In terms of narrative situation, The Idiot Boy  and Tintern Abbey  present two contrasting variations. Where the former is written in a third person narrative with an anecdotal and balladic, bard-like tone, the latter utilizes a contemplative and confessional first person narrative. Instead of being an objective and self-composed omniscient narrator, the narrator in The Idiot Boy  is restless, impatient and he has a substantial case of nerves. He is overwhelmed with anxiety in the second stanza of the poem and he asks four questions one after the another, seemingly either very disturbed or very excited by "the bustle about [Betty Foy's] door" (TIB, 7). Later in the poem, he vents his frustration upon his muses when he is unable to relate Johnny's adventure in the woods. "Oh gentle muses, is this kind? / Why will ye thus my suit repel?" he laments (TIB, 352-353). The narrator in Tintern Abbey  is remarkably calm and composed. Unlike his counterpart, who is very generous with his exclamations and incessant questioning, this narrator uses exclamation points sparingly, preferring to speak (write) in a clear prose style structured by blank verse. Indeed, the choice of blank verse and simple prose reflects what Wordsworth calls "emotions collected in tranquility," and it affords the reader a smooth reading of the poem; whereas in The Idiot Boy, the endless repetitions and narrative impingements jar the reading process.

Another difference in the narrative situation of the two poems is the distance between the narrator and his subject or subjects. In The Idiot Boy, the narrator, being a third person narrator, is unable to gain access to all the information regarding his characters that might be relevant to a good rendition of the story. For example, he is unable to reveal where Johnny goes while he is missing. Neither is he able to describe (or perhaps even understand) how Johnny feels during the entire incident; unfortunately all that the narrator knows about Johnny, is that he "burrs." The narrator in Tintern Abbey  however, possesses a tremendous clarity of vision. Not only is able to describe the scenery around him in vivid detail, he is also able, by virtue of the poem being autobiographical, to reveal his innermost thoughts and emotions. "I cannot paint/ What then I was That time is past/ And all its aching joys are now no more/ And all its dizzy rapture," he sighs, revealing a thorough understanding of the state of mind of the subject of his poem ­ himself (TA, 77-87). The entire poem appears to describe an epiphany. As the narrator (Wordsworth himself) stands upon a hill overlooking the countryside around the abbey, we, the readers, are delighted by the sudden, spontaneous overflow of emotions, and the final reassuring tranquility.

This apparent inclusion of the reader into the poet's consciousness and into the sequence of events in Tintern Abbey  is abruptly overturned when the narrator addresses his sister. The entire narrative transforms from a first person to a second person narrative and the reader is reduced from being the addressee in a heart-to-heart confessional to the third party who perhaps, reads this letter addressed from brother to sister, or on a more ominous note, overhears a conversation between the two. In other words, the reader realizes that he is and has been completely excluded from the poem. "My dear, dear sister!" Wordsworth writes, immediately placing himself and his emotions beyond the reader's reach. Once again, The Idiot Boy  provides a contrasting situation. Ironically, even though there exists an unbreachable distance between narrator (and therefore the reader) and his characters, the reader is not distanced from the poem but is on the same metafictive level as the narrator. "Oh reader, now that I might tellA most delightful tale pursuing," the narrator specifically addresses the reader, thereby establishing The Idiot Boy  as a more reader-engaging text than Tintern Abbey (TIB, 322-326). Nevertheless, the touching, confessional tone of Tintern Abbey  still more than makes up for its narrator abruptly casting the reader aside.

Kennie Wei Jin Ting