DOI: 10.24308/iass-2014-137

Sofia University “St Kliment of Okhrid”

anita.kasabova@gmail.com

Abstract

Autobiography is defined as: “retrospective prose narrative written by a real person concerning their own exist­ence, where the focus is their individual life, in particular the story of their personality” (Lejeune, 1972, 120). Autobiography, it is said, relies on a pact between author and reader, requiring “identity between the author, the narrator, and the protagonist” (Lejeune,1982: 193). Autobiography, it is argued, is self-narrative and therefore the self is a narrative construct (Bruner, 1987; Eakin, 2005, 2008).

My claim is that these three views are problematic and, following Maria Popova’s proposal for the round table on semiotics and narrative, I suggest that the notion of autobiographical narrative requires further analysis of narratological ‘figures’ (to use Genette’s [1966] term), such as ‘first-person narrator’, ‘character’, ‘narrative time’, ‘perspective’ (following Bal [1985]), and ‘storyworld’ (Herman, 2002, 2009). Consider the following passage in tennis champion Li Na’s self-narrative:

“In 1998, when I was an idealistic 16-year old girl, a television station in Beijing interviewed me and asked what my biggest dream was. […] I tilted my sun-darkened face to the lens and said: ‘My biggest dream? I hope I can be a top ten tennis player. I know it’s extremely difficult, but I’ll work hard’. God knows how much cour­age it took for me to make that statement back then. But now, I wish I could say one thing to that little girl: ‘Hey! We made it!’” (Li Na, 2014: loc. 113).

Through which ‘I’-perspective does the reader see Li Na? How does the ‘possible’ storyworld overlap with the ‘actual’ world inhabited by author Li Na and her readers? I examine these questions by re-defining three autobi­ographical figures: (1) the ‘narrating I’ as timekeeper, (2) Genette’s [1966, 1972, 1983, 1991, 2002]) figures of narrative time and narrative order as the narrativetime-space of actions and events and (3) the autobiographical story (-’plot’/μῦθος) as wish fulfillment.

This paper explores how an autobiographical narrative refines the genre. I follow Genette (1999, 39)’s view that autobiography is halfway between diction and fiction. In my analysis of the recent self-narrative by Chinese tennis star Li Na (2013), I test some traditional attributes of the genre: “retrospective prose written in the first person”, “non-fictional genre” and “autobiographical pact between author and reader”. I suggest that the autobiographical space-time of her narrative appeals to her readers by transmitting values such as pursuing one’s dream and dealing with ordeals.

1. Autobiography in theory and practice

The noun autobiography denotes life narratives written in the first person, also called self-referential life writing (Smith & Watson, 2001: loc.88). French structuralist Philippe Lejeune defined autobiography as: “retrospective prose narrative written by a real person concerning their own existence, where the focus is their individual life, in particular the story of their personality” (Lejeune, 1975: 120). According to narratological tradition, autobiography is a non-fictional genre. However, I follow genre-theorists Gérard Genette’s (1999) Jean-Louis Janelle’s (2006) and Smith & Watson’s (2001) distinction between autobiography and memoir. Pace Holocaust and other documentary accounts in the first person, I focus on autobiography as a personal life-story rather than memoirs and this is how I examine Li Na’s (2013) text. Memoirs have a public historical significance because they are testimonies of political events and a collective past. Former tennis champion Li Na’s life-story, however, is personal and exemplary: having retired from tennis in September 2014 due to chronic knee injuries while ranked as the world’s No. 2 tennis player, she is a role model for young Chinese. Nonetheless, her autobiography does not document China’s recent history.

Autobiography is contractual (Lejeune 1975), in the sense that writing requires a responsibility constraint: authors of life-narratives tell, as far as possible, who they are, what happened and why they are doing what they are doing, without inventing things. The narrative voice in autobiographies also figures as the protagonist of the story she is telling. Hence autobiography is literary by diction rather than by fiction and this genre is halfway between fiction and diction (Genette 1999: 35). In life narratives, the narrator is supposed to be identical with the author, for autobiography is said to rely on a pact between author and reader, requiring “identity between the author, the narrator, and the protagonist” (Lejeune, 1975: 193).

