Do Your Characters Talk To Your Readers?

[Five_Inch_Heels]

In some older TV shows the narrator will almost talk to the viewers while telling the story between character dialog. The Wonder Years and How I met Your Mother are examples.


I'm not sure if that's what they call breaking the fourth wall or not, but it's how I've been trying to do it.


From one not published yet:

My wife chimed in, “Take care of her girls, we’ll see you later.” and we waved them off.​

​

“Do you think she knows?” her mother asked me.​

​

“I don’t know. We just have to let things ride for a while.”​

​

Yes, there was a secret we weren’t sure we wanted her to know.​

From My Sister, My Tutor:

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“Somehow we just clicked like old college room mates and from what she told me, you were doing some of the same things guys were doing with me. She told me she felt you were into her for your own reasons and not really paying attention to her wants and needs.”​

​

Now this kind of sucked, because I thought I’d gone all out for her.​

Also:

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"She turned around slowly and let me look at her from all angles for close to a half an hour without saying anything else.​

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“OK, that’s enough for now. Go to bed and we’ll continue in the morning.”​

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She gathered her clothes and headed to her room.​

​

Sleep? Is she nuts? How the hell was I going to sleep? Somehow I did though and the next thing I knew was the smell of coffee brewing and cinnamon rolls baking. It had to be a dream. A very weird dream. It didn’t happen. My older sister did not strip and tell me to study her naked body.​

​

 

[StillStunned]

Ben's Big Mistake: "My name's Ben, and I'm about to make a mistake."

 

[SimonDoom]

I don't see any of these as examples of breaking the fourth wall or speaking directly to the reader. These are just fairly standard examples of revealing the narrator's thoughts via first person POV narration.

In film and TV, voice-over narration is not the same as breaking the fourth wall. A good example of breaking the fourth wall is a scene in Ferris Bueller's Day Off where Ferris stops what he is doing and talks directly to the camera. At the very beginning of the movie he turns to the camera to address the audience to explain his plan to play hooky, and he does it at the end as well, after the credits, telling the audience to go home. That's breaking the fourth wall.

In a book, it happens when the narrator doesn't just narrate his thoughts but directly addresses the reader, such as with a form of address like, "Dear Reader" or "you."

 

[baffling8929]

I usually use a parenthetical for this type of thing. I think it's fun to sprinkle in here and there when you're writing first person. It can add a bit of sass or round out the narrator-character's personality, but it's also easy to overuse it.

Depending on the length of the piece/chapter, I usually shoot for 1 to 3 of them.

 

[madelinemasoch]

In some older TV shows the narrator will almost talk to the viewers while telling the story between character dialog. The Wonder Years and How I met Your Mother are examples.


I'm not sure if that's what they call breaking the fourth wall or not, but it's how I've been trying to do it.


From one not published yet:

My wife chimed in, “Take care of her girls, we’ll see you later.” and we waved them off.​

​

“Do you think she knows?” her mother asked me.​

​

“I don’t know. We just have to let things ride for a while.”​

​

Yes, there was a secret we weren’t sure we wanted her to know.​

I just want to point out that you do not need that last line at all. It’s obvious from the dialogue lines above it. You don’t have to straight up tell the reader anything you show to them in dialogue.

 

[SimonDoom]

I just want to point out that you do not need that last line at all. It’s obvious from the dialogue lines above it. You don’t have to straight up tell the reader anything you show to them in dialogue.

This is a great point. Don't let narrative step on or duplicate dialogue. Good dialogue doesn't need that.

 

[Mastered_again]

I write mostly in 1st person and speaking to the reader to reveal inner thoughts.
I try to do as Simon says and not repeat dialog

 

[StillStunned]

In "Flesh for Fantasy" I have this line, during the build-up:

Don't worry, I'm about to get to the good bit.

If there is in fact a fourth wall when you're writing in 1P, this clearly breaks it. Of course you can always kick down the fourth wall and get right up in your reader's face.

 

[jehoram]

In "Flesh for Fantasy" I have this line, during the build-up:

If there is in fact a fourth wall when you're writing in 1P, this clearly breaks it. Of course you can always kick down the fourth wall and get right up in your reader's face.

This is a great example of writing in the second person.

As for breaking the fourth wall, it really doesn't, because the wall never exists in that example.

But, if in the course of telling the story, the narrator says "I don't know what you might make of this, but..." and then continues with the story, I think that might qualify.

 

[THBGato]

https://www.literotica.com/s/mittens-1?page=8 by FeatherWatt is the best example I've seen here of genuine breaking the fourth wall. It's funny too.

 

[TheRedChamber]

Ben's Big Mistake: "My name's Ben, and I'm about to make a mistake."

"We know Ben, we read the title. It's going to be a big one, apparently."

 

[TheRedChamber]

This is probably a good place to solicit opinions on the following, genuinely fourth wall breaking extract. Just got it back from my regular beta-reader and he hated it. It was an experiment and I probably will have to tone it down somewhat...

Title: How I Became a Lesbian Pornstar
Category: Lesbian
Description: (Undecided. I think the title pretty much covers it)

Becky is Becky.

It doesn't really matter if you approve of her being Becky or not. She doesn't care.

So when Becky pulled me aside at work and announced she was going to audition for a role in a porn film, I knew it wasn't because she wanted to me to tell her it was a good idea, or to tell her that it was a bad idea, or to reassure her that I wouldn't think any less of her whatever she did.

No, she wanted a ride.

Despite being twenty-two, Becky had long since given up on passing her test. She didn't have money for more lessons and wouldn't have had money for a car anyway. Hence, my involvement in the latest in a long line of attempts at moonlighting.

