dark circles, felt the dark circles digging under my startled eyes.
Until one day, when I was at her door, listening to her humble and silent refusal, her mother appeared. She must have been finding it strange that this girl had appeared mutely and daily at the door of her house. She asked both of us for an explanation. There was a silent confusion, punctuated by words of little clarification. The lady found it more and more strange that she didn't understand. Until this good mother understood. She turned to her daughter and with great surprise exclaimed: but this book has never left this house and you didn't even want to read it! "
(Excerpt from the short story clandestine happiness, by Clarice Lispector)
Observer narrator:
"The whale dog was about to die. He had lost weight, his fur had fallen out in several places, his ribs bulged against a rosy background, where dark spots festered and bled, covered with flies. The sores in his mouth and the swelling of his lips made it difficult to eat and drink.
That's why Fabiano had imagined that she had the beginnings of hydrophobia and had tied a rosary of burnt corn cobs around her neck. But the whale, always from bad to worse, rubbed itself against the stakes in the corral or went into the woods, impatient, chasing away the mosquitoes wiggling the withered ears, waving the short hairless tail, thick at the base, full of threads, similar to a tail of rattlesnake.
So Fabiano decided to kill her. She went to get the flintlock gun, rubbed it, cleaned it with the rag-drawer and made sure to carry it well so the dog wouldn't suffer too much.
Sinhá Vitória closed herself in the cabin, towing the frightened boys, who guessed misfortune and never tired of repeating the same question:
"Are you going to mess with the Whale?"
They had seen the chumbeiro and the polvarinho, Fabiano's manner distressed them, giving them the suspicion that Baleia was in danger.
She was a member of the family: the three of them played together, so to speak, they didn't differ, they rolled in the sand of the river and in the fluffy manure that was rising, threatening to cover the pigsty."
(Excerpt from the short story Whale, by Graciliano Ramos)
omniscient narrator
"Deep down, Ana had always needed to feel the firm root of things. And that a perplexing home had given him. Through crooked paths, she had come to fall into a woman's destiny, with the surprise that it fit in it as if she had invented it. The man she married was a real man, the children she had had were real children. His former youth seemed strange to him as a disease of life. She had gradually emerged from it to discover that happiness was also not present: by abolishing it, she had found a legion of people, previously invisible, who lived like someone who works - with persistence, continuity, happiness. What had happened to Anne before she had a home was forever beyond her reach: a disturbed exaltation that had so often been confused with unbearable happiness. In exchange, she had created something at last understandable, an adult life. So she had wanted him and chosen him.
His precaution was reduced to being careful in the dangerous hour of the afternoon, when the house was empty and no longer needed, the sun high, each member of the family distributed in their duties. Looking at the clean furniture, her heart clenched a little in astonishment. But in his life there was no place for him to feel tenderness for his amazement—she smothered him with the same skill that the dealings at home had given him. She would then go out shopping or taking objects to be repaired, taking care of her home and family without them. When she returned it was late afternoon and the children from school were demanding her. So would come the night, with its quiet vibration. In the morning she would wake up haloed by calm duties. She found the furniture dusty and dirty again, as if they had come back with regret. As for herself, she was obscurely part of the dark and soft roots of the world. And she anonymously nurtured life. It was good that way. So she had wanted and chosen him."
(Excerpt from the short story Love, by Clarice Lispector)
Read too:
- Narrative text
- Narrative Elements
- Plot