The Point Of View

Importance of Point Of View In A Story

The point of view from which a story is told has a lot of weight on how the reader interprets the meaning of it. A clearexample of how important POV is for the reader is “The Tell-Tale Heart” by Edgar Allan Poe. Whether or not the POV used in this story is reliable or not, depends onwhat the story is really about.

For instance, one way of looking at the story is stating that the story is about how a madman thinks of himself, what action he does,and how he justifies them. For example when he says: “True! Nervous, very, very dreadfully nervous I had been and am; but why will you say that I am mad?” (1)”, he isstarting to justify his actions before even telling what actions did he commit. The thing is that he does this throughout the whole story. Another part of the storythat gives us insight of his mad brain is: “For his gold I have no desire. I think it was his eye” (1). So, if the author intention was to describe a madman from themad man POV himself, he succeeded.

But, if the author’s intention was to tell a story of a murder or death, then he chose a not very understandable or reliable orsane narrator. Because of the same madness of the narrator, one cannot take the narrator version of the story as the whole truth. For example, when he says: “Theofficers were satisfied. My manners had convinced them” (3), this cannot be taken as certain, because there is not a POV from the officers themselves. We are seeing thisstory trough a keyhole.

In the end, it all depends on how you look at the story, the meaning you think it has, and what do you think the author’s intention was.