Бањолучки триптих
The Banjaluka Triptych

Summary/Abstract: This paper aims to offer a narratological analysis of the dominant and subordinate poetic elements in the novels: Simana, Gospodska Street and The Sisters and the Comrades written by Serbian author Ranko Risojević. These three novels are related in many ways, primarily by their structure and also poetics. They all present characters and events that took place in the town of Banja Luka, from the late 19th till the late 20th centuries. A significant number of cohesive poetic elements bind them into one whole. The chronotope is mutual and the micro-localities are compatible with each other, and therefore these three novels can be treated as a macro-narrative.The characters in the novels differ in their number, as well as in the way they are presented and formed, since they come from different periods and do not have the same social, educational, national nor religious background. Two poetic characteristics of these three novels are especially interesting. The first of them is the narrative situation, i.e. the narrator’s position (combined with a specific organization of the chronotope). The second one is related to the ways the characters have been formed. The above mentioned characteristics vary from the dominant to the subordinate functions, and so the narrative situation and characters are analyzed in that aspect. We have demonstrated that the transformation of the narrative situation from Simana (2007), to Gospodska Street, and finally to The Sisters and the Comrades is correlated. It is the most dominant poetically in the novel The Sisters and the Comrades, since it significantly defines the ways of character shaping, as well as the perspective from which the events are presented. In the other two novels, the narrative situation is not so dominant, especially in Simana, where it narrows down the chronotope and reduces the perspective. The chronotope is the most dominant in the novel Gospodska Street, because it incorporates and nearly absorbs all the other elements, but it is highly subordinate in the other two novels. The novel Simana is based on the strong predominance of the leading character, Simana, and the ways it has been shaped. At the same time, the dominant narrative situation initiated and caused the subordination of the characters in the other two novels.

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