POINT OF VIEW: First Person vs Third Person

A popular original post from 2007

By Heather Moore
(Originally published April 26, 2007... but POV continues to be a struggle for many new writers)

If you just said, "Huh?" this blog is for you.

When we read a book, we don’t always pay attention to the point of view. Instead, we enjoy the story. But when you write a book, point of view becomes an integral method of telling the story through the character.

FIRST PERSON
First person point of view is almost always used in YA novels. Over the past several years, it has become increasingly popular in adult fiction, especially the suspense genre.

In Orson Scott Card’s book, Characters and Viewpoint, he says: “When you use a first-person narrator, you are almost required to tell the story in someone else’s voice—the voice of the character telling the tale.” (143)

1st person/present tense—Good Grief by Lolly Winston

On Halloween, angels and ghosts and pirates flock to my doorstep. A tiny pumpkin hoists her leg over the threshold and clings to my calf like a koala bear.
“No Jenny,” the baby’s mom says, and laughs. “We don’t live here.”
This is a busy year for trick-or-treaters. It’s only seven and I’m already running low on candy, since I never made it back to Safeway to load up. (p.34)

1st person/ past tense—Life of Pi by Yann Martel

My fellow castaway came into view. He raised himself onto the gunnel and looked my way. The sudden appearance of a tiger is arresting in any environment, but it was all the more so here. The weird contrast between the bright, striped, living orange of his coat and the inert white of the boat’s hull was incredibly compelling. My overwrought senses screeched to a halt. (p.160)

THIRD PERSON
Third person point of view is by far the most common and reaches across all genres and age groups. Third person has two methods: limited narrative and omniscient narrative.

Orson Scott Card says a reader is “led through the story by one character, seeing only what that character sees; aware of what that character thinks and wants and remembers, but unable to do more than guess at any other character’s inner life.” (155)

You can also change viewpoints with limited narrative, as long as you have a clear division like a scene break or new chapter.

3rd Person—Limited Narrative: At the Journey’s End by Annette Lyon (all in different scenes)

Maddie’s POV:
A rifle shot split the air with a crack.
The sound halted Maddie in her step, and she looked around for the source. Maybe Peter or James had bagged some game for dinner—a wild rabbit, perhaps. It would taste good after eating dried fruit and jerky for nearly two weeks. But something told her that wasn’t right. (1)

Clara’s POV:
Another coughing fit gripped Clara Franklin, one so intense she didn’t even reach for her handkerchief on the end table. Her frail body curled up against the pain piercing her chest with each cough. As the spell ended, she found her hands clenching the bedclothes like claws. She had to consciously release each finger and make her breath even out. (35)

Abe’s POV:
Taking his hat off, Abe entered the building and wiped his sleeve across his brow. He was tired of the heat. First Utah’s, now California’s. He knew he might as well get used to it, at least until he reached Snowflake. (55)

OMNISCIENT NARRATIVE:The narrator can see into more than one character’s mind, switching back and forth at will. (Card, 156)

3rd person—Omniscient: Skipping Christmas by John Grisham (all in the same scene, 77-79)

Nora's POV:
“I already have calendars for next year.” That was news to Nora, who was biting a fingernail and holding her breath.

Luther's POV:
Luther caught himself for a second and allowed his anger to settle in. As if buying a calendar was the only measure of his pride in the local police force.

Treen's POV:
Since Treen could think of no intelligent retort, he grew hot too and decided he would get Krank’s license plate number and lie in ambush somewhere . . .

And finally . . .
Before you start writing your novel, decide on which point of view you’ll use. Do you want the readers to see the entire book through just one character’s eyes? Then try 1st person. Are you writing a romance and want the POV of the heroine and the hero? Try 3rd person narrative. Just be sure that you don’t POV hop when writing either 1st person or in 3rd person narrative. When in 3rd person narrative, you can switch POV when there is a scene or chapter break.

Close vs. Distant POV

A popular post from March 2010. 

by Annette Lyon

It's come to my attention that in all our posts about point of view, that we've never covered the concept of close third person versus distant third person.

Time to remedy the oversight!

Most contemporary fiction written in third person (he said this; she did that) is written in a pretty close point of view. It's probably what you're used to reading. For that matter, if you look at the Writing on the Wall archives, close third and first person are the two points of view that generally apply.

