Pavlenko V. The fictional functions of author and reader in the works of J.Barth and D.Barthelme in 1950-1970-s.: conventions and innovations.

Object is the problem of the relation between the author, reader and text in american postmodernism literature. The aim to analyse the fictional functions of author and reader in the works of J.Barth and D.Barthelme in 1950-1970-s. Methods - comparative - historical and germenevtic methods, system-functional approach. The dissertation focuses on the study of the fictional functions of author and reader in the works of famous postmodernist writers, John Barth and Donald Barthelme. The postmodernist literature faces great challenges of status and functioning of all the elements - author, reader and text. "The death of the author" in postmodernist practice turns out to be the technique of the author's self-effacement. The post-modernist author gives his view in a veiling form, he prefers indirect expression of his thoughts, and does all his best for his voice to be lost in a variety of other voices. The author tries to involve the reader into the process of co-creating the text, by "saying" the words,as e.g. J.Barth, or by "showing" the events, as e.g. D.Barthelme, in such a way that the effect of direct reader's presence is made. J.Barth and D.Barthelme found the way of making the reader's imagination liberated, and introducing the new forms of story-telling and communicative strategy. These postmodernist texts represent the cul-tural situation when "untraditional" thinking tries to overcome traditional writing. J.Barth's and D.Barthelme's works show the writers' desire to get into multi-dimensional world by means of a written language, and by discovering the possibilities of an open meaning-making text structure. The study of author's and reader's fictional functions in the works of J.Barth and D.Barthelme opens the new perspectives of understanding the aesthetics of literary postmodernism in the second half of the XX c. The sphere of use is training courses.