Point of View

The Swans of Fifth Avenue is told through a third-person omniscient narrator and related in the past tense. By writing in this point of view, Benjamin is able to enter any character’s consciousness and reveal his or her thoughts. As readers, we are privy to the actions of each character as well as how those actions sometimes contradict with that same character's thoughts. For example, we see that Babe almost always thinks things she chooses not to say aloud. Conversely, a great deal of Truman's thoughts remain concealed to the reader, indicating the character's deceptive quality in a way that allows us to experience him as the innocent he presents to The Swans.

Language and Meaning

The dialogue between The Swans during the scenes at La Côte Basque is simple and restrained while the language used to describe the thoughts of the characters...