Point of View in Stories

[Whispersecret]

Hey, friends. After many months of enjoying the stories at this site, I decided to try my own hand at it. I submitted my first story, "Hostile Takeover" almost a month ago and am anxiously waiting for it to be posted.

What I want to know is if people have a definite preference for point of view. All the stories I've read so far are all written from one POV. When I wrote my story, I switched from one to the other. It's exciting to me to get into both of the characters' heads so I can experience it more fully. But since my purpose is to entertain others, it's important to me to know if the changes between points of view disturbed you as readers or jarred you in any way while you read. Men especially, did it bother you to "experience" the story through Fiona's point of view? I appreciate the feedback.

 

[Wordmage]

Still haven't seen Hostile Takeover, but the title is intriguing!

Most writer's tend to prefer "authorial voice," meaning they can dig into everyone's thoughts and feelings. It's not only easier, but is less likely to jar the reader out of the world you've created.
If you're switching back and forth on POV, it doesn't bother me; what bugs me is when one character suddenly knows something they shouldn't.
"When I touched her breast she wilted inside."
How would *I* know? I might suspect it, or I might assume from reactions, but I (meaning the character) can't *know.*
I look forward to reading Hostile Takeover.

 

[Whispersecret]

To be fair to Laurel, I've told her to hold off on posting my story. I am a chronic re-writer, and I've been making changes here and there on all three parts. (There could be as many as eight by the time I'm done.) So it will be a while before you DO see it, Wordmage.

Yes, characters that have ESP bother me too. Also, when it's written in first person and I can't tell the sex of the narrator until they happen to mention one of their own body parts.

Thanks for the input. I appreciate it!

 

[sweetnpetite]

.

 

[BlackShanglan]

You know, I have to argue with the posts to this thread so far, and even (sorry SNP) query the value of resurrecting it. Yes, point of view is a crucial element of storytelling - but to suggest that there is a "right" POV for general usage is extremely unhelpful. POV is, or should be, intimately related to the nature of the story and the needs of the text. In the best works, it's as essential as the action or the language to the telling of the tale. Who would try to rewrite Huckleberry Finn from the third person perspective, or seek to rob Jane Austen of that brilliant and charming voiced omniscience?

If there is to be useful debate on POV, in my opinion it must be about the range of possibilities and the advantages and limitations of each. It can't be about "what's the best POV" any more than we could have a meaningful debate on the topic of "what's the best sort of character" or "what's the best thing to use for your first visual image?"

(Not that I'm at all opinionated on the topic ...)

Shanglan

 

[sweetnpetite]

You know, I have to argue with the posts to this thread so far, and even (sorry SNP) query the value of resurrecting it. Yes, point of view is a crucial element of storytelling - but to suggest that there is a "right" POV for general usage is extremely unhelpful. POV is, or should be, intimately related to the nature of the story and the needs of the text. In the best works, it's as essential as the action or the language to the telling of the tale. Who would try to rewrite Huckleberry Finn from the third person perspective, or seek to rob Jane Austen of that brilliant and charming voiced omniscience?

If there is to be useful debate on POV, in my opinion it must be about the range of possibilities and the advantages and limitations of each. It can't be about "what's the best POV" any more than we could have a meaningful debate on the topic of "what's the best sort of character" or "what's the best thing to use for your first visual image?"

(Not that I'm at all opinionated on the topic ...)

Shanglan

Thank you Shanglan.

I didn't mean to suggest that this was the 'right' answer, just that it was a good thing to talk about.

I loved your answer. Any other oppinons?

 

[Octavian]

This is something that has been occupying my thoughts this past few days.

I am writing another story and I wanted to do it in the third person, simply because my first two stories are written in the first person and I wanted the new one to be different.
But I find it difficult to convey the thoughts of the characters without a lot of he thought she thought etc

On balance I prefer to write in the first person. I have to sacrifice the knowledge of what the other characters are thinking but it allows me to better explore the innermost feelings of the narrator.

Octavian

Thread killer extraordinaire

 

[Guest]

 

[Guest]

Hey, friends.

Family business, my arse!
You self-righteous religious nut.

 

[matriarch]

<snip>.

Oh, pooh...the horsie said it better!

*snicker*.......Lilred called you a 'horsie', Shang.......

*coughing gently, recomposing myself*.
My apologies, people. Back to the thread. Hijack over.

 

[NoJo]

You know, I have to argue with the posts to this thread so far, and even (sorry SNP) query the value of resurrecting it. Yes, point of view is a crucial element of storytelling - but to suggest that there is a "right" POV for general usage is extremely unhelpful. POV is, or should be, intimately related to the nature of the story and the needs of the text. In the best works, it's as essential as the action or the language to the telling of the tale. Who would try to rewrite Huckleberry Finn from the third person perspective, or seek to rob Jane Austen of that brilliant and charming voiced omniscience?

