Point of View In literature point of view

Point of View

In literature, point of view is the angle which a reader connects to the story—usually by the person who tells the story – the narrator.

Having a character relate the events makes a story more personal and helps the reader feel involved.

First Person • Narrator is a character in the story or poem. • readers see the world through the eyes of the narrator (who is one of the characters). We know only what the narrator knows, feels, or thinks. • Look for pronouns- I, me, my, we, our, and us

The deputy told me to empty my pockets: two quarters, a penny, a stick of bubble gum, and a roll of grip tape for my skateboard. Carl Hiaasen, Flush

First Person • My clothes have failed me. I remember the green coat I wore in fifth and sixth grades when you either danced like a champ or pressed yourself against a greasy wall, bitter as a penny toward the happy couples. Gary Soto – The Jacket

Third Person-Limited • This narrator tells the story from the perspective of an observer and refers to characters with pronouns such as he, she, or they. • Narrator is not a character in story or poem • You know the thoughts and feelings of ONE character he

After reading twelve pages, she looked to the end to see how many more pages there were to go: more than two hundred. E. L. Konigsburg, From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler

rd 3 Person-Omniscient (om-nish-ent) • An Omniscient narrator knows all and sees all that happens in a story and knows the inner thoughts and feelings of all characters.

They sat on the Terrace and many of the fishermen made fun of the old man and he was not angry. Others, of the old fishermen, looked at him and were sad. But they did not show it and they spoke politely about the current and the depths they had drifted their lines at and the steady good weather and of what they had seen. Ernest Hemingway, The Old Man and the Sea

What is the POINT OF VIEW? • The day I decided to steal a dog was the same day my best friend, Luanne Godfrey, found out I lived in a car. Barbara O’Connor, How to Steal a Dog

What is the POINT OF VIEW? • Georgie’s hook was a foot lower than all the others. The janitor had put it in especially for him on the first day of fourth grade. Georgie usually didn’t think too much about it. He didn’t usually think about the step stool under the chalkboard either or the fact that his feet didn’t reach the floor when he sat at the lunch table…Because thing was, Georgie Bishop was a dwarf. Lisa Graff, The Thing About Georgie

What is the POINT OF VIEW? Tuck almost never smiled except in his sleep. Mae sat up in bed and looked at him tolerantly. The sounds of her dressing were so familiar to Tuck… Winnie woke early the next morning …she realized that sometime during the night she had made up her mind: she would not run away today…Miles seemed to sense that she was watching him. Natalie Babbitt, Tuck Everlasting

BE CAREFUL when trying to determine point of view: “I just wondered, ” said Winnie. “All right. I’m one hundred and four years old, ” he told her solemnly. “No, I mean really, ” she persisted. LOOK BEYOND THE DIALOGUE TO FIGURE OUT POINT OF V

What about The Fourteenth Goldfish? • When I was in preschool, I had a teacher named Starlily. • We live in a house that looks like a shoebox. • “Is the fruit alive or dead? ” he probes.

SO WHAT? Why is POINT OF VIEW important to: • You as a READER? • You as a WRITER?