Learning Paths » 5A Interacting
Why is Thinks a Postmodern novel?
I think everybody would answer 'yes' to the question. There are some elements of the novels , which reveal why Thinks... is a postmodern novel.
It is an open novel; with this I mean that there is more than one genre (journal, stream of consciousness , e-mail style,...). There is textual discontinuity between a chapter and the following one, because a chapter with the stream of consciousness is interrupted by another one with the journal. The reader has a direct relationship with the two protagonist (Helen and Ralph), as a matter of fact both the style of stream of consciousness and the journal allows to understand what goes round the head of Helen and Ralph. Thus the style of the novel is informal. Since postmodernism deals also with metaliterature, also Thinks... deals with this element. As a matter of fact David Lodge through Helen, who teaches creative writing at the university, makes understand the reader how literature works. Helen teaches the reader problems of literature, and particularly in the chapter in which she is correcting her student's work, the reader gather information about: plot, characters, setting, and narrative technique. She teaches us how to build a novel.
In conclusion we can answer together that Thinks... is a postmodern novel.