Li Na’s autobiography, however, does not conform to the tri-partite identity between author, narrator and protagonist because it was written as a part of her sponsor Nike’s commercial campaign to popularize tennis in China.[1] Therefore it is questionable which ‘I’ actually authored it, although that ‘I’ testifies to Li Na, the tennis star who exists outside the text. And the text exists and is accepted as an autobiography, and it sells copies precisely because it is a first person account of Li Na’s exemplary life-story. Literary tradition assumes that in autobiography, this fictional role called ‘I’ has a testimonial function: referring to a person outside the text indicates the source of information (Genette, 1972: 262). This is what Li Na’s narrative does, but the testimonial link to the author is merely assumed by the audience, for the ‘I’ refers to the audience’s idea of Li Na, rather than the ‘real’ Li Na.

Narrative theory invested the autobiographical ‘I’ with extradiegetic powers, although Lejeune admits that autobiography is self-referential (1977, 31-32). Self-reference does not entail a correspondence with the extradiegetic world because it does no explanatory work: ‘I’ does not explain or justify the use made of the pronoun ‘I’. As Barthes (1967, 145) put it, “the ‘I’ is “nothing more that the instance saying ‘I’”. Lejeune (1977: 41) points out that, in an autobiography, the protagonist and narrator’s perspectives share a common mark: the author’s point of view. He argues that the use of the first person masks “the co-presence of a ‘you’ and a ‘he’, […] all referring to the same individual.” (1977: 31-32). But “referring to the same individual” neither accounts for the reliability of that individual’s narrative, nor for the latter’s authorship. Yet the audience engages with autobiographical narratives. I advance a different reason as to why this is so and show how the autobiographical pact could be reformulated, while allowing self-narratives to persist halfway between diction and fiction.

Lejeune himself, in later years, is ambivalent about autobiography as a non-fictional genre: “Telling the truth about the self, constituting the self as a complete subject, is a fantasy. In spite of the fact that autobiography is impossible, this in no way prevents it from existing.” (1986: 33). Lejeune’s fallacious implication is, that if there is an autobiography, then there is a real person whose life makes true that autobiography, but on this explanation, autobiographies are impossible. What is impossible about autobiography is that readers should believe it to be true by virtue of the identity relation across author-narrator-protagonist, which is made true by the author’s signature. What if autobiographies fail to satisfy the condition that ‘I’ refers to a real person outside the text who is narrating their real life? Consider the following example of an impossible autobiography: if there is a life-narrative by Binjamin Wilkomirski (1995), then there is a person called Binjamin Wilkomirski whose life is such that, necessarily, if Binjamin Wilkomirski exists, then his autobiography exists. Wilkomirski signed his autobiography, so its existence is confirmed. Unfortunately, Wilkomirski’s life-narrative is a fraud. His autobiography, Fragments: Memories of a wartime childhood (1995) is an invented memoir of a childhood spent in concentration camps. As journalists Gibbons & Moss (1999) write in their review of the ensuing scandal: “he is a damaged individual who appears to believe the extraordinary story he told in Fragments: Memories of a Childhood (1939-1948). But his apparent sincerity does not make it true.”[2]

1.1. Reformulating the autobiographical pact

In order to steer clear of Lejeune’s paradox, I suggest reformulating the autobiographical pact as an engagement between author and audience, where the author provides an exemplary account of her own life, which the readers can apply to their lives. On this view, an autobiography is not made true by its author, although the author exists, but by the audience’s response to and appraisal of his or her tale. The first-person retrospective account of a character’s past becomes a prospective account for readers to follow because it is an account they can relate to. Thus the window to someone’s personal past becomes a window for readers’ personal futures. This window is considered as a reliable testimony not only because of the responsibility constraint, but because there is direct evidence provided by the media.

Autobiographical writing seems grounded in implicit conditions of appraisal, which regulate how the narrator recounts her life-story. In Li Na’s case, the evidence consists of Facebook posts, televised tennis matches and interviews, articles about her in the press, as well as public appearances to launch Nike products.[3] Her Facebook page is a window for appraisal and feedback from her fans and audience – an autobiography-gone-live, where author and readers virtually interact. When Genette (1999, 39) says that autobiography is halfway between diction and fiction, we might add that, due to digital media, autobiography has become a project in the making. Li Na continues her life-story on FB, permitting a trans-medial interaction between author and audience online. There the audience can participate in her autobiography and appraise it by ‘liking’ it. In this way, her self-narrative involves participants outside the text.[4] Self-narrative is now less a finished product and more a continuing process or work in progress, for with blogs and FB posts the public receives regular updates about the author-narrator-hero’s life and activities.

