Perspectives

Textual perspective

The short story “Strawberry Spring” by Stephen King has some postmodern characteristics. The postmodernist literary movement experienced a rise in the post-World War II era and gained popularity throughout the late twentieth century. “Strawberry Spring” was published in 1968, when postmodernism was still a popular literary style used by many authors. Postmodernist works can be recognised through themes, context, and narrative techniques.

In terms of postmodernist narrative techniques, the story features intertextuality. The story references other literary works such as J.R.R. Tolkien’s novel The Lord of the Rings (l. 29) and Carl Sandburg’s poem Fog (l. 88). The story also features temporal fragmentation, as the story recounts events from two different timelines: one in the past, and one at the time of narration. Fragmentation also happens due to the narrator’s memory loss. This makes the narrator partly unrel...