Characters
The most important characters in the short story “Blink and You Miss It” by Alex Garland are the narrator (who is also the main character), and the beach guru. Sammy, the little boy whom the narrator imagines and writes to, is only a symbolic character.
The narrator
The narrator of the short story is also the main character in the plot.
Outer characterisation
His outer characterisation only informs us that he comes from England and that he was a seventeen-years-old drug user when the main events took place, somewhere in South East Asia (probably Thailand), and that at the moment of narration he is in jail in a Buddhist country.
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Inner characterisation
He renders some of his inner characterisation directly, describing himself as “an abject free-fall”, meaning that he sees himself as a failure. However, he remembers that when he was a child, he had common sense and was well raised, like his small neighbour from England, Sammy: “At five, I was certainly the kind of kid who looked both ways before crossing the road.”
In the beach community he begins to live in, he comes across as naïve. The episode he narrates about how he ended up being arrested includes a lot of self-irony to his credulity: “Being seventeen and in a free-fall, I didn't see this guy for what he was. So I listened to his stupid travel stories.”
Furthermore, although his attitude at the time of the narration is critical and sarcastic of the guru, the fact that he let himself manipulated by the man suggests that he was unaware of the man’s true character before his arrest.
Still, certain information about the guru may suggest the narrator sensed/knew something was off, but he just chose to ignore it probably because his judgement was clouded by drug use. For instance, he knew the guru was extorting his followers for money, and that the fact the chief of the police was his drug contact meant trouble: “I had to pay our hitch-hiking fare, naturally, as the guru didn't believe in cash unless it was someone else's.”
I should have tapped on the driver's window and told him to pull over. Got off the truck and walked home. And the idea did cross my mind, but at the same time I was imagining the reactions of everyone when I got back. So I kept my mouth shut.”
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The beach guru
The beach guru is the second most important character in the short story, and he is described only from the narrator’s perspective.
Outer characterisation
His outer characterisation is rendered in a single long passage, from which we find out the way the man looks, that he uses drugs and that he abuses some of the youngsters in the beach community that he leads:
Pushing forty, possibly past it, though all you could do was guess because being stuck in a young person's world, he was pretty coy about divulging his age. Encyclopaedic knowledge of substances. Receding hairline, number-one all over to hide it, nineties version of the comb-over. A keen eye for any of us he suspected he could get into bed.
Inner characterisation
The man’s inner characterisation is constructed both directly (by the narrator) and indirectly through his actions.
First of all, the fact that he sleeps with people in the beach community which are younger than him suggests that he abuses his power and has a morally questionable behaviour.
In front of his community, he acts as a relaxed person, using colloquial language and exerting fascination over them:
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