作者：张砚
　　【Abstract】This paper aims at analyzing Fowles’ novel- The French Lieutenant’s Woman and discussing the narrative notions of beginning， the development and the end of the story in details according to the narrative theory.
　　【Key Words】Narrative； The French Lieutenant’s Woman； Beginning； Development of a Story； Ending
　　【作者簡介】张砚（1987-），女，汉族，四川泸州人，硕士研究生，讲师，四川大学锦城学院，研究方向：欧洲语言文化，翻译。
　　It is said in the book： An Introduction to Literature， Criticism and Theory （2004） that the simplest way to define narrative is as a series of events in a specific order– with a beginning， a middle and an end. This paper analyzes the novel of The French Lieutenant’s Woman on how the narrator gets the story started， developed and ended.
　　Firstly， as the book notes “one of the ways in which a literary text multiplies its beginning is through the deployment of pretexts – titles， subtitles， dedications， epigraphs， introductions， ‘notices’ and so on”（Bennet & Royle， p5）， we can find the novel adopts one of the ways to start the story. It has pretexts， different quotation from various famous literature works at the beginning of each chapter. These quotations work as guidance or summary of each chapter. For example， Chapter One’s quotation is from Hardy’s ‘The Riddle’. The poem says： “Stretching eyes west， over the sea，， wind foul or fair， always stood she prospect-impressed solely out there did she gaze rest， never elsewhere Seemed charm to be”. The story begins as is described in the poem： Lyme Bay and “the pair who began to walk down the quay at Lyme Regis”（Fowles， p9）. It means the beginning of each chapter， like that of Chapter One， goes smoothly after the quotation.
　　Another aspect of beginning is the beginning of the whole story. The story begins with an obscure description about the man and the woman walking down the quay with no explanation on their identities or intentions which arouses readers’ curiosity. It is only a vague introduction without enough information. In chapter 10， Charles and Sara met for the first time—the story starts— for the previous several chapters can be seen as the background information only.
　　The development of the story goes around the relationship between Charles and Sara and also involves several other events which makes it a complex and interesting story. “There is always more than one story” （Bennet & Royle， p5）—besides Charles and Sara’s love story， there are also stories of Charles and Ernestina， Charles’ heritage problem， Sam and Mary etc.. These related stories are distributed in different chapters， contributing to the whole development of the story.