Title:   WHEN THE SHELL REFUSES TO CRACK: AMBIGUITY AS STRUCTURAL CONDUIT IN FIDELIS OKORO’SCRACKING THE SHELL

Abstract
Literature has been described as “the language of defamiliarisation”. Known in literary studies as
ostrananie, defamiliarisation is the artistic technique of presenting to readers common things in
an unfamiliar or strange way in order to enhance perception of the familiar. This concept is
popularized by Viktor Shklovsky in his 1917 essay entitled, “Art as Technique”. According to
Shklovsky, the technique of defamiliarisation is meant to make objects “unfamiliar”. He argues
that art is a way of experiencing the artfulness of an object. An object is not important, he says,
until we try to defamiliarize it to find its artfulness. Ambiguity, briefly put, is the ability of a text to
generate multiple shades of interpretation without making any of the interpretations imposing or
overridingly accessible. Because of the confusion inherent in the words or expressions that convey
ambiguity, it is only context that often resolves the uncertainty, not necessarily the meaning of
words. In this essay, therefore, the aim is to treat ambiguity as an aspect of plot in Fidelis Okoro’s
Cracking the Shell. By employing the deconstructive theory, the take of this write-up is that if
literature is actually the language of defamiliarisation, then ambiguity is a veritable instrument in
this process. This we shall demonstrate by examining how this concept has animated the
characters and plots of the text.
Key words: Literature, Ambiguity, Structure, Deconstruction, Defamiliarisation

Citations:

Publication Date: 2021-07-09