TMoP, Chap 1, Page 1, Paragraph 1

[Joe Allonby]

Reads like stage directions.

On Thu, Sep 18, 2008 at 6:33 AM, Richard Ryan <richardryannyc at yahoo.com>wrote:

> "October, 1869.  A droshky passes slowly down a street in the Haymarket
> district of St Petersburg.  Before a tall tenement building the driver reins
> in his horse."
>
> One of the first things that might strike a reader inclined to notice and
> ponder such aspects of "The Master of Petersburg" is that the novel begins
> in the third person present, or more precisely, the third person limited
> present.  Without being literally a stream of conscious novel, the effect of
> this viewpoint is to give the novel a certain psychological immediacy, an
> internalized quality.  At the same time, the authorial voice maintains at
> least the vestiges of realism and objectivity traditionally associated with
> the third person viewpoint.
>
> The third person present is a rare enough point of view that Wikipedia's
> list of novels by viewpoint doesn't include any told in this person and
> tense (a deficiency which can now be corrected....)
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_novels_by_point_of_view
>
>
>
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