| Summary: | The concept of character is quite a problematic term in postmodern ction since postmodern texts overtly subvert and transgress the conventions of characterization in the novels of previous ages. In relation to the paradoxical and ambiguous nature of postmodernism, character undergoes a radical transformation in postmodern ction, and it cannot be pinned down with regards to the conventions of characterization. The character in postmodern ction becomes a site where the ontological concerns of postmodernism that the text rests upon are reverberated. Thus, postmodern problematization of such contentious concepts as self, identity, essence, history writing, ction, and fact is carried out and presented through postmodern characterization in the novel genre. Deprived of characters in the conventional sense, postmodern ction can thus be claimed to establish its own conventions of characterization. Hence, this paper analyses John Fowles' Mantissa (1982) so as to discuss how postmodern ction utilizes characterization to reverberate certain issues problematized in postmodern context and hence puts forth its own character conventions.
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