Humans are influenced and socialized by many things in life, including social media, family members, friends, and teacher. We learn grow, and develop our perspective and personality as we age. Although we are learning, we are always reminded that it is important to be ourselves. In Edgeworth’s 1801 novel Belinda, the author uses point of view, diction, characterization, and parallel structure to develop Hervey’s character and warn against letting other people influence one’s actions. Firstly, the author uses a third person point of view as an outsider to give a clear, unbiased view of Hervey’s personality. If the story had been told by another character or from Hervey’s point of view, Hervey might not have appeared as the “chameleon” that we know him to be. Due to this perspective, we know that all of the adjective assigned to Hervey are accurate. Hervey’s actions and feelings are also therefore unbiased. “He was so dreadfully afraid of passing for a pedant… he pretended to disdain every species of knowledge.” The author uses this blunt, pointedly unbiased characterization of Hervey as well as Hervey’s actions to emphasize the negative nature of Hervey’s personality as well as warn against letting other people influence one’s actions. The author also uses diction (adjectives) to …show more content…
The author states “Increasing admiration of her beauty, adn with increasing dread of being taken in to marry a niece of…” This sentence shows the completely opposed and conflicting feelings inside of Hervey that are present because of hervey’s inability to let go of the opinions of others. This internal turmoil is another way the author warns against Hervey’s “chameleon character.” No one wants to be completely indecisive because two warring, equal but opposite ideas are raging in one’s head. This is another way the author develops Hervey’s character disapprovingly and encourages people to be