The Logic of Narrative Possibilities

The Logic of Narrative Possibilities

CLAUDE BREMOND

This essay, like Barthes' ''Introduction to the Structural Analysis of Narrative'', was also published in no. 8 of Communications. Barthes situated the work of the contributors to the journal in a line with the Russian formalists in general and Vladimir Propp and Claude Lvi-Strauss in particular. These writers, Barthes explained, had drawn attention to the fact that, for all the infinite variety of narratives, they share a basic structure which can be isolated and analysed. In his contribution, Claude Bremond sets out to elaborate a comprehensive typology of the structural elements underlying all kinds of fabulas (which he still calls narratives), not just one particular kind, as Propp had done in his Morphology of the Folktale ( 1928). Bremond accepts Propp's fundamental notions of 'function', the basic narrative unit, made up of events and actions; and 'sequence', or basic groupings of functions. The most elementary sequence is made up of three functions: the first opens the possibility of carrying out an action or event; the second achieves the virtuality opened in the first; and the third is the result that closes the process. The range of combinatory possibilities is doubled if the virtuality opened in the first function is not fulfilled. Bremond builds his elementary sequence accordingly: Virtuality -- Actualization // Absence of Actualization -- Goal attained // Goal not attained. As he explains, this basic triadic scheme can be further subdivided into more complex triadic combinations, according to the most recurrent kinds of events and actions and to the perspective from which they are analysed, for the same event may be described, for example, as 'evil performed' (from the perspective of the victim) and as 'deed to be avenged' (from that of the avenger). Bremond's scheme provided a simple typology of actions and events and helped define the different roles of the characters in the fabula according to their function (the seducer, the seduced, the

avenger, the victim, etc.), thus foregrounding their structural roles as 'actants' (a term coined by Greimas) rather than as characters.

The essay reprinted below included a 'Postface' written by Bremond for the English version in 1988 in which he corrected an important point in his earlier basic scheme. To the notion of 'modification' of the initial situation (which might start a process of 'amelioration' or 'degradation' of a given character), he added the complementary notion of 'blockage of modification' (resulting in 'frustration' or 'protection'). The intersection of these four fundamental processes provides the axis around which all fabulas are structured. Bremond's triadic typology, like the typologies devised by other French structuralists such as Tzvetan Todorov (in Grammaire du Dcamron, 1969) and A.-J. Greimas and J. Courts (in Smiotique: Dictionnaire raisonn de la thorie du langage, 1979) was influenced by generative linguistics in that its overall aim was to establish the 'grammar' of narrative: that is the overall system of rules in the deep structure underlying each and every textual manifestation -- whether existent or conceivable -- at surface level.

I

Semiological study of narrative can be divided into two parts: on the one hand, an analysis of the techniques of narrative; on the other, a search for the laws which govern the narrated matter. These laws themselves depend upon two levels of organization: they reflect the logical constraint that any series of events, organized as narrative, must respect in order to be intelligible; and they add to these constraints, valid for all narrative, the conventions of their particular universe which is characteristic of a culture, a period, a literary genre, a narrator's style, even of the narration itself.

After examining the method used by Vladimir Propp to discover the specific characteristics of one of these particular domains, that of the Russian folktale, I became convinced of the need to draw a map of the logical possibilities of narrative as a preliminary to any description of a specific literary genre. Once this is accomplished, it will be feasible to attempt a classification of narrative based on structural characteristics as precise as those which help botanists and biologists to define the aims of their studies. But this widening perspective entails the need for a less rigorous method. Let us recall and spell out the modifications which seem indispensable:

First, the basic unit, the narrative atom, is still the function, applied as in Propp, to actions and events which, when grouped in sequences, generate the narrative.

Second, a first grouping of three functions creates the elementary sequence. This triad corresponds to the three obligatory phases of any process: a function which opens the process in the form of an act to be carried out or of an event which is foreseen; a function which achieves this virtuality in the form of an actual act or event; and a function which closes the process in the form of an attained result.

