So what is...

[Dearelliot]

Writing in 3rd person, but having an insight into just one of the characters' inner thoughts.

I

 

[Voboy]

Close third.

 

[EmilyMiller]

Close third.

Is that like fourth place?

 

[MelissaBaby]

Writing in 3rd person, but having an insight into just one of the characters' inner thoughts.

I

Usually referred to as "third person close perspective," or "limited perspective."

 

[TheLobster]

It's close or limited, like the other posters said, but only if "one of the characters" whose inner thoughts we know is the PoV character.

Otherwise it's some weird third person pseudo-partial-omniscient that I've never seen used and I don't think has a name.

 

[AllenWoody]

Writing in 3rd person, but having an insight into just one of the characters' inner thoughts.

I

I was taught to call it "Third Person Limited"

 

[Dearelliot]

thanks...

 

[Dearelliot]

So, if I tried to introduce the other characters' inner thoughts sometime later in the same story, I wonder if that would/could be confusing to the reader.
And , if it is called 'limited, or close third', what is it called if the writer includes the inner thoughts of other characters in the story.

 

[BeechLeaf]

Yes, changing would be jarring if you just moved to another person. But if sufficiently marked, it could work. If, for example, the first person's last thought was wondering what the other person was thinking, then the narrative explicitly takes this up and announces somehow that here's what the other person is thinking. That is, hand over the baton.

 

[AStrangeDesire]

@Dearelliot there was a good thread on POV just recently: https://forum.literotica.com/threads/on-writing-point-of-view.1651968/
^ that might help you.

 

[Dearelliot]

Thanks, I did read through that post, and I will take my time and go through it a few more times.

 

[Voboy]

So, if I tried to introduce the other characters' inner thoughts sometime later in the same story, I wonder if that would/could be confusing to the reader.
And , if it is called 'limited, or close third', what is it called if the writer includes the inner thoughts of other characters in the story.

I'm doing a story in close third right now. I don't enjoy it much; I'm usually more of a first person guy. But this story requires me to explain a few things my narrator can't know much about... hence, close third.

There are a few paragraphs where I leave her perspective. It's easy to do seamlessly. The key is to be detached, like the third person you are. Don't suddenly veer off into other peoples' thoughts or ideas, in other words, because yes. That would confuse and annoy me if I was your reader.

If you want to include other peoples' thoughts and inner monologue? You're not writing in close third. You're writing in omniscient third, as some call it.

 

[Britva415]

if I tried to introduce the other characters' inner thoughts sometime later in the same story, I wonder if that would/could be confusing to the reader

There is nothing about this which is inherently confusing. One can easily do it successfully, and one can also get it wrong.

Just keep it in mind while you’re writing. Make it clear. Review how it sounds/feels when you re-read your first draft and are taking notes about what to revise. Fix it if necessary, leave it if not.

And “fix it” doesn’t mean “delete it, don’t do it.” It just means “make it more clear/less confusing” if you feel that that’s a problem.

The thing about “close” or “limited” third person narration/point of view is, it isn’t all-or-nothing. “HOW close” is a valid question, a valid dial to fine-tune. You don’t even have to maintain it for the whole piece’s length. You can, but it’s not a rule. Maybe different scenes just call for different zoom levels.

Be free to do what works. Any notion that “this can’t work” is to be doubted and questioned. We’re authors: Our challenge is to make it work. Go ahead and write it, then figure out later whether it worked or not. And revise as necessary.

 

[anthrodisiac]

So, if I tried to introduce the other characters' inner thoughts sometime later in the same story, I wonder if that would/could be confusing to the reader.
And , if it is called 'limited, or close third', what is it called if the writer includes the inner thoughts of other characters in the story.

It depends. If you're in close third for one section, then you have a section break and you're in close third for a different person, that's perfectly normal and within what most people would call close third.

However, if you don't have section breaks, and you're head-hopping, that's called, well, head-hopping. It's a particular style of third-person omniscient where the reader is dipped into people's heads, and it's not limited to any one person. It's not inherently confusing, just like any writing tool isn't inherently confusing. Like @Britva415 said, it's about the execution.

And also, I completely agree with this:

Be free to do what works. Any notion that “this can’t work” is to be doubted and questioned. We’re authors: Our challenge is to make it work. Go ahead and write it, then figure out later whether it worked or not. And revise as necessary.

