A study of modality and point of view in some selected short stories

Abstract EN

This study explores how point of view and modality systems are presented in fiction.

It applies the Simpson's Model (1993) of Point of View to analyzing three different short stories.

The short stories chosen for analysis are Edgar Allan Poe's "The Fall of the House of Usher", Ernest Hemingway's "The Last Good Country", and Gustave Flaubert's "A Simple Heart".

The study displays how modality systems are very important and helpful to show the position of the narrator to the fictional world and to the minds of the characters in it.

The researcher addresses the following issues: the narrative mode of the story, the dominant type of modal shading, the position of the narrator, whether inside or outside the story