Review It
Now that you have read the story and reviewed details about the characters and plot events, let’s take a look at the narrator of the story and the point of view used in “The Story of an Hour.”
- Point of view is the perspective from which a speaker or writer recounts a narrative or presents information.
- First-person point of view is in use when a character narrates the story with I-me-my-mine. The advantage of this point of view is that you get to hear the thoughts of the narrator and see the world depicted in the story through his or her eyes.
- Third-person point of view is that of an outsider looking at the action. These are two types of third-person points of view:
- Third-person omniscient, in which the thoughts of every character are open to the reader.
- Third-person limited, in which the reader enters only one character's mind, either throughout the entire work or in a specific section. Third-person limited differs from first-person because the author's voice, not the character's voice, is what you hear in the descriptive passages.
Let’s take a deeper look into “The Story of an Hour” by reviewing what we have learned about point of view. Think about who the narrator is and how much he/she knows about each of the characters in the story. That will help determine the point of view. Feel free to reread the story to make sure all the details are fresh in your memory.
Keeping in mind what you have learned about point of view, answer the questions below.
