Blacktop Wasteland

Point of view is one of the most important and most misunderstood elements of literary fiction. There are two primary literary points of view: first person, in which the narrator is one of the characters in the story; and third person, in which the narrator is situated “outside” the narrative events and instead reports those events. Third-person narration is often omniscient, meaning the narrator speaks from the god-like perspective of knowing everything about everyone in the story, including their thoughts and intentions.

Cosby writes with a third-person limited omniscient narrator, meaning that the narration tends to follow one character and is relatively restricted to reporting only those events within that character’s awareness. Instead of choosing one character for the entire novel, however, the author shifts between individual third-person perspectives. This allows him to relate more details of the developing narrative and place the reader intimately inside the thoughts of various characters. This also heightens the internal tension of the story.

An example is in Chapter 21, which begins as if the narrator is looking over Bug’s shoulder, relating what he is thinking as he listens to Lazy spell out what he must do to stay alive—which Bug intuitively recognizes as deceit.