Signs of recognizing the unreliable narrator and examining it in Goli Targhi's story "Elsewhere"

The narrator's authority, which is in the realm of the rhetorical influence of the narrative power, causes us to accept her/his evaluation under the influence of the traditional perceptions and expectations of our minds without thinking. Recognizing the signs of instability of this authority leads to the unreliability of the narrator. The present article has identified the narrator's confidence in a short story of Goli Targhi entitled "Elsewhere" by identifying the rhetorical tools of "distance", "voice" and "focalization". We have also examined some linguistic signs, including negative modalities, which indicate skepticism. This story was chosen because of the narrator's claim that the narration of the events is based on documents, evidence and based on the recollection of the narrator's past memories in order to evaluate its authenticity or unreliability. This story has been studied in a descriptive-analytical way, which reveals the narrator's doubts by distancing the narrator from the events and characters.