Hands | Style

Hands Style

Point of View and Narration

"Hands" is told in the third person, by an unseen narrator who does not participate in the story and who has only a limited ability to see into the characters' thoughts and feelings. For example, the narrator observes closely as Wing Biddlebaum paces up and down on his veranda and knows that Wing is hoping for a visit from George Willard. But when the young woman on the wagon mocks Wing's baldness, the narrator does not report any emotional reaction from Wing. Does the remark hurt his feelings? Does he share in the joke? The narrator reports only the physical manifestation of Wing's response, saying that Wing's "nervous little hands fiddled about the bare white forehead as though arranging a mass of tangled locks." Similarly, when Henry Bradford beats Myers, there is no description of Myers's pain or shock. The narrator describes only what can be seen: "the frightened face...
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