Narrator and point of view

The short story “Lamb to the Slaughter” by Roald Dahl is a third-person narrative told by an anonymous narrator who functions as an observer of the characters.

The third person narrator knows what Mary Maloney thinks and feels, but does not make further introspective comments regarding the other characters. This is why we can say that the narrator has a point of view limited to Mary Maloney’s perspective. Here is an example in which the narrator depicts Mary’s thoughts and feelings:

And now, she told herself as she hurried back, all she was doing now, she was returning home to her husband and he was waiting for his supper; and she must cook it good, and make it as tasty as possible because the poor man was tired; and if, when she entered the house, she happened to find anything unusual, or tragic, or terrible, then naturally it would be a shock and she’d become frantic with grief and horror. Mind you, she wasn’t expecting to find anything.

When depicting the other characters – suc...