The novel's narrative is postmodern in that it focuses on the self-conscious act of the author telling a story. Fowles discards the traditional, omniscient, Victorian narrator who knows everything about the characters and shares this information with the readers. The narrator in The French Lieutenant's Woman, who identifies himself as the author, breaks into the story continuously, providing background information, but also confounding readers' expectations about narrative continuity and clarity. He often moves back and forth in time. For example, he interrupts his description of Lyme Regis by mentioning Jane Austen's use of the Cobb in her novel Persuasion, which was written approximately fifty years before The French Lieutenant's Woman's setting date, and by mentioning a twentieth-century Henry Moore sculpture.
He also refuses to give us a clear portrait of Sarah, who remains enigmatic.....
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