The main condition of Li Na’s life-story is the success of its protagonist-narrator. The goal of a life narrative is to show how the protagonist attains an exemplary level of well being which can serve as an example for others. If the autobiography fulfills this condition, the life-story is successful and receives a positive appraisal from the audience. The pact between author and audience relies on their appraisal of the former’s narrative and the sense of purpose it expresses. I suggest the virtual world of the autobiography is relatable to the actual world of author and audience by transposing the value of a life lived well to a model in which the audience can participate in the shared space provided by digital media. This relatability of a self-narrative warrants its status as an exemplary tale, as is the case with Li Na’s autobiography.

Her life-story begins in June 2011, the morning after her victory at the French Open.

So, today I’m in Paris, and my impressions of the previous night aren’t just some fleeting fantasy. […]. Today is June 5 2011 and yesterday, at the Roland Garros Stadium I became the French Open women’s single champion. To be honest, until this morning, I was more or less in a daze. I still couldn’t take in that I’d really won the championship. (2013, loc. 110)

This a-chronic beginning transgresses the story chronology by anticipating the storyline about a young Chinese girl from Wuhan who became a professional tennis player at age 15, retired from the Chinese State system to compete independently at age 26 and became an international tennis champion at age 30. In this way she tells her readers, who know her as a tennis star, where she came from and how she became the Li Na they know, so that they can relate to her ordinary beginnings and follow her example of pursuing her dream. Narrator Li Na regulates the progress (or regress) of the character Li Na on the scale of personal and social values: to become somebody of standing and renown by means of her own actions.

My name is an extraordinarily common one in China. […] Since my earliest memories, I’ve always felt that I was nobody special. If it weren’t for winning the French Open and everything that it has brought me. I believe I would have gone to my grave feeling much the same. (2013: 60)

Li Na’s person and life-story are emblematic for the young generation because she breaks out of the Chinese social model to become someone special. She is a rule-breaker who became a role model for Chinese women. She is “affectionately called “Big Sister Na” (Nàjiě) among Chinese communities and is considered a ‘strong, unbending and unyielding’ role model” says Wikipedia.[5] In her recent article on Li Na, aptly titled “The meaning of Li Na” (Time 26.05.2014), journalist Hannah Beecham writes: “[t]he tennis star is more than a global sports icon – she inspires millions of Chinese as a symbol of independence and freedom. […] Li symbolizes how a young Chinese can achieve personal success even after distancing herself from the party and state. Her willingness to assert herself endears her to the millions of Chinese searching for their unique voices in a collective society.”[6] Her life-story serves the audience, because it shows how a better life is possible, enabling them to gather evidence.

Since Li Na is a public figure, she easily recognizable and identifiable outside the text for the autobiographical pact to be valid. These latter can choose whether or not to ‘like’ her particular life-story on Facebook and whether or not they would like to participate in conversations about it in virtual discussions on blogs or forums. Hence her contract between author and audience is validated by the audience’s participation in, as well as appraisal of, Li Na’s tale. The pact holds across the virtual world of Li Na’s life-narrative to the actual world inhabited by author and audience, when the audience responds to the narrative, relates to the narrator and ‘likes’ the protagonist. Li Na relates with her audience by communicating the emotions she experienced on her road to fame.

Tennis has brought me much more than just fame; it’s brought me profound emotion. The joy I felt the first time I won a Women’s Tennis Association championship; the nervousness of playing in a Grand Slam; the surreal feeling of being watched by more than ten thousand spectators […].(2013: 69)

Nonetheless, the pact between author and audience is grounded in a deeper relation: transmitting the sense of a life lived well.

I like myself very much now. […] I’m now thirty-one years old and my life is no longer aimless, my dreams no longer out of reach. I’m satisfied with my self and my life. […] I just want to earnestly live for each moment and enjoy every day. (2013: 3632)

The appeal of Li Na’s autobiography is due to certain values that remain constant across the divide between traditional narrative and digital media, such as pursuing one’s dream, dealing with ordeals, adapting to change and having a goal and reaching it. These values contribute to the relatable content of Li Na’s life-narrative with which a young female audience can identify: to have a dream and to work hard to achieve it. Li Na’s autobiography is relatable because it is not just a biography told in the first person but a storyworld in which she shows us her goal and how she achieved it by dealing with ordeals – loss, obstacles, injuries, defeat – and how she gained self-knowledge. Li Na’s life-narrative is about achieving her dream to become a top ten tennis player. Of course this dream is also a moment of her biography and has biographical significance. But her biography does not engage the audience as her life-story does, because her first person narrative or autobiography is the one that shows the audience how they might get there, by giving them an example or principle for future action.

