Question

- Compare and/or contrast any of the first person narrations which we read, like a Sherlock Holmes story or _The Big Sleep_ (if you wish) to any of our 3rd person books, like _Maltese Falcon_ or __Silence of the Lambs_. Explore issues like how reliable the narrators appear to be, how close or far away from the action and investigating are you (as reader) permitted to be, and/or what you know and don't know about the action based on the point-of-view. Have at least two points of comparison/contrast.

Answer 1

In the first person narration, the author is taking the story through his eyes. Many novels are first person narration like The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald and the opening line of the novel is as follows ' In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that I've been turning over in my mind ever since'. This kind of narration is used in fictions, autobiographies, memoirs and personal essays. It is rarely used in academic writing.

In third person narration, the narrator does not refer to him or herself as the first person or also does not refer the reader as the second person. The story moves in the observer's point of view. It is the most commonly used point of view in writing and uses words like he/she/it. The narrator is not the part of the story. There are three types of third person point of view - Third person limited, Third person multiple, third person Omniscient.