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<title> A DISCUSSION ABOUT NARRATION </title>
I have had the opportunity to read a book by David Malouf called Remembering Babylon. With help, in form of small pieces from the book to whom I will refer later on while answering and discussing the following questions. 1. Does the narrator do both the seeing and talking in the story? 2. Has the narrator omniscience of events, characters, setting or is it limited? 3. What effect has this narrative technique to the readers response to the text. I will refer to two passages in the book as I discuss these questions. 

The first passage is in the very first part in the book. That is when Gemmy - the main character for the first time appears in front of three children... "They were two little girls in patched gingham and a boy, their cousin, in short pants and braces, all three barefooted farm children not easily scared"... The narrator describes the situation as he himself was watching, he points out what they were wearing and how they were acting at that very moment. Here the narrator do both the seeing and talking. 

To express the writer's omniscience in this part I will give you this piece as an extraordinary example. "Lachlan Beattie felt the snow melt at his feet". It is not Lachlan himself who speeks, but the narrator who express Lachlan's feelings. We can see the same procedure in this part. "A black! That was the boy's first thought. We are being raided by blacks". In the latter sentence you can almost hear the boy's voice through the writer. The narrator is very detailed and seems to be aware of everything that happens. 

The narrative technique in this first passage is very easy to read because everything that happens is described in a clear way. It is clear shown that it is a story like "once upon a time", as the first line starts with... "One day in the middle of the nineteenth century"... 

The second passage starts with an describtion of Gemmy sneaking around the childrens' house before the children meets him. Here the narrator goes back in time and let us be aware of what exactly was happening before Gemmy was discovered. We get the hole happening told again but this time out from Gemmy's mind. In this sequence the narration changes. Suddenly we get the story out from Gemmy's mind but it is still the narrator who does the talking. We can see that in... "He crept closer.., he put his.., he did not want..," All the time the narrator tells us what Gemmy did, and did not. 

The omniscience is clear stated again shown in this part... "If he could get the words inside him, as he had soaked mush, the creature, or spirit or whatever it was, would come up to the surface of him and take them"... The narrator has access to Gemmy's thoughts and he tells this part as he knew everything that Gemmy was thinking.

The narrative technique within this sequence could be a bit confusing because suddenly the "once upon a time" story changes and you feel like being more "intimate" and more "close" to the characters. Another matter that could be confusing concerning the writing technique is shown in this pattern ..."The dog intervened. It flashed out and began snapping at his heels. The boy raised the gun to his shoulder"... Here you understand that the story is told again, but from another view, from Gemmy's view.

These two passages I have discussed differs from each other very much eventhough the content are almost the same. The narrator has total omniscience, but it is the way of writing that the narrator has created the story that differs mostly. He mixes his way of writing all the time and that could be difficult to follow in a story written like this. In general, I think the response of a text like this, eventhough it could be a bit confusing, still make the story more alive. That is because you get to know the characters better as the narrator gets access to their minds. 

Personally I thought it was a bit difficult to follow in the beginning, but after a while when this "a-ha feeling" came up to me, and I felt that I "broke the wall" to the way of writing. I noticed that I started to appreciate this "jumping" technique the narrator has been using. I have to say it is really an excellent way of telling a story. The use of the narrator in this text is great as the narrator works as the one who links the different parts together. Like a spider in a web. The fact that the writer is doing both the seeing and talking makes him work as the tool that makes it possible for a story like this to be created.
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