Third, the foregoing differ from Propp's method in that none of these functions lead necessarily to the following function in the sequence. On the contrary, when the function which opens the sequence is proposed, the narrator always has the choice of having it followed by the act or of maintaining it in a state of virtuality: when an act is presented as having to be realized, or if an event is foreseen, the actualization of the act or of the event can just as well take place as not. If the narrator chooses to actualize the act or the event, he still has the choice of allowing the process to continue on to its conclusion, or he can stop it on the way: the act can attain or fail to attain its goal; the event can follow or not follow its course up to the end which was foreseen. The network of possibilities opened in this way by the elementary sequence follows this pattern:

II. The narrative cycle

All narrative consists of a discourse which integrates a sequence of events of human interest into the unity of a single plot. Without succession there is no narrative, but rather description (if the objects of the discourse are associated through spatial contiguity), deduction (if these objects imply one another), lyrical effusion (if they evoke one another through metaphor or metonymy). Neither does narrative exist without integration into the unity of a plot, but only chronology, an enunciation of a succession of uncoordinated facts. Finally, where there is no implied human interest (narrated events neither being produced by agents nor experienced by anthropomorphic beings), there can be no narrative, for it is only in relation to a plan conceived by man that events gain meaning and can be organized into a structured temporal sequence.

According to whether they favor or oppose this plan, the events of a given narrative can be classed under two basic types which develop according to the following sequences:

Each elementary sequence which we will eventually isolate is a specification of one or the other of these two categories, which thus establishes the first principle of dichotomous classification. Before examining the various sequences, let us specify the modalities according to which amelioration and degradation combine in a narrative:

(1) By end-to-end succession. It can immediately be seen that narration can alternate phases of amelioration and degradation according to a continuous cycle:

However, and this is not quite so obvious, this alteration is not only possible but necessary. Let us consider the beginning of a story which presents a deficiency affecting an individual or a group (in the form of poverty, illness, stupidity, lack of a male heir, chronic plague, desire for knowledge, love, etc.). For this beginning to develop, the situation must evolve; something must happen which will bring a modification. In what direction? One might suppose either toward amelioration or degradation. Rightfully, however, only an amelioration is possible. Misfortune may, of course, grow worse. There are narratives in which misfortunes follow one after the other so that each degradation brings on another. But in this case the deficiency which marks the end of the first degradation is not the real point of departure of the second. This intermediary interruption -- this reprieve -- is functionally equivalent to a period of amelioration, or at least to a phase which represents the preservation of what can still be saved. The departure point of the new phase of degradation is not the degraded condition, which can only be improved, but the still relatively satisfying state which can only be degraded. Likewise, two amelioration processes cannot follow one another, inasmuch as the improvement brought about by the first still leaves something to be desired. By implying this lack, the narrator introduces the equivalent of a phase of degradation. The still relatively deficient condition which results acts as a point of departure for the new amelioration phase.

(2) By enclave. The failure of a process of amelioration or degradation in progress may result from the insertion of a reverse process which prevents it from reaching its normal conclusion. In this case we have the following schemata:

(3)By coupling. The same sequence of events cannot at the same time and in relation to the same agent be characterized both as amelioration and degradation. On the contrary, this simultaneity becomes possible when the event affects at one and the same time two agents moved by opposing interests: the degradation of the fate of the one coincides with the amelioration of the fate of the other. This produces the following schema:

The fact that it is possible and indeed necessary to change viewpoints from the perspective of one agent to that of another is capital for the remainder of our study. It implies the rejection, at our level of analysis, of the notions of Hero, Villain, etc., conceived as labels and attached once and for all to the characters. Each agent is his own hero. His partners are defined from his point of view as allies, adversaries, etc. These definitions are reversed when passing from one perspective to another. Rather than outline the narrative structure in relation to a privileged point of view -- the hero's or the narrator's -- the patterns that are herein developed will integrate the many perspectives belonging to diverse agents into the unity of a single schema.

III. Amelioration process

The narrator can limit himself to indicating an amelioration process without explicitly outlining its phases. If he simply says that the hero solves his problems or that he gets well, becomes good, handsome, or rich, these specifications which deal with the contents of the development without specifying how it comes about cannot help us to characterize its structure. On the contrary, if he tells us that the hero solves his problems after a long period of trials, if the cure is the result of a medication or of a doctor's efforts, if the hero regains his beauty thanks to a compassionate fairy, his riches because of an advantageous transaction, or his wits following the resolutions he makes after committing an error, then we can use the articulations within these operations to differentiate diverse types of amelioration: the more detail the narrative provides, the further this differentiation can be carried out.

