When it comes to narratives some things are essential to a story while other things are not needed in a story. The things that are seen as important to a story are known as the narratable. Gerald Prince defines narratable as something that is “worthy of being told.” In contrast to the narratable, the unnarratable would be something that is not worthy of being told. As Gerald Prince states, “We are often aware of the unspoken agenda by which the tell ability of a series of events, the narrativity of this or that mode of representation, is assessed in certain contexts” (1). Something that is not included or seen as unnecessary to be told is the unnarratable. For example, if I were to tell someone that I took a shower, I would simply just say that I took a shower. I wouldn’t say that I used to soap to wash my body and then shampooed and conditioned my hair. In our fast paced society people do not spend the time to give such detail in their daily activities. Our society is only interested in the narratable. For example, news stories often only include stuff that the newscasters consider narratable and important but other people might want to hear the details they left out. However, each person thinks differently and some may feel that something is important while others disagree. Gerald Prince states, “one narrator's unnarratable can very well be another's narratable" [1]. Something that I choose to leave out and does not seem important to my narrative may be significant to someone else’s narrative. In deciding whether or not something is vital to a story is one’s personal opinion and what one considers unnarratable may be considered narratable to someone else.
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