of the story is really Updikes narration written in the point of view, or voice of Sammy, one cannot be displeased in the way the story is depicted form this particular day at the A & P. There is no better way to narrate the story than though the eyes and thoughts of a teenage boy in is prime.As stated in the thesis, Timothy OBrien also writes his short story, How to tell a True War Story, in the first person narrative, although the style in which he narrates is quite different than from the style in A & P. OBrien, who was an actual soldier in the Vietnam War takes on more of an autobiographical approach to telling his true war story. The opening lines to the story, This is true. I had a buddy in Vietnam. His name was Bob Kiley, but everybody called him Rat., suggests to the reader immediately that he author is telling this story from his own point of you with the fact that he gives the impression of the story being part of a conversation already taking place. The statement, This is true., gives the reader an idea of two veteran soldiers sharing their war stories in a bar, in which the next one sounds even more unbelievable than the one before.Not only does OBrein write is story from a more autobiographical point of view, but he also takes on the style of an essay; as after each dramatically point in the story there is a paragraph following explaining what he wrote in the paragraphs preceding. It is as if there are two narration voices in the story, one for the part telling the actual war story to the other soldier, and one telling the whole story to the reader; war story and its reasons.The paragraph following the descriptive tale of his two buddies fooling around with the smoke grenades suggests this theory.In any war story, but especially a true one, its difficult to separate what happened from what seemed to happen. What seems to happen becomes its own happening and has to be told that way... The story as a whole was w...
