Extended Essays 2021

blank spaces. These gaps allow for the ‘multiplicity of interpretations that readers can

generate’ 36 which is what Mitchell wants as a contemporary, postmodern author. By allowing

readers to interpret his text in different ways, Mitchell is crafting an unreliable narrator. By

changing the focaliser in each segment of the temporally distorted novel, none of the narrators

can act within Booth’s definition of a reliable narrator - the ‘norms’ of the work - and can

therefore be considered unreliable.

36 Approaches to Reading Practices. QCAA, 2011

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