Stylistic Narrative of Otherness: A Study of Power Relations in Selected Texts by John Steinbeck and Gabriel García Márquez

Abstract

This study investigates the stylistic features that mark the creation of powerlessness, and ultimately “otherness,” in fiction. To this end, this study focuses on two fictional characters: Jelka Sepic in John Steinbeck’s “The Murder” and the old man in Gabriel García Márquez’s “A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings.” Most of the clauses associated with these characters—as actors—exhibit nearly a fixed set of verbs: intransitive, perceptive, static, negative, and passive. These verbs make the aforementioned characters influenced by rather than influencing the flux of events conditioning their own reality. Also, in a large portion of other clauses they are passive participants, i.e. being affected by other actors. Jelka and the old man are juxtaposed with superior characters, like Jim, Elisenda, and Pelayo, whose power is foregrounded by transitive, dynamic, imperative, and material-action-intention verbs.