Review of David Mitchell's novel Black Swan Green

Thirteen-year-old Jason Taylor narrates David Mitchell’s coming of age novel Black Swan Green, a novel that would lose Jason’s humorous voice if it were told through third person omniscient narration. Throughout the novel Jason describes how he is bullied mercilessly on a daily basis, but what Jason’s peers don’t know is that Jason is secretly a very talented poet. If the novel were not told from Jason’s point of view, it would lose Jason’s unique sarcasm and wit. Here, Jason describes why he uses a pseudonym (Eliot Bolivar) to secretly publish his poetry: “If you show someone something you've written, you give them a sharpened stake, lie down in your coffin, and say, ‘When you’re ready” (123). If this novel were told from third person omniscient point of view, the reader might not be able to relate to Jason as much, particularly with his self-consciousness.  In addition to poetry, Jason finds respite alone outdoors, which he again describes with his characteristic humor: “Trees’re a relief, after people” (204). If this novel were told through third person omniscient narration, and if readers spent equal time in the heads of Jason’s bullies and Jason himself, readers might not get to know Jason as well or be able to understand the deep effect bullying has had on his maturing character. While Jason has developed a sense of humor, he is also beginning to see the world as a harsh, untrustworthy place: “Human beings need to watch out for reasonless niceness too. It's never reasonless and its reason's not usually nice” (277).  Here, Jason second-guesses a suspicious stranger who comes to his door asking to sharpen his family’s knives for a low price.  Unfortunately, because Jason has been bullied so much by his peers, he has lost trust in humanity; however, Jason finds encouragement, friendship, and even young love in unexpected places and it’s evident that Jason has a bright future.