Narrative Interpretive Centers in Ray Bradbury’s Cistern: Exposing Internal and External Human Conflicts

Abstract

In the light of the inevitable twinning of linguistic theory and literary critical interpretation and appreciation, Ray Bradbury’s narrative techniques constitute his own thematic and aesthetic discourse. Bradbury’s stylistic narrative discourse evokes a set of narrative tools through which characters communicate ideas, thoughts, and feelings, creating aesthetic effects that appeal to readers. These blended artistic elements are interpreted in the light of the theoretical fictional context of narrator-character, character-character, narrator-reader interactions. Exploring a web of narrative-characterization centers in Bradbury’s story Cistern, the paper sheds light on the centers of the point of view, dialogic narrative technique, and thematic concerns that include internal and external conflicts. Meantime, the paper draws on Gérard Genette’s analytical method of study of narrative discourse, among others. Moreover, Bradbury’s themato-narrative techniques offer a fresh interpretative community for understanding his narrative characterization centers and serve as a receptionist case study for scholars and critics of modern literary criticism.