Horace's Point of View

Author's Note: This is a piece showing my knowledge on point of view. I used the book The Ranger's Apprentice by John Flanagan.

In the series The Ranger’s Apprentice by John Flanagan, Will is an Apprentice who learns to be a Ranger. The series is written from third person view but focuses on Will the whole time. It talks about what he’s thinking and what he’s doing but not from Will’s eyes. Will sees everything in a smart and well thought out manner because he has been trained that was. If John Flanagan would write it from third person over Horace the thoughts and feelings would be different. Horace would be a little more of wanting to run into the enemy head on and not think much.

In every book in the series Will has to go against some danger and sometimes love. From the danger Will sees he is nervous sometimes. If it were from Horace’s eyes he would love it. Warriors always do. From their eyes it’s always a game and they want to win and be the best. Even if it takes killing many people. The head schoolmaster for battle school wants to make the warriors as heartless as possible. As a warrior you do not want emotion, you just want to win and kill. Horace is only human though and can’t help to have emotion, but he still wants to win fights however it takes. The Rangers are made to think absolutely everything through. They don’t like killing if it is unnecessary, but most times it is.  

John Flanagan uses the third person view but tells what Will is thinking. Some of his thoughts come to what a lot of men think about… women. In the earlier books Will was trying to figure out who he liked. The choice was between Alyss and Princess Cassandra. He has grown up with Alyss all his life and starts to really like her. They even share a kiss now and then. If the girl thing was from Horace’s eyes he would have the same problem. Horace grew up with Alyss too but does not like her that way. He still gets a little jealous when Alyss and Will hug. Now Cassandra and Horace is a different story. Cassandra wants the two boys to fight over her but Will gave up. Horace is Cassandra’s personal body guard and has had a crush on her the whole time. So there is a difference between the view of Will and Horace when it comes to girls. Will would think Alyss is prettier and Horace would think Cassandra is.

The different points of view can really change the story and make the reader think differently about characters and events. If the book were following Horace people would start to feel that he is a nice guy but wants to kill. Also, that he is kind of a softy about his friends. If the book follows Halt though, the reader would feel that Halt is mean but very thoughtful and caring for people he likes. The point of view really changes the readers opinion on characters.

As you can see the view from Will’s thoughts and actions would differ from Horace’s. Horace is a man of action first unlike Will who needs to think it through. They both want to do what’s right for their country, but they have different ways of getting through things.