Gaston
By:
William Saroyan
Every
details of the story must be filtered by the readers. Along with, the point of view of characters’
voice throughout is very crucial in understanding a certain story. POV is the
outlook in taking into account of things, wherein it shows the emotion of
personages involved inside the story. It is also a reflection of an opinion
which has been taken from the experience of an author; it might be in real life
or just an imagination. In literature, it serves as a lens in which readers
look at the world. Point of view is the way the
author allows you to "see" and "hear" what's going on.
In the story “Gaston”, an experience
of a six-years-old girl during her first visit would be limited to a one
person. By shifting point of view and narrative
distance in the story; it allows us to
see the experience and the personality of the characters. On the grand
scale, during the visit, the girl appears to be connected to her father and
enlightened by his characteristics. Saroyan offers us in his story the image of
an imaginative, compassionate, and somewhat pitiful father. In my point of
view, the father, who is comfortable and kind, with his great love and care
towards his daughter seems to have positive impacts on the young girl’s
attitude albeit happens only for a short moment.
Saroyan used third person POV to
highlight the commonalities of the father and daughter at the beginning of the
book. As it progresses it shifts from third person to first person focusing on
a single character. He recognizes the limits of his own perspective and ideas
of comparing life into a flawed peach and thus allows other characters to add
depth. These stories enable Saroyan to communicate some “truth” about peoples’
attitude towards life through the actions of character. As soon as, a bug move
off in the peach down to the white plate. There came a thoughtful stop in their
minds. Then, after a continuous explanation given by the father, the girl asked
“Aren’t you going to squash him?”
while the father’s response is; “No, of
course not, why should I?” then her comeback; “Everybody hollers when a bug comes out of an apple, but you don’t
holler or anything.” The sequencing of the conversation (POV) and the power
of the thoughts make a word for their attitude.
Moreover, many of the statement
shifts in point of view then comes with a greater understanding of the whole
story; it doesn’t show only the opinion of the author but also the feelings of
the character. For example, when her mother relates to her that her father’s
action was constantly known since they were together before. “Somebody get a peach with a bug in it, and
throws it away, but not him. He makes up a lot of foolishness about it.” Furthermore, with this statement, the mother
seems to stand as a narrator for she conveys the entire father’s action in a
third person POV form.
In
other case, in which both POV were combined and shift within a single statement “Gaston is right here, just outside his
broken house, and I’m not angry at you.” Similar with the third POV, the
girl acts as the narrator by telling what’s happening about Gaston but it
doesn’t reveal the character’s inner thought. However, you would notice on the
end part of the statement, the girl used first person POV using “I” in a form
of contraction “I’m”. Thus, there is an easy shifting of POV occurs in which it
determines what the girl feels about. To
think seriously, this tactic of changing point of view is obviously more
difficult to apply to narrative non-fiction, but the idea of looking outside
oneself for insight and variation is something that can be utilized to help
create cohesion and depth within the story.
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