A Nurse's Story (Style)

Style

Point of View

The omniscient third-person narrator of "A Nurse's Story" is free to take on the perspective of any character, regardless of the time or place in which that character lives. The narrator is god-like in his ability to look into the mind of every character and to communicate to readers private motivations, desires, and thoughts. Readers discover, for instance, that Warren Booth Jr. still harbors deep resentment because of the strike's negative impact on his family and on his own preparation for an important football game. Moreover, the narrator is free to articulate and, even comment on, the limitations of Warren's own understanding of past events and of himself, as when the narrator notes that "[t]he fact that [Warren] himself has never managed any great enterprise did not occur to him" or later when he debates with himself whether to attend Mary McDonald's funeral. His decision, never spoken but accessible to the narrator (and through him to the reader), speaks volumes about the humanity of one of the town's leading men: "Forget the funeral. Send a card."

Episodic Structure and Lack of Chronology

"A Nurse's Story" is structured as a series of episodes that move fluidly across the history of Mary McDonald's life. Although each episode can stand alone as a component of the story, it is more important to see them as interdependent units, with each memory shaping the one that came before and after. Characters appear and reappear in new contexts, as connections between the various aspects of Mary's life reveal themselves, allowing patterns to form and reform as the story unfolds. Reading Baida's story is like living a life, an exercise that involves both a rethinking of each experience gained over the years and a rereading of the entire story with the maturity that comes over time.