The Erroneous Narrator: Contextual Analysis of Sherwood Anderson’s Death in the Woods Because of the standing of most narrators they are considered trustworthy and non bias, though in some situations the narrator of a text is inaccurate and can end up weaving and constructing a story not completely precise. This is the case in the short story, Death in the Woods written by Sherwood Anderson which has a narrator that is not only inaccurate in his narrative but he also at several points makes clear his fallacious events within the story. The narrator starts the story by giving the main character context: her old age, her attire, along with making clear that the protagonist was a nameless woman who spoke to no one. The narrator’s first erroneous statement was the name of the protagonist which he stated directly after claiming the woman was nameless. The next sign of the narrator’s lack of knowledge, leading to a incorrect assumption, is when the narrator explains a scenario in which the protagonist visits the shop of a butcher. Within this description the narrator, at which point was a child living in the same town as the old woman, states the woman was alone with the butcher in the shop, meaning the entire situation is a conjecture with no obvious factual evidence. Both of these points prove that the narrator of the short story is not a reliable source and the story itself is not at all factual though based on what seems to be a true story. Opening the story with the speculation of the lives of other individuals, the narrator instantly shows that he is prone to conjecture and shows his inconsistency as a citable source in the telling of this story. The narrator then focuses on one select scenario in which the subject is an old woman living in the same town as the narrator, at a point where he was a young child. Directly after switching from a general overview to