VLVL2 (3) A Finesi Romance #1

[Paul Nightingale]

> 
> >>
> >>> The flashback runs three pages (22-25) and offers Hector, in
Ricardo
> >>> Montalban mode, trying to write, ie produce, a narrative that
> > features
> >>> Zoyd as snitch.
> >>
> >> I don't think this is correct. For example, the new paragraph
> > (starting at
> >> 24.12) contains information provided by a detached narrator.
> >
> > As you can see, above, I wrote that the passage features Hector etc.
I
> > didn't write that it necessarily features his pov exclusively
> 
> You wrote that Hector in pages 22-25, was "trying to write, ie
produce, a
> narrative that features Zoyd as snitch". Maybe I misunderstood you,

I hope not, you're grading me here. But just to make sure: I never wrote
that the passage is written entirely, and exclusively, from Hector's
pov. I've purposely not deleted the two versions, above, of what I
actually did write. So now I've said it three times.

> but
> it's
> actually a detached narrator

The passage doesn't have a first-person narrator (eg Hector telling his
own story, although a narratologist would argue that the narrator is
always first-person). But it does prioritise his pov insofar as the
build-up to his frustration and loss of control are what the passage
describes. On your "detached narrator" see my comment below.

> who narrates the paragraph from "That fatal
> five-spot" (24.12) to "in the first place" (25.7), and in the section
of
> text down to 24.31, wherein the observation is made that Zoyd "was
content
> to go on eating the groceries, burning the gas, and smoking the pot
the
> others obtained" with snitch money, it is *Zoyd's* pov which is
> foregrounded.
> 

The description of Hector's loss of control necessarily takes in Zoyd's
resistance. And resistance here is as much a question of attitude as
anything he does or doesn't do. The final lines of the passage
("everything about this Gordita assignment ..." onwards) indicate, as
I've already suggested, that Hector's failure to turn Zoyd is
inseparable from his failure to comprehend that attitude. Hence, and
necessarily, Zoyd's pov is implicit where it isn't explicit. As I wrote
previously, Ch3 is built on the way Zoyd and Hector read each other and
themselves, read themselves in each other. In that respect their povs
are inseparable.

> My point below, seeing as it needs to be spelt out, is that there is
none
> of
> that characteristic Hectorial TexMex Spanglish in the section of text
> where
> you're claiming that Hector's pov is "dominant".

It doesn't matter how many times you spell it out, you still don't have
a point worth making. You've still failed to explain why there should be
any such Hectorisms in order for the passage to make sense in the way
I've indicated.

> And, in fact, throughout
> this chapter the narration switches back and forth between Hector's
pov,
> Zoyd's and a detached narrator.

But the purpose of the passage remains Hector's failure to turn Zoyd,
which of course is your problem. You're also a little clumsy with your
use of "detached narrator" here, which doesn't quite match the usage
above.

> 
> Like I said, though, nice try.
> 

And I really do appreciate these lessons from the master.