Multivocality in Neo-Victorian Fiction
Multivocality in Neo-Victorian Fiction

Author(s): Adisa Ahmetspahić
Subject(s): Bosnian Literature
Published by: Naučnoistraživački institut »Ibn Sina«
Keywords: multivocality; historiographic metafiction; neo-Victorian; Waterland; Possession;
Summary/Abstract: The late twentieth-century Britain has shown great degrees of emulation of the Victorian era with the aim of regaining the past glory and stirring the national pride. Fictional works produced at the time were categorized as neo-Victorian fiction. These works critically asses and talk/write back to the Victorian values, thereby countering Victorian metanarratives and allowing the emergence of petit récits. The aim of this paper is to broaden current knowledge of multivocality through the lens of historiographic metafiction in neo-Victorian fiction. The paper discusses two neo-Victorian novels: A. S. Byatt’s Possession and Graham Swift’s Waterland. The principal concern of this paper is the degree to which neo-Victorian fiction relies on historiographic metafiction and how historiographic metafiction engenders multivocality that had been suppressed in the Victorian age. Discussions of both novels greatly revolve around the historical representation of the past, the role of history and its narrativization, and the plurality of history, whereas the discussion of Byatt’s Possession takes into consideration the position of women and women artist’s autonomy in the Victorian era.

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