the universal pandemic of violence: a narratological reading of ian mcewan’s black dogs

this paper aims to offer a critical reading of the contemporary english author ian mcewan’s fifth novel entitled black dogs (1992). i postulate that literary critics have frequently read his fiction for what it is not. as such, mcewan’s thought-provoking engagement with cultural questions has more often than not gone unexamined owing to a critical blueprint that, reducing his oeuvre to the topoi of violence, or to a gallery of obnoxious characters branded as psychopaths, typecasts him as a writer of disturbing, salacious fiction. arguing that mcewan writes to dissect and criticise contemporary cul-ture, i offer a reading of his novel as a literary intervention into a cultural debate. i argue that of cru-cial importance in mcewan’s novel is the question of the narrative structure through which the differ-ent segments of black dogs are recounted. drawing on the narratological concepts and terminology in-troduced in the works of gَerard genette and shlomith rimmon-kenan, i examine the complexities of the narrative discourses of mcewan’s novel and its interlinking thematic analogies. based on this read-ing, i conclude that mcewan’s intervention in the ongoing cultural debates of today makes of him a se-vere critic of our time.