Solid advice in pretty much all writing contexts.

 

[StillStunned]

So, if I tried to introduce the other characters' inner thoughts sometime later in the same story, I wonder if that would/could be confusing to the reader.
And , if it is called 'limited, or close third', what is it called if the writer includes the inner thoughts of other characters in the story.

You come across this all the time in published books. For example the Eye of the World, the first book of The Wheel of Time, is initially told exclusively from Rand's POV. It's only when the party are escaping from Shadar Logoth, if I remember correctly, that other characters get POV scenes - about 300 pages into my copy.

I'd actually say that different POVs are more or less expected in close/limited 3P.

 

[Britva415]

You come across this all the time in published books. For example the Eye of the World, the first book of The Wheel of Time, is initially told exclusively from Rand's POV. It's only when the party are escaping from Shadar Logoth, if I remember correctly, that other characters get POV scenes - about 300 pages into my copy.

I'd actually say that different POVs are more or less expected in close/limited 3P.

Absolutely. It’s done all the time. We really aren’t talking about some avant-garde experimental technique which takes a savant to pull off successfully.

 

[SkyBubble]

Is that like fourth place?

Sorry, no medal.

 

[ElectricBlue]

So, if I tried to introduce the other characters' inner thoughts sometime later in the same story, I wonder if that would/could be confusing to the reader.
And , if it is called 'limited, or close third', what is it called if the writer includes the inner thoughts of other characters in the story.

It's still limited third, you just have to be clear who's head you are in at the time. I did it intuitively in this story, once the third character arrived. It's told in third person, but the pov shifts frequently, but without the usual pointers.

It's up to readers to determine whether it works or not, but the score and comments suggests it did. Nobody has complained or commented about the shifts in pov.

You're My Last Flight

 

[MrHereWriting]

Writing in 3rd person, but having an insight into just one of the characters' inner thoughts.

I

Limited is having access to one characters thoughts and you see it through their eyes.

Omniscient is having access to everyone one's thoughts and you see it through an all-knowing narrator, even if a single character is your focus in that chapter or the entire book.

"Close/Deep" is trying to make the reader feel as much like the character as possible through their thoughts (which you won't put in italics or finish with 'he thought,' you will incorporate them in the over all narrative), emotions, and your descriptions of what they are experiencing.

Basic Examples:
Limited - He was hungry.
Omniscient - He was hungry and so was everyone else.
Close/Deep - He was hungry. How long had it been since he last eaten. His stomach growled. Where's the food?

 

[WaxPhilosophic]

There's also 3rd person objective, where you get a character's POV but not their thoughts. It's like watching a film or television show. You see the action, but the character is not describing their thoughts about it. It's an interesting way to challenge yourself to show and not tell, but it can feel a little distant, particularly for erotica.

 

[HelenL]

So, if I tried to introduce the other characters' inner thoughts sometime later in the same story, I wonder if that would/could be confusing to the reader.
And , if it is called 'limited, or close third', what is it called if the writer includes the inner thoughts of other characters in the story.

If you're writing in limited third-person you can only have one PoV character, and you can only show the the thoughts of that one character. But you don't need to have a single PoV character throughout the work, only one per scene/chapter. The way to include others' thoughts is to write the story from more than one point of view. Change the point of view to the character whose thoughts you need to show. You have to be careful about this, though.

* Only change PoV character at a chapter or scene. Changing PoV mid-scene is head-flopping and defeats the point of using close third.
* Make it very clear when you change the PoV character. You can show who's thoughts you're experiencing early, or you can have a non-narrative way to identify the character, like a name in a heading. @redgarters just did the former very effectively in "A Hopeful Hart". You're never in any doubt about whose eyes you're seeing through.
* Don't introduce a PoV just to give a convenient perspective in one situation. If you have one or two points of view for 99% of the story but slot in one scene from the hotel manager's perspective because they're the only one who sees the jilted husband come by it feels cheap. Your PoV characters should all be significant players in the story.
* A rule of thumb my writing teacher told me was that you should never introduce a new PoV character after the mid-point of a novel/story. I think if you're Stephen King you can have new characters pop up whenever you need them, but for the rest of us it feels artificial to give someone that level of importance when the story is already established.

I really would recommend the @redgarters story for a great introduction to dual/multi-PoV close third.