But what is close third?

To start defining the term, let's first describe distant third person.

Distant Third Person

Point of view, of course, is the lens through which the writer (or the narrator voice) tells the story. For a moment, think of that lens as a movie camera standing back from the action but hanging in the air over a character's head.

The camera captures what the POV character sees, and perhaps what the POV character hears. However, for the most part, the narrative is separate and apart from the character and what he or she is feeling or experiencing. It's objective, not making interpretations.

The camera can certainly show an amazing fight sequence. We won't be privy to the POV character's thoughts, feelings, and so forth about it, but we'll see a great movie in our heads.

It's almost like a journalist reporting the events in vivid detail, sitting perched on that camera.

The camera can get more distant, pulling back to the point that we can't even tell much about the POV character at all, or it can get a bit closer, perhaps letting us in on gestures and other behaviors.

But there's always a barrier; the reader stays outside the POV character's head.

Close Third Person

Just as with distant third, close third has degrees of closeness. A very close (or tight) third person POV will be so entrenched in the POV character's head that the reader knows their every thought, feeling, smell, taste, sound, touch, reaction, facial expression, motivation, and more.

A slightly less tight POV will show emotions and senses, but might not get so tightly ingrained in the character's psyche. Again, it's a matter of degrees. Just how close are you to the character, emotionally, psychologically, and otherwise?

In a sense, all variations of third person are about degrees of closeness, and the same book could have varying degrees.

For example, an opening paragraph of a chapter could be very distant as the reader is introduced to a location, say a snowy mountain scape. Then the "camera" pans closer to the POV character huddled a cave trying to stay warm. The closer we get, the more we know about what that character is thinking, feeling, doing, planning.

Some people argue that if you're going for an extremely tight third person, then you might as well be writing in first person, since that POV is just as tight, if not tighter. (If the character is telling the story, you're totally in their head, right?)

The problem with that argument is that a story in first person has limitations of its own, among them this biggie: your first person POV character must be present in every single scene, and you can never, ever, show anything from anyone else's POV.

That said, first person is a popular POV, and many fantastic books have been written in it. Just be certain it's the right one for your story before you commit to it. (Rewriting a book with a new POV is as big a task as writing an entirely new book. Trust me on this one; been there, done that.)

Ask yourself whether your book would be stronger if you could show a scene from another POV, such as the antagonist's, a parent's, or a friend's.

If so, opt for a tight third instead of first. That way, you get most of the benefits of first person (you're right in their head) without the restrictions.

Another caveat:

Don't cheat with first person. Readers will be seriously annoyed if something the POV character knows isn't revealed to them as well. After all, they're in the POV character's head, so they should know everything that character does.

Some rules of thumb with point of view:

• Don't have too many POV characters per book. A common number is between two and five. Some genres lean toward fewer POVs (such as romance), while others can handle more (such as epic fantasy). Know your genre and its expectations. Avoid too many if you can, simply because keeping track of them and readjusting to a new POV can be taxing on the reader.
• Maintain ONE point of view per scene. Don't be tightly in Jane's head and then flip to a John's head (tight or otherwise) mid-scene. That's disorienting and unnerving to the reader, who is trying to keep track of who is thinking and feeling what, and exactly which lens to interpret the story through.
• Separate point of view shifts with scene shifts (and visual markers like asterisks) and/or chapter breaks.

When Present Tense Works

A popular post from March 2010.

by Annette Lyon

Some time ago, I ranted about many aspiring writers I'd recently come across who insisted on using first person, present tense in their work. More specifically, I ranted about how it's not that great of an idea to do unless:

A) you know how to handle all the other aspects of writing a good story

AND

B) you know why you're using present tense instead of regular past. (Why and how will present tense make the story stronger?)

Since I recently came across a great book that uses first person present, I'm thinking it's time to revisit the topic and show why it worked in that book.

The Chosen One by Carol Lynch Williams is a young adult novel about thirteen-year-old Kyra, who lives in a polygamist compound and is promised to her 60-year-old uncle as his seventh wife. It's a complex, rich story, and it's told with Kyra's voice in present tense, as if it's happening right now.

One thing that present tense has going for in this book is that it provides a solid way to flash back to intense, important moments from the past.

