英国著名作家威廉·萨默塞特·毛姆在他的短篇小说选的序言中说,我的许多短篇小说都是以第一人称“我”写成的。其目的是为了使读者觉得“我”所叙述的事情确实可信。因为当某人告诉你,他所诉说的事就是他耳闻目睹的亲身经历,你便会更倾向于认为他对你说的是实话。另外,从故事叙述者的观点来看,这样的安排还有一个长处,即:他只需把他所了解的事实告诉你;至于他不了解的,则尽可由你自己去想象。过去有些用第一人称形式写作的小说家,在这方面相当疏忽大意。他们的笔下往往会倾泻出滔滔不绝的对话,而这些对话却是他们不可能听到过的;所 The famous British writer William Somerset Maugham said in the preface to his short story selection that many of my short stories are written in the first person “me”. The purpose is to make the reader feel that what I have described is truly credible. Because when someone tells you that what he tells you is the personal experience he has seen and heard, you are more inclined to think that he is telling you the truth. In addition, from the point of view of the narrator, this arrangement has another advantage: he only needs to tell you what he knows about it; and if he does not understand it, he can imagine himself. In the past some novelists writing in the first person form were rather negligent in this respect. Their writings tend to pour out endless conversations that they can not possibly hear;