ABSTRACT
Narrative is at the heart of children's lives and cultures from earliest years. They are exposed to countless anecdotes in family interactions and neighbourhood talk, they hear stories and tell them, developing a feel for the culturally distinctive ways of structuring narratives and keeping listeners interested. The issue of metalanguage needs airing, especially given that application of grammatical knowledge is not a standard part of technical talk when it comes to literary interpretation in school English. Linguistically informed study of literature is not new. This chapter invites readers to put on the metafunctional lenses to explore key aspects of narrative technique. It shows how an ideational lens reveals interesting aspects of setting, characterization and plotting. The chapter surveys grammatical features of narration, focalization and voicing through our interpersonal lens. Finally, and all too briefly, it looks at signposting and layout through the textual lens.
