Autofiction in a Decaying World: Temporality, Uncertainty, and Narrative Power in Dodie Smith’s I Capture the Castle.
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2025-12-02
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Alfred Nobel University
Анотація
The aim of the article is to identify the narrative mechanisms of written self-creation in Dodie Smith’s novel I Capture the Castle, with a focus on autofiction and temporality as key artistic devices in shaping identity amid cultural, historical, and existential decline. The study re-evaluates the novel through the lens of modern autofict ion theory, integrating narratological and feminist approaches in order to explore how the chronotopic structure, diary form, and narrative indeterminacy function as tools for the transformation of the female subject.
The methodological foundation of this study is based on an interdisciplinary combination of hermeneutic analysis, poststructuralist theories of subjectivity (including the work of Jacques Derrida and Judith Butler), classical narratology (Gérard Genette and Paul Ricoeur), and contemporary theories of autofiction (Serge Doubrovsky, Manuel Alberca, and Philippe Vilain). Special attention is paid to the diary genre as a medium for self-reflection and the literary practice of staging the writing self. The methodology also includes comparative analysis with contemporary female autofiction writers to situate Smith’s novel within a broader genealogical and thematic framework.
The analytical focus lies on the interrelation between narrative time and identity construction, examining how the protagonist Cassandra Mortmain employs the diary form not merely to record experience but to perform and revise the self. Through close reading and theoretical contextualisation, the article investigates the novel’s representation of gendered identity, class instability, and narrative authority.
Results of the research. The findings of this study reveal that I Capture the Castle exhibits a sophist icated temporal structure characterised by instability, fragmentation, and retrospection. These temporal qualities not only reflect the protagonist’s psychological state but also establish a space for constructing identity in opposition to a deteriorating external reality. Cassandra’s writing serves multiple functions: as catharsis, as reconstruction, and occasionally as simulation. This triadic function corresponds with the core gestures of autofiction, which blends real and imagined elements in order to preserve the narrator’s sense of wholeness amidst disintegration.
The research demonstrates that the diary form facilitates a continuous reworking of selfhood. Cassandra’s reflections and revisions of earlier entries highlight the performative nature of writing, whereby identity is not discovered but enacted. Her diary becomes a space where past, present, and anticipated futures intersect, allowing for a fluid and dynamic self to emerge. This aligns with Ricoeur’s notion of narrat ive identity and Bruner’s theory of self as a storytelling construction.
Furthermore, the novel’s treatment of gender and class reveals how narrative can serve as both a site of constraint and a mode of resistance. Cassandra’s position as a young woman in a declining aristocratic family reflects broader societal tensions in interwar Britain. Her use of the diary to assert narrative control is interpreted as a feminist gesture of self-authorship, challenging patriarchal and class-based limitations.
Through comparative analysis with later autofictional works by Rachel Cusk, Sheila Heti, and Deborah Levy, the study underscores I Capture the Castle’s anticipatory role in the development of the genre. Cassandra Mortmain, though fictional, functions as a proto-autofictional narrator whose self-reflexivity, temporal manipulation, and narrative authority prefigure many of the formal and thematic concerns of contemporary literary autofiction.
This article positions I Capture the Castle not merely as a nostalgic coming-of-age novel but as a richly layered text that engages deeply with questions of identity, temporality, and authorship. By situating the novel within the frameworks of autofiction, feminist narratology, and narrative identity theory, the research highlights its contribution to literary traditions of self-writing and its relevance to ongoing scholarly debates on narrative form and subjectivity.
Moreover, the novel invites a rethinking of the boundaries between fiction and autobiography, demonstrating how imagined characters can inhabit the same ontological space as real authors through shared concerns of memory, selfhood, and authorship. This blending foregrounds the potential of autofiction not merely as a literary technique but as a mode of being that resonates with readers navigating their own fragmented and uncertain realities. The findings underscore the continued importance of studying under-recognised literary texts that innovate subtly, contributing to the evolution of genre and theory alike.
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autofiction, temporality, narrative identity, written subjectivity, diary novel, feminist literary criticism, Dodie Smith, genre hybridity, narrative power, modernist sensibility, автофікшн, наративна темпоральність, щоденниковий дискурс, письменницьке «я», жанрова гібридність, письмова ідентичність, феміністська критика, хронотоп занепаду