Gideon the Ninth

Free and indirect discourse is a literary device that shapes a story’s narration. Free and indirect discourse occurs when a third-person narrator speaks in ways that reflect the internal thoughts of a character within the story. The narrator describes the Fourth House teenagers as “ghastly,” “loathsome,” and “awful” (85-86). These are the feelings of Gideon, not the narrator. The novel is told from a third-person limited perspective and while this does allow insight into the perspective character’s mind, it does not project the perspective character’s thoughts onto the narrator.

Free and indirect discourse lets the narrator “dip” into Gideon’s head to share her thoughts and feelings as if they were objective facts about the scenes described. The narrator saying that Gideon thinks the teenagers are awful carries less weight than the narrator simply stating that the teenagers are awful. Free and indirect discourse allows a third-person narration to make characters’ feelings weightier by placing them in the authoritative perspective of the narrator.

Allegory is a symbolic story that allows a given scene, object, or character to represent something greater within the narrative. It is also a simplified way to explain a moral or lesson that would be difficult to convey otherwise.