How to talk to Girls at Parties is a short story written by Neil Gaiman, that takes place in London, England around the early 1970s. The story is told through first person, coming from one of the boys, Enns’s perspective. The narrator seems to be a bit omniscient, but overall unreliable when telling the story, for a couple of reasons. I consider Enn omniscient because it is a memory of his, therefore he could have altered the story in any way that he desired, and we all would be forced to believe him. However I consider Enn unreliable because his story has a couple of contradictory points, and he himself lets us know that he is recalling a memory over 30 years ago. For example on page 94, Enn is reflecting on how good looking the girls are and says “…all the girls at that party were lovely; they all had perfect faces” which is not exactly the most accurate description when talking about someone. But before making this observation about he girls at the party on page 93, he talks about a girl with a “gap between her two front teeth.” This isn’t the only imperfection that he noted when making observations of other girls at the party, which clearly shows his unreliability. However the first person narrative is what allows us to understand what is going on in the novel. Without hearing the story from Enn’s perspective we wouldn’t be able to understand his thought process. The downfall of hearing the story from Een is that we have to guess what we think is wrong with Stella, and the other girls, leading to Vic his friend leaving the party frantically.
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Kofi!I really liked your observation about the narrator being an omniscient character. I totally agree that this is his story from the past and he could have altered it in any way. You and I both agreed that the narrator was an unreliable character. I like how you pointed out that he is recalling this story that occurred thirty years ago, making his story unreliable because memory is often biased and altered. One thing I want to mention is the hidden meaning behind the title of the story. I was thinking maybe talking to girls means more than just a verbal conversation because at parties, girls are not attracted to conversations but they want to have physical contact with someone. It could be dancing, hugging, kissing, etc. I get this idea from pages 92 and 95. In the beginning of the party, he has a conversation with the girl from Wain and ends up leaving him in the dusk. Then he talks to a girl name Triolet and things get physical between the two. This makes me want to believe that the question the title is asking has been answered. In order to talk to girls at parties, it takes more than just a conversation.
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