we now know who the narrator is . why might the author choose to tell the story from the first-person point-of-view?

 Grant is more educated than most of the people, black or white, in the region, and is accorded high social status because of this. However, he feels oppressed in the South because of his race, and longs to move to the North and take up a different profession. Grant is unique in that he is educated and commands an amount of respect, even from whites. We see both an objective intellectual view of systemic racism as well as Grant's own personal torment. This makes his narrative very intriguing.