When the rest of the story is happening NOW, we get a clear cue as to when we're in a flashback by the simple use of past tense. One moment Kyra IS DOING THIS, and the next, we're remembers that SUCH AND SUCH HAPPENED.

There's no need to transition with past perfect (I had gone, he had said) to alert the reader that we're going into or out of a flashback.

In many of the cases I ranted about, the beginning writers were relying on flashbacks in a bad way; it was often a clue that they were either starting in the wrong place or including information the reader didn't really need.

In the case of The Chosen One, we need all that information. And starting earlier and showing those scenes in real time would have weakened the impact of those scenes, because they're shown in an important sequence and as Kyra herself is reflecting on them and how they impact her next moves and decisions.

Big caveat here: Flashbacks are much like present tense: HANDLE WITH CARE.

Sloppy writers rely on lots of flashbacks to explain back story and provide exposition. If you're flashing back too often (or even in the first chapter), stand back to see if you're starting in the wrong place or whether that back story is really necessary to the whole. You might be able to cut it altogether.

As my previous rant (ahem . . post) warned, be careful about maintaining your tenses. Since we're all most familiar with regular past tense, it's all to easy to slide into past tense when you don't mean it to be a flashback. It's equally easy to revert to present tense in what should be a past-tense flashback. You'll need eagle eyes during revision to make sure you're consistent.

First-person present can be done well, and The Chosen One is a great example of that. (Another is Good Grief, by Lolli Winston.) But don't choose it willy-nilly.

Know why it will strengthen your story (or will it?) and how to do it well. If you're still trying to learn the basics of writing (dialogue, characterization, plotting, and so much more), stick with past tense for now.

It was plenty good for just about all the old greats in the literary cannon; it's good enough for you, too.

Ghostwriting--Interview with Lu Ann Staheli

by Heather Moore

One of our senior editors, Lu Ann Staheli, has been working for the past several months on ghostwriting a book. I thought it would be interesting to learn more about this process. Many books are ghostwritten—especially those you see with "celebrity authors". Some ghostwriters are acknowledged inside the pages (i.e. Glenn Beck’s book The Christmas Sweater had two ghostwriters). Others are acknowledged on the cover such as When Hearts Conjoin, by Erin Herrin with Lu Ann Staheli. Today, Lu Ann has joined us to share her journey of writing the story of Herrin family and their conjoined twins who were successfully separated.

1. From a ghostwriter’s standpoint, how do you begin a project like this? Of course, because I live in Utah where the Herrins twins were born, I had heard some of their story on the local news so I was at least familiar with who they were and some of what the girls had gone through in their short lives. When I first heard they were doing a book I thought, “Wow! What a great project. I wish that I could have written it.” As things worked out, the universe must have read my mind because last August I found myself in that very position. I was given a book outline, and few sample chapter pages, but I was told that Erin, the girls’ mother, didn’t feel the tone of what had been written was right. She wanted a more personal story instead of sounding like a magazine article. So I set to work, drafting a single chapter to get a feel for the project, choosing to write the book more like one might write a novel, using a first person narrative voice, and that voice had to be Erin’s. I hadn’t met Erin yet when I wrote that first chapter, but we sent it off to her, she loved it, and we were on our way. I met with her in October just to chat. It was a good experience because I was able to hear her true voice, begin to understand a little more about her, and to see first-hand her interaction and relationship with the girls, their sister Courtney, and her husband, Jake. The boys were not at home the day I visited. After that meeting, the real work began.

2. When creating the chapters and the flow of the book, how did you decide what information to use and what not to use? We didn’t want this book to turn into a medical procedural, yet we knew we had to maintain the story’s reason to be told. Erin wanted to insure that nothing in the book would ever delve too deeply into the girls’ privacy, so I had to weigh the information I discovered against making sure we had an accurate portrail of events, yet keeping the book more about the emotion instead of the medicine. Since we wanted to stay in Erin’s point of view, it was important to only share what she experienced, felt, and understood. There were many times I just tried to put myself in her place as I worked on the draft and let my own emotions and questions surface. The interesting thing was when I sent her the drafts she would often reply, “That’s exactly how I felt!”

