Narrative Structure and Character Development in George Orwell's Burmese Days

There is a division between the narrative structure and the character development in Burmese Days which can be highlighted through Orwell’s use of a third person narrator. This narrator provides a basis for the reader by which he can assess his particular role and involvement with the novel. The reader’s awareness of the narrator and the different levels of narrative technique that are employed act in a way which restrict the voice and expression of Orwell’s main character, Flory. Yet, in an opening passage of the book, we are introduced first to an official, the magistrate U Po Kyin:

“A ring of clerks were making a steady income by misappropriating Government stores, and Po Kyin (he was plain Po Kyin then: the honorific U came years later) took naturally to this kind of thing. However, he had too much talent to spend his life in a clerkship, stealing miserably in annas and pice. One day he discovered that the Government, being short of minor officials, were going to make some appointments from among the clerks. The news would have become public in another week, but it was one of Po Kyin’s qualities that his information was always a week ahead of everyone else’s. He saw his chance and denounced all his confederates before they could take alarm. Most of them were sent to prison, and Po Kyin was made an Assistant Township Officer as the reward of his honesty. Since then, he had risen steadily.” [1]

Within this brief, slightly ludicrous, account of Po Kyin’s working life we witness an inherent sense of irony that will control most of the narrative. It is an irony that connects natural talent with criminal endeavours and associates honesty with betrayal. The narrator observes and interprets the events with precision and detail, often placing unobtrusive comments within the text by qualifying a comment or slightly exaggerating a description. Thus, the innocent