Narrator and point of view

The short story “The German Boy” by Ron Butlin is narrated mainly in the past tense by an unnamed first-person narrator. The dialogue, however, is in the present tense. The narrator also makes use of the present tense when he describes the action that takes place in the present, when the narrator is an adult: “This morning I have come to the office and done nothing” (p. 91, l. 19). He also briefly employs the future tense when describing a flashforward scene: “And tomorrow I will return to the office (…)” (p. 95, l. 32).

The narrator is subjective. He tells the story according to the way he remembers it as a child and the way he experiences the events as an adult. This means that the events are subjected to the narrator’s interpretation, and the reader cannot receive an impartial account of what happened. Moreover, the narrator seems to directly address the readers, asking them to believe his point of view: “Believe me, I know – Klaus taught me so” (p. 91, ll. 17-18).

The narrator’...