Romance Hyperspace
摘要
This chapter reads as a contribution to the theorisation of medieval romance’s narrative space. It argues that medieval narrative space must be conceived as a “hyperspace,” that is to say a complex, labile, and fundamentally multi-dimensional type of space. The “storyworld” (the setting in which the narrative unfolds) constitutes only one of its dimensions. Due namely to its frequent use of oral formulae, romances constantly conjure up another dimension of space which may be called “enunciative space” and extends to the actual world where the stories are performed or read. This facet of romance hyperspace is articulated in complex and ever-varied ways with the storyworld and with a third spatial feature of romance space: “hermeneutic space,” i.e. the dimension of space that operates along supernatural and/or fairy lines and fuels an interpretative urge in audiences. Hermeneutic space’s connections with both the storyworld and with enunciative space make for extraordinarily complex narrative spaces in medieval romance.