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Genre

Fictional biography

Narrator

Third-person, omniscient narrator; an unreliable "biographer" who changes style and tone to suit the changes of Orlando's life

Climax

The climax occurs when Orlando finds herself in the present day, 1928, and she is forced to acknowledge her own nature as a multitude of selves and experiences within one person.

Protagonist

Orlando

Setting (Time)

1588 to 1928

Setting (Place)

Mostly in England (London and Kent), but 1660–1685 are spent on an excursion to Constantinople and the hills of Turkey

Point Of View

Third-person omniscient; the narrator or "biographer" knows what each of the characters are thinking and inserts her own explanations into the text

Falling Action

Orlando, having found love, now finds life in the present moment; standing by her oak tree, she looks over her manor and welcomes back her husband Shel.

Tense

Immediate past, real-time narration

Foreshadowing

Orlando's poem foreshadows that she will end up back at her oak tree; the appearance of Archduchess Harriet foreshadows that he will me a man; Orlando's troubles with the gypsies foreshadow that she will return to England.

Tone

Detached, philosophic, and poetic; although she attempts to include dates and facts making the book a real 'biography,' the narrator's work ends up as poetry.

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