Let us first consider things from the perspective of the beneficiary of the amelioration. (It should be understood that the beneficiary is not necessarily aware of the process engaged in his favor. His perspective can remain in a potential state, like that of Sleeping Beauty while she waits for her Prince Charming.) His initial state of deficiency implies the presence of an obstacle which prevents the realization of a more satisfying state. The elimination of the obstacle implies intervening factors which act as means taken against the obstacle and in favor of the beneficiary. So that if the narrator chooses to develop this episode, his narrative will follow the schema:

At this stage we may be dealing with a single dramatis persona, the beneficiary of the amelioration, who benefits passively from a fortunate combination of circumstances. In this case neither he nor anyone else bears the responsibility for having brought together and activated the means which overturned the obstacle. Things 'turned out well' without anyone's having seen to them.

There is no such solitude when the amelioration, rather than being ascribed to chance, is attributed to the intervention of an agent endowed with initiative who assumes it as a task to accomplish. The amelioration process is then organized into behavior, which implies that it takes on the structure of a network of ends and means which can be analyzed ad infinitum. In addition, this transformation introduces two new roles: on the one hand, the agent who assumes the task for the benefit of a passive beneficiary acts, in relation to that beneficiary, no longer as an inert means, but as one endowed with initiative and with his own interests: he is an ally. On the other hand, the obstacle confronted by the agent can also be represented by an agent, also endowed with initiative and his own interests: this agent is an adversary. In order to take these new dimensions into account we must examine: the structure of the completion of the task and its possible developments, the full details of the alliance relationship brought about by the intervention of an ally, and the modalities and the consequences of the action undertaken against an adversary.

IV. Completion of the task

The narrator can limit himself to mentioning the performance of the task. If he chooses to develop this episode, he must make clear first the nature of the obstacle encountered, then the structure of the measures taken to eliminate it -- intentionally, and not by chance this time. The agent can be lacking these means, perhaps intellectually if he is ignorant of what he must do, or materially if he does not have the necessary tools at his disposal. The recognition of this lack is equivalent to a phase of degradation which, in this case, takes on the specific form of a problem to solve and which, as before, can be dealt with in two ways: things either work out by themselves (heaven may unexpectedly provide the sought-for solution) or an agent may assume the task of arranging them. In this case, this new agent acts as an ally intervening for the benefit of the first who becomes in turn the passive beneficiary of the assistance thus given him.

V. Intervention of the ally

It is possible that the ally's intervention, in the form of an agent who takes charge of the amelioration process, not be given a motive by the narrator, or that it be explained by motives having no link with the beneficiary (if the aid is involuntary). In this case one cannot really speak of the intervention of an ally: deriving from fortuitous encounter between two tales, the amelioration is the product of chance.

Things are quite different when the intervention is motivated, from the ally's point of view, by the merits of the beneficiary. In that case the aid is a sacrifice consented to within the framework of an exchange of services. This exchange itself can assume three forms: either (1) the aid is received by the beneficiary in exchange for assistance which he himself offers his ally in an exchange of simultaneous services: the two paramenters are in this case jointly responsible for the accomplishment of a task of mutual interest; or (2) the aid is offered in gratitude for a past service: in this case the ally acts as the beneficiary's debtor; or (3) the aid is offered in the hope of future compensation: in this case the ally acts as the beneficiary's creditor.

Three types of allies and three narrative structures are thus determined by the chronological ordering of the services exchanged. If two associates are jointly interested in the completion of a single task, the perspective of the beneficiary and that of the ally come so close together as to coincide: each one is the beneficiary of his own efforts united with those of his ally. In a final stage there could be a single character split into two roles: when an unhappy hero decides to right his fate by 'helping himself,' he splits into two dramatis personae and becomes his own ally. The completion of the task represents a voluntary degradation, a sacrifice (a fact which is supported by the expressions 'to do something with great pain,' 'to toil,' etc.) whose purpose is to pay the price of an amelioration. Whether it is a question of a single character who divides in two, or of two interdependent characters, the role configuration remains identical: the amelioration is obtained through the sacrifice of an ally whose interests are the same as those of the beneficiary. Rather than coincide, the perspectives oppose one another when the beneficiary and his ally form the couple creditor/debtor. Their roles then take on the following form: for example, A and B must each obtain an amelioration distinct from that of the other. If A receives B's aid in order to achieve amelioration a, A becomes B's debtor and will be obliged in turn to help B achieve amelioration b. The narrative will follow the schema:

