Anticipating Annihilation: The Application of Barthes Five Codes on Gordimer’s The Moment Before the Gun Went Off

The present study analyzes Nadine Gordimer’s short story The Moment Before the Gun Went Off through the lens of Roland Barthes’ hermeneutics, proairetic, semic, symbolic, and cultural codes. By adopting a qualitative method and through a close textual analysis of the story, the present paper aims to uncover the story’s underlying racial and social tensions and its final revelation to demonstrate how meaning, tension and suspension is created through the strategic narrative technique of the writer. The application of the five codes respectively uncoded and revealed the underlying enigma and sense of the mystery, function of suspense, the antithetical elements, cultural significance, and connotational elements that add layers to story’s meaning.

کلیدواژه ها:

Nadine Gordimer ، Barthes ، codes ، structuralism