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McAnally's (The Community Pub) => Author Craft => Topic started by: Nickeris86 on July 04, 2011, 05:28:04 PM
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My brain keeps arguing with itself on the merits of telling a story in first person or in third person and I can't decide which one works better for my story.
When play the plot through my head I am always thinking from the point of the view of the main character, which I think makes the story more dynamic and engaging. However when I try to write in first person the story just seems kinda choppy so I convert it to third person but then I don't feel the personal connection to the main character that I did in my head.
It is very frustrating, does anyone have any input on the subject or their own conflict of point of view?
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Both certainly have their merits, I won't deny that. I don't have time to get in depth right now, but I'll give a very general opinion.
Third person allows for a little bit more freedom. You can swap character point of view easily and follow events that the narrator in a first person event wouldn't have any knowledge of. Basically, it can be a bit easier to get inside more heads.
First person I have felt can be limiting. To some degree, depending on the genre of course, I find first person perspective less dramatic. No matter how badly the character gets beaten, or threatened, or whatever happens, you know the character is going to live or else how do they tell the tale? Now as I said, it depends on the genre. Involve a character in a world of magic and actual gods roaming the earth then it is possible for a character to die and still keep the tale going. However, set the story in the year 2010 in a world identical to our own, well, death is permanent, therefore I feel it is less dramatic. Sometimes first person can also limit the amount of heads you can tell the story from as sometimes it can confuse the reader. If you're sticking with one head then first person works quite well as long as you remember your narrator can only speculate as to what is going on in someone else's head and not actually know (unless of course the genre allows it lol).
I'm sure someone more eloquent than myself will stop by shortly and give you a better idea.
Though most of all, I support whichever perspective you feel the most comfortable with.
Perhaps try writing the same scene in each way and see which works best for you. If all else fails, write a chapter or two of the story from both perspectives to judge and even let a beta reader take a look at it.
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What sounds right to you?
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First person I have felt can be limiting. To some degree, depending on the genre of course, I find first person perspective less dramatic. No matter how badly the character gets beaten, or threatened, or whatever happens, you know the character is going to live or else how do they tell the tale?
That one's easy; put in a frame where somebody later on is reading their grandfather's diary.
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On the whole, I find first person a lot more difficult--you're not only limited in what your POV character can know at any given time, but you also have to find him/her a unique voice that will help define his/her character.
However, it can be deeply rewarding. See The Dresden Files for an example of first person done right. :)
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I will probably repeat a lot of what's already been said but...
Third person is allows you freedom. It is easier to fill in back story or to build tension by telling what the bad guys are doing. If you like multiple story lines that all converge at various points, third person allows you to do this.
When you talk to other people you talk in the first person ( at least most of us do ) Because of this it is a much more comfortable and "natural" way to write for most.
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How about you? Have written in First before? Do you have a more comfortable handle on 3rd?
As Shecky said, "What sounds right to you?"
The story, you say, is screaming 1st, but you think its choppy, right? Is that because you haven't written a lot of 1st POV? Are you naturally more comfortable in 3rd?
If so, then you can decide to challenge your 1st POV writing, or stick with what is more comfortable. I would point out that 3rd can get very zoomed in on your main character, and some would argue it can be as close and emotional as 1st.
Tell us why you think your 1st is choppy. Maybe you want to post a couple chapters of the 'choppy' version for us to ponder on?
Either way, happy writing.
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Tell us why you think your 1st is choppy. Maybe you want to post a couple chapters of the 'choppy' version for us to ponder on?
Well, post it somewhere else, then put the link here. I think, but I could be mistaken, we're not allowed to actually post our own work here directly. :)
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Yes, but excerpts are okay. So have you written a lot of 1st? Have you resolved the issue? Was the thread helpful?
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Sorry i never posted back my bad >.>
Yeah this thread was helpful, i am going to write out the prologue in first and third person and see how the compare, will probably ask for volunteer readers after i am done.
I haven't done a whole lot of writing lately, and by that i mean absolutely none lol, but when i will soon.
And no i have not written first before, only third, but i like first person a lot when i read it. if its done right it makes me feel more connected to the character.
Three of my favorite first person novels are:
Dresden files duh
Anita Blake vampire hunter, at least when she actually had moral controversies and acted like a human being rather than a series of orifices to be filled.
and the Stare Hatchling, though its been so long i can't remember if this was a first person book.
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There are a couple books that play with first/third a bit. Both Elizabeth Bear and Patricia Briggs (and probably more that I don't know) have used a combination of first and third.
