Diegesis

According to Gerald Prince in A Dictionary of Narratology, diegesis is "(1) The (fictional) world in which the situations and events narrated occur; (2) Telling, recounting, as opposed to showing, enacting." In diegesis the narrator tells the story. The narrator presents to the audience or the implied readers the actions (and perhaps) thoughts of the characters (including perhaps, but not necessarily, all that dwells within their imagination, their fantasies and dreams).

Diegesis in contrast to mimesis

Diegesis (Greek διήγησις) has been contrasted since Plato's and Aristotle's times with mimesis, the form that is showing rather than telling the thoughts or the inner processes of characters, by external action and acting. Diegesis, however, is the narrative in fiction and nonfiction, the telling of the story by the narrator(s). The narrator(s) may speak through his/her characters or may be the invisible narrator or even the all-knowing narrator who speaks from above in the form of commenting on the action or the characters.

What diegesis is

Diegesis may concern elements, such as characters, events and things within the main or primary narrative. However, the author may include elements which are not intended for the primary narrative, such as stories within stories; characters and events that may be referred to elsewhere or in historical contexts and that are therefore outside the main story and are thus presented in an extradiegetic situation.

Diegesis in literature

For narratologists, all parts of narratives--characters, narrators, existents, actors--are characterized in terms of diegesis. For definitions of diegesis, one should consult Aristotle's Poetics; Gerard Genette's Narrative Discourse: An Essay in Method (Cornell University Press, 1980); or (for a readable introduction) H. Porter Abbott's The Cambridge Introduction to Narrative (Cambridge University Press 2002). In literature, discussions of diegesis tend to concern discourse/sjuzet (vs. story/fabula).

Diegesis is multi-levelled in narrative fiction. Genette distinguishes between three "diegetic levels." The extradiegetic level (the level of the narrative's telling) is, according to Prince, "external to (not part of) any diegesis." One might think of this as what we commonly understand to be the narrator's level, the level at which exists a narrator who is not part of the story he tells. The diegetic level is understood as the level of the characters, their thoughts and actions. The metadiegetic level or hypodiegetic level is that part of a diegesis that is embedded in another one and is often understood as a story within a story, as when a diegetic narrator himself/herself tells a story.

Diegesis in film

Because commercial cinema is based on mimetic construction techniques (such as continuity editing, "diegetic" typically refers to the internal world created by the story that the characters themselves experience and encounter: the narrative "space" that includes all the parts of the story, both those that are and those that are not actually shown on the screen (such as events that have led up to the present action; people who are being talked about; or events that are presumed to have happened elsewhere).

Thus, elements of a film can be "diegetic" or "non-diegetic." These terms are most commonly used in reference to sound in a film, but can apply to other elements. For example, an insert shot that depicts something that is neither taking place in the world of the film, nor is seen, imagined, or thought by a character, is a non-diegetic insert. Titles, subtitles, and voice-over narration (with some exceptions) are also non-diegetic.

Film sound and music

Sound in films is termed diegetic if it is part of the narrative sphere of the film. For instance, if a character in the film is playing a piano, or turns on a CD, the resulting sound is "diegetic." If, on the other hand, music plays in the background but cannot be heard by the film's characters, it is termed non-diegetic or, more accurately, extra-diegetic. The score of a film (commonly but erroneously called the "sound track") is "non-diegetic" sound. Some examples:

• Jacques Tati's film Les Vacances de Monsieur Hulot (Mr. Hulot's Holiday) systematically builds much of its humor through the systematic confusion and shifting placement of "diegetic" and "non-diagetic" sound-image relationships, showing that these positions depend on the audience's perception of the mimetic space of the film.

• In The Truman Show, a sequence shows the characters at night, when most of them are sleeping. Soft, soothing music plays, as is common in such scenes, but we assume that it does not exist in the fictional world of the film. However, when the camera cuts to the control room of Truman's artificial world, we see that the mood music is being played by a man standing at a bank of keyboards. This abrupt shift from apparently non-diegetic to diegetic is a kind of cinematic joke.

• In the film Blowup, directed by Michelangelo Antonioni, all the music heard in the film is diegetic-either heard from a live pop group, record player or car radio.

• Director Luis Buñuel disliked non-diegetic music, and tried to avoid it in his films. The films of his French era have absolutely no score, some (Belle de Jour, Diary of a Chambermaid) contain absolutely no music whatsoever. Belle de Jour does, however, feature (potentially) non-diegetic sound effects, believed by some to be clues as to whether or not the current scene is a dream.

Diegesis in Music-Theatre

As with film, the term 'diegetic' refers to the function of the music within a work's theatrical narrative, with particular relevance to the role of song. Within the typical format of opera/operetta, characters are not 'aware' that they are singing. This is a non-diegetic use of song. If however the song is presented as a musical occurrence within the plot, then the number may be described as 'diegetic'.

Example: In The Sound of Music, the number 'Doh, a Deer' is diegetic, since the characters are aware they are singing. The character Maria is using the song to teach the children how to sing. It exists within the narrative sphere of the characters. In contrast, the song 'How do you solve a problem like Maria?' is non-diegetic, since the musical material exists externally to the narrative.

Diegesis in Role-Playing Games

In role-playing games diegesis includes all the "in-game" parts of the story, both those that are and aren't actually played out. However, rules or system elements that are used to resolve what does and doesn't happen in the imagined situation are typically "non-diegetic." For example, the number of hit points that a character has may determine whether or not a character dies in a fight, but are not themselves part of the narrative situation.