Points of View

As a novelist, Cain preferred the first-person point of view in the telling of his stories. The use of first-person point of view in Double Indemnity, however, is not merely a matter of an author's individual preference. It is an integral and necessary element of the story. First, the author uses the device of presenting the story in the form of a telling by the narrator to an unseen and unknown listener or reader, when he subtly makes reference to this unknown person at the beginning in Walter's line, "That was how I came to this House of Death, that you've been reading about in the papers." From an author's perspective, this is a useful technique, because it creates mystery and suspense that will increase the reader's desire to turn the page.

Second, because first-person point of view creates strong reader identification with the character, it...