She'd done some nude modelling before... [Cut for length]

She'd tried being a stripper... [Cut for length]

If you've got this far in the story and you’re wondering why everything is about Becky, well, welcome to my life. Becky and I work in the same firm which produces beer taps. Her mum knows my mum. My crush asked her out in sixth form and she said 'no'. Becky now works in HR but senior management are always calling her round to take part in some meeting, or function hospitality event. She ‘livens the place up,’ apparently.

I work in IT support.

Becky needs a lot of IT support.

I'm a woman, by the way. Apparently it's important to establish these things early on in a piece of fiction so as not to confuse you, the dear reader. Actually, now I think about it, I suppose it's heavily implied by the title, so you probably weren't that confused. I was just worried in case you were flummoxed by the whole woman in an IT support role thing. You wouldn't be the first.

As for what I look like, I am six-foot tall, with legs that go all the way down, crystal blue eyes and full-bodied wavy blonde hair that reached past my shoulders. I have firm 44DD breasts with...nah, I'm fooling with you. That's Becky again. You were all staring at her tits while I was talking anyway. If you want a mental image of me, imagine someone with an enormous chip on their shoulder.

For the moment at least. This is a story about how I overcame some of those issues.

Becky doesn't actually ask me directly for the lift of course. She calls me up because she's having problems with the website for the buses. I come up, close a few pop-ups, and then have to explain to her that to get to the location she's selected she'll need to change four times and wait an hour and three-quarters in Milton Keynes. Her face drops and I find myself offering her the lift out of pity. She'll never be able to get there on her own.

Why do I do this? Put myself out for a three-hour drive on a Thursday evening for little to no reward. I ask myself this question a lot. It's complicated. I have complicated feelings towards Becky.

Although not actually that complicated. Again, that title up there is doing a lot of the heavy lifting. Just remember you're now well ahead of ‘story me’.

All I knew at this point is that I wasn't crazy about the idea of Becky doing porn, and somehow I wanted to be there to protect her.

 

[StillStunned]

"We know Ben, we read the title. It's going to be a big one, apparently."

The fun lies in finding out what the mistake is.

 

[SimonDoom]

I'm curious why people want to break the fourth wall in an erotic story. It works in comedy, because it's jarring and can be funny, like the scene in Annie Hall where Woody Allen's character pulls Marshall McLuhan from off screen and addresses the audience. But this quality is distancing in an erotic story, which I think usually works best by being immersive and keeping the reader in the scene as continuously as possible.

 

[TheRedChamber]

The fun lies in finding out what the mistake is.

Nah, I make enough mistakes in my own daily life, I don't need the headache of protagonist making more mistakes when I'm just trying to relax...

 

[AlinaX]

How to put a fourth wall explicitly into the story: A Lively Tale Indeed

 

[SimonDoom]

How to put a fourth wall explicitly into the story: A Lively Tale Indeed

That's a good example. I think it works because from the beginning you establish a playful, quirky tone.

 

[oneagainst]

I had the FMC address the readers directly in the opening of both The Light Between The Trees and Polly and it really changed the story: the idea of her accusing the reader of being twisted for wanting to even read the story. It explored a theme of exploitation of the female character for the purposes of making a good story, giving her a chance to bite back. I haven't really seen it done on Lit. Was a lot of fun to write.

 

[Bazzle]

Diary entry based stories are talking directly to the reader?

Not exactly 4th wall, but close enough.

 

[madelinemasoch]

I had the FMC address the readers directly in the opening of both The Light Between The Trees and Polly and it really changed the story: the idea of her accusing the reader of being twisted for wanting to even read the story. It explored a theme of exploitation of the female character for the purposes of making a good story, giving her a chance to bite back. I haven't really seen it done on Lit. Was a lot of fun to write.

It's funny how you wrote the story anyway, almost like that's part of the fun.

 

[Djmac1031]

I've done it several times, including in my latest story.

If you have found this, if you're reading it right now, I hope you're not some poor, misguided soul here by mistake. And I hope my bones have finally turned to dust. Otherwise, be mindful. If you hear something shuffling behind you, run. Although I suppose by then it's already too late.

https://www.literotica.com/s/the-devils-sting

 

[Bramblethorn]

I have a fourth-wall break in the middle of Red Scarf, because in that story I'm trying to give an authentic portrayal of two autistic characters but there's one aspect where it wasn't feasible to do that.

 

[oneagainst]

It's funny how you wrote the story anyway, almost like that's part of the fun.

It was a setup into a much larger piece of work, continuing in Critical Response - the idea of the put-upon FMC finally being able to break free of the author's clutches, out beyond the 4th wall, writing stories of her own. It led to A Place For Us All to Belong where the FMCs are free to explore the tropes and redo the endings, and get into all sorts of trouble.

It's keeping me off the streets, anyway.

 

[NoTalentHack]

From something I'm working on now:

Not exactly buying a cherry red Mustang convertible, but at least a similar impulse. Look, you have your midlife crisis how you want to have yours, and I’ll have mine the way I want to have mine.

 

[madelinemasoch]

It was a setup into a much larger piece of work, continuing in Critical Response - the idea of the put-upon FMC finally being able to break free of the author's clutches, out beyond the 4th wall, writing stories of her own. It led to A Place For Us All to Belong where the FMCs are free to explore the tropes and redo the endings, and get into all sorts of trouble.

It's keeping me off the streets, anyway.

How does that work as a writer? Because ultimately, you still wrote it.