Stream of consciousness

Literary term that describes a “mode of narration that undertakes to reproduce, without a narrator's intervention, the full spectrum and continuous flow of a character's mental process, in which sense perceptions mingle with conscious and half-conscious thoughts, memories, expectations, feelings, and random associations” (Abrams 299). It was coined by psychologist William James (the brother of Henry). May Sinclair transposed the psychological term to the analysis of narrative. Novelist Dorothy Richardson started to experiment with it in her series Pilgrimage. The technique was refined in the 1920s and is a hallmark of Modernist classics such as James Joyce's Ulysses (1922) or Virginia Woolf's Mrs Dalloway (1925).

Definition

Due to its vagueness, the term has been used either as an equivalent of the interior monologue, as an umbrella term for various different stylistic techniques, which aim to express the subject matter of human consciousness, or as the designation of a type of novel (Friedman 2-3).

The stream of consciousness novel is characterised by the “the expression of an inner awareness” (Humphrey 5). Modernist writers encouraged their readers to turn to their inner world and draw their attention to individual realities. It was believed that one could not trust anymore in the external world of the new age, since it was changing constantly. The stream of consciousness therefore describes the Modernists' anxiety towards this world. The fictional characters display feelings such as alienation, disillusionment, anger or fear and the “preoccupation with the ultimate nature of reality” (Kumar 3). Identity and the self, isolation and the failure to communicate as well as the importance to live in the moment are, amongst others, the predominant themes expressed in stream-of-consciousness fiction.

Historical influences

The psycho-analytical school of Sigmund Freud and its interest in the irrational workings of the human psyche and free association of ideas led to a discussion of psychology also in literature. Freud`s theories of “the preconscious and unconscious became the legitimate domain of fiction” (Friedman 7).

Furthermore, the stream of consciousness was especially influenced by the new psychology of Henri Bergson and William James. Bergson´s concept of durational flux is regarded as the “creative impulse behind the new mode of portraying character as a ceaseless stream of becoming” (Kumar Preface). William James´ Principles of Psychology (1890) first highlighted “the conception of thought as a stream and the idea of the `compounding of consciousness´ (Friedman 2). Marcel Proust's novel A la recherche du temps perdu (1913–27) emphasized the importance of psychological time, because it was the first to show the merging of human sensory impressions and memories (Kumar 10).

The stream of consciousness is said to have aspects in common with impressionist painting, Symbolism and cinematic techniques. It is similar to impressionism respecting the new perception of the real world. Common features of Modernist and Symbolist writings are “their use of a complicated association of ideas (and) their insistence upon inventing a special language to express individual personality”. The stream displays cinematic techniques such as motion, montage and flashbacks (Kumar 5-6).

Techniques

The stream of consciousness constitutes a departure from traditional conventions not only with regard to time and content, but also with regard to literary technical devices. The following are the four basic techniques used to present stream of consciousness (Humphrey 23).

1. Direct interior monologue: “The technique used in fiction for representing the psychic content and processes of character, partly or entirely unuttered, just as these processes exist at various levels of conscious control before they are formulated for deliberate speech” (Humphrey, 24). There is no narratorial intervention in terms of commentaries or explanations and no audience, which the thoughts are being addressed to.

2. Indirect interior monologue: Shows the same characteristics as the direct interior monologue, but presence of a narrator is discernible (Humphrey, 29).

3. Omniscient description: Was used in fiction before, but gained new importance in the 20th century through its psychological approach to the characters. This description ensures that “the reader is always within the mind of the character” (Humphrey, 35)

4. Soliloquy: “The technique of representing the psychic content and processes of a character directly from character to reader” (Humphrey, 36), without an explicit narrator, but with an implicit audience being addressed.

Analogy with music

All of the above-mentioned techniques contain an evocative and detailed use of language. The experimentation with styles, musicality, sound patterns and symbolic imagery mirror the ambition of the Modernist writers to create something new. The resemblance to music is achieved by the varying use of tenses (Friedman 25). One example for musicality in Modernist literature is the "Sirens" chapter in James Joyce`s Ulysses: the “musical puns, references to songs of all sorts, overlapping phrases, and frequent harmonic touches all conspire to […] give the impression that we are confronted with a musical form in literary pastiche” (Friedman 133).

Sources

• Abrams, M. H. A Glossary of Literary Terms. 7th Edition. Orlando: Harcourt Brace, 1999.
• Friedman, Melvin. Stream of Consciousness – a Study in Literary Method. Folcroft, PA: Folcroft Press, 1970.
• Humphrey, Robert. Stream of Consciousness in the Modern Novel. 8th Edition. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1972.
• Kumar, Shiv K. Bergson and the Stream of Consciousness Novel. 2nd Edition. New York: New York University Press, 1963.