EXPLORATION OF SOME POSTMODERNIST FEATURES IN EDGAR LAWRENCE DOCTOROW’S RAGTIME

Abstract

Postmodernism is wave of critical thought on the shores of literature that subverts the canon and crystallizes fictional truths through various features. This study investigates the features of Postmodernism in Edgar Lawrence Doctorow’s Ragtime. The fictional text thrives on the literary styles and ideas which serve to dispute, reverse, mock and reject the principles of modernist literature. The presentation considers Postmodernism as an intellectual movement which has a powerful influence on contemporary literary writings. The study examines how Doctorow re-works the traditional boundaries of narrative in modern manners. Some of the major features of postmodernism present in Ragtime such as subversion of the master-narrator, fragmentation, multiple points of view, intertextuality, and historiographic metafiction are examined with relevant illustrations from the fictional text. It also finds Postmodernism as a theory relevant in analysing the text. The study concludes that there is a heavy presence of postmodernist features in Doctorow’s Ragtime.