Point of View in Toni Cade Bambara's, "The Lesson"

Point of view is an essential element to a reader's comprehension of a story. The point of view shows how the narrator thinks, speaks, and feels about any particular situation. In Toni Cade Bambara's "The Lesson," the events are told through the eyes of a young uptown girl named Sylvia. The reader gets a limited point of view because the events are told strictly by Sylvia. This fact can influence the reader to see things …

…have some of the finer things. The fact that "ain't nobody gonna beat me at nuthin" shows that Sylvia is going to be the best of anything she pursues (312). Bambara wants the reader to see that there is another type of lifestyle in the city. It is not to belittle Sylvia and her peers just to show that there is a difference of values. In this novel, that value is the difference of spending money.