The narrative structural forms in The Emigrants by W. G. Sebald

Abstract

This article studies the narrative structural forms in The Emigrants by W. G. Sebald, in order to clarify one of the ways the work conveys the fate of the exiles when facing with their traumatic memories. Through the approach of narratology, poetics and structuralism, the article models two forms of narrative structure in the work. The first is the parallel structure of narratives with similar architecture that can both stand independently and be linked together by a network of connection points, creating a solid cohesion for the work. Second is the overlapping narrative structure, intertwining the narrative layers of storytellers at different narrative levels, creating the blurring and dissolving into each other of those narrative layers. It is the art of creating such structures that shows the writer's creative ability when finding an art form that is completely compatible with the concepts of memory in his works such as separation, fragmentation, questionability and trauma of memory. Narrative structure, therefore, is an important element in the artistic world that W. G. Sebald's prose fiction created.

Keywords: overlapping structures, parallel structures, The Emigrants, W. G. Sebald