Struggles with keeping tense consistent

[neuroparenthetical]

Voting doesn't mean anything, especially in LW. No one in LW is 1-bombing based on content, style or least of all grammar. It is purely rooted in juvenile aspects of morals and kink shaming, so we can dismiss that argument entirely with the wave of a hand.

Exactly my point. Seems like a sad, weird, pathetic flex to bring it up, then, doesn't it? coughcoughcough.

I think what people are failing to understand is that I'm perfectly willing to concede all the "feels," comments, because I recognize that past tense is the majority choice. People grow up with it. It "feels" better to them. Granted, over and over again.

I have my own preference. It is what it is. I'm still not reading any kind of breakdown of the core objective argument: writing with a 1-tense shift is more complex than writing with a zero-tense shift. It's made even worse because the past and past-perfect in English are just a fucking nightmare of judgment calls and exceptions. When you start in the present tense, it's far clearer when you just need to hit up the past tense instead. The past perfect recedes in likely importance. Now, in my opinion, that's a very good thing for other reasons, too. In order to try to move the conversation out of the realm of opinion, I'm choosing to focus on the fact that writers fuck it up an awful lot. That's a truth claim, baby.

On a separate note, the tendency of writers to accidentally slip into the present tense is simply a more-extreme version of another common problem they have when they elect to use the narrative past tense: inconsistent narrative voice/character/distance. The past tense encourages people to slip into the detached, "once upon a time" type of narration, even if they're using a character in the story to narrate, and even if they want some intimacy and immediacy. This gets them into trouble, because they're then tempted to insert the reader directly into the character's mind when things get intense. Half the time, they remember to "wrap" those thoughts and feelings in language that's consistent with "once upon a time" narration. The other half of the time, they don't. It's a shitshow.

You may not like the present tense, but man does it significantly mitigate those issues. With a present tense narrator, the narration becomes as intimate, casual, immediate, and kinetic as the writer wants it to be, and writers have a much easier time keeping it level. Trust me: a well-timed WHAT THE FUCK? in the narrative text can be a lot of fun. With present tense narration, it's vastly more likely to seem natural and consistent.

I seriously edit pieces on a regular basis that recklessly, heedlessly blend all of these, after establishing "once upon a time" as a baseline:

"I couldn't believe my own eyes or ears. WHAT THE FUCK? I thought to myself."
"What the fuck was even happening? No. This couldn't be real. Not now."
"WHAT THE FUCK?"

You can make anything work if you're a hep cat. The overwhelming majority of writers are not hep cats. The above is just as much of a shitshow as it appears. A well-established trend of detached, complete sentences - not to mention a narrator that's talking about their character as a previous version of themselves (you know... from the past?) - gives way to all of that shit in the second and third examples.

Present tense? The narrator's basically talking to you and/or thinking at you. Stylized narrative text is so much easier to justify.

 

[XerXesXu]

Further up, XerXesXu asked which of my stories was the one Simon spotted, where I inadvertently shifted to present tense in the sex scenes then lapsed back to past tense to progress the story. It wasn't a deliberate thing; indeed, I didn't even know I had done it until I saw his comment.

It does illustrate, though, the observation often made that present tense has more immediacy and intimacy than past tense, when describing passion, and is therefore "better". I don't agree with that assertion, by the way - either tense can portray deep intimacy just as effectively as the other.

It certainly flowed naturally in and out of the moment as I wrote it - I'm very much a stream of consciousness writer, and my finished product is usually very raw, as I don't edit much.

https://literotica.com/s/rope-and-veil

In the first, long sex scene, not the shorter second 'reveal' scene. But, yes the first scene is an excellent example of the 'vivid present'. I note that the essence of style is consistency, notwithstanding that, had I not been primed to watch for it I'd have been oblivious; your descriptive ability in both scenes demonstrates that neither tense inhibits the ability to describe intimacy. I liked it very much and gave it 5*.

PS: When I say consistency, I don't mean you shouldn't use the vivid present for action scenes when narrating in the past tense, I mean use it in all the action scenes, like the guy in the pub, or the schoolgirls, upstairs rear, on the bus, loudly describing their adventures, sexual and otherwise, last night or over the weekend.

