‘the […] narrator has always been of significance’ (Barbara Wall). Discuss ideas of narrators and/ or narration within Children’s Literature.

‘the […] narrator has always been of significance’ (Barbara Wall). Discuss ideas of narrators and/ or narration within Children’s Literature.

I will begin my reading from A. A. Milne’s Winnie-the-Pooh. In the Introduction, the narration states “If you happen to have read another book about Christopher Robin, you may remember that he once had a swan”[1]. I read this to be a direct address on the “you”. This perspective could be read to be pre-supposing that there is an addressee, but in fact the direct address of “you” is not claiming an address to anyone or anything other than the “you”. There is a shift in the narrative perspective within this extract as it goes from talking about “Christopher Robin” to “he once had a swan”, rather than “Christopher Robin once had a swan.” Later on in the Introduction, it says “You can’t be in London for long without going to the Zoo.” As before, I read this to be a direct address on the “you” – however, the perspective does not state whether or not the text is addressing a different internal “you”. It is not relevant for the text to state which “you” it is addressing.

The Introduction also says “or the swan had Christopher Robin, I don’t know which”. The word “I” shows a shift in perspective once more – it is no longer stating a “you” perspective, but a more personal “I” perspective. The “I” perspective brings into question the narrator itself; by having “I” mentioned, I read this narrator to have some form of consciousness of self, as opposed to being a narrator in the text which is separate to the text. However, the perspective can only claim the “I”. It cannot claim name, identity, consciousness, or where that potential consciousness of the narrator is. The identity of an “I” narrator in the text is something we create by reading it – and the text does not exist to be read. It simply exists, and therefore cannot claim anymore perspective attached to “I” than the “I” itself.

There is another shift in perspective shortly afterwards, as the text says “when we said good-bye, we took the name with us”, moving from the singular “I” perspective to the plural “we” and “us” perspective. This begs the question of who the “us” is. Because the text cannot claim a perspective that requires to be read (the text still exists, regardless of whether it is read or not), I read the “us” to not be referring to an internal narrator and a reader, but instead be referring to some form of plural narration within the text itself; but, just as with the “I” perspective, the text cannot claim anymore perspective attached to the “we” and “us” than the “we” and “us” themselves. The shift in perspective that is definite, however, is that by shifting from “I” to “we” and “us”, the perspective is shifting from singular narration to plural.

I would like to draw attention back to the quote of “If you happen to have read another book about Christopher Robin, you may remember that he once had a swan”, with particular focus on the “if” and “may”. These words are conditional, and therefore I read this to mean that this statement is conditional within the text itself; even “if” another book about Christopher Robin has been read, this does not automatically mean that a swan will be remembered; the word “may” means that the “you” being addressed in the perspective is still not guaranteed to “remember that he once had a swan”. It is conditional, both in the text itself, and in its address to the “you” perspective. The word “happen” confirms this further. It is not a necessity for the “you” perspective to have read another book about Christopher Robin; I read the word “happen” to mean there is simply a chance that the “you” perspective has read another book about Christopher Robin. All of this makes the narrative perspective conditional. None of it implies certainty within the perspective; this quote is entirely a conditional perspective of possibilities.

Later in the Introduction, the text states that “I had written as far as this when Piglet looked up”. This is a retrospective perspective on an already retrospective perspective. The “had written” shows that the perspective claims to be in the past; however, the words “as this” mean that the text had to have been being written at exactly that moment in order for Piglet to have “looked up” just as this had been written. This offers a paradox of sorts – through the word “had”, the perspective