POSTMODERN CONCEPT OF CHAOS IN THE SERIES OF NOVELS BY R. ZELAZNY “THE CHRONICLES OF AMBER”

Abstract

The article reveals main postmodern features peculiar to the chronotope of Chaos as a main form of representing the concept of Chaos in the series of fantasy novels by R. Zelazny “The Chronicles of Amber”. The chronotope is presented as a three-component structure consisting of time, space and a subject. In the article the chronotope of Chaos is considered as an element of the interface system consisting of a number of subchronotopes, each of which has a peculiar subjectively coloured time-space form of the narrative organization. The chronotope of Chaos is based on such ideas of postmodern literature as a metabolic way of creating a simulacrum of the time-space continuum, applying rhizome to modelling time and space within it and destructing them, using schizophrenic delusions for visualizing the simulacrum. The article reveals the connection between the state of epistemological incertitude of the main characters placed into this system of coordinates and the ideas of postmodernism claiming the impossibility of an objective assessment of the reality and the illusory nature of truth.