 

[ElectricBlue]

In the first, long sex scene, not the shorter second 'reveal' scene. But, yes the first scene is an excellent example of the 'vivid present'. I note that the essence of style is consistency, notwithstanding that, had I not been primed to watch for it I'd have been oblivious; your descriptive ability in both scenes demonstrates that neither tense inhibits the ability to describe intimacy. I liked it very much and gave it 5*.

Thank you.

In fact, I edited the story twice, for other reasons - once because of advice from a woman with spina bifida, who said, "No, a wheel chair user wouldn't do that," a second time for some other stylistic reasons based on another writer's input; but I didn't even see the tense changes until Simon commented.

And as you say, you had to go looking for them. I don't think they affect the story at all, not really.

 

[Duleigh]

Readers of my stories will know that I go off the rails on tense pretty regularly. What causes me to crash is that I'm writing the story in past tense, but to my character the story is happening in the present tense. I really need to keep beating on myself is that Present Tense ONLY happens inside the quotation marks. It gets really annoying because to me the tense confusion makes sense. Sometimes I think I'm Billy Pilgrim.

 

[yowser]

It's made even worse because the past and past-perfect in English are just a fucking nightmare of judgment calls and exceptions. When you start in the present tense, it's far clearer when you just need to hit up the past tense instead.

Like almost everyone else, I'll register surprise at your aversion to the past tense in English, but you have identified it as a preference, so fair enough.

One comment though: the rules in English for past tense usages are so simple compared to most other languages (esp classical languages like Latin, Greek, Sanskrit) that it is hardly impossible to get them down cold. I agree that many still do mangle them here, often unconsciously, but if you aspire to good writing, then you absolutely need to master verb tenses.

If you are trying to tell a simple story, the less tense shifting you do, especially if it exposes your ignorance of grammar, the better, I'll agree with you on that. But a little awareness and care in the verb arena can make for a much more satisfying creation.

 

[SimonDoom]

I have my own preference. It is what it is. I'm still not reading any kind of breakdown of the core objective argument: writing with a 1-tense shift is more complex than writing with a zero-tense shift. It's made even worse because the past and past-perfect in English are just a fucking nightmare of judgment calls and exceptions. When you start in the present tense, it's far clearer when you just need to hit up the past tense instead. The past perfect recedes in likely importance. Now, in my opinion, that's a very good thing for other reasons, too. In order to try to move the conversation out of the realm of opinion, I'm choosing to focus on the fact that writers fuck it up an awful lot. That's a truth claim, baby.

If you like present tense, then by all means, you should use it. Many authors do, and they do it successfully.

I think you exaggerate its virtues over past tense, though. I think it's relatively easy to navigate one's way around awkward past perfect sentences. I almost never slip into present tense, so for me that's not a problem. Also, in present tense you have a corresponding issue: the use of present perfect. Example:

I pull the meatloaf out of the refrigerator. It is noon, and so far today I have eaten nothing more than a bagel and a tangerine.

Past tense version would be:

I pulled the meatloaf out of the refrigerator. It was noon, and so far that day I had eaten nothing more than a bagel and a tangerine.

I see no difference in terms of either ease of writing or ease of reading. As an author you have "relative tense" issues whether you write in past tense or present tense.

As I said, if you like present tense, then use it.

But I think past tense has several distinct advantages:

1. It's more familiar to readers.
2. You're less likely to slip up if you write in past tense than in present tense. Most tense errors at Literotica occur because the author starts in present tense but gets careless because it's not natural and the author reverts out of habit to past tense. This is BY FAR the biggest mistake Lit authors make about tense. I always notice it and I always dislike it. You are likely to avoid the problem altogether if you just stick with past tense. That's what I do.
3. This is purely a matter of taste and subjective judgment, but I feel past tense makes more sense as a mode of storytelling. The notion that one is telling a story as it is happening seems more artificial to me, because nobody can narrate eloquently, with good grammar, on the fly. It strikes me as contrived. When I read your story, I know that it was, in fact, written in the past. It's not being written in real time. Past tense seems to me a more logical and natural fit with the actual fact of the story's existence. That's me. Others may disagree, and they're not wrong.

 

[neuroparenthetical]

You're less likely to slip up

I dunno, dude. We're reading about writers slipping up by shifting into the present tense for kinetic scenes within this very thread. It seems to be an issue. Call it a hunch, but I think an increasing number of writers are "seeing" stories in their heads like they would television and movies. That nudges them towards the present tense, even more so than the generally more-intimate and more-kinetic nature of the tense itself. Notably, the majority of dialogue also takes place in the present tense. The tense itself is - wait for it - rather present in many stories already. Sorry, couldn't resist.

past tense makes more sense as a mode of storytelling.