I determine the above-mentioned values in Li Na’s life-narrative by following Bakhtin (1981), according to whom autobiography is a chronotope for ordering time-space between an older narrator and a younger protagonist for the audience. Li Na’s autobiography is a chronotope or space-time in which the first person signifies by example, transmitting a role the reader can engage with. I think Bakhtin’s (1981) notion of adventure-and-ordeal-novel, in particular the system of values and virtues allowing characters to deal with problematic situations is applicable to Li Na’s autobiography because the action unfolds between the first-person character-and-narrator’s goal and the achievement of that goal by successfully overcoming ordeals. These are the poles of plot movement in autobiography, which, as Bakhtin (1981, 89) writes, “have a biographical significance. But it is not around these that the novel is structured; rather it is around that which lies between them.” ‘Adventure’ denotes events about to happen or happenings and in this sense it is applicable to self-narratives, which recount what happened to an author-narrator and what actions and virtues are required to deal with events and circumstances.

The appellative function of Li Na’s autobiography lies in how she comes to terms with “happenstance” (“sovpadenie” 1981: 92), by showing that goals can be updated, while maintaining her dream. Bakhtin’s notion of happenstance is a chronotopic value, which blends circumstance and occurrence. Unlike a memoir, which has historical significance, an autobiography does not so much testify to the truth of what happened in someone’s life, as show how the protagonist-narrator deals with chance events when they happen, as is the case with Li Na’s tale. The appeal of her life-story for the audience is that by following Li Na’s example, they also have a chance of achieving their dream. The goal-happenstance-actions-ordeals-achievement-balance model seems appropriate for analyzing Li Na’s life-story, because it remains constant through changes of narrative context. And narrative context does change in this particular tale, because Li Na’s autobiography is a result of sports & media company IMG’s creative management in producing content for appraisal and consumption by a target audience.[7]

2. How Li Na’s autobiography became an exemplary tale

Li Na’s life-story is intended as an exemplary contribution to the actual world of the audience. She writes, that: “if my life and what I’m doing can contribute a little to our planet’s supply of positive energy, I’ll be very happy, and very honored.” (2013: 3279). After her book was published in Chinese, she remembers a student at Beijing University “who said that when he sat for the college entrance exam in 2011, my victory in the French Open spurred him on, helping him to score really well on the exam and get into Beijing University. I knew this was partly said in jest, but it was still very encouraging.” (2013: 3268).

The protagonist successfully carries out her personal and social goals, is resilient when facing defeat (as well as facing herself when facing defeat), successfully overcomes obstacles fate or happenstance may have in store for her and her life-narrative ends on a higher level than it started. Li Na provides a recipe for reaching this higher level:

When we want to move to a higher level, we must first defeat the enemy within: our own inner demons. (2013: 1763)

Li Na’s autobiography is about being able to face failure as well as success and maintaining one’s inner balance. Her successes have been accompanied by failures, such as a losing streak after winning the Roland Garros tournament, which she explains as hitting a rut and losing her sense of purpose.

I had no desire for victory and it was humiliating. […] My mind was a blank. I not only didn’t know how to play, I’d also forgotten why I should carry on playing. (2013: 3088)

When you achieve a long-held goal, it’s actually the loneliest time in your life. It’s a time when fear and anxiety arise, because, with the target reached, you wonder what you should do next. (2013: 3116)

Li Na’s life-story has a protagonist that can succeed, fail, recover, waver, fall and bounce back once again, because she has learnt to accept herself. This protagonist steps up the ladder of personal and social values, confronting her limited capacity to predict her own future or evaluate the consequences of her choices and actions from her younger character’s point of view.

I didn’t know I would make a comeback after bidding tennis farewell, just like I can’t judge now whether the two years in retirement were ultimately good or bad for me.” (2013: 1107)

In her life-narrative, narrator Li Na transmits the idea of not being able to see her future but believing in it. The narrative’s temporal structure is the “meaning-bearer” of her autobiography, because it shows how her dreams and actions connect over time through changes, which may either help or hinder her progress and achievement. Her own arduous training is helped by Nike’s sponsorship but hindered by the Chinese state-run sports system, which she quit in 2008. In addition, her career is hindered by injury. She describes her swollen knee condition in the Australian Open in 2010.

