Creative writing - Mike Sanders 2014
We are the third person
Influential point of view
Speech, voice, and point of view
Chandler went to the shops and bought the most expensive champagne he could find. He used his ex-wife’s credit card.
When using third person point of view, you’re writing about someone, yet there are a variety of subtleties to doing so. The following distinctions help you recognize and employ the nuances of writing that call for its specialized pronouns.
DEFINITION
Third person is a point of view in which the narrator relates all action using pronouns such as he or she.
Third person subjective, limited
A limited third person viewpoint means the reader sees the events through just a single character’s perspective rather than all the characters’. It’s written in the third person—he, she—but the reader only views proceedings through one pair of eyes. This means the reader only knows what that particular character knows. Any information hidden from that character is also be hidden from the reader and must be revealed through plot and/or dialogue.
Third person objective
Third person objective—also called third person dramatic—is a style of writing in which the narrator does not reveal the thoughts, feelings, and emotions of the characters. Instead, the author objectively relates the events without offering opinions or emotional reactions.
This style of writing is often used for newspaper articles or scientific journals. The aim is to present the facts and allow the reader to make up his or her own mind. This version of third person is not very often used in fiction.
Third person omniscient
Also known as “universal omniscient,” this point of view is that of a narrator who takes no part in the story but knows all the facts and all characters’ innermost thoughts and feelings. It is a general overview, good for sweeping sagas such as J. R. R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings. The narrator can move inside different characters’ minds at will, relating thoughts and feelings of all them. (Note this is different from third person subjective, which has to stay with just the main character.)
The omniscience of this point of view allows the reader to know everything about every character and event in the story. It is by far the most popular form of writing in modern fiction.
Third person descriptive
One of the main advantages to the third person point of view is the scope for description. Unlimited to person, place, or time, an omniscient narrator can describe events to which there are no characters as witness. It can fill in details of which characters are unaware, allowing the reader to know things about characters they don’t know themselves. This serves to increase drama and tension in writing; readers want to know what will happen when characters discover things about themselves or other characters.
Description can include analogies the characters themselves would never use, rich, atmospheric metaphors to heighten drama or make a reader fall in love with a place, person, or time.
When the storyteller is not inside a character’s head, he or she can see more and hear more and, therefore, relate more to the reader. This can cause readers to feel they’re a little distant from their characters. To remedy this, you must balance this with a proportionate amount of time directly inside characters’ lives and thoughts.