Observations on Narrative Forms Between Reality and Literaryness

Abstract

The concept of literaryness is generally used to express the aesthetic and linguistic characteristics of written or oral texts. The notion encompasses the artistic value of a text, the use of language, the style of expression, the way emotions and thoughts are conveyed, the structure, and depth of expression, also signifying the aesthetic and emotional impact of literary works. However, the meaning attributed to this concept can vary across cultures and time periods, and can be interpreted differently by different writers, critics, or readers. Due to the variability and uncertainty in drawing its boundaries, debates about the concept of literaryness continue. Narrative genre, on the other hand, is a concept used to determine how a text is organized, the language and style of narration, the themes it contains, and its narrative purpose.

This article presents an approach that questions the boundaries of literature and the definition of genres. While examining the relationship between reality and fiction in every narrative, it emphasizes the approaches of different disciplines to this issue. However, especially when discussing various narrative genres from newspaper articles to literary texts, it points out that the boundaries of genres are not fixed and can change over time, highlighting the importance of language and style in determining genres. The main thesis of the article, which seeks answers to fundamental questions such as how literary works can be distinguished from other written texts, is that the boundaries between literature and reality are uncertain, and genres can vary in this regard, requiring attention to this issue in genre naming. The article also focuses on the role of language and style in determining genres. It argues that it is possible to understand genres by examining the elements and structures contained in texts, that literature is not limited to classical genres, and that modern/postmodern approaches are effective in determining genres, explaining claims such as some texts not strictly adhering to the specific characteristics of a genre but often combining elements of different genres, and texts with these characteristics can be called “hybrid narratives”. In literary studies, narrative genres that are evaluated separately from literary text genres, under the heading of instructional texts, such as newspaper articles, interviews, literary criticisms, memoirs, and the narrative changes they have undergone with the spread of newspaper culture, both in Western and Turkish literature, are discussed with examples to support the theoretically advanced claims in the selected texts.