 

[TheLobster]

Basic Examples:

Almost, but not quite.

• Objective — He was hungry. His stomach growled.
• Omniscient — He was hungry, wondering how long it was since he had last eaten and where the food was. So did everyone else.
• Limited — He was hungry. It was so long since he had last eaten, he couldn’t even remember. His stomach growled. Where’s the food? he wondered.
• Close/Deep — He was hungry. How long had it been since he’d last eaten? His stomach growled. Where was the food?

In close 3P, you interweave narration with the PoV character thoughts directly. But you can also do limited 3P where you report on most thoughts through indirect speech, with only some direct “quotes” that are clearly marked as such (I used “he wondered” as a tag, but you could skip it and instead write the direct thought in italics).

I personally prefer 3P limited because it feels much more natural than 3P close. People don’t think in complete sentences, and what we refer to as thoughts are usually mixed with emotions and sensations. It makes sense to report on this mishmash indirectly, cleaned up slightly for reader’s consumption, rather than pretending MC’s brain operates on nothing but perfect King’s English.

 

[MrHereWriting]

Almost, but not quite.

• Objective — He was hungry. His stomach growled.
• Omniscient — He was hungry, wondering how long it was since he had last eaten and where the food was. So did everyone else.
• Limited — He was hungry. It was so long since he had last eaten, he couldn’t even remember. His stomach growled. Where’s the food? he wondered.
• Close/Deep — He was hungry. How long had it been since he’d last eaten? His stomach growled. Where was the food?

In close 3P, you interweave narration with the PoV character thoughts directly. But you can also do limited 3P where you report on most thoughts through indirect speech, with only some direct “quotes” that are clearly marked as such (I used “he wondered” as a tag, but you could skip it and instead write the direct thought in italics).

I personally prefer 3P limited because it feels much more natural than 3P close. People don’t think in complete sentences, and what we refer to as thoughts are usually mixed with emotions and sensations. It makes sense to report on this mishmash indirectly, cleaned up slightly for reader’s consumption, rather than pretending MC’s brain operates on nothing but perfect King’s English.

He didn't asked about objective, he asked about using characters' thoughts.

And that's what I did with my example, interweave the thoughts with the narration when it came to close/deep. The limited example was as basic as it gets, but if you felt it needed a thought tag example, okay.

And, as I said, in close/deep, you won't put thoughts in italics or use a thought tag, which means in limited you will.

"Close/Deep" is trying to make the reader feel as much like the character as possible through their thoughts (which you won't put in italics or finish with 'he thought,' you will incorporate them in the over all narrative), emotions, and your descriptions of what they are experiencing.

 

[StillStunned]

* Don't introduce a PoV just to give a convenient perspective in one situation. If you have one or two points of view for 99% of the story but slot in one scene from the hotel manager's perspective because they're the only one who sees the jilted husband come by it feels cheap. Your PoV characters should all be significant players in the story.

More of a guideline than a rule, I'd say. It can be very effective to use a one-off POV to introduce a scene, particularly one where your main character appears for the first time. George MacDonald Fraser does this in Mr American, for example, which begins with a police officer watching passengers disembark from an ocean liner and then follows the POV of one of those passengers. I've done it a few times, for example Lights, Camera, Blood: Ch. 02 (a taxi driver's POV to establish where the story is set and who the main character is) and The Rivals Ch. 04: The Black Tomb (exposition provided by a bored guard before shifting to one of the two main POV characters).

You can also use it in a scene that involves a main character who's not a POV character. That way you can tell the scene as if the reader is there without burdening yourself with a recurring POV character. In The Dome 03: Over the Edge, for example, POV characters Xero and Ro-Gara have to rescue non-POV character Raurri. I use the POV of one of the captors to describe the situation in the moments before the actual rescue.

It's easy to overdo this, of course, but then again it's easy to overdo many things. Otherwise I find it a useful way to keep the story lively and provide the reader with information they otherwise wouldn't get.

* A rule of thumb my writing teacher told me was that you should never introduce a new PoV character after the mid-point of a novel/story. I think if you're Stephen King you can have new characters pop up whenever you need them, but for the rest of us it feels artificial to give someone that level of importance when the story is already established.

*Laughs maniacally in Robert Jordan*

 

[MrHereWriting]

More of a guideline than a rule, I'd say.

Rules? Where we're going, we don't need rules.