3. The mother of the conjoined twins, Erin Herrin, is listed as a co-author. How did the writing relationship work between the both of you? After I met with Erin, I came home and started a draft of the book in earnest. A flurry of emails went back and forth between the two of us, details were added, I did online research to support what I was writing, Erin corrected things I hadn’t gotten quite right, sent me tidbits she had remembered, and answered my million questions, until at last we had it right. Sometimes she and I were online at the same time, so answers came quickly. Other times, I had to just write through a section and wait for her response. That meant I had to do rewrites a little more often on those sections, but as a writer, I think we all understand the need to just get words on the page and worry about revision and researching later.

4. What type of research did you find yourself doing to flesh out details? I did a lot of reading about conjoined twins in general, but mostly about Kendra and Maliyah. You’d be amazed at how much is really out there about these two little girls. Jake runs a website for them as well, and I watched several video clips of news reports about their surgery. I found online articles about the girls that even Erin didn’t know were available. I also had to learn about medical procedures and equipment. My husband is an LPN, so I asked him a lot of questions and he was able to explain things to me pretty well. Since I’ve never given birth to a child, I relied on my friends to tell me details about pregnancy, ultrasounds, labor, and nursing. Sometimes I think I heard more than I ever wanted to know.

5. When ghostwriting, what are some of the challenges you faced? And what aspects were easier than you thought? Originally I wanted to tell the story completely in chronological order, but I realized that the hook of this story was the girls, and although the family history played a key role, we needed to start with a dramatic moment, so I had to take their life story and organize it into a plot, just like I would for a novel or screenplay, a process I was already familiar with. I reviewed the chapter outline they had given me, and decided where the real story was found, to insure this didn’t become just a travelogue of events. I worried that Erin wouldn’t agree with me at first, but as the story started to come together and she could review the pages, she relaxed and felt good about where the book was headed. Probably the most difficult thing about this book was that Erin had tried so hard to shut out all the fears and bad memories from the past that she had almost blocked out some of the very details we needed to make this story alive enough to touch the hearts of the readers. Sometimes getting the chronological order just right, or remembering which doctor played what role, or sorting through details was confusing, but we hope anyone who finds an error will forgive us, knowing that revisiting this time in her life and the lives of the girls was not always an easy thing for Erin to do.

6. What types of agreements or contracts were made between you, as the writer, and the Herrin family, as the story source? I was originally approached to do this book as a straight ghost-writer, which means I wouldn’t have had my name on it at all. However, as the book progressed, and as Erin and I got to know each other via email and our in-person meeting, we both came to realize how important it was to work as equals on this project. She couldn’t do the book without me, and I couldn’t write her story without her. Erin’s original contract was with Richard Paul Evans as the publisher, and it’s through his company that all of us are being paid, so we came to an agreement that Erin and I would share the writing credits. The girls have their own share of royalties for their trust fund, so everyone wins. Erin and I have also talked about working together on a screenplay for a movie-of-the week based on the book, so that may come about in the future as well.

7. Most writers don’t have a hard time to write their own books, let alone one for someone else. How did you manage this project with your own personal projects? People often ask me how I manage to do all that I do at any given time. I don’t know. I’m a workaholic? I am always busy on something, and I have a husband who doesn’t mind cleaning house, cooking meals, shopping, and running kids around from this thing to that. (Well, let’s say he doesn’t always mind.) Because I’m an English teacher, there are times when my students are reading or writing that I can too. I don’t watch much television, and I’m usually in my home office for at least a few hours each day. I’ve gotten good at writing fast and using little pieces of time to reach my goals, although sometimes a favorite project gets set aside for something with a more immediate return. As a newspaper columnist, I learned how to write a 500 word piece from scratch to final draft form in under an hour. I’m also great at working on multiple projects at the same time, a talent that certainly came in handy as I wrote When Hearts Conjoin at the same time that I finished the screenplay for Seasons of Salvation.

Thanks, Lu Ann for sharing your ghostwriting journey with us!

Note: When Hearts Conjoin will be out May 2009.

The I's have it

By Julie Wright

I actually have real writing instruction today rather than my usual, "You can do it!" posts that I usually do.

Something horrible when you write in first person--you end up with a disproportionate amount of I's.

