Giant Bones Literary Qualities

Giant Bones Literary Qualities

Beagle's fiction often experiments with a great variety of narrative voices. The first-person narrator in Giant Bones is an exasperated father who is trying to get his son to sleep in the absence of his mother, who is away nursing a sick relative. The father provides what is called a "frame narrative," a story surrounding the main story. In the case of Giant Bones, the frame provides the context for Selsim's adventure, explaining that Selsim is the boy's great-great-great grandfather. Frame narratives very often just provide context for the main story, but the frame narrative in Giant Bones frequently interrupts the main story, persistently reminding readers that the story of Selsim has some direct relevance to the boy who is afraid to go to sleep, and who is especially worried that he is going to be short rather than tall like the rest of his family. Much of the novella's...
(read more)