It’s Techtober!

With so many folks gearing up for NaNoWriMo and the fall writing competition season (including our own Super Challenge #6), I thought we’d skip our usual poetry slam this month and talk about a fiction (or nonfiction) technique instead. That’s right – we’re going to spend the next dozen or so paragraphs of your life talking about point of view. What is it, what does it do, and what are the advantages and disadvantages of each kind?

Choosing the right point of view to tell your story from can change everything. POV determines what information the reader gets, and how, and from whom. That means you can decide to lie, hide the ball, or lay everything out for the reader to see.

Most of us have a preferred POV – one that feels natural to write in. Sometimes that’s because it’s what we read a lot of. Other times it’s because those are the stories we like to tell. For example, not a lot of mystery writers use third-person omniscient because, well, it doesn’t leave a lot of mystery. Can you tell a mystery story that way? Sure! Think of the Encyclopedia Brown books. On the other hand, one of the strengths of the storytelling in the Sherlock Holmes mysteries comes from how Watson, as narrator, doesn’t have access to all the information that Holmes does.

Look who’s talking

POV comes in three main flavors, depending on who’s narrating. Each style is important to understand, because they’re capable of conveying different amounts of information about different things.

First person

Me, me, me, it’s all about me. In first person storytelling, you’re inside one person’s point of view, and you’re going to stay there for a while. This style tends to be both conversational and confidential, as though the character is speaking directly to the reader. When you write in first person, the trick is to stay out of the character’s way and let them tell the story the way they want to tell it.

Good for:

• Intimate relationship between reader and narrator
• Tight focus
• Conversational style
• Can hide information with an unreliable narrator or a narrator who doesn’t see crucial things (think Dr. Watson)

Weakness:

• You can only tell the reader what the character sees
• You can only tell the reader what the character feels
• The character may not accurately perceive information, which leaves you with a choice of dropping out of character in your narration or failing to tell the reader a crucial piece of data

Example:

“I suppose you’re all wondering why I called you here today,” the Detective said. I could see that he was as exhausted as I felt, and I wished he would go away somewhere to sleep.

“I’m not.” The words were out before I could stop myself. I was getting too old for this, I thought, at fifteen, and did not much care for the Detective’s moustache in any case.

Second person

This is probably the least used point of view, because it’s the one most likely to make a reader resistant. In second person, your reader is a character in the story. “You open the door, and you see a kitchen, not big or small, with a streaky counter top and a cold oven.”

Good for:

• Total immersion in a story
• Absolute control over the reader’s perceptions

Weakness:

• Must stick to “show, don’t tell” – that is, you can show the reader a thing they should be sad about, but you can’t tell them they’re sad (either they feel it or they don’t)
• Some readers really don’t like being told what they see, or have trouble “roleplaying” a character in your story

Example:

“I suppose you’re all wondering why I called you here today,” the Detective said. You could see the lines forming on his face, under that repellent mustache he kept waxed and trimmed like a slightly damp caterpillar. Before you could stop yourself, you assured him that you were not in the slightest bit confused about his motives.

Third person

He, she, it, they. In third person narratives, both the storyteller and the reader are looking at the characters through a lens. Third person comes in a couple varieties: omniscient and limited.

3rd Omniscient

In this POV, you have access to all knowledge about every character and event. That makes it super useful for storytelling, but don’t fall victim to the notion that you must tell the reader all the information that you can. They’ll get bored.

Good for:

• Conveying emotions of a wide variety of characters
• Big casts of characters so you don’t have to have a POV character wandering through every scene
• You don’t have to figure out how to get all the knowledge the reader needs into one character

Weakness:

• Tempting to tell too much
• Can get boring really fast

Example:

“I suppose you’re all wondering why I called you here today,” the Detective said. He was exhausted; the past three days had taken their toll on more than his appetite.

“I’m not,” the Insouciant Youth sassed back. She was getting too old for this, she thought, at fifteen, and did not much care for the Detective’s moustache in any case.

3rd Limited

In third person limited, the reader is still an “observer” in the story rather than a participant or the person a participant is talking to, but tey have a much narrower field of vision. That is, they’re limited to the information one character has.

Good for:

• Probably the most common narrative style.
• You can shift points of view between characters as you need in order to give the reader – but not a specific POV character – information in a way that you can’t with a first-person narration
• Tight focus on one aspect of the story without the reader having to be immersed

Weakness:

• Tempting to shift POV too often – don’t do it!
• You still have to figure out how to get the information to the reader if it’s happening outside the POV character’s field of view
• Many writers accidentally give information about, say, a non-POV character’s emotions which would be more appropriate to a 3rd person omniscient style. Remember that if you want your character Jenny to know someone else is sad, you can’t say “Paul felt sad” but you have to say “Jenny felt bad for Paul as she watched him cover his face with his hands and burst into tears.”

Example:

“I suppose you’re all wondering why I called you here today,” the Detective said. He was exhausted; the past three days had taken their toll on more than his appetite.

“I’m not,” the Insouciant Youth sassed back. The Detective was unsurprised, since she had missed no chance since Mrs. Ginwiddie’s death to assure him of her competence and his age.

About the author:

Rowan submitted exactly one piece of microfiction to YeahWrite before being consumed by the editorial darkside. She spent some time working hard as our Submissions Editor before becoming YeahWrite’s Managing Editor in 2016. She was a BlogHer Voice of the Year in 2017 for her work on intersectional feminism, but she suggests you find and follow WOC instead. In real life she’s been at various times an attorney, aerialist, professional knitter, artist, graphic designer (yes, they’re different things), editor, secretary, tailor, and martial artist. It bothers her vaguely that the preceding list isn’t alphabetized, but the Oxford comma makes up for it. She lives in Portlandia with a menagerie which includes at least one other human. She tells lies at textwall and uncomfortable truths at CrossKnit.

rowan@yeahwrite.me