Revealing Internal Conflict

Revealing Struggles of The Human Heart

William Faulkner claimed that the only thing that makes the pain and agony or writing

worthwhile is that literature is “the study of the human heart in conflict with itself.”



The only thing that makes literature worth writing is the understanding of human hearts

in conflict with themselves. Through writing, the author helps readers to understand

internal conflict of what he or the narrator is going through, or even other characters. This

is often established through point of view, usually first person or omniscient. In Tom

Whitecloud’s “Blue Winds Dancing”, conflict between the narrator and himself is

effectively revealed through first person point of view. The native in this short story

experiences internal conflict of self-identity. He worries that he is too modern to be

native and too native to be modern. The narrator also contemplates whether the whole

modern society is right, or h...