“Sometimes I think I am the unreliable narrator of my own life. Sometimes I think we all are.”― Alice Feeney (His and Her)
An unreliable narrator is a narrator whose credibility is compromised. The term was coined in 1961 by Wayne C. Booth in The Rhetoric of Fiction. While unreliable narrators are almost by definition first-person narrators, later arguments were made that second and third-person narration can also be unreliable.
"I have called a narrator reliable when he speaks for or acts in accordance with the norms of the work (which is to say the implied author’s norms), unreliable when he does not."
The above definition was given by Wayne C. Booth to brimming a difference between a reliable and unreliable narrator based on the narrator's speech and whether it violates or conforms to general norms and values.
Peter J. Rabinowitz criticised Wayne C Booth’s definition of Narrator’s unreliability which relies on the facts external to the narrative, such as norms and ethics, which must necessarily be tainted by personal opinion, and gave a new definition-
An unreliable narrator, however, is not simply a narrator who 'does not tell the truth' – what fictional narrator ever tells the literal truth? Rather an unreliable narrator is one who tells lies, conceals information, and misjudges with respect to the narrative audience – that is, one whose statements are untrue not by the standards of the real world or of the authorial audience but by the standards of his own narrative audience.
Knowing the narrator's unreliability does not completely depend upon the viewer/ reader’s intuitive judgement. Unreliable Narration in this view becomes purely a reader's strategy of making sense of a text. There are a few signs which can help to judge the narrator’s unreliability:
Intratextual signs such as the narrator contradicting himself, having gaps in memory, or lying to other characters
Extratextual signs such as contradicting the reader's general world knowledge or impossibilities (within the parameters of logic)
Reader's literary competence. This includes the reader's knowledge about literary types (e.g. stock characters that reappear over centuries) and knowledge about literary genres and their conventions or stylistic devices.
William Riggan analysed in a 1981 study discernible types of unreliable narrators, focusing on the first-person narrator as this is the most common kind of unreliable narration.
The Pícaro: a narrator who is characterised by exaggeration and bragging.
The Madman: a narrator who is either only experiencing mental defence mechanisms, such as (post-traumatic) dislocation and self-alienation, or severe mental illness.
The Clown: a narrator who does not take narrations seriously and consciously plays with conventions, truth, and the reader's expectations.
The Naïf: a narrator whose perception is immature or limited through their point of view.
The Liar: a mature narrator of sound cognition who deliberately misrepresents themselves, often to obscure their unseemly or discreditable past conduct.
An unreliable narrator can be said to be the main voice of the text who misrepresents what actually happens in the plot. Depending on the narrator's background, role and motives, his/ her unreliability could be deliberate or unintentional. If one wants to know whether the narrator is reliable or not the simple thing a viewer or reader can do is pay attention to what other characters are saying and is it matching to what the narrator is saying? Does the narrator’s earlier and later text-align?
As discussed earlier the concept of first-person narration arises a doubt of whether the narrator is reliable or not because being present in one place doesn't let him know about other incidents and happening of the characters. The narrator can perhaps be biased towards the one with whom he is close too. The third-person narration means someone omniscient is narrating a story, a god-like, who knows everything about everyone so he/ she can be reliable.
The concept of first-person narration was widely used in twentieth-century literature. Perhaps because after the world wars, the world was disillusioned and distorted. They had no idea about what is happening in the world and everyone started questioning the aim/ absurdity of human existence. No one was confirmed about their own lives and that’s what gave rise to the non-confirmed narration which can not be completely trusted, that is the unreliability of narration which can be perfectly done through First-person narration. So that anyone who questions the writer about the narrator being liberal and open to one character and not so to others can easily be answered by saying it's the narrator’s own view, not the author’s.
Now let's take an example of An Artist of the Floating World by Kazuo Ishiguro and discuss its narration by protagonist Masuji Ono.
An Artist of the Floating World is a novel by a British author Kazuo Ishiguro, it depicts post-war japan. It is narrated by Masuji Ono, an ageing painter, who looks back on his life and how he has lived it. He notices how his once great reputation has faltered since the war and how attitudes towards him and his paintings have changed. The chief conflict deals with Ono's need to accept responsibility for his past actions rendered politically suspect in the context of post-War Japan. The novel ends with the narrator expressing goodwill for the young white-collar workers on the streets during lunch break. The novel also deals with the role of people in a rapidly changing political environment and with the assumption and denial of guilt.