Sure, but how much of that is simple acclimation? Here's the thing: the narrative past tense is so awkward and kludgy in its details that many people disavow it as being "true" past tense. The use of "now" and "this" (and other, similar words like "today" and even "yesterday") are constantly winking at the reader, telling them that the past tense is just a conceit, and not a legitimate attempt to ground the story in the relative-past of the narrator.

That last bit also feeds in to my other comment, above. The past tense gets writers (and therefore readers) so confused about who's actually narrating the story, and when, and how much intellectual/emotional distance they ought to have from said story.

You can still screw pretty much everything up when using the present tense. You can, absolutely, disrupt the narrative voice. By happy synergy, it happens less often. People who commit to the present tense are simply far less likely to try to do something arch, distant, or omniscient. They nip most of the problems in the bud.

Granted, I've caught a few epic boners in the present tense with a non-omniscient narrator. Jerky McGee's running for his life down a blind alley, and suddenly he knows everything about the six guys chasing him, including the ones half a block away in the Pinto. It does happen. It happens even more often in the past tense.

 

[Duleigh]

Call it a hunch, but I think an increasing number of writers are "seeing" stories in their heads like they would television and movies.

Well... yeah, actual English isn't on the curriculum anymore, so people are doing what they're taught by the media bombardment they receive every day. I majored in English when I returned to school back in 2002 and we didn't write anything, we read it all, we watched movies, we discussed Steven King vs Ambrose Bierce (well, they talked about Steven King I tried to introduce them to Ambrose Bierce). Tenses, Conditionals, Modals... they were never even discussed. One day before class I wrote this on the board before the professor arrived:

I know it's wrong to end a sentence with a preposition, but sometimes you just have to.

He and I were the only ones to get it. I was the only person in class who knew what a semicolon was. After 20 years in the military my literary skills were pared down to bullet statements, I needed my skills to be bumped up and what I got was an easy A and lectures in social justice a decade before it was fashionable. This was 15 years ago; I hope and pray this English department was an exception, but I really don't think it was. Most of my professors were skilled practitioners of the craft, but the curriculum didn't include English in English 101.

I'm not tearing down Literotica writers, quite the opposite, I see a bunch of average folks doing a good job at communicating ideas without being equipped with the tools to adequately do the job. We should be building these folks up and offering suggestions.

​

 

[XerXesXu]

I know it's wrong to end a sentence with a preposition, but sometimes you just have to.

​

That sentence doesn't end in a preposition. Show me I'm wrong - if you're able to.

 

[Duleigh]

That sentence doesn't end in a preposition. Show me I'm wrong - if you're able to.

View attachment 2151952

 

[XerXesXu]

View attachment 2151952

It's an infinitive marker - a homonym of the preposition. In the 8 parts of speech used to analyse English it goes in the residual category, it's an adverb.

 

[HectorBidon]

I think an increasing number of writers are "seeing" stories in their heads like they would television and movies.

Right. A story told around a campfire and a motion picture can both be vivid, moving, meaningful, and entertaining, but they are two very different experiences.

The traditional written story aims to be a transcription of a storyteller's tale. The narrative past tense arises because storytellers usually recount incidents that happened in the past. We are certainly used to hearing and reading this type of story, as Simon and others have said.

But there's no reason a written story can't try to convey a more immediate, cinematographic experience. I think of a present-tense story not so much as a storyteller pantingly dictating in real time, but as a screen-writer/director laying out the action in the way he/she wants it to appear in the reader's imagination. Note that stage directions in plays have always avoided the narrative-past conceit and have been written in the present tense: "The hero enters, stage left; the heroine swoons."

So maybe present-tense writers should imagine that they are writing a screenplay or a graphic novel. There is a single, simple progression of time, indicated by the storyboard panels, and all temporal relationships should be referenced relative to this.

I think, though, perhaps you are overemphasizing the difficulties of the past tense. Certainly many compelling stories have been written in the past tense. But, I agree with you that a talented writer can write a compelling story in the present tense as well.

 

[SimonDoom]

It's an infinitive marker - a homonym of the preposition. In the 8 parts of speech used to analyse English it goes in the residual category, it's an adverb.

