Tutorial Task on “Ibrahim Something,” UALL2024 1

UALL2024 Malaysian Literature in English

BA (Hons) English Education; BA (Hons) English
Language Faculty of Arts and Social Science
Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman

Tutorial Task
Lee Kok Liang’s “Ibrahim Something”

1 Traditionally speaking, what narrative perspective is used?

The first person narrative perspective ‘I’ is used, telling a story. The narrator is recalling
his experience when he was hospitalized during the Japanese occupation. The story is told
in a traditional way. The narrator recalls what happened to ‘I’ when ‘I’ was hospitalized.

2 What kind of Genettian focalisation is used in the story?

Internal focalization. The narrator engages

One of Gérard Genette’s contributions to narratology (narrative studies) is that he

distinguishes “who sees” (vision) from “who speaks” (voice/narrator) in narrative (186; ch. 4
“Mood”). By “who sees” he means “who is the character whose point of view orients the
narrative perspective?” By “who speaks” he means “who is the narrator?” (186)

He uses “focalisation” (what Brooks and Warren call “focus of narration”) (189) to refer to
the former in order to replace the traditional terms of narration, “perspective” and “point of
view,” which blur such a distinction. He classifies the following three types of focalization in
relation to the previous theories of narration:

The first term [zero focalization] corresponds to what English-language

criticism calls narrative with omniscient narrator and Pouillon ‘vision from
behind,’ and which Todorov symbolizes by the formula Narrator >
Character (where the narrator knows more than the character, or more
exactly, says more than any of the characters knows). In the second term
[internal focalization], Narrator = Character (the narrator says only what a
given character knows); this is narrative with ‘point of view’ after Lubbock,
or with ‘restricted field’ after Blin; Pouillon calls it ‘vision with.’ In the third
term [external focalization], Narrator < Character (the narrator says less
than the character knows); this is the ‘objective’ or ‘behaviorist’ narrative,
what Pouillon calls ‘vision from without’” ([1972] 1980: 188–89). (Qtd.
Genette in Niederhoff, par. 4) (Emphases added)

Designed by Luke K L LIM

Tutorial Task on “Ibrahim Something,” UALL2024 2

Works Cited [MLA]

Barnes, John. “The Fiction of Lee Kok Liang.” 1985. Quayum and Wicks 184-90.

Lee Kok Liang. “Ibrahim Something.” Death Is a Ceremony and Other Short Stories, Singapore,

Federal Publications (S), 1992, pp. 93-106.

Niederhoff, Burkhard. “Focalization.” Created 4 Aug. 2011, revised [by Wilhelm Schernus] 24

Sept. 2013. The Living Handbook of Narratology, edited by Peter Hühn, et al.,

Interdisciplinary Center for Narratology, U of Hamburg, https://www-archiv.fdm.uni-

hamburg.de/lhn/node/18.html#:~:text=Definition,hypothetical%20entities%20in%20the

%20storyworld. Accessed 12 Mar. 2023.

Quayum, Mohammad A., and Peter C. Wicks, eds. Malaysian Literature in English: A Critical

Reader. Petaling Jaya, Selangor Darul Ehsan, Pearson Education Malaysia, 2001.

References [APA]

Barnes, J. (1985/2001). The fiction of Lee Kok Liang. In M. A. Quayum & P. C. Wicks (Eds.),

Malaysian literature in English: A critical reader (pp. 184-190). Pearson Education

Malaysia.

Lee K. L. (1992). Ibrahim something. In Lee K. L., Death is a ceremony and other short stories

(pp. 93-106). Federal Publications (S).

Niederhoff, B. (2013, September 24). Focalization. In P. Hühn, et al. (Eds.), The living handbook

of narratology. Interdisciplinary Center for Narratology, University of Hamburg.

https://www-archiv.fdm.uni-

hamburg.de/lhn/node/18.html#:~:text=Definition,hypothetical%20entities%20in%20the

%20storyworld (Original work created 4 August 2011)

Designed by Luke K L LIM

Tutorial Task on “Ibrahim Something,” UALL2024 3

Quayum, M. A., & Wicks, P. C. (Eds.). (2001). Malaysian literature in English: A critical

reader. Pearson Education Malaysia.

Designed by Luke K L LIM