The story is narrated by Masuji Ono, a celebrated painter who once created propaganda for the Imperial Army. He now finds himself labeled a traitor by the younger generation, a reputation that threatens to derail his youngest daughter’s forthcoming marriage.
The whole novel is narrated by Masuji Ono. We find that the narrator goes from a flashback to a flashback. Whenever he is talking about something he deviated from it and starts telling something else. As a reader, we feel fragmentary in his narration. Also, the story is not linear it is narrated in fragmentation. Ono talks about the present than about his young days and drives in the memories of his childhood.
The novel is driven by ono’s younger daughter Noriko’s marriage arrangement. Her engagement has been called off and for this Noriko seems to be blaming his father’s past. His Older daughter Setsuko and Himself met at his place. And this simple task is the starting point of his recollections, opening twisted alleys of memory. Slowly we come to know about Ono’s relationship with his student and son-in-law.
Throughout the narration, we see Ono trying to prove that he was one of the most renowned artists of his time. In his narration about his childhood, his father burnt his paintings and warned him not to follow art as a profession, then, then what? No further information about his family and his relation with his family is given. He also narrates that when he started following his own ideology of painting, his art teacher removed him from his guidance. Here also he didn't clarify why he was removed by his teacher. On the breaking of Noriko’s first engagement, he narrated his meeting with Jiyo Miyake but didn't elaborate on what they talked about.
Also, this fragmented narration of Ono indicates us something is missing or the narrator is trying to hide something. And as we discussed in Peter J. Rabinowitz's definition of the unreliable narrator ‘...unreliable narrator is one who tells lies, conceals information, and misjudges with respect to the narrative audience…’Why our narrator is unreliable is a debatable topic. At first go, it can be age. After all, Ono is well-retired with two daughters and grandchildren. However, the irregularity in information can be attributed much more to unpleasant circumstances than memory failure.
But as we move further in the novel we realise that Ono politicised his art, under the influence of Chisu Matsuda. Matsuda showed him the lower class of society and made him realize the uselessness of art if it is not useful to society. Made him feel guilty about his art form, ukiyo-e. He changed his art form which was not accepted by his art teacher as well as supported the war. The war in which he lost his wife and younger son. Majusi Ono’s son-in-law considered him to be a culprit for the war and that was the reason why their ideologies didn't match. That's the only reason why his master stopped him from giving class. Masuji himself felt himself to e a culprit of the was and that's why he tried in his every narration to hide that and tried to show himself superior.
The reader can only realise that the narrator is unreliable if he tries to think from various viewpoints. If he/ she questions the memory or observation or emotions shared by the narrator.
“There are three sides to every story: my side, your side, and the truth. And no one is lying. Memories shared serve each one differently.” — Robert Evans, The Kid Stays In the Picture
Works Cited
Booth, Wayne C. “The Rhetoric of Fiction, Booth.” The University of Chicago Press, 1971, https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/R/bo5965941.html. Accessed 8 May 2022.
Evans, Robert. The Kid Stays in the Picture. New Millennium Press, 2002.
Feeney, Alice. His & Hers: A Novel. Flatiron Books, 2021.
Frey, James N. How to Write a Damn Good Novel, II: Advanced Techniques For Dramatic Storytelling. St. Martin's Publishing Group, 1994. Accessed 8 May 2022.
Ghosh, Vidisha. “The Unreliable Narrator: Exploring Ishiguro's An Artist of the Floating World.” TheSeer, 4 April 2021, https://theseer.in/the-unreliable-narrator-exploring-ishiguros-an-artist-of-the-floating-world/. Accessed 8 May 2022.
Ishiguro, Kazuo. An Artist of the Floating World. Faber & Faber, 2001.
Nünning, Ansgar. “Unreliable Narration.” jltonline.de, F. Zipfel, 1977, http://www.jltonline.de/index.php/articles/article/download/332/925.
Rabinowitz, Peter J. “(PDF) Truth in fiction: A reexamination of audiences | Peter J. Rabinowitz.” Academia.edu, https://www.academia.edu/625840/Truth_in_fiction_A_reexamination_of_audiences. Accessed 8 May 2022.
Riggan, William. Pícaros, madmen, naïfs, and clowns : the unreliable first-person narrator. University of Oklahoma Press, 1981.
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