Narrative and Identity

The intricate relationship between narration and identity has become an important topic in the field of literary and cultural studies. The volume shows that the questions of identity that pervade many cultural spheres can be illuminated by looking at narrative modes of sense-making, especially as manifested in literature, and that studies of narrative forms benefit from being considered in terms of their relationship to human identity. The contributions to the volume approach the interfaces of narrative and identity from various theoretical angles and provide a critical assessment of some of the most important aesthetic forms which literature can employ to explore the multi-layered relationship between narrative and identity. While there is a unifying focus on 20th-century literature, the contributions register a growing awareness of (inter)cultural differences, highlighting the way in which narrative forms of identity construction are subject to historical and cultural variability.