In narrative, as in sculpture, the

In narrative, as in sculpture, the basis of the motion within virtual space is the human body, the object that does not allow location to be static. It is precisely because we move around a sculpture that it is not a painting, that we are embodied rather than fixed in a location. Likewise, it is because characters are always somewhere physically in a narrative, always positioned in a way that they are able to anticipate types of possi­ble movement and able to use different sorts of perceptual information, that narrative space can never be static. That critics have largely failed to recognize this kinetic basis for narrative space is the natural result of failing to give sufficient attention to the corporeal nature of narrative characters. With attention to the body within this space, our narrative theories are fundamentally changed.