A Postmodern Reading: Metafiction, Intertextuality, And Hyperreality In The Nonlinear World Of The Husband Stitch

Abstract

The study is based on the short story The Husband Stitch by Carmen Maria Machado, analyzing it through the lens of postmodernism. The study will focus on postmodern elements in the short story, like metafiction, nonlinear and fragmented structure, Intertextuality, hyperreality, and magical realism. The study is critical because it highlights how The Husband Stitch by Carmen Maria Machado employs innovative postmodern storytelling to give voice to female experiences that are often marginalized or silenced in traditional narratives. By analyzing the story’s use of metafiction, intertextuality, and nonlinear narrative, the study reveals how literature can challenge and reshape cultural ideas about gender and power. Understanding these techniques helps readers and scholars recognize the complex ways stories influence social attitudes and can promote feminist perspectives. For the theoretical framework, the study uses Linda Hutcheon's book A Poetics of Postmodernism and Jean Baudrillard's Simulacra and Simulation. The study involves a close encounter with the text, employing the textual method proposed by Alan McKee.

 Keywords: Feminist Storytelling, gender and identity, metafiction, magical realism, narrative fragmentation, nonlinear narrative, postmodernism, intertextuality