Interpreting unknown worlds: functions of metonymic conceptualization in William Golding's The Sea Trilogy

Abstract

William Golding's Sea Trilogy (1991) presents the reader with a number of problems, notably how to link the remote spatio-temporal location of the narrative with the author's explicit intention of commenting on present-day society. This article argues that the reader's task is facilitated by the use and frequent recontextualization of conventional metonymies. Metonymy is defined as a conceptual mechanism, extending beyond rhetorical one-word substitutions. In the particular case of this narrative, Golding continues a stylistic feature already noted in Lord of the Flies (1954), where changes in self-perception are marked by means of changes in outward appearance. A series of conceptual metonymies in The Sea Trilogy, functioning to highlight conventional beliefs, structures the development of an important episode and facilitates the reader's interpretation of thematic material.

Keywords

conceptualization conventional Golding William interpretation Lord of the Flies metonymy narrative point of view Rites of Passage The Sea Trilogy

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