Point of View

Vonnegut uses point of view to significant effect in this collection. The narrator often, if not always, directly affects the reader's perception of the characters and events in each story. Vonnegut uses both first and third person narration. Many of the first person narrators, as in "The Hyannis Port Story," "The Foster Portfolio," "More Stately Mansions" and "Who Am I This Time?" are acquaintances of the protagonists of the stories. The narrators of these stories are reliable in the sense that they are honest, but the reader ultimately has access to the people, places and events described through the filter of the narrator's eyes. In "Who Am I This Time?" the reader must trust the narrator to believe that Harry Nash is the astounding stage actor that the narrator describes him to be. In "More Stately Mansions," the reader's opinion of Grace McClellan could easily be...