In Sexing the Cherry, Jeanette Winterson dismantles the concept of linear time, presenting it instead as a fluid, multi-layered dimension where past, present, and future coexist. The novel argues that human identity is a collection of countless lives unfolding simultaneously across different temporal planes, rather than the simple, singular narratives people prefer. This philosophy is embedded in the book’s structure, which collapses centuries and blurs the lines between memory, experience, and imagination, suggesting that the journey through life is a constant navigation of overlapping realities. The question of what is “real” or “true” in Sexing the Cherry is the point Winterson is communicating through the intermixing of imagined and fantastic stories.

The novel explicitly articulates this theory in its philosophical interludes. In a section titled “The Nature of Time,” Jordan posits that our inward lives are governed by an “imaginative impulse” that allows us to “pass like lightning along the coil of pure time” (87), which defies the normal concept of chronology. This idea reframes time as a landscape to be explored rather than a path to be followed. The self is described as “multiple not single,” made up of “countless existences” that can be accessed outside of conventional chronology. This theoretical framework provides the logic for the narrative’s surreal shifts, justifying moments where characters seem to step out of their own historical context and into another.

This concept of simultaneous time is most vividly demonstrated by the convergence of the novel’s two main timelines. The primary narrative is set in the 17th century, following the Dog-Woman and her adopted son, Jordan. However, this is interwoven with the story of Nicolas Jordan, a 20th-century naval cadet. The temporal boundary between them dissolves when Nicolas, standing on the deck of a modern tugboat in the Thames, is approached by a man in 17th-century attire. The man, whom Nicolas recognizes as John Tradescant, speaks of the recent burial of King Charles I. This moment, which is mentioned twice in the novel, is a factual intersection of two different presents, confirming the novel’s assertion that all moments are eternally accessible.

The book further argues that linear time is a cultural and linguistic construct rather than an objective truth. During his travels, Jordan learns of the Hopi, a tribe whose language lacks tenses for past, present, and future, leading them to perceive time as a unified whole. In asking a Spanish man living among the Hopi how long it took to learn their language, he does not even understand the question because of its foundation in time. This anthropological detail reinforces the idea that our perception of a sequential reality is learned and can be unlearned. Jordan’s own quest is defined by this fluid understanding of existence. He seeks a dancer he may have met or only imagined, concluding that the memory “may lie in the future or the past” (92). For him, and for the novel as a whole, reality is a dynamic interaction of all possible times and all possible selves.