Problematics and Composition Originality of P. Ackroyd’s Novel “The Plato Papers”

Abstract

The composition of the novel by the modern English writer P. Ackroyd “The Plato Papers” in connection with the problems of the work is considered. The review of the last researches devoted to creativity of this author is given. Attention is paid to how the work reveals the problem of interpretation of history, its ambiguity, the concept of the movement of time, progress, the relationship of the past, present and future. The author shows that when shifting the time of the novel in the future, Ackroyd uses the documentary imitation technique, changes narrators and types of narration. The composition of the work consisting of separate small parts connected in a key way by the speaker Plato is analyzed. Such properties of the composition of the analyzed novel as fragmentation and nonlinearity are noted. It is shown how the novel realizes postmodern idea about the relativity of the interpretations of the events of the past. The position of the main character endowed with the gift of insight, able to penetrate into the past, to look from an unusual point of view at the present, to doubt and seek the truth is revealed.