Time order in three novels of OK Matsepe : the story behind the text

Abstract

One of the major text-oriented movements of the twentieth century, structuralism interests itself in the structural patterns of literary works. Gerard Genette, renowned French structuralist, examined the complex relations between the narrative and the story it tells. Among others, he dealt with tense,which works with the relationship between the time of the story (histoire) and the time of the text (recit). Thus he order concerns the relationship between the succession of events in the story and their arrangement in the text, duration has to do with distortion of narrative speed, while frequency denotes the relationship between the number of times an event appears in the story and the number of limes it is narrated or mentioned in the text (Chapter 1). Rooted in the aforementioned tenets, this study examines time order, i.e.order relations, in three novels of Northern Sotho author 0 K Matsepe, viz LeSitaphiri (Chapter 2), meqokqo ya Bjoko (Chapter 3) and Letsofalela (Chapter 4). By reconstructing the story from the text in each case, the remarkable extent to which Matsepe deviated from linear chronology was revealed The investigation disclosed numerous discrepancies between story-time and text-time, in Genette's terms known as anachrolis: analepsis which implies a "return to the past" and prolepsis denoting "a leap into the future". All three works begin in medias res, which means that the starting point of the text is not the starting point of the story. Through his abundant use of analepsis Matsepe manages to blur the distinction between past and present, creating a literary portrait of simultaneity and timelessness, a reality, yet different from the real world. In a world fraught with magic, turmoil and strife, peace can only be enjoyed when the inhabitants have moved to a new locality. In so doing, Matsepe hints at another world as the eventual peaceful destination of man. The few instances of prolepsis similarly stress that longing for a better dispensation: on earth man is but a sojourner on his way somewhere (Chapter 5).