The novel is a literary genre that is framed in narrative.
Novel is a concept from the Italian novella , which means "news" . The dictionary of the Royal Spanish Academy (RAE) defines the first meaning of the term as that work of literature that, developed in prose , is responsible for narrating actions that partially or totally belong to the field of fiction.
Some examples where this word appears: "Ernesto Sábato was an Argentine writer who stood out for his novels and essays " , "They gave me Stephen King's latest novel" , "Someday I will write a novel about the English invasions" .
The literary novel and its different elements
In the way literature understands the term, a novel differs from texts of other genres mainly by its length (greater than 60,000 words). In this way, it can be differentiated from stories by being longer, presenting several intertwined stories and not having a linear character. Furthermore, novels generally (with some exceptions) present highly complex plots , a large number of characters involved in the central theme and, in some cases, several narrators.
The novel consists of three fundamental elements: the action (the events that happen and that constitute the plot ), the characters (the characters that participate) and the environment or setting (the setting, the space where the actions take place and where the sayings are). characters).
In turn, regarding its structure, it is composed of three parts: the presentation ; development ; and the outcome , conclusion or resolution . In each one the extension varies, but the structure is rigorously maintained, although in some cases it is difficult to identify the various fragments.
The science that is responsible for establishing the conditions that each text corresponding to a type of narrative must meet is called narratology . During structuralism this science grew considerably, subdividing and classifying the most important aspects of any narrative. To mark these differences, he established ways of studying the narrator (narrative voice, point of view, etc.); the characters (the functions in the work); the plot (everything that happens in the story and how it does it); and the time and space of the narrative (represented with the concept of chronotope , which focuses on the connection between different places and times in the same narrative work).
Before publishing a novel, detailed review of the manuscript is essential.
Classification according to type
The novel can be classified in several ways: according to its length, its content, its narrator, etc.
Depending on its structure, it can be a short novel or simply a novel .
The short novel has a simple structure and lacks both long dialogues and a detailed description of the events. It presents very concise stories , without subplots, and does not delve too deeply into the lives of the characters , but rather the attention is focused directly on the events that are going to be narrated.
For its part, the "conventional" novel presents the characteristics that we mentioned above and is divided into chapters , where each unit has coherence and a certain autonomy.
Depending on the narrator, meanwhile, the novel can be narrated in the first person ( protagonist narrator or secondary character) or in the third person (witness, omniscient or observer narrator).
According to the structure of the story, the themes that are touched on and the way in which conflicts are addressed, on the other hand, the novel can be of various types: romance , mystery , science fiction , fantasy , thriller , historical novel …
There are many literary awards designed to recognize the quality of novels.
The black novel
The crime novel is a subgenre focused on crime. Their stories pose some mystery that is resolved as the plot progresses.
The Spanish Salvador Gutiérrez Solís is one of the great exponents of the crime novel in our language. Books such as "Only those who die live" , "The language of the tides" and "The anonymous lovers" are part of his literary production, which also includes stories developed as threads on X through his account @gutisolis .
Director of the Mairena Black Festival de Novela Negra del Aljarafe and CordoBlack Festival de Novela Negra del Sur , we asked him why, in his opinion, the increasingly widespread interest in creating or reading stories that feed the universe of the novel is due. black:
The current crime novel has a peculiarity that makes it what we could call the total genre. You can talk about any circumstance of the world and its inhabitants, about love, dreams, the future, climate change, political corruption or a serial killer, whatever you want, and you also offer the reader a hook with which You get hooked on reading, if you are skilled.
Salvador Gutiérrez Solís
The novel according to its narrative discourse
Another way to characterize the novel is according to the narrative discourse it presents and how it does it. Narrative discourse is the way in which the story is told, considering who is telling it and how they do it. There are several types of discourses in narrative:
- The narrative discourse itself is a way of introducing the story as if it were told. It is not so important how the author expresses himself, but what he expresses. It is important to pay special attention to conversations and every word said.
- Quoted speech is called those stories where the narrator takes words from the characters and introduces them into the story. It can be direct (reproducing the words as they were pronounced) or indirect (reproducing the meaning of the characters' words but not literally)
- Flow of consciousness is the third type of discourse in narrative and consists of presenting the characters' thoughts almost instantaneously, as they arise in their consciousness. In addition, the events and conversations that will give life to the literary work are narrated.
Something typical of fiction
The notion of novel is also used to refer to those situations in reality that, due to their characteristics, would seem typical of fiction , or to lies in general: "I was already bored with Sol's novel with her boyfriend," "It ends with the novel and tell us what happened at school" , "The boss thought it was all a novel, but I was telling him the truth" .
Likewise, in some regions, someone who invents lies or who believes stories that make no sense is called a novelist .
The novel as a TV series
In some countries , finally, the word novel allows us to name soap operas , which are fictional television series that usually belong to the romantic genre.
«Every night I watch the Channel 6 soap opera» y «Who is your favorite soap opera boyfriend?» son frases que muestran este uso.