To others, 2010 might seem like the year I was basking in the lime-light, but in fact, the most indelible impression that year left on me was pain. […] Injury is as devastating as a mountain toppling. This time, my knee was in very bad shape. After I got into the fourth round, I had to rest for a whole day after each match because the knee couldn’t take more than two consecutive days of exercise. (2013: 2725)

Despite her injured knee, Li Na made it to the semi-finals and into the world’s top ten players in 2010. Yet her narrative shows that victory comes at a price.

[A]fter two weeks of play in the Australian Open, I received 3500 points, taking me into the world’s top ten. I thought I’m a top ten player. It doesn’t feel quite as good as I expected! (2013: 2750)

In order to be appraised as successful, the scale of the protagonist’s activities does not necessarily follow the proverbial “rags to riches” road. Rather, she should advance in life by earning positive moral qualities or virtues by learning life’s lessons, such as that “[v]ictory is not won casually, especially when the game is being played by the world’s elite players.” (2013: 2762). Li Na writes about how she came to terms with losing in the second round in the Sydney international tournament, in 2010:

My mental state is always up and down, wandering between defeat and victory. When I came to understand this about myself, I became more rational in the face of failure. (2013: 2712)

Narrator Li Na shows the audience how those lessons can be learnt, absence of bad luck permitting. An important virtue is how to adapt to change and update one’s goals. As Li Na puts it:

To be honest, change requires a great deal of courage for a thirty-year old woman. She might even lose some of her strong points in changing. Not everyone has the capacity to bear what’s going to happen and the possible consequences. (2013: 3419)

According to Chinese tradition, a woman loses her youth at thirty, but I feel I’m still in good shape. […] Everyone’s growth and aging process is unique. (2013: 3214)

Having transmitted the sense of a life lived well by presenting the conditions for a good model the narrator’s mind is at peace. If the audience appraises her life-story, as she would like it to be, the transmission is successful, because the author’s interests converge with the audience’s. Therefore the goal has to be a mutual one, shared by author and audience: to track the retrospective appraisal of the author’s life. According to Li Na, “the greatest gift that victory brought, was peace of mind.” […]

I would no longer need to hate myself for every little mistake. My internal referee would let me off the hook, for once. ‘Li Na, this time you’ve done alright,’ I said quietly to myself. (2013, loc.122)

Li Na’s life-story is relatable to actual worlds of authors and audience because there is a “basic story”, or underlying motif, to transmit the sense of a life lived well and this sense is instantiated by her particular life-story. The “basic story” is Li Na’s aim for a successful life and it is the instance of a model of the ‘events-and-ordeal’ type. This aim is exemplary because it constitutes an example for the readers’ future actions and hence her narrative is destined for readers, although the narrator’s reflections are addressed to her younger and maturing selves.

2.1. Li Na’s narrative transmits her message through a reflective dialogue intended for her audience

As Lejeune puts it: “identity is a constant relation between the one and the many” (1977: 30). In an autobiography this relation plays out as a constant reflection between an author, a narrator, a protagonist and an audience. The narrator and protagonist are indicated by various personal pronouns: “I”, “me”, “you”, “she” or “we”). The audience is obliquely implicated by the second person “you”. In her life-story, Li Na reflects on herself as the audience is looking on. Although the addressee is herself (the protagonist), her dialogue is intended for public consumption.

Sometimes I really want to go back in time and tell that helpless little Chinese girl in the midst of a crowd of strangers to cheer up, that everything will be fine. But other times I know it’s not necessary. […] those hardships and obstacles proved to be fate’s way of teaching me bravery and fortitude. (2013: 774)

When things aren’t going well, two voices sound in my head at the same time, as if I were fighting with myself. (2013: 3135)

Lejeune (1977: 21) points out that the nature of the receiver is double: “if I speak to myself as you, I nonetheless offer this enunciation as a spectacle to the auditor or reader, who is present at a discourse destined for him, even though it is no longer addressed to him.” The meaning of a life-story is reflected through its narrative figures, as well as through the reflective dialogue, which formats the narrative. For example, Li Na engages her audience by sharing her tennis player’s “internal debate” as she’s “looking for a crack in her opponent’s serve” and finding ways to “vent her anger at herself” when the opponent is too strong.

