IDENTITY, CHANCE AND INCREDULITY OF POSTMODERN METAFICTIONIN PAUL AUSTER’S CITY OF GLASS

Abstract

Paul Auster’s contribution to the postmodern novel is praiseworthy due to inclusion of various elements such as intertextuality, plurality, uncertainty and themes of chance, identity and existence versus essence. In City of Glass, Auster started a sequence of events by chance in New York City by foregrounding the concepts of place, labyrinth, self, and public.He proposed that one’s identity depends on the role he/she takes and such multidimensional identity might be chosen by chance. Quinn, the Protagonist of the novel, is a writer who writes under pseudonym of William Wilson, but enters a story as a detective using another name and takes another identity. Fictional names and events in the novel emphasize that as Lyotard proposedcredulity of narratives and identities are challenged. In addition, at the beginning, Quinn enters the events by chance, but reacts to events intellectually and rationally which in turn suggests that in postmodern literature individuals react to chance, uncertainty, and plural identity, though it is aimless. Language game and arbitrary language are equivalent with transparency of glass in The City of Glassthat targets indistinguishable identities as indications of aimless postmodern search of unity and centrality.