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Part II is pivotal and substantial, demonstrating the uses of humanist inquiry at the level of narrative theory. It reveals how the concerns of narrative humanism can be situated alongside concepts developed in contemporary media theory, cognitive film studies, literary Darwinism, anthropology, social psychology and philosophy. This chapter introduces the concept of social narratology: a catalogue of the various social functions that story provides throughout our lives, and the way a humanist might use this knowledge to both understand and to create stories of ethical substance.

This chapter covers the use of emotion in fiction: the way we use stories to signal affective aptitude or emotional intelligence, to regulate moods and shift undesirable affect, to stimulate emotional contagions, to replace mystification with causal emotional attributions, to both inspire and deflate fears, and to share that which upsets us with imagined others.

This chapter ties up the social narratology of Part II by looking at some of the uses of narrative in generating ethical conclusions. It covers gossip, the “playing through” of responses to ethical dilemmas, and some of the basic “how to live” questions embedded in a majority of stories. It concludes with suggestions for future research based on this work.

The introduction addresses the urgent need to study intergenerational relationships and situates the connection between childhood and old age in a historical context and within age studies. The main theoretical concepts on which the authors in this volume rely are introduced: drawing on cognitive studies, they treat the connection between childhood and old age as a “root metaphor” (Lakoff & Johnson) and study age not as a biological given, but as a social performance. A performative take on age in fiction involves terminological challenges, and the introduction situates ways of defining age and phases in the life course in a multinational, multimedia context. It also offers some pragmatic solutions for discussing age despite these challenges. Finally, the introduction establishes three basic patterns in the way that old age and childhood are connected: affinity, complementarity, and conflict. Each pattern is discussed in detail with reference to the contributions in the volume.

The Epilogue offers a summation of the main arguments of the book; namely that Ammianus Marcellinus casts the major episodes of Julian’s reign as topoi, which are familiar from classicizing historiography in Latin, and that in doing so he deliberately presents a more ‘Romanized’ account of Julian for a Western, Latin-speaking audience. The Epilogue also compares the various points in the narrative where the narrator appears as a participant, and suggests that these are all conditioned by Ammianus’ wish to use his ‘presence’ as a way both of critiquing Julian, and of creating authority for his version of Julian’s reign.

This chapter argues for the need of developing a “black feminist narratology” in order to understand the complex role of the racialized narrator in Post-Soul fiction. Building off of the work of feminist narratology, this chapter applies the black feminist narratology – with its dual focus on race and gender – to ZZ Packer’s recent story “Brownies.” Packer’s satire works to emphasize the need for marginalized peoples to foster positive approaches to community identification, while also suggesting the need to develop such communal identification between reader and writer.

The Introduction defines the perimeters and terminology of the book. In addition, it offers a brief overview of the role of moral didacticism in historiography from antiquity to the 21^st century and discusses the distinctiveness of moralising in ancient Greek historiography compared with other genres at the time. It then offers a narratologically based typology of moralising techniques, which is used throughout the book.

Argues that the conventional form of minor-character elaboration, which becomes visible as the genre flourishes between the 1980s and the present, articulates a set of consensus values of liberal pluralism. Reading a wide range of texts produced in this period, the chapter shows how the registering of the narrative voice and psychology of a formerly minor character becomes the genre’s primary convention. While scholars have often lauded such texts for liberating the voices, of minor characters, I argue that rather than accomplishing an emancipation or posing a subversive challenge, the genre reaffirms the unique subjective experience of every individual, and the necessity of a pluralist dialogue between conflicting agendas.

This chapter provides an introduction to narrative theory as a formal approach to the lives of the saints in the Scottish Legendary. Narratology as a key theoretical field, its main strands as well as its chances and challenges for the analysis of medieval narrative are discussed and problematised. The formal approach is placed within more general discussions of surface vs. symptomatic reading. Both a close and a deep reading are proposed as an expedient method to scrutinise the narrative art in the compilation. The chapter is rounded off with a section on the various ‘communicative’ instances that come into play when reading and interpreting the legends of the saints.

How can you study the emergence of a field through a new journal? Chapter 8, the third Interlude, looks at ten years of the online journal Game Studies as a way of looking at the new field of game studies. We use Voyant to look at the high frequency vocabulary and we use named entity recognition with social network analysis to look at the connections between key figures like Espen Aarseth and Janet Murray. The chapter revisits the challenge of ludology (the study of play) to avoid importing narratology into the new field from literary studies. High frequency words give us some idea of what game studies is becoming as more attention is paid to rules and culture.

