Point of View

Author Winston Groom precedes his novel Forrest Gump with a quotation from the 17th-century English writer John Dryden: "There is a pleasure sure in being mad / which none but madmen know." Groom proceeds to let Forrest tell in his own words about a life that is "no box of chocolates," but "pretty interestin" nonetheless. Forrest opens by stating that his IQ is 70, which is borderline imbecile/moron, but he prefers the term "halfwit." He immediately tells an anecdote that shows he knows when he is being cheated and that he should react more "normally," but instead he walks away, feeling all the more like an idiot.

Early on, Forrest talks about idiots in literature, which seems out of character until he tells how he has come to study the subject and reveals that he is, in fact, an idiot savant, "A person who cannot tie a...