Abstract

This paper examines contemporaneity through the lens of experimental fiction as a mode of progression within literary fiction. Looking specifically at the novels of Eimear McBride and contextualising these as part of a trajectory of a specifically feminine form of experimental fiction, developed from a modernist grounding, the paper connects the Deleuzo-Guattarian philosophical concept of becoming with a rhizomatic process of writing as a temporal unfolding. Addressing issues of accessibility and readership within the framework of literary categorisations, prize culture and the distinctions between literary and popular fiction genres, I argue that McBride’s writing process effects a form of Deleuzian becoming through the process of writing and reading. Highlighting the literary techniques of the fractured narrative, liminal language and the collective assemblage of character the paper suggests this new form of experimental fiction is a possible progression of the epistemology of the Contemporary.

How to Cite:

Robinson, C., (2017) “The Becoming of Contemporaneity through Experimental Fiction”, Dandelion: Postgraduate Arts Journal and Research Network 8(1). doi: https://doi.org/10.16995/ddl.361