Briggs' Dragon Blood uses first person for one main character, and third for the other. In this case, it might be a holdover from the previous book in the duology, Dragon Bones, which had only one viewpoint character in first person- when she added the second, it would have felt strange to have the same character suddenly in third person instead. It's a bit odd at first, but you can definitely mix it up with viewpoints, as long as you don't have fifty characters all in first person.
Bear uses first/third very well in her Promethean age and Edda of Burdens series, but it's more of a stylistic choice. One character, after losing her name and soul, suddenly switches from third to first person narration (everybody else is third) to indicate that she no longer has a name. Another is always in first person, present tense instead of past tense, so give an animalistic feel to the character.
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I've been told that the secret to 1st POV is an extremely strong character voice. Another sample you might try is Charlie Huston's Joe Pitt's casebooks. :-)
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That one's easy; put in a frame where somebody later on is reading their grandfather's diary.
Or the person's ghost telling their story to some young person...
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I write part of my story in the first person, then switch it away to third person for a couple of chapters so that the reader knows what's going down, even if the protagonist doesn't. A lot of people say that you can't do that, but there are no rules to fiction :D write in whichever way makes you happiest and feels right!
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By habit I write third, and hop about inside different characters heads, so though I have a primary POV character, I also get into other folks' heads.
The first NaNoWriMo I succeeded at was a 1st person, done mostly as a challenge to myself. Worked out okay.
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Ok I have started writing out my introduction to the my story in first person, when it is finished is their anyone that would like to read it and let me know what they think, i will then commence writing it in third and present that to those who wish to read it as well.
Let me know
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"Ok I have started writing out my introduction to the my story in first person"
Okay there is your mistake right there. Sure, go ahead and write an introduction or backstory for yourself, but not for the reader. The reader wants the story to start, and an intro is a cheap-ass way of not jumping right into plot or character or good dialogue - the meat.
I HATE introductions (as a reader), use them all over the place as a writer.
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Okay there is your mistake right there. Sure, go ahead and write an introduction or backstory for yourself, but not for the reader. The reader wants the story to start, and an intro is a cheap-ass way of not jumping right into plot or character or good dialogue - the meat.
I HATE introductions (as a reader), use them all over the place as a writer.
Your preferences are not universals.
This reader really likes the things that can be done with a good introduction, and tends not so much to like stories that are very obviously trying to hook hard and fast and early.
Some stories want to open with a hook. Others, like for example The Lord of the Rings, want to open with a net. Both options are valid.
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"Ok I have started writing out my introduction to the my story in first person"
Okay there is your mistake right there. Sure, go ahead and write an introduction or backstory for yourself, but not for the reader. The reader wants the story to start, and an intro is a cheap-ass way of not jumping right into plot or character or good dialogue - the meat.
the reason i am doing an 'introduction' is because i have a very interesting back story for the character that if i don't at least give a fragment of in the beginning my readers may be lost on why my character is the way he is. Primarily it explains where he got a rather nasty burn scare that covers the left side of his neck and down over his upper arm and chest. this scare plays a big role in the first book and if i just straight into the meat of my work people will wonder where he got this scare and why its so important to him.
I HATE introductions (as a reader), use them all over the place as a writer.
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ok i have the first person version. its very rough so be gentle. if you want to read it let me know
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the reason i am doing an 'introduction' is because i have a very interesting back story for the character that if i don't at least give a fragment of in the beginning my readers may be lost on why my character is the way he is. Primarily it explains where he got a rather nasty burn scare that covers the left side of his neck and down over his upper arm and chest. this scare plays a big role in the first book and if i just straight into the meat of my work people will wonder where he got this scare and why its so important to him.
Why is people wondering that a problem ?
That would strike me as the kind of mystery about a character that actually does catch my attention.
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the reason i am doing an 'introduction' is because i have a very interesting back story for the character that if i don't at least give a fragment of in the beginning my readers may be lost on why my character is the way he is. Primarily it explains where he got a rather nasty burn scare that covers the left side of his neck and down over his upper arm and chest. this scare plays a big role in the first book and if i just straight into the meat of my work people will wonder where he got this scare and why its so important to him.
I HATE introductions (as a reader), use them all over the place as a writer.
Well, there are a couple ways you could do this without an introduction. (I'm not criticizing or saying you should avoid an introduction, just brainstorming here) But you could have thoughts going through his head that are relevant to the scar during moments in which the scar is important.
Ex: Imagine he's sitting at a campfire, debating a crucial decision. It's going to be difficult, and there will be a lot of hardship ahead. In the end, he decides he's going to do it, and he's going to put his whole heart into it. He's going to do it because he can't let an innocent person go unprotected *looks down at scar* Never again...
