PRESENTATION OF TRAUMA NARRATIVE THROUGH STYLISTICS IN CHILD IN TIME

Abstract

This trauma study analyses McEwan’s novel The Child in Time (1987), narrated with third-person perspective, where the protagonist is the victim of a traumatic experience. His trauma affected consciousness is brought forward through stylistic devices as free indirect speech, anacoluthon and variations in syntax. The versatility of indirect speech under the third-person perspective and the free indirect discourse enrich the sympathetic narrative attitude for the protagonist in the syntactic hybrid of narrative discourse. Thus this novel presents a traumatological narrative highlighting the post-traumatic stress borne by the major character through stylistic devices.