Creative writing - Mike Sanders 2014
I am the first person
Influential point of view
Speech, voice, and point of view
In this chapter
· Telling a story from first person point of view (POV)
· Employing second person storytelling
· Writing in the third person
· Achieving remoteness with POV
The discussion of point of view is one of the touchiest craft debates among creative writers and their editors. Yet choosing your point or points of view is one of the most important things you’ll do as you plan your narrative. And to do it well, you must be aware of the intricacies of viewpoint and consider how it will impact your overall piece.
Artists generally don’t like rules, and so writers usually balk when advised not to write in first person present tense because it’s too hard to sell—or when they’re told they shouldn’t use the omniscient viewpoint because it simply isn’t done very often these days. I’m that way myself. I want to stretch my abilities and try different styles and forms. In fact, if I happen to be confronted with too many rules, I’ve been known to rebel and break a few.
On the other hand, as the editor of a small literary magazine (that often breaks rules, by the way), I recognize the value of the other side of the coin as well. Editors have seen omniscient viewpoint executed poorly more often than not. It’s true that omniscient is very hard to do well. Yet there’s no denying the mastery of Joseph Conrad, who wrote books in which the point of view might change with each sentence—sometimes five times in one paragraph! In most instances, the effect would be dizzying, but Conrad could pull it off so that you always knew who was talking and it felt perfectly natural.
Rules are made to assist creative writers, but if you feel confident enough to pull a Conrad, go ahead and break the rules. Just be sure your choice of POV makes the most of narrative, and never forget that narrative drive is everything to the reader. Readers are not interested in the writer’s angst or cleverness if they don’t fit well within the narrative.
It’s time to learn how the key to successful choice of viewpoint is understanding thoroughly how your choice of point of view (POV) will impact your narrative. You probably already have heard point of view referred to by the pronouns we use to tell our story, and that’s how you’re going to be learning about its best functions and uses: by considering POV in terms of first person, second person, third person, and distance. My aim is to show you who should render the action in different situations and why.
DEFINITION
Point of view (POV) is a way the events of a story are conveyed to the reader. It’s the vantage point from which the narrative is passed from author to the reader.
I am the first person
When you construct a narrative through a viewpoint character using I or we, you’re using first person point of view. Every detail of your narrative must be filtered through the teller. This impacts your choice of narrator, although it might be—and most often is—your main character. If your main character cannot see, hear, touch, smell, taste, think, know, or feel it, you can’t include it. Therefore, if you want to introduce something outside the range of your main character, you have to use the words or observed actions of some other character who is in a position to see/know the events and convey the information you want the reader to have. Remember that unless they are the clairvoyant, the POV character cannot know the thoughts or unspoken feelings of another character.
DEFINITION
First person is a point of view in which an I or we serves as the narrator of a piece of fiction.
Despite the limitations of what a character can know when you use first person, it often succeeds in making the reader feel like the character’s best friend or closest confidant. In fact, the viewpoint character often confides in the reader things he or she wouldn’t tell his closest friend.
This can be a comfortable point of view because it allows the writer to get right into the character’s head. However, beginning creative writers often find first person POV challenging because you really need to completely understand your character in every conceivable way to write well from this POV. For example, you can’t use language your character wouldn’t use or describe things your character wouldn’t notice.
WATCH OUT!
The most common problem when using first person POV is that it’s difficult to resist the urge to tell the reader everything rather than show it. It also can be frustrating to be trapped in one character’s head for the length of a book. This forced closeness can breed boredom, if not contempt, which is particularly problematic if your character is a thinly disguised version of yourself.
Even if I ultimately choose another point of view, I always find it helpful to write a couple scenes in first person as an exercise to really get into my main character’s head. In fact, many authors suggest it’s helpful to write your first chapter from several points of view before you settle on the POV that’s most comfortable for you as a writer and also most effective for the narrative you’re working on.
Here are some things to keep in mind to maintain the POV character’s voice throughout:
Consistency The voice of the narration should be consistent with the character’s cultural, social, educational, and regional background.
Voice The voice itself is important as well. There’s a fine line between unique and annoying—not to mention the current obsession with political correctness. How easy, for instance, would it be to read an entire novel written in heavy dialect valley girl or hipster-speak?
Language Word choice can reveal a lot about a character, so if you have a professional wrestler in your narrative, be sure he or she employs the buzzwords of that sport.
Character Character is developed not only through dialogue, but also through narration. You need to be careful that the reactions and personality of the viewpoint character don’t disappear or lose consistency during emotional moments in the story. The character needs to be involved—to react to events physically and verbally—not just describe the reactions of others. The professional wrestler, for example, is going to have feelings and opinions about other wrestlers. What are they?
So why would anyone choose first person point of view? Most notably, because it generates an intimate perspective. The reader’s vicarious experience is heightened by the tightly focused perspective created when everything is being filtered through the viewpoint character. This is particularly attractive to young readers who can easily see themselves in the story. It also can open some interesting plot possibilities because the narrow viewpoint can hint that things aren’t what they seem, allowing for narrative twists later on. Finally, first person POV can be a lot of fun to write because the author gets to “live” the story through another set of eyes. By the end, you feel as though you’ve come to know another person intimately, even though that person is only a character you’ve invented.