The narrator

The main character of the short story “Tin Man” by Jennifer Kerslake is a nine-year-old child who is also the narrator of the story. Note that the gender of the narrator is never directly revealed in the story, but we have chosen to assume she is a girl. This also matches the introduction to the story in a magazine where it was published as a story about a ‘father-daughter relationship’.

The narrator’s mother died recently, and now the narrator lives with her father outside the town and close to the forest. The narrator is therefore mostly isolated from her peers, which might make her more eager to fit in with the children at school.

When the narrator is offered the role of Tin Man in her school’s production of The Wizard of Oz, she most likely sees this as a chance to fit in. At the same time, she is worried about her costume. From the start, she does not think that her father will be able to make her a costume: “As soon as I set eyes on the silver knit, I know he won’t be able to do it.”. The narrator doubts that her father will be able to perform a task that was usually done by her mother, which could mean that the narrator is not sure th...