The three types of allies that we have just distinguished -- the interdependent associate, the creditor, the debtor -- act according to a pact which regulates the exchange of services and guarantees the repayment of services rendered. Sometimes this pact remains implicit (it is understood that hard work is worthy of payment, that a son must obey the father who gave him life, that a slave obey the master who saved his life, etc.); sometimes the pact is the result of a particular negotiation, spelled out in the narrative more or less specifically. Just as it was necessary to search for means before

implementing them when their lack constituted an obstacle to the completion of the task, so aid must be negotiated when an ally does not cooperate spontaneously. Within the framework of this preliminary task, the abstention of a future ally makes of him an adversary who has to be convinced. This negotiation, soon to be discussed, constitutes the peaceful way of eliminating an adversary.

VI. Elimination of the adversary

Among the obstacles which prevent the completion of a task, some, as we have seen, present only an inert force; others take on the form of adversaries, agents endowed with initiative who can react through chosen acts to the procedures undertaken against them. The result is that the procedure for eliminating the adversary must be organized according to more or less complex strategies in order to take this resistance and its diverse forms into account.

We need not consider the case in which the adversary disappears without the agent's bearing the responsibility for his elimination (if he dies of natural causes, falls under the blows of another enemy, becomes more accommodating with age, etc.): in that case there is only a fortuitous amelioration. Taking into account only cases where the elimination of the adversary is attributable to the initiative of an agent, we will distinguish two forms: (1) peaceful -- the agent tries to influence the adversary so that he cease opposition to the agent's plans. This is negotiation which transforms the adversary into an ally; (2) hostile -- the agent attempts to inflict damage upon the adversary which will incapacitate him and therefore prevent him from any longer opposing the agent's endeavors. This is aggression, which aims to suppress the adversary.

VII. Negotiation

The negotiation consists for the agent in defining, in agreement with the ex-adversary and future ally, the modalities of exchange of services which constitute the goal of their alliance. But it is still necessary that the principle of such an exchange be accepted by both parties. The agent who takes such an initiative must act so as to create a corresponding desire in his partner. In order to obtain this result he can use either seduction or intimidation. If he chooses seduction he will try to create the need for a service that he will offer in exchange for the one he needs; if he chooses intimidation he tries to create fear of the harm he can cause, but spare just as well, and which can act as a payment for the service he wants to obtain. If this operation succeeds the two partners are equal. A desires a service from B as B does of A. The conditions which make the search for an agreement possible are established. There remains to negotiate the modalities of the exchange and to guarantee that all engagements will be faithfully carried out. The following is a simplified schema of negotiation by seduction:

VIII. Aggression

When he opted for negotiation, the agent chose to eliminate his adversary by an exchange of services which transformed him into an ally; when opting for aggression, he chooses to inflict an injury which will do away with the adversary (at least insofar as he is an obstacle). From the perspective of the victim of aggression, the beginning of this process constitutes a danger which, if it is to be avoided, will normally require an act of self-protection. If this act fails the following occurs: In the above schema it is the aggressor who retains the advantage. However, this is obviously not always the case. If the adversary seems to have at his disposal efficient methods of serf-protection, it is desirable for the aggressor to catch him off guard. In that case, the aggression takes on the more complex form of a trap. To use a trap is to act so that the victim of aggression, instead of protecting himself as he could, cooperates unknowingly with the aggressor (by not doing what he ought to, or by doing what he ought not to). The trap is set in three stages: first, a deception; then, if the deception succeeds, an error committed by the dupe; finally, if the error-inducing process is brought to its conclusion, the deceiver exploits his acquired advantage, which places a disarmed adversary at his mercy: The deception, first of the three phases of the trap, is in itself a complex operation. Deception consists of several actions carried on simultaneously: the dissimulation of what is, the simulation of what is not, and the substitution of what is not for what is in order to create a semblance of truth to which the dupe reacts as if it were real. In any deception two combined operations can thus be distinguished, a dissimulation and a simulation. Dissimulation itself is not sufficient to constitute the deception (except insofar as it simulates the absence of dissimulation); neither does simulation by itself suffice, for an open simulation (that of an actor, for example) is not a deception. In order to go after the bait, the dupe must think it real and be unaware of the hook. The following diagram outlines the deception mechanism:

When the classification is further developed, several types of deception can be distinguished. Differences are created by the type of simulation used by the deceiver to disguise the aggression being planned: (1) the deceiver can simulate a situation implying the absence of any relationship between him and the future victim: he pretends not to be there, literally (if he hides) or figuratively (if he pretends to be asleep, to look away, to lose his mind, etc.); (2) the deceiver can simulate peaceful intentions: he proposes an alliance, tries to seduce or intimidate his victim, while he secretly prepares to break off the negotiations or to betray the pact; (3) the deceiver simulates aggressive intentions so that the dupe, busy defending himself against an imaginary assault, leaves himself open and defenseless against the real attack.

IX. Retributions: recompense and vengeance

The injury inflicted by the aggressor on his victim can be considered as a service in reverse, no longer consented to by the creditor but extorted by the debtor and requiring in return the infliction of an injury of similar proportions, comparable to receiving payment for an open debt: the debtor pays, despite himself, the amount of a loan he was forced to incur. Reward for a service rendered and vengeance directed against an incurred wrong are the two faces of retribution. Like payment for services, payment for wrongs is the consequence of a pact which is at times implicit (all evil acts deserve punishment, an eye for an eye, etc.), at times explicit, spelled out in the terms of a specific alliance which outlines a threat against breaking a contract.

A new type, the retributor, and two subtypes, the rewarding retributor and the avenging retributor, appear here. The retributor is, so to speak, the guarantor of contracts. From his point of view every service becomes a good deed which requires reward and every injury an evil deed which calls for punishment. His role coincides with that of the debtor who pays his debts on time, making up for the failings of the insolvent or recalcitrant debtor. [. . .]

[XV. Punishment]

Amelioration, degradation, reparation: the narrative circle is now closed, opening the possibility of new degradations followed by new reparations according to a cycle which can repeat itself indefinitely. Each of the phases can itself be developed ad infinitum. But in the course of its development it will become specified, through a series of alternative choices, into a hierarchy of enclaved sequences, always the same, which exhaustively determine the field of the narratable. The linking of functions in the elementary sequence, then of elementary sequences in a complex sequence, is both free and controlled at the same time: free (for the narrator must at every moment choose the continuation of his story) and controlled (for the narrator's only choice, after each option, is between the two discontinuous and contradictory terms of an alternative). It is therefore possible to draw up a priori the integral network of choices offered; to name and to place in the sequence each type of event brought about by these choices; to link these sequences organically in the unity of a role; to coordinate the complementary roles which define the evolution of a situation; to link evolutions in a narration which is at one and the same time unpredictable (because of the play of available combinations) and codifiable (because of the stable properties and the finite number of combined elements).

At the same time this production of narrative types is a structuring of human behavior patterns acted out or undergone. They furnish the narrator with the model and substance of an organized evolution which is indispensable to him and which he could not find elsewhere. Whether it be desired or feared, their end rules over an arrangement of actions which succeed one another and form hierarchies and dichotomies according to an inviolable order. When man, in real life, maps out a plan, explores in his mind the possible developments of a situation, reflects on the course of action undertaken, remembers the phases of a past event, he forms the first narrations of which we can conceive. Inversely, the narrator who wants to order the chronological succession of the events he is relating, to give them a meaning, has no other recourse but to link them together in the unity of an action directed toward an end.

Thus to the elementary narrative types correspond the most general forms of human behavior. Task, contract, error, trap, etc., are universal categories. The network of their internal articulations and of their mutual relationships defines the field of possible experience a priori. By constructing from the simplest narrative forms, sequences, roles, and series of more and more complex and differentiated situations, we can establish the bases of a classification of the types of narration; moreover, we define a framework of reference for the comparative study of these behavior patterns which, always identical in their basic structure, are diversified ad infinitum according to an inexhaustible play of combinations and options, according to cultures, periods, genres, schools, and personal styles. Although it is a technique of literary analysis, the semiology of narrative draws its very existence and its wealth from its roots in anthropology.