Concerned with the nature of the medium and the borders between fact and fiction, reflexivity was a ubiquitous feature of modernist and postmodernist literature and film. While in the wake of the post-postmodern “return to the real” cultural criticism has little time for discussions of reflexivity, it remains a key topic in narratology, as does fictionality. The latter is commonly defined opposition to the real and the factual, but remains conditioned by historical, cultural, discursive, and medium-related factors. Reflexivity blurs the boundaries between fact and fiction, however, by...

Understanding Metalepsis provides a state-of-the-art overview of the narratological concept of metalepsis and develops new ways of investigating the forms and functions of metaleptic narratives. Informed by a hermeneutic perspective, this study offers not only an account of the complexities that characterize the process of understanding metaleptic phenomena, but also metatheoretical insights into the hermeneutics of narratology.