That way you get to tell the reader that he's got this scar, that it's on his mind, and that the current situation is similar to the situation in which he got his scar. Then maybe as you go on he could have nightmares or flashbacks where you reveal bits and pieces of how he got this scar without giving away the whole tale. It creates suspense, and it reveals backstory on the scar while keeping your main plot moving along nicely.
Also, I'd love too look over a copy. I'll do my best to provide constructive feedback.
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"Your preferences are not universals."
Good point, since that is not even true in my own mind. What I hate, is an introduction that "explains", I like show don't tell, or better yet "make me think." I loved the introductions in the Belgariad, because they had absolutley nothing (overtly) to do with the story. They were short, well done, equivalents of bed time stories that later in the book I could go "oh, I get how that fits in!"
"This reader really likes the things that can be done with a good introduction, and tends not so much to like stories that are very obviously trying to hook hard and fast and early."
I once read an author describing how he worked as "when I'm writing, I skip over the boring parts." and I find that sometimes I need to write them - so I understand them - but I don't need the reader to read them. I'm all for writing more than is needed and trimming.
I also really like the "show, don't tell" example of the burn/campfire. Well done.
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Good point, since that is not even true in my own mind. What I hate, is an introduction that "explains", I like show don't tell,
That would be one of those things that never quite made sense to me at some levels. It's all words; everything is telling.
I once read an author describing how he worked as "when I'm writing, I skip over the boring parts." and I find that sometimes I need to write them - so I understand them - but I don't need the reader to read them.
The thing about that is that everybody has different notions of what the boring parts are. Neal Stephenson writes infodumps that go on for pages and pages and pages in ways that are absolutely fascinating and would harm his books a lot to be cut. Myself, I often find action scenes boring, particularly if they're not doing anything other than being action scenes.
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Me: Good point, since that is not even true in my own mind. What I hate, is an introduction that "explains", I like show don't tell
the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh: That would be one of those things that never quite made sense to me at some levels. It's all words; everything is telling.
I can't tell if you are being sarcastic or serious. It's the difference between:
SHOW: "The memory makes McAshlan's hackles rise, but he doesn't fume. His voice drops slightly in pitch and becomes icy calm. His hands rest lightly on the desk top. His eyes focus on a car corner, and his words are trimmed in Scottish. They are precise words, individual, each set apart from the next, call cast in iron and covered with chrome."
and TELL: "I could tell that remembering the situation upset him by the way he spoke."
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the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh: That would be one of those things that never quite made sense to me at some levels. It's all words; everything is telling.
I can't tell if you are being sarcastic or serious. It's the difference between:
I'm being entirely serious.
SHOW: "The memory makes McAshlan's hackles rise, but he doesn't fume. His voice drops slightly in pitch and becomes icy calm. His hands rest lightly on the desk top. His eyes focus on a car corner, and his words are trimmed in Scottish. They are precise words, individual, each set apart from the next, call cast in iron and covered with chrome."
and TELL: "I could tell that remembering the situation upset him by the way he spoke."
See, one of those is a precise and accurate third-person camera-eye. The other is a first-person description which gives you the information that the first-person viewpoint isn't interested in giving you all those precise details, and that is every bit as much characterisation information for your first-person narrator as the first example is of characterisation of the person you describe.
Different techniques. Different results. Equally valid. Which one to use depends on what you care about conveying to the reader.
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Me: SHOW: "The memory makes McAshlan's hackles rise, but he doesn't fume. His voice drops slightly in pitch and becomes icy calm. His hands rest lightly on the desk top. His eyes focus on a car corner, and his words are trimmed in Scottish. They are precise words, individual, each set apart from the next, call cast in iron and covered with chrome."
and TELL: "I could tell that remembering the situation upset him by the way he spoke."
"See, one of those is a precise and accurate third-person camera-eye. <snip> Different techniques. Different results. Equally valid. Which one to use depends on what you care about conveying to the reader."
I'm not asking if you prefer one or the other, or what other words you would use to describe the different techniques. My only question is: is this enough information for you to understand the distinction that I (allowing that others may vary) make when I say "Show" vs "Tell".
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"See, one of those is a precise and accurate third-person camera-eye. <snip> Different techniques. Different results. Equally valid. Which one to use depends on what you care about conveying to the reader."
I'm not asking if you prefer one or the other, or what other words you would use to describe the different techniques. My only question is: is this enough information for you to understand the distinction that I (allowing that others may vary) make when I say "Show" vs "Tell".
No. Not remotely. I see two different styles of telling. It sounds like you are seeing the information you're leaving out of the shorter one and not focusing so much and the extra information you have added in.
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Ok I just finished the third person rough draft opening. Like literally I just finished five minuets ago.
If you would like to check it out let me know and I'll send it to you in a PM.
