Fragmented Temporality, Digression and Experiments in Consciousness Representation: Arthur Machen’s “The White People”

This article examines the formal features of the short story “The White People,” written in 1899 by fin-de-siècle author Arthur Machen. The story is composed almost entirely of a girl’s diary written in the first person and in a stream-like flow, almost without paragraph breaks. Its artistic value has long been recognised: it was H. P. Lovecraft’s second favourite horror story of all time and it has been defined by S.T. Joshi as “a masterpiece of indirection.” After a stylistic and narratological analysis of the diary section, this contribution explores the diary’s relationship with the interior monologue technique. It also investigates how the child’s language and “mind-style” are evoked through a specific use of syntax and vocabulary. Finally, it focuses on the complex representation of temporality and the use of embedded tales, which give the narrative a digressive and erratic progression. This analysis of the short story also aims to emphasise the innovative and experimental aspects of fin-de-siècle short fiction, which are often overlooked in comparison to the modernist short story.