Re: RARA-AVIS: Woolrich's "Fright" - 1st vs 3rd person narration

From: DJ-Anonyme@webtv.net
Date: 20 Feb 2008


Harry,

In recent hardboiled fiction, mostly PI novels, there's a trend to incorporate chapters of third person material in a narrative that is first person overall. This is often to report events that the narrator did not witness/was not involved in and/or to show the actions of the killer, often serial killer, being hunted by the PI. Block, for instance, has used it in at least one recent Scudder (I think he used it in the most recent one, too, which I have not yet read). The recently deceased Benjamin Schutz used the technique in his first novel, Embrace the Wolf.

Mark



This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : 20 Feb 2008 EST