• I wonder if he thought he was clever.
• I saw him plunge the dagger into her heart.
• I wished he'd just shut up!
• I wondered whether or not I'd have the guts to fire him face to face . . . maybe I should just send an email . . .
• I couldn't help but laugh when she tripped on her strappy heels.
• I knew I'd end up walking home. He always left me stranded.

In third person, you can mix words around a bit--interchanging the character's name for words like "his" and "he." This allows you to shake it up and keep the reader from going blind by staring at the letter "I" ten times in three sentences. But in first person, you're stuck.

I am part of an online writer's group (several writer's groups actually) where the question was posed, "How do I get rid of all those I's?"

Well . . . you could have the protagonist always referring to him or herself in third person, but that's kinda creepy. Or you could create long and convoluted sentences skirting around the dreaded word. Or you could simplify.

In the world of Julie Wright, where all things are chaos, she simplifies where she can (I told you it was creepy).

I write mainly YA and middle grade. Such writing leans towards the usage of first person. This is because the youth are self absorbed! Just kidding. It's more likely because youth have an easier time reading when they can become the main character. The emotions are sharper, the victory more sweet, the pain more agonizing. And kids, who live in a world of constant shift and discovery, don't mind spending time in other people's shoes. Adults may sometimes find the experiences of another person uncomfortable.

Because my books are mostly first person, I've had to train myself to look for the "I's" when editing. First draft is a free for all--filled with: "was", "I", "that", "were", and all those other dead words that drag a manuscript down to the unpublished hot place.

Here are some quick solutions to a few of those "I" sores.

• I wonder if he thought he was clever. (Did he think he was clever?)
• I saw him plunge the dagger into her heart (He plunged the dagger into her heart.)
• I wished he'd just shut up! (Couldn't that man just shut up?)
• I wondered whether or not I'd have the guts to fire him face to face . . . maybe I should just send an email . . . (Sending him an email seemed a less confrontational way to fire him. He'd probably appreciate me saving him from the embarrassment of a face to face meeting.)
• I couldn't help but laugh when she tripped on her strappy heels. (Laughter erupted from my mouth when she tripped on her strappy heels)
• I knew I'd end up walking home. He always left me stranded. (Of course I ended up walking home. He always left me stranded.)

In most of these sentences, by yanking out the "I", the sentence ends up cleaner, and more immediate. This is a good thing.

Multi-Person Narrative

By Julie Wright

No, we are not talking about schizophrenia (even if most of us have this ailment).

Melissa C has asked a question on narrative and POV (Point of View).

She is writing the manuscript in first person, but has a point of view that needs to be in the story that is from a differing point of view than that of our protagonist. The question is:

That second storyline is vital to the story, in my opinion but I don't know
what tense to write it in. Do I use third person or what? OR should you even
have a second storyline going in if the book is in 1st?

The answer is you can use a multi-person narrative mode in order to make your second storyline come through. You can do it one of two ways (there are other ways, but these two are the most common as well as the easiest to keep clear for the reader).

• First person POV with main character/storyline, and first person POV with secondary character storyline.
• First person POV with main character/storyline, and third person POV with secondary character storyline.

As Heather mentioned in the comment section of the previous blog, the absolute most important thing when you're switching point of view is to make sure the reader knows within the very first sentence that we've switched. You need to change scenes or chapters so the reader knows we're starting somewhere new. There are several successful authors who use multi-person narrative.

It is natural to move into first person narrative when we're story-telling. It keeps us closer to the character and makes us feel like we know exactly what's going on. The problem comes when you need the reader to know things the character doesn't know. At that point we end up contriving stupid scenes that could never happen in anyone's reality in order to put the character in the right place to overhear/see/be-in-on whatever we need them to know.

Having another point of view helps us as writers to avoid the absurd contrivance of maneuvering our characters into places they wouldn't logically or believably be. Even when real life seems contrived. Your manuscript cannot.

So if you need to add another point of view in order to carry along your secondary plot line, go ahead.

One last tidbit of advice: if you're secondary plot line is told by the antagonist or bad guy, you will likely want to do that POV in third person (even if your main storyline is told in first and you want to keep things all equal). The reason for this is that it is very hard for many readers to be too closely in the mind of the bad guy. It's causes a repulsive reflex that is hard to overcome.

Clear as mud?

:)