Extended Essays 2021

seen as a mere ‘telling medium [who] strived for neutrality and transparency’ 11 . However, in

the second person chapters, “ you ” become the character and the narrator resumes external

focalisation, breaking the form of the other chapters. External focalisation is where readers are

told what the characters say and do, which Calvino emphasises with his use of the imperative.

He tells readers to “ close the door …Tell the others right away “No I don’t want to watch TV!...

I don’t want to be disturbed!” ” 12 . By using the imperative, Calvino is telling ‘you’ what to say

and do, highlighting the narrators external focalisation. By externalising the role of the

contemporary author, the implied reader 13 would recognise the narrators switch in form from

zero to external focalisation. Through a contemporary author-centred approach Calvino

tampers with the form of the novel, thereby utilising metafiction.

Calvino also utilises poioumena in IOAWNAT . Poioumena is a specific type of metafiction in

which the story is about the process of creation. Metafiction draws attention to the fictionality

of a novel and poioumena is a way to do that in which the author references the creation of the

novel, within the novel. Poioumena is also used to connect the real world and the fictional

world within the novel. The first clear example of this is in Chapter One of the novel, when

“you” are reading IOAWNAT. Calvino tells readers to “ watch out: it is surely a method of

involving you gradually, capturing you in the story before you realise it – a trap. Or perhaps

the author still hasn’t made up his mind” 14 . Through his use of poioumena, Calvino challenges

the historical author-centred approach that ‘the text was revered as the message of the author -

god, whose intention determine d its meaning’ 15 . He highlights that even he doesn’t know where

the novel is going to as he is writing which shows the reader that he is not an ‘author - god’ who

11 Beginning Theory. Peter Barry, 1995 12 IOAWNAT – Page 1 13 The Rhetoric of Fiction. Wayne C. Booth, 1961 14 IOAWNAT – Page 12 15 The Death of the Author. R. Barthes, 1978

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