Stream of Consciousness

Stream of consciousness is a Modernist device of artistic depiction that reproduces the continuous, spontaneous movement of thoughts, impressions, memories, and associations in a character's consciousness in all their chaos, illogicality, and fluidity, without logical ordering or authorial commentary. Unlike the ordered interior monologue, stream of consciousness imitates the very 'raw material' of psychic life — broken phrases, free associations, the mixing of past and present. This device became one of the defining discoveries of modern twentieth-century prose; it was classically developed by James Joyce (Ulysses), Virginia Woolf, and Marcel Proust. In Ukrainian literature elements of stream of consciousness, free associativeness, and lyrical 'dishevelled' writing appeared in the prose of the 1920s, in particular in the work of Mykola Khvylovy with his impressionist-expressive manner. Stream of consciousness deepened the possibilities of psychological analysis and expanded the boundaries of the narrative form.