I think you are correct about it being an infinitive marker. In this case, the word "to" implies the larger infinitive verb phrase "to end" followed by the implied direct object phrase " a sentence with a preposition." It's not a preposition, it's part of the implied infinitive.

But I'm going to quibble with you about whether it's an adverb. Do you have a source for that? That doesn't seem logical.

If you compare it with the "to" in the first part of the sentence, that's part of an adverbial phrase "to end a sentence with a preposition" which modifies the adjective "wrong."

But in the second part of the sentence, the word "to" functions differently. It's part of a verb phrase "have to end." In this case "have" is the auxiliary verb and "to end" is the infinitive verb that is the principal verb. "To" is, as you say, an implied marker for the full principal verb "to end." But why would one call it an adverb?

 

[XerXesXu]

You call 'very', an intensifier, an adverb for the same reason. We've been here before, remember.

 

[SimonDoom]

You call 'very', an intensifier, an adverb for the same reason. We've been here before, remember.

Please explain more. I'm curious.

I hadn't seen the phrase "infinitive marker" before, so I did some research, and I think you are right about that. It makes sense. But I don't understand the description of "to" in this case as an adverb. I think it's part of an auxiliary verb + principal verb phrase, not an adverb.

 

[XerXesXu]

I think it's part of an auxiliary verb + principal verb phrase,

So, which part of speech is that? If you're doing an 8 column analysis, in which column do you put it?

 

[SimonDoom]

So, which part of speech is that? If you're doing an 8 column analysis, in which column do you put it?

Well, what is the word "to" in "to be"?

I think the right answer is that the word "to" has no separate meaning. It's part of the infinitive form of the verb "to be." It makes no sense to describe "to" in this context as a preposition or an adverb. It's just part of the infinitive verb.

This makes sense when you consider how it's done in Spanish: "estar" or "ser." Spanish dodges the problem of having two words express a verb form in this context.

I think your first answer is the best one: it's an infinitive marker. That's a better description of its function than trying to shoehorn it into the 8 column format.

Here's an interesting discussion of infinitives and the use of the word "to" in them (and a discussion of infinitives that do NOT use "to"):

https://www.grammarphobia.com/blog/...d modal auxiliaries or secondary auxiliaries).

 

[XerXesXu]

This makes sense when you consider how it's done in Spanish: "estar" or "ser." Spanish dodges the problem of having two words express a verb form in this context.

I think your first answer is the best one: it's an infinitive marker. That's a better description of its function than trying to shoehorn it into the 8 column format.

What? Just like in Latin.

We can agree that it’s an infinitive marker.

What makes it different to ‘very’, which, you say, is an adverb? Try to drop it in the 8 parts of speech in Latin/English? Set the columns out with Adverb on the right. There are words that won’t fit in any of the first seven columns; by convention, they go into the eighth. ‘Very’, you say, goes into Adverb because it can intensify an adverb, but it can also intensify an Adjective, so how does it ever reach so far left? By convention, because it doesn't fit anywhere else.

You can make up your own mind about whether 8 column analysis of English is dysfunctional. Recall, it was my suggestion that there is no need to artificially spatchcock intensifiers, infinitive markers etc: into Adverbs, just call them what they are.

At least, we agree that neither ‘to’ in the material sentence is a Preposition.

 

[AWhoopsieDaisy]

Yeah, that comment puzzled me too.

Everything I grew up reading was in past tense, and it still is. I find it quite intuitive.

That wasn't the case for me. By the time I was old enough to read chapter books and recognize tense I rarely saw past tense. At least not in any book I found tolerable enough to finish. Mind you, I was and still am a very picky reader because I hate 99% of narrators. Every time my literature class puts "describe the narrator" on a quiz I have to go back and make sure I didn't just write down "boring"

 

[SimonDoom]

That wasn't the case for me. By the time I was old enough to read chapter books and recognize tense I rarely saw past tense. At least not in any book I found tolerable enough to finish. Mind you, I was and still am a very picky reader because I hate 99% of narrators. Every time my literature class puts "describe the narrator" on a quiz I have to go back and make sure I didn't just write down "boring"

Can you give examples? I'm puzzled how ANYONE can say that the majority of fiction they've read is in present tense, because it is so much less common. I mean, The Cat In The Hat is in past tense. All children's literature I can think of is in past tense. Nearly all classic literature. Nearly all Pulitzer Prize winners. Genre fiction, like horror, detective and crime, westerns, romances-- almost all of it is in past tense. I may be wrong but 50 Shades may be in present tense. I remember Scott Turow's Presumed Innocent being in present tense, but in that case there's a good reason for it, because it serves the suspense of the whodunit in the narrative. In order to be someone who hasn't read mostly past tense you would have to avoid the vast majority of authors.

