Let’s Get Meta: 9 Books that Break the Fourth Wall
You are reading this article right now. Your eyes are looking at the words in this sentence and, hopefully, processing the information. You clicked a link possibly on the Book Riot website or a link in a newsletter or social media post. Given that you are choosing to read an article about books breaking the fourth wall, you must have good and intriguing taste. Welcome to the rabbit hole.
I, too, was thrilled the first time I realized that books could do that. It was mind-boggling that a character could talk directly to the reader and/or realize they were in a book. Some scholars call it meta-fiction, but that can include other books that break with literary structures, not just books that break the fourth wall. But I digress.
While it’s not exactly a new phenomenon — there are books going back centuries that do this — it has been fun watching more fourth-wall-breaking books being published each day. Some of these books focus on playing with their given genre, like mystery or fantasy.
Today, you are going to read a list of nine books that break the fourth wall. The first few are works published before 2000 — a few were printed before 1900. The second segment is works published very recently. I hope you enjoy breaking the fourth wall with me and these books.
Before the Year 2000
The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman by Laurence Sterne
Whenever I think of the fourth wall being smashed, Tristram Shandy is the first work that comes to mind. Published in 1759, Tristram is telling you the story of his life. Well, sort of. He tells you about the circumstances around his life, mostly before his birth. It’s a wildly transgressive book, fooling around with typeface, narrative structure, and of course, he regularly addresses the reader. You’ll have to read it to find out if he actually gets born.
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë
I definitely did not quote a line in this book in my wedding speech. Why are you looking at me like that?
This 1847 novel tells the story of orphaned Jane Eyre as she navigates the world. It’s centered around her work as a governess for the wealthy and charming Mr. Rochester but when she discovers his terrible secret, she has to make a choice. Throughout the narrative, Jane occasionally addresses the readers, including some really memorable quotations that I won’t name so I don’t spoil the book.
The Flowers of Buffoonery by Osamu Dazai, translated by Sam Bett
In this 1935 novella, Yozo Oba finds himself subject to buffoonery and small distractions by people visiting him in a sanatorium after a failed suicide attempt. At the same time, he’s dealing with the face that his girlfriend, Sono, died by suicide. It’s a story that explores despair and grief, as well as the way humans try to cover the darkness. On top of it all, Yozo constantly makes first-person asides, commenting on the very nature of his own story.
If On A Winter’s Night A Traveler by Italo Calvino, translated by William Weaver
This 1979 work is one of the most quintessential works of fourth-wall-breaking fiction. It’s literary experimentation at its best. You, the reader, have gone to the store to purchase a new book and discover a serious misprint. The Reader decides to go back to the store to get a new volume and gets drawn into a whole adventure trying to find the correct book while meeting a fellow reader along the way.
Recently Published
West Heart Kill by Dann McDorman
I am always in the mood for some good fourth wall, meta-fictional murder mystery. The set up is familiar: Adam McAnnis visits his old college friend at the exclusive West Heart club. But it’s clear that something is amiss and a storm is about to break, figuratively and literally. Someone ends up dead. And you reader, are in the thick of it all.
The Gameshouse by Claire North
Speaking of games and meta games, this collection of Claire North’s three novellas into a single book takes it to a new level. People can visit and gamble at the Gameshouse but only the special people can play in the higher league, where more than money is on the line. Games are not played on boards; they are played in local politics or even across the world. The players gamble for more fundamental things, like your taste for strawberries or your healthy lungs. And of course, you play your own part, observing the action.
The Book of Form and Emptiness by Ruth Ozeki
After the accidental death of his father, Benny Oh starts hearing voices of objects around him. He tries to ignore them, but when his mother starts hoarding items, that is harder and harder to do. The voices follow him outside of the house, and only the library can provide some silence — and a whole new world of possibility. He also discovers his own Book that tells the story of his life, where he can ask his own story to move forward or back as he desires. He may not be directly addressing you, the reader, but the Book addresses Benny as his reader.
Warcross by Marie Lu
This book brings in yet another reality — the virtual one. The virtual reality combat game Warcross has taken the world by storm. Emika Chen has to take care of herself after her father died. She is a hacker and bounty hunter, searching for minor criminals. But when she’s in a bind, she decides to hack herself into the live Warcross opening ceremonies, and instead of passing by unnoticed, she gets a call from the game’s inventor Hideo Tanaka, now a billionaire. He wants her to act as a mole in the championship to find the criminal who tried to hack the game. In this game where the border between virtual reality and reality is blurred, this duology makes sure to keep the reader unbalanced with its break of the border between reality and the story.
Interior Chinatown by Charles Yu
Last but not least, we have Interior Chinatown, the 2020 National Book Award for Fiction. Working as a background actor on television, Willis Wu has played many of the stereotypical roles for Chinese folks. He aspires to be Kung Fu Guy, because that’s the creme de la creme for Chinese actors. Told in a series of formats including screenplay, the book intermixes and intertwines Willis’s real life and Willis’s roles in television shows exploring how race, class, and immigration in the US. It’s a novel that seems to break the fourth wall over and over in new ways.
So now we’ve come to the end of the article. I hope you found some new books for your TBR. Or at least think a bit more about how literature can break the fourth wall.
If you are interested in reading more books that play with structure, check out this list of 5 Unusually Structured Speculative Fiction Novels or my list of 6 Books with Inventive Structures.
