Written In 3rd Person Through Sandra's Eyes example essay topic

Both stories involve death but the writer's approach their task in very different ways. Compare and contrast how Doyle and Lively create their characters and the different effect this produces. The darkness out there by Penelope lively and the "Speckled band" by Arthur Conan Doyle are both short stories including death but they have many differences. The "Speckled band" is a 19th century piece which will therefore have different views on life e.g. the role of women in society, on the other hand "The Darkness out there's a fairly modern piece dating around the 21st century which will have modern views on life. Doyle's piece is a very stereotypical piece with very straight forward views and messages.

There is a definite good character (Holmes) who saves the day and then the bad character, (Roylott) who wants to kill people, and foil Holmes plan. It is clearly showing good conquering evil with an almost predictable ending. However "The darkness out there" is different altogether which isn't surprising due to the huge difference in date. The plot is very complex and hard to grasp immediately because of the twists and turns of it. The ending (used in the loosest possible terms) is almost inconclusive. It ends "everything is not as it appears, oh no". which could mean that it will always go on, the "darkness", that it doesn't have an ending because it is in people.

In this story the characters change and mature over the coarse of the story, the characters cannot be identified as being good or evil until the end of the story which is totally the opposite to Doyle's categorized characters. In the speckled band it is written in a first person narrative seen through the eyes of Dr. Watson, Holmes's sidekick. The darkness out there is written in 3rd person through Sandra's eyes which are very limited which allows the reader to make judgments on what appears to be a stereotypical character turns out to be more than you expect from your first impressions. In the darkness out there, there are 3 main characters.

Mrs. Rutter, Sandra and Kerry. It is written in a 3rd person perspective which is He, She, It and They. In line 34 the perspective turns to almost first person, how Sandra would say it, seen through Sandra's eyes, it changes from "she hoped it would be... ". to "it was alright here in the sunshine... ".

This perspective change allows us to see things through Sandra's rather limited views on life and people. Sandra is a very judge mental person. Our fist indication of this is her thoughts of Pat who runs the club. Pat has a "Funny eye, a squint... a big chest... our people who help other people always not very nice looking?" This shows that Sandra judges people on what they look like. Another example of this is when Kerry is first introduced into the story. Kerry Steven's is not "reckoned much on" because of his "blacked licked down hair and slutty eyes...

". Sandra then states that "some people you only have to look at to know they " re not up to much" which is totally backwards when know that Mrs. Rutter was directly involved of the murder of the German pilot. Sandra believes that Mrs. Rutter is a "sweet" old lady like the others in the club which is a good example of how limited she sees things. However Kerry senses something about Mrs. Rutter. "I don't go much on her". Is his first opinion of her which shows us that Kerry is tuned in to his surroundings whereas Sandra isn't.

Sandra is portrayed as a nieve daydreamer who is aware of the danger in the world e.g. the "German plane", the "Rapists" but has a childish view of it..