When your opponent’s attack is raging like a storm, and your own internal debate is raging without any answers, all you can do is vent your anger on yourself. (2013: 222)

The “you” directly addresses her own self, seen from her vantage point of narrator, but indirectly it provides a window for the audience to engage with the protagonist’s fight to win and be appraised as she acquires virtues like braveness and strength.

Those hardships and obstacles proved to be fate’s way of teaching me bravery and fortitude. (2013: 774)

The narrative form of Li Na’s narrative appears to be a reflective or internal dialogue between various self-perspectives. The ‘pseudo-temporality’ of her autobiography spans across the reflective dialogue between an older narrator-self and a younger protagonist-self who appears in the story. That is why the temporal order is determined by an older narrative voice looking back at a younger protagonist. In My Life, the narrative voice is that of a 30-year old tennis champion looking back at her younger self and with whom she dialogues, as she tells her readers about herself in a narrative that ‘lasts’ from the early 1980’s till 2013.

In 1998, when I was an idealistic 16-year old girl, a television station in Beijing interviewed me and asked what my biggest dream was. […] I tilted my sun-darkened face to the lens and said: ‘My biggest dream? I hope I can be a top ten tennis player. I know it’s extremely difficult, but I’ll work hard’. God knows how much courage it took for me to make that statement back then. But now, I wish I could say one thing to that little girl: ‘Hey! We made it!’ (Li Na, 2013: loc. 113).

The time-lines of narrator and protagonist converge, as the tennis star recalls her younger self, wishing she could speak to her in the present (time of narration), rather than speak about her in narrated time (past perfect tense). Hence she uses the conditional to project herself into a hypothetical dialogue, crossing time of events and narrative time (story time) in her mental time travel: “I wish I could say […] to that little girl: ‘Hey! We made it!’” To put it differently, the narrator Li Na speaks about herself in the 1^st and 3^rd persons and to herself in the 2^nd person, as well as the 1^st person plural. The narrator Li Na is the sender and the character Li Na the receiver of this message – but they are both aspects of the author who presents herself in the plural in her life-narrative.

This emblematic episode is repeated in the chronological storyline (1998) when the narrator refers to Nike’s 2011 “Fuel for Dreams” marketing campaign. Li Na’s dream not only has an audience, it became a dream brand for Nike when it was successfully sold to an audience.[8] The copy “to be in the top ten has always been my dream” engaged China’s audience to participate in Li Na’s dream and make it their dream, by identifying with her goal to succeed – at least in their imagination. Nike’s success as a dream product followed, as a result of Li Na’s successful narrative of her success as a tennis champion. The narrator reflects on her young self in the commercial and re-identifies with her dream and the public utterance of that dream 16 years later, after it had come true.

Every time I see that ad, I’m overcome with emotion. I look at my sixteen year old self – green, but with no stage fright – saying to the camera, ‘My biggest dream? I want to play my way into the top ten. I know this is very difficult to do, but I'll work hard. […] I didn’t really have the courage to utter my dream out loud, but at that moment, I went with it. (2013: 1024)

The narrative’s emphasis on the dream indicates that Li Na’s basic story is not her biography translated into a first-person narrative, but her motive for writing it: to show who she is, what she did, how she became successful. And that her success is defined by achieving her dream of becoming a top tennis player, as well as by re-defining her goals once her “internal referee” had “let her off the hook” (2013: 122).

The process of writing a book had helped me know myself better. […] [N]ow I am able to look at life from a different perspective […]. I’ve happily discovered that although I can’t forget, I can at least let go.” (2013: 3268)

I’m over thirty years now. I no longer need to use camouflage to make myself look strong. (2013: 3684)

Conclusion

My aim in this paper is to examine a current case of autobiographical writing in search of an appropriate theoretical frame. Li Na’s life-narrative is an example of an autobiography, which does not fit into its narratological slot. Hence autobiographical writing may disprove autobiographical theory. On one hand, it seems that generic definitions are not sufficiently subject to revision, while on the other hand there remain many loose threads in narratology, such as Lejeune’s relatively un-cited 1977 paper, which could be appropriately used to update theoretical explanations of narratives and, perhaps, to formulate narratological predictions about future narratives.

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