Castrating Axis: The Reading Theory and Narrative Performative of Roland Barthes

The S/Z of Roland Barthes is both a theoretical text and narrative text. So, the analysis of it should be done across the theory and the form of narrative. Reading itself is writing, which makes body become the inevitable agency. The interposition of body results in the narrative bargain between text and reader. In S/Z, the outcome of the bargaining is the castrated body of the reader. The S/Z is a new story systemized by the castrating axis, which is the result of reading "Sarrasine", and also the experimental ground of Roland Barthes' theory. The story told by Roland Barthes also bears out another theory in reverse, namely, the narrative performative theory, although the term doesn' t appear in S/Z.