MYTHOPOETICS AND MYTHOLOGICAL IMAGERY IN MODERN BRITISH FICTION: KAZUO ISHIGURO AND WILLIAM GOLDING

Abstract

This article provides an in-depth examination of mythopoetics and mythological imagery as fundamental narrative strategies in modern British fiction, with particular reference to the novels of Kazuo Ishiguro and William Golding. The study seeks to explore how mythological patterns, archetypes, and symbolic structures operate within modern narrative forms to shape character construction, ethical reflection, and philosophical meaning. Drawing on mythopoetic theory and comparative literary analysis, the research investigates selected novels in order to identify both convergences and divergences in the authors’ artistic approaches.

The analysis demonstrates that William Golding consistently employs explicit mythological frameworks, archetypal characters, and ritualistic imagery to expose the primal instincts and moral contradictions inherent in human nature. His novels transform myth into a moral allegory through which the collapse of civilization and the fragility of ethical order are examined. In contrast, Kazuo Ishiguro adopts a more implicit and internalized mythopoetic strategy. In his fiction, myth manifests through memory, silence, repression, and symbolic narrative structures rather than overt mythological references. The article argues that despite stylistic and generational differences, both authors confirm the enduring relevance of myth as an artistic and philosophical instrument in twentieth- and twenty-first-century British fiction. By reworking myth within modern narrative contexts, Ishiguro and Golding address universal concerns such as identity, responsibility, trauma, moral choice, and the limits of human self-knowledge.