Time and Narrative, Volume 3

In the first two volumes of this work Paul Ricoeur examined the relations between time and narrative in historical writing fiction and theories of literature. This final volume a comprehensive reexamination and synthesis of the ideas developed in volumes 1 and 2 stands as Ricoeurs most complete and satisfying presentation of his own philosophy. Ricoeurs aim here is to explicate as fully as possible the hypothesis that has governed his inquiry namely that the effort of thinking at work in every narrative configuration is completed in a refiguration of temporal experience. To this end he sets himself the central task of determing how far a poetics of narrative can be said to resolve the "aporias"the doubtful or problematic elementsof time. Chief among these aporias are the conflicts between the phenomenological sense of time (that experienced or lived by the individual) and the cosmological sense (that described by history and physics) on the one hand and the oneness or unitary nature of time on the other. In conclusion Ricoeur reflects upon the inscrutability of time itself and attempts to discern the limits of his own examination of narrative discourse. "As in his previous works Ricoeur labors as an imcomparable mediator of often estranged philosophical approaches always in a manner that compromises neither rigor nor creativity."Mark Kline Taylor Christian Century "In the midst of two opposing contemporary optionseither to flee into ever more precious readings . . . or to retreat into ever more safe readings . . . Ricoeurs work offers an alternative option that is critical wide-ranging and conducive to new applications."Mary Gerhart Journal of Religion