Page 207 - DENG501_LITERARY_CRITICISM_AND_THEORIES

Unit 18: Mikhail Bakhtin and his ‘From the Prehistory of Novelistic Discourse (Textual Analysis with Chronotopes...

and sanctified", it is also widely read and interpreted by many across the world. However, the Notes
history of language and verbal discourse has the power to change meaning. While polyglossia
complicated the novelistic discourse and how texts were read, the Bible remains the one text read
and interpreted by many. Bakhtin also says that polyglossia contributed to debunking the myth of
"straightforward genres", that it offers change and variety. Interestingly, when the Bible it is
interpreted, it is for moral meaning; the conversion of language over time and the various meanings
it implies doesn't hold precedence.
The word hybrid is used repetitively in the essay to describe a crossbreeding of ideas. In part three
of the essay, both parody and satire are referenced as "intentional hybrids" in linguistic discourse.
However, "satire" is said to be complex. While both imply irony and imitation, parody is a
composition of satire. The marriage of languages to produce a comical style and influential discourse
should be problematic. Crossing languages would cause confusion and misinterpretation, but
instead it enhanced the history of novelistic discourse.
Bakhtin discusses the origin and nature of the novel arguing that "mere literary styles" are not
enough to analyze and define the novel, and instead we should focus on the relationships between
the distinct elements that distinguish the novel from other genres.
Bakhtin begins by briefly charting the course of the attempt to analysis and define the novel, and
the resulting failure, because of the failure to explore the "stylistic specificum, of the novel as a
genre." Bakhtin then provides a few examples of the use of imagery and metaphor within a novel,
and how these elements different from their use in poetics. Bakhtin points out a distinctive
characteristic of the novel "the image of the another's language and outlook on the world…,
simultaneously represented and representing, is extremely typical of the novel." Bakhtin then
discusses the relationship between the styalistic elements an author uses in a novel as "connected
to one another and with the author via their own characteristic dialogical relationships." Bakhtin
posits that it is these relationships that define the sense of style of a novel, and of the genre as a
whole. Another distinguishing characteristic of the language in the novel, as mentioned above, is
that language not only represents something in the world, but also "serves as the object of
representation." In the next section of "From the Prehistory of Novelistic Discourse," Bakhtin
discusses the idea of parody. Bakhtin spends a great deal of time going over the origin of parody
and its varying roles, all to conclude that the novel allowed the author to examine language from
"the point of view of a potentially different language and style." It is this "creating consciousness"
that sets apart the novel from other genres. Parody within the novel is a parody about an object
(like the use of parody in other genres) but this parody itself becomes an object. The final section
of "From the Prehistory of Novelistic Discourse," is an exploration of the use of the quotation. Like
the other elements that distinguish the novel, Bakhtin spends some time going over the origin and
use of the quotation, ending in its use today in the novel. Through his discourse on quotation,
Bakhtin determines that the quotation was one of the first elements responsible for parody. "Latin
parody, is therefore, a bilingual phenomenon," concludes Bakhtin. Bakhtin ends by reminding the
reader that we cannot examine the prehistory of the novelistic word with "mere literary styles."
Bakhtin's essay was tough to comprehend. The beginning of the essay had a much easier pace and
clearer direction to read to, so that it was much more understandable. What I got lost in was the
myriad examples Bakhtin employed to illustrate his point. More so than any other author we have
read, Bakhtin relied upon the use of multiple and detailed examples to make his point. However,
I did identify with Bakhtin's first discussion on the language of the novel. Here, Bakhtin was able
to isolate what it is that distinguishes the novel from other genre's, that is, its unique ability to
represent an external object, but also be itself an object; the language of the novel both represents
and is representing simultaneously. Bakhtin said, "Novelistic discourse is always criticizing itself,"
which strongly resonated for me with Paul de Man's theory on the resistance to theory. De Man
concludes, that theory is resistance to itself in the same way that Bakhtin concludes that the
language of the novel criticizes itself. One of the weak points I found in Bakhtin's essay was
during the beginning, when he made some very hasty premises to his argument, such as, the "Five
different stylisitic approaches to the novelistic discourse…" Another concept, which I couldn't
fully grasp in Bakhtin's essay, was his concept of parody. Bakhtin spent page after page talking

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