Includes bibliographical references (p. 283-292) and index.

Preliminaries. Introduction / David Herman -- Toward a definition of narrative / Marie-Laure Ryan -- Studying narrative fiction : a starter-kit. Story, plot, and narration / H. Porter Abbott -- Time and space / Teresa Bridgeman -- Character / Uri Margolin -- Dialogue / Bronwen Thomas -- Focalization / Manfred Jahn -- Genre / Heta Pyrh�onen -- Other narrative media (a selection). Conversational storytelling / Neal R. Norrick -- Drama and narrative / Brian Richardson -- Film and television narrative / Jason Mittell -- Narrative and digital media / Nick Montfort -- Further contexts for narrative study. Gender / Ruth Page -- Rhetoric/ethics / James Phelan -- Ideology / Luc Herman and Bart Vervaeck -- Language / Michael Toolan -- Cognition, emotion, and consciousness / David Herman -- Identity/alterity / Monika Fludernik.

"The Cambridge Companion to Narrative provides a unique and valuable overview of current approaches to narrative study. An international team of experts explores ideas of storytelling and methods of narrative analysis as they have emerged across diverse traditions of inquiry and in connection with a variety of media, from film and television, to storytelling in the 'real-life' contexts of face-to-face interaction, to literary fiction. Each chapter presents a survey of scholarly approaches to topics such as character, dialogue, genre or language, shows how those approaches can be brought to bear on a relatively well-known illustrative example, and indicates directions for further research. Featuring a chapter reviewing definitions of narrative, a glossary of key terms and a comprehensive index, this is an essential resource for both students and scholars in many fields, including language and literature, composition and rhetoric, creative writing, jurisprudence, communication and media studies, and the social sciences." http://www.loc.gov/catdir/enhancements/fy0729/2006038545-d.html.