Use these questions or activities to help gauge students’ familiarity with and spark their interest in the context of the work, giving them an entry point into the text itself.

Short Answer

Who can be the narrator of a story, and what duties and obligations do they have in that role? What are the different kinds of points of view in a story?

Teaching Suggestion: Guided questions may be beneficial to direct class discussion if the question is too broad. For example, students might be asked about their pre-knowledge on first-, second-, and third-person perspectives. They may then be directed to make concrete connections by brainstorming other books they’ve read that have featured either first- or third-person narration. These examples may be used to help students develop a knowledge base of narrative point of view, which they can then reference as they reflect on the effect each kind of narration has on the story being told and its audience, either in a piece of short writing or as part of a larger discussion. This short answer prompt may also be used to introduce the idea of an intrusive narrator, preparing students to analyze fourth-wall breaks and examine the construction of Narrator and Reader as characters in the novel.