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| David Lodge, The Art of Fiction |
| The Art of Fiction gathers articles written by
Lodge initially for the Independent on Sunday and the Washington Post.
From beginnings to endings, Lodge reveals the "tricks" behind any work of
literature, answering the questions
one may ask: from whose point of view is the story told and what does this
narratorial choice implies for the novel? What impact has an unreliable narrator
on the story told? How is suspense created? To what extent is a coincidence
acceptable to provide a twist to
the story? Are the names of
the characters meaningful at all? What do "stream of consciousness",
"metafiction" or "magic realism" mean? These questions are answered and
many more topics are evoked
along with them. Lodge illustrates the different topics with extracts from
diverse authors, from Laurence Sterne to Paul Auster, including Jane Austen,
Kazuo Ishiguro or Milan Kundera. When this is relevant, Lodge even refers to his
own pieces of fiction, as he does for instance when he explains how he chose the
names of his characters in Nice
Work:
I was looking for names that would
seem "natural" enough to mask their symbolic appropriateness. I named the man
Vic Wilcox to suggest, beneath the ordinariness and Englishness of the name, a
rather aggressive, even coarse masculinity (by association with "victor",
"will" and "cock"), and I soon settled on Penrose for the surname of my
heroine for its contrasting connotations of literature and beauty ("pen" and
"rose"). I hesitated for some time, however, about the choice of her first
name, [...] Eventually I discovered in a
dictionary of names that Robin or Robyn is often used as a familiar form of
Roberta. An androgynous name seemed highly appropriate to my feminist and
assertive heroine, and immediately suggested a new twist to the plot: Wilcox
would be expecting a male Robin to turn up at his factory.
The Art of
Fiction is an excellent reading for those who are interested in literature
and in writing and who want to discover the stylistic process behind the
writing, whether they are literature lovers or aspiring writers. The articles,
popularized, are not
addressed to literary scholars, but to the public at large. Therefore, the
terminology used is accessible, and whenever a "technical" word is needed,
it is previously defined, making the whole book very readable and even
entertaining, as David Lodge's works always
prove to
be.
Rating: 
© Discussing Books, 04/02/2002
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Buy Thinks:
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Buy The Practice of Writing:
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Buy Therapy:
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Buy Nice Work:
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Buy Small World:
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Buy On Writing:
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| Further Readings |
Works by
David Lodge:
Lodge, David (2006) The Year of Henry
James
Lodge, David (2004)
Author, Author
Lodge,
David (2001) Thinks
Lodge,
David (2000)Home Truths
Lodge,
David (1996)The
Practice of Writing (non-fiction)
Lodge,
David (1995)Therapy
Lodge,
David (1993)The Art of
Fiction
Lodge,
David (1992)Paradise News
Lodge,
David (1991)How
Far
Can
you Go?
Lodge,
David (1989)Nice Work
Lodge,
David (1985)Small World
Lodge,
David (1981)The British
Museum is Falling Down
Lodge,
David (1979) Changing
Places
On Writing:
King, Stephen (2000)
On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft
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Critiques
