Mikkie, Bob, And Aie: Flash Fiction And The Uses Of Fragmented Narrative Threads
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Date
2010
Department
English and Languages
Program
Master of Arts
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This item is made available by Morgan State University for personal, educational, and research purposes in accordance with Title 17 of the U.S. Copyright Law. Other uses may require permission from the copyright owner.
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Abstract
This thesis presents twenty-six original works of flash fiction set in Hagerstown, Maryland and involving three main characters: Bob, Mikkie, and Dr. Aie who share common emotional territory. The works are introduced by an essay that explores the nature and dynamics of flash fiction and how the genre can be used to experiment with fragmentation, narrative line, and alienation. The essay also addresses the consequences that fragmented, fractured, and missing narrative threads may have on the reading and creative experience. The creative works, though singular pieces in and of themselves, are arranged in chronological order to both exploit the benefits of flash fiction and to locate the reader in a more conventional narrative context. Poised between poetry and short fiction, flash fiction can capture the intensity and lyricism of poetry and the abbreviated nature of contemporary storytelling. The creative work uses flash fiction to convey the complex story of life in a rural Maryland town where the past and the present are uneasy.