Point of View

The novel is written in the first person and the past tense. The protagonist is the sole narrator and point-of-view character in the novel. His perspective is contained entirely in the time following the accident, which is significant, because there are strong implications that the accident caused fundamental changes in his personality and perspective. The novel provides no significant exposition about his life or personality prior to the accident, and this fact reflects the protagonist’s feeling of alienation and detachment from his pre-accident life. Moreover, the accident seems to have caused a sense of alienation from reality and the experience of life in general. This state is a driving element of the protagonist’s actions in the novel.

The first-person perspective of the narration allows the novel to directly portray the protagonist’s thoughts and emotions. These portrayals, coupled with the reader’s own...