 

[AWhoopsieDaisy]

Can you give examples? I'm puzzled how ANYONE can say that the majority of fiction they've read is in present tense, because it is so much less common. I mean, The Cat In The Hat is in past tense. All children's literature I can think of is in past tense. Nearly all classic literature. Nearly all Pulitzer Prize winners. Genre fiction, like horror, detective and crime, westerns, romances-- almost all of it is in past tense. I may be wrong but 50 Shades may be in present tense. I remember Scott Turow's Presumed Innocent being in present tense, but in that case there's a good reason for it, because it serves the suspense of the whodunit in the narrative. In order to be someone who hasn't read mostly past tense you would have to avoid the vast majority of authors.

Old enough to recognize tense = middle school. So you're looking at YA novels published between 2014-2020 which did have a trend toward present tense thanks to everyone and their mother copying The Hunger Games. Also my gripe with narrators sucking ass just in general, gave me a heavy preference for books without traditional narrators (Graphic novels, Playscripts, Homestuck, nonfiction and academic studies.)

Not that there's anything particularly wrong with past tense, I just don't get why it's the default. I think all tense+POV combinations have their own distinctive feeling that should be conciously chosen for the story at hand, rather than assumed. Treating acrylic paint as the default in painting would be stupid and any painter worth their salt will choose between watercolor, oil or acrylic based on their respective material strengths and weaknesses for a specific project.

No amount of industry defaulting can negate the fact that past tense in fiction by nature gives the reader the sense that these events are not current. That the narrator has already experienced the story and is recounting it to an audience over a campfire. Like that's not a flaw of past tense, that is it's defining feature.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Old enough to recognize tense = middle school. So you're looking at YA novels published between 2014-2020 which did have a trend toward present tense thanks to everyone and their mother copying The Hunger Games. Also my gripe with narrators sucking ass just in general, gave me a heavy preference for books without traditional narrators (Graphic novels, Playscripts, Homestuck, nonfiction and academic studies.)

Thought so, and I get that, and your interest in other narrative forms makes sense.

But, and here's the but - if you're going to flourish as a writer, (and it's safe to assume that's why you've wandered into the Hangout) you should read a lot more literature, steep yourself in it, all eras, and move away from the idea that present tense is somehow superior.

It might be a YA trend in the twenty-first century, but it's by no means the default for quality literature. That doesn't make present tense invalid, but there are many more good books written in past tense. Writers use it for a reason, it pays to understand what it is - then you can make the artistic choice, which tense works best for this story?

 

[pink_silk_glove]

Not that there's anything particularly wrong with past tense, I just don't get why it's the default.

It's the nature of story telling in general, which is the root craft of the art of prose fiction. What else might one possibly expect the default to be?

 

[SimonDoom]

Same might be said about present tense.

Based on what's been said, the writers for the 'new generation' prefer present tense, and their readers will age with them. If you want to cater the 'new generation', then perhaps it's better to stick to what they've become used to, instead of writing the way writing used to be in the past.

But, no doubt, there's an audience for both, and perhaps, most readers don't care at all.

But is this true? Is it true that there's a significant shift toward present tense?

I'm not aware of that, at least in the context of books of fiction, as opposed to graphic novels, or what have you.

Harry Potter is in past tense. Most fiction published today still is in past tense, as far as I know. Twilight was in past tense.

I'm not arguing for or against any reader's preference for one tense or another. I was just startled to hear anyone say they don't read fiction in the past tense, because I don't know how it is possible to read a lot and to do that. One cannot do that and be well-read.

 

[TheRedChamber]

It's the nature of story telling in general, which is the root craft of the art of prose fiction. What else might one possibly expect the default to be?

Put simply, if your sitting round a campfire and the storyteller is telling you a story then (true or not) the implication is that the story had already happened, hence past tense.

On the other hand, if your watching live police chase on the news then the newscaster is reporting things as they are happening. Hence present tense, which can seen more exciting but can also get tiring living in the moment for so long.

As a wild theory, the switch to YA present tense may be a reaction to how younger people consume media.