Point of View

The story is told in the first-person perspective, usually in the present tense. (Past-tense is used to differentiate what happened prior to the "present" of the story, even though the entire story, seemingly, is told some time after Dean's death.) The narrator, though anonymous, is a vitally important part of the story. As he himself says explicitly on several occasions (cf. 47) the story is a product both of actual facts and of his own fantasies. Therefore, the story is as much of a reflection of the narrator himself as the characters involved.

The narrator's fascination with Dean—and, therefore, the impetus for the entire story—stems from his frustration with women. He is a shy, lonely man who feels powerless when it comes to women. Dean, on the other hand, at least the version of Dean that he has invented, is a symbol of...