Using Carter’s textual relationship with Saussure and Derrida as a starting point, this chapter will examine the writing of two other “literary” female authors and their narratological engagement with incest and difference with regard to Derridean différance. This will include a discussion of A.S. Byatt’s writing of incest and the assertion of familial class difference in Morpho Eugenia (1992). Similarly in Doris Lessing’s The Golden Notebook (1962), there is also a social and cultural hierarchy of difference, which is expressed through the telling of incest. By linking the difference of both the incestuous and the separateness of the notebooks a reading of transcription will suggest that incest does not only fill the abject space but comes perilously closer to home.

This chapter introduces the subject of miracles in both the Islamic and Christian traditions. It begins with a selective survey of definitions from these traditions and embraces the views of both believers in such phenomena like St. Augustine of Hippo and total sceptics like David Hume, Richard Dawkins and Daniel C. Dennett. It then moves to examine what is termed the Medieval Mindset and under this heading such topics as milieu, continuity and contrasts are considered. The narratological substratum and method of the volume are delineated here, whereby themes and motifs will be identified in the succeeding chapters. Following H.Porter Abbott’s excellent paradigm it is noted that themes will be identified as abstract and motifs will be identified as concrete.

Gabrielle Bell's The Voyeurs stages voyeurism in multiple ways. Bell's avatar of ten acts as a voyeur, peering at neighbors or passers by. Some times she is the object, not subject, of a gaze: both other characters, as well as the reader, often observe her as she goes about her daily routines. But sometimes readers are presented with a third aspect of voyeurism, which is what she sees. Instead of just watching her watch, sometimes the reader sees what she sees. Thus Bell presents us with her vision, as well as offering herself to our gaze. While we generally associate voyeurism with radical subjectivity, loneliness, and alienation, Bell offers her vision as an invitation to join in a community of watchers, as we become more a ware of what and how we see.

W.G. Sebald's documentary fiction takes two forms: following and wandering. Yet the wandering always turns into repetitious self-following, and the following always dissolves into wandering. This is the reciprocal form melancholy takes in his books, and the chapter argues that melancholy thus is unexpectedly harnessed to propel a narrative. If the ontological point-contra Heidegger-is that death is never near enough, the ethical point is that melancholy, contra Freud, is an attempt to wander with the dead who cannot be brought near enough. Melancholy is an imitation of death that energizes itself by its failure to imitate death perfectly.

Acupuncture is currently among the most popular complementary therapies used by IVF patients in North America and the United Kingdom, offered predominantly in private clinics and occasionally through national health services. There is currently no consensus on the efficacy and mechanism of acupuncture treatment on IVF; hypotheses offered included the facilitation of the flow of qi in the pelvic cavity, the improvement of uterine-lining thickness, better response to medications such as hormone injections, or the optimisation of general health. This chapter investigates the promotion and dissemination of acupuncture treatments for IVF patients, in particular through an expanding market of self-help books published in the United States, which discuss how to make babies with the help of Chinese medical treatments. Close readings of these texts reveal their mobilisation of: patient testimonials; a particular history of Chinese medicine that invokes a continuous tradition and timeless wisdom; and a narrative of individualism, customisation of therapies to suit patients’ need, and attainment of a general sense of well-being. These popular manuals reveal how practitioners of Chinese medicine in North America fashion themselves, and how they respond to patient demands and changes in the medical marketplace.

Chapter 2 analyses the depiction of two characters in the first extant books, who in similar ways prefigure Julian’s later role in the narrative. The Caesar Gallus in Book 14 and the usurper Silvanus in Book 15 are both appointees, rivals, and finally victims of Constantius. Significantly Ammianus appears as a character during both episodes, and it is argued that he establishes his presence as a means of effecting a significant shift in the narrative’s presentation of each of Constantius’ rivals. Additionally the chapter proposes that Ammianus draws on the figure of Nero in his characterization of the tyrannical Gallus, and it offers a narratological survey of the Silvanus episode.

If you are interested in supervillains – or, for that matter, their wretched, do-good counterparts, the superheroes – then The Supervillain Readeris for you. Bringing together essays related to film, history, literature, and contemporary comics, The Supervillain Reader takes an interdisciplinary, multi-media approach to examining the deep history and current status of the supervillain. From witches, Darth Vader, and Voldemort, to The Kingpin, Cobra, and Bizarro, the evolution of the bad guy is an exciting, often surprising one, and the articles collected here – some new, some classics in the field – engage with the trope’s most pressing and central issues and offer the best possible starting point for supervillain studies.