ABSTRACT
Bakhtin’s work prizes social and historical value above all else. The concept of dialogism, which states that any utterance depends on the anticipated response of another speaker for the determination of its meaning, stresses the centrality of social
context to communication and interpretation.5 Dialogic communities are formed through this semantic dependence of the utterance upon the word of an ‘other’ (or, in the case of the textual utterance, the response of a reader/viewer). Bakhtin seems fascinated by the novel – which he deems the pre-eminent dialogic mode of textual representation – at least partly because it was the dominant literary form of the era. He realises that there is something intrinsic to the novel form that sustains the ability to connect with a huge, popular audience (as writers like Rabelais and Dostoevsky certainly did). However, there are other vital elements in novelistic discourse, elements that provide the very grounds for dialogic representation in art. The academically overlooked form of the Greek adventure narrative provides the platform for examining modes of temporal and spatial construction in the novel. Bakhtin utilises the building-brick simplicity of the genre – which, with apologies to Gross, we might dub the ‘Big Loud Action Novel’ – to lay out terms for the wider-ranging discussion to follow.