If there is to be useful debate on POV, in my opinion it must be about the range of possibilities and the advantages and limitations of each. It can't be about "what's the best POV" any more than we could have a meaningful debate on the topic of "what's the best sort of character" or "what's the best thing to use for your first visual image?"

(Not that I'm at all opinionated on the topic ...)

Shanglan

Shanglan,

This thread was WhisperSecret when she was a newbie. She bacme one of the best and most incisive feedbackers around by the time I started posting here a couple of years later.

There were some very good threads regarding POV, discussing "omniscience" and other arcana. In one thread I challanged authors to write a story in the future tense. Some great attempts. I might try to dig one up.

 

[Guest]

Hijack over.

The cops missed my anti-tank nuclear long-range torpeedo super sonic air-to-air combat missile under my bed.

 

[NoJo]

Hey Chilled, I remember when you first started posting here. Then you became weird and antisocial. Maybe you should read some of your old posts.

 

[BlackShanglan]

*snicker*.......Lilred called you a 'horsie', Shang.......

*coughing gently, recomposing myself*.
My apologies, people. Back to the thread. Hijack over.

*nuzzles Mat*

Want to see how true it is?

Shanglan

 

[BlackShanglan]

There were some very good threads regarding POV, discussing "omniscience" and other arcana. In one thread I challanged authors to write a story in the future tense. Some great attempts. I might try to dig one up.

I would quite like to see those. I didn't intend any denigration of WhisperSecret - just didn't think that that thread seemed all that worthy of resurrection.

Shanglan

 

[Colleen Thomas]

POV can make or break a great story idea. I don't think there is a right or wrong, but I do have strong preference. I've never been able to finish one where the pov of the reader is that of participant, i.e. the you did this or you do that. I cannot write convincing first person, but enjoy reading a first person story if it's done well.

My own preference is an omniscinet narrator. But that POV has it's own pitfalls. The best advice I know is to write what you want, from the pov you feel, and I don't think you can go to wrong, since it's your story to begin with.

 

[BlackShanglan]

I agree that of all of the options, second person ("you see" / "you do") is the hardest to make work well. I think that there's a reason why, when one examines the great works of literature that have stood the fire and made it through to the canon, one hardly ever sees this in use. I can't think of an example - not to say that there are none, or that it's impossible to write well in it, but that it presents specific challenges. It's particularly hard to suspend disbelief when one is asked to buy in to what one is doing oneself.

First person can be a great deal of fun. I love the intense characterization that one gets through it, and it's also excellent for stories in which the reader's access to information must be controlled. For example, all of the suspense and interest would go right out of a Sherlock Holmes story if it was written from Holmes's POV, or from a third-person omniscient. By seeing the epidoes from Watson's first person POV, we get a limited, teasing flow of information that lets us conjecture and ponder without being privy to the internal workings of the Great Mind. Thus, when he presents his solution, we have (ideally) that "Ah ha!" moment of having seen all of the pieces, but not the ordering intelligence putting them together. Similarly, in the cinematic world, a move like "The Usual Suspects" or "The Sixth Sense" only works because we only see the story through the lens of a single, poorly informed character. First person lets you do a great deal with surprise and concealment, and so I found myself turning to it in stories like "Letters from the Hesperus" or "The Private Diary of Alexander Pope" because I felt it would spoil the story, or at least make it a very different story, for the reader to have all of the information from the start. You can limit information in the third person - I think that came off reasonably well in "Meer Kass" - but it's a great deal harder, because you have to work with expressing a character's perspective while realistically leaving out information that the character has.

Third person is, of course, wonderful for letting every side of the story be told. It can also help establish tension in the text - always a goal in my opinion - but of a different sort. Instead of the text knowing something the reader doesn't, the reader comes to know something the text doesn't - or rather, something that individual characters in the text don't know. That tension can be interesting when characters interact; the reader feel the tension from knowing what's going on in one character's mind while another character is oblivious. That lets the author establish good dynamics - the sorts of scenes where a terrible misunderstanding really wrings the reader's heart, or where, in the cinema world, you're screaming "No! Don't trust her!" at the movie screen.

There is also, of course, the issue of character development - do you go for seeing a very intense picture of one character, as with first person or limited third, or do you go broader and wider, as with third total omniscient? But I think it's important to also address that idea of dramatic tension. I feel that it's an overlooked aspect of POV that bears examination.

Shanglan