Studying the element of time in the “I am Youssef” Ayman Al-Atoum's novel، according to the vision of Gerard Genet

Abstract

Analyzing the temporal structure of the narrative text according to the relationship between the time of discourse and the time of the story According to Jennett's opinion، it leads to the emergence of three levels of narrative time construction: order, duration, and frequency. The story of “I Am Youssef” by Ayman Al-Atoum revolves around our master Youssef، the Prophet of God when he was a young child of his father Jacob among his brothers, as the story was in the Qur’an and answers some of the questions that may revolve in the minds of those who know this story. This research aims to study the element of time in this story based on the descriptive analytical method in the light of Gerard Genet's theory. The results of the study indicate that the writer more than using the technique of retrieval in both its pleasant and painful types, because many events happened to the heroes of the story in the past, where the novel was filled with different temporal events, starting with the Prophet Yusuf’s memory of his three nights in the well the moment he entered prison, in addition to his recollection of the peaceful life in the palace. We also see the frequent use of the verb "remember" while employing the retrieval technique, and this confirms the importance of this technique in the novel.