(fairly) new (but unlisted) "benefits"

[Laurence Horn]

On Aug 5, 2011, at 12:00 PM, Joel S. Berson wrote:

> At 8/5/2011 11:51 AM, Jesse Sheidlower wrote:
>> On Fri, Aug 05, 2011 at 11:44:34AM -0400, Laurence Horn wrote:
>> >
>> > *Is there a better term for the first-person protagonist of a song?
>> > It's not necessarily "the singer", "the songwriter", or the person
>> > whose point of view is represented (which may be a third/second
>> > person). Talk about lexical gaps!
>> 
>> I'd go with "narrator", "speaker", or in some contexts "persona".
> 
> I don't think the literary critics have come up with anything better,
> considering the many uses I see of "narrator".
> 
> 
The relevant sense of "narrator" in the OED is 2a,

The voice or persona (whether explicitly identified or merely implicit) by which are related the events in a plot, esp. that of a novel or narrative poem.

which I guess would cover the song context, sort of, given that "esp." is not exhaustive.  But it still seems weird to me to refer to the song's narrator, not that I can come up with anything better.  

LH
------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org