Point of View

Point-of-view is perhaps the feature of "Crazy They Call Me" that readers will recognize first, as it is written in the rarely-used second person. Second person narration, unlike first person which uses "I" pronouns or third-person which uses "they/she/he" pronouns, uses "you" pronouns and addresses a subject as if speaking directly to them. Readers can hear this difference in the very first sentence of the story: "Well, you certainly don't go out anyplace less than dressed, not these days" (1). From the outset, then, the story sets up a dialogue between speaker and subject and challenges readers to imagine who is doing the talking.

It becomes clear as the story progresses, however, that the second-person narration signals that the speaker is talking to herself. We learn quickly that the addressee is Billie Holiday, the famed blues singer from Philadelphia who performed in New York...