Exploring the Narrative Structure of Boys Will Be Boys A Barthesian Reading

Abstract

The present paper explicates the underlying structure of the title chapter of Sara Suleri’s memoir Boys Will Be Boys (2003). Though interesting yet complex, the selected text creates difficulty for the novice readers to understand the theme of the narrative. Therefore, to make the text understandable for the naïve readers, the paper applies Barthesian theory of five codes for the theory helps a reader to unfold the tightly woven structures of a narrative (Barthes, 1974; Zaib and Mashori, 2014). Following codebased textual analysis, the study observes that the target narrative embodies all the proairetic, hermeneutic, semic, symbolic and cultural voices. From beginning to end, the narrative seems enigmatic and suspenseful to the reader wherein different words like “pip”, “mozzi” and “hodgepodge” stand for their connotative meanings. Similarly, binary polarity is structured in the delineation of the characters of girls and boys. Further, the text is enriched with the cultural references of East and West. Finally, the paper argues that the exploration of the narrative in the light of Barthesian five codes makes the reading understandable for the naïve beginners.