Stream of consciousness Novel

Stream of consciousness is a narrative technique which attempts to capture all the emotions and thoughts which flow through a character's mind in a random manner. The term 'stream of consciousness' was coined by the American psychologist William James (brother of novelist Henry James) in his book The Principles of Psychology (1890). In literature, it is often used interchangeably with the term interior monologue'. Many modernist novels use this device to present before the reader the unfiltered thought processes of a character.

Features of a stream of consciousness novel

 

The traditional concepts of plot and characterisation are given up.

The standard techniques of description, narrative and dialogue are replaced with interior monologues.

The author emphasises memory, intuition, sense perceptions and feelings, along with a character's thoughts.

The focus is on capturing the fluidity of the inner life and depicting the myriad feelings and thoughts passing through a character's mind.

These novels are often anti-romantic (a story featuring an unsure or indifferent protagonist who fails in her/his quest/journey).

 

Dorothy Richardson was among the first modernist writers

to employ this technique. James Joyce's Ulysses (1922) and

Finnegans Wake (1939), Virginia Woolf's Mrs Dalloway

(1925) and To the Lighthouse (1927), and William Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury (1929) are well-known examples of the stream of consciousness novel.