An Analysis of the Concept of Suspension in Narrative Structure: the Case of Surah Al-Naba

Suspension is a concept whose boundaries go beyond the mere concepts of being and cognition and inclines towards practical (rather than theoretical) areas with effective mechanisms. Limiting suspension to pure theoretical issues make it a passive topic, like thousands of other topics which are at passive positions of recognition or reconstruction. It goes without saying that such functional and practical features cannot make us ignore the conceptual features of suspension because each action, however its cognitive aspects be natural and invisible, inevitably, is based on theoretical considerations. Accordingly, in this article, first, we succinctly analyzed the theoretical aspects and fields of this concept and then analyzed Surah Al-Naba, as a practical sample.
The authors of this article believe that the Quran is one of the best texts for this research purpose, and the strongest and yet the most succinct expressions of suspense are found in Quranic text. Suspension in Surah Al-Naba in a multi-layered and dense condition separates the text from typical linear narratives and through creating a sense of surprise, ambiguity, wandering and waiting and by raising successive implicit questions provide in a coherent, yet complex and unpredictable, structure everything a great literary work requires.