Second-Person Narratives in Non-Fiction

The aim of the article is to analyse the particularity of second-person narratives in non-fiction. Their special status results from the fact that telling another person his or her own story is a convention in fiction but occurs rarely in everyday communication. In non-fiction narratives, the problem of different perspectives (of the narrator and the addressee) is particularly valid, i.e. often the point of view of the narrative “you” is only a disguised point of view of the “I.” The analysis of A Man by Oriana Fallaci shows the shift from the melting of perspectives to an evident distance. In Hanna Krall’s Hamlet, the “I” presents the “you” with an ultimate interpretation of his life.