Knowra Polyphony Polyphony Polyphony is a narrative form in which distinct characters retain independent voices and ideas rather than serving one authoritative viewpoint. Their perspectives remain in dialogue without being absorbed into a single final account.
Dialogism : A theory of meaning in which utterances answer, anticipate, and interact with other utterances. Polyphony makes this interaction among voices the structure of a whole narrative.
Problems of Dostoevsky's Poetics : Mikhail Bakhtin’s study of Dostoevsky’s fiction as a new kind of polyphonic novel. This book established polyphony as a literary concept through close readings of Dostoevsky.
Mikhail Bakhtin : A Russian literary theorist whose work shaped twentieth-century studies of language, dialogue, and the novel. Bakhtin named and theorized the polyphonic quality he found in Dostoevsky.
Monologic novel : A novel in which characters’ perspectives remain subordinate to a controlling authorial worldview. It offers the clearest structural alternative to characters’ independent ideological voices.
Heteroglossia : The coexistence of distinct social languages, registers, and viewpoints within a language or text. Its varied speech forms give a polyphonic narrative audible social differences.
Crime and Punishment : Fyodor Dostoevsky’s novel about student Rodion Raskolnikov’s murder and its aftermath. Raskolnikov’s ideas meet other characters’ judgments without being reduced to a single authorial verdict.
Fyodor Dostoevsky : A Russian novelist whose works include Crime and Punishment, The Idiot, and The Brothers Karamazov. Bakhtin treated Dostoevsky as the central creator of the polyphonic novel.
Multiperspectivity : The presentation of events through more than one character’s perspective. Multiple viewpoints alone do not ensure the independent, dialogic status required for polyphony.
Narrative voice : The speaking presence through which a narrative is told. Polyphony distributes narrative authority among voices rather than concentrating it in one.
The Brothers Karamazov : Fyodor Dostoevsky’s novel about the Karamazov family, faith, morality, and a murder trial. Its competing accounts of faith and responsibility exemplify unresolved dialogue among characters.
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