As for the conversation at hand: I too prefer when an author shows rather than tells however some others show to much and get hung up on all the details *cough* Steven King *cough*.
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I once went on a haunted ... stuff ... tour down in New Orleans. The tour guide went on a cute rant about how "this was the house that Anne Rice mentioned in her books" and how that could be recognized because she described a particular painting "in detail.... in great detail ... some would say in obsessive detail." Had the folks who had read her books cracking up.
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Depending on the subject, long infodumps and gratuitous exposition can actually be pretty interesting. But then again, I'm the type of reader that wonders whether or not a Dune shield would explode if you threw a lightsaber at it, so...
On "show, don't tell", if it's not important, give it a quick description and move on. If it's vitally important, or the POV character happens to be paying very close attention for some reason, go ahead and stuff all the nuances you can into the description. If every paragraph of a novel is like the first example, I'd get tired pretty quickly. I'd say save it for the details that need it.
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"I'm the type of reader that wonders whether or not a Dune shield would explode if you threw a lightsaber at it, so..."
I would think yes on that.
"Depending on the subject, long infodumps and gratuitous exposition can actually be pretty interesting."
Depends on a lot. My best friend and I both like Heinlein (probably spelled wrong); had very different reactions to Number of the Beast, both because of the long, detailed, internal and external monologues about leadership. I read the book multiple times just to dwell on them, he couldn't even get past the first quarter of it.
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On "show, don't tell", if it's not important, give it a quick description and move on. If it's vitally important, or the POV character happens to be paying very close attention for some reason, go ahead and stuff all the nuances you can into the description.
The failure mode of that is giving away what's going to be important later on and what isn't way too obviously early in the book.
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On "show, don't tell", if it's not important, give it a quick description and move on. If it's vitally important, or the POV character happens to be paying very close attention for some reason, go ahead and stuff all the nuances you can into the description.
and it was wisely pointed out:
The failure mode of that is giving away what's going to be important later on and what isn't way too obviously early in the book.
I agree, that's an easy pitfall, which is one reason I think it works better as a style than as a tool, if you can get what I mean.
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On "show, don't tell", if it's not important, give it a quick description and move on. If it's vitally important, or the POV character happens to be paying very close attention for some reason, go ahead and stuff all the nuances you can into the description.
and it was wisely pointed out:
The failure mode of that is giving away what's going to be important later on and what isn't way too obviously early in the book.
I agree, that's an easy pitfall, which is one reason I think it works better as a style than as a tool, if you can get what I mean.
There are piles and piles of information that people are going to get from descriptions, they're not going to pay attention to all of it. Probably very little. So it's good to get those details out there, especially if they are allusions or foreshadowing. The trick is that you have to display them in the way that the character's going to notice them. Because the character's going to shrug them off now and later on that piece of the puzzle is gonna click into place in his head and you'll get that golden "oh shit" moment where time slows down and he catches what's wrong. You need to make the detail sound neglible now and be important later.
Take, for example, the mindfog in Summer Knight. At the time, Dresden just kind of acknowledged the fact that it was illegal sorcery, and started trying to deal with the situation. But those 2 words in themselves play a very important role in figuring out who his opponent is. He was facing a wizard, and one not sanctioned by the white council. Sure, faeries can do magic, but they tend to have very different methods and means by which they operate, so if it was faerie magic, he probably would have called it just that: Faerie Magic. He specifically said "illegal" though, which points to a form of magic which is moderated by a body of law. The white council is the only body of law that governs the use of magics. (The accords don't count. They help to round things out, but the accords are more of a treaty than a form of government itself) Given what he had to draw on so far from that book, the only wizard unsanctioned by the white council in the area was Elaine. So, we could technically have parsed out from that point in the book that Elaine was playing both sides of the field, and this does come into play later, when Dresden realizes he's been betrayed by her. He remembers the mindfog.
This is a very difficult technique to perfect. You want to get those details out there. You want the reader to acknowledge them. You want the character to acknowledge them. And you want them both to shrug it off for now. I suppose you could technically try making those details more obvious, but then your character has to be an idiot to not notice them, and the reader's not an idiot. He's gonna be sitting there screaming inside his head, "WHY ARE YOU IGNORING THAT YOU FOUND YOUR DEAD BUDDY'S DOGTAGS IN YOUR GIRLFRIEND'S PURSE!?!?!?! ARE YOU STUPID!?" So I suppose on this particular subject, we ought take Jim's advice: The reader's not an idiot. Get the information out there and let the reader find it. Your readers are always going to be smarter than you expect. They'll notice. (I don't remember where I saw him say that, but I am VERY sure I saw him say it... somewhere)
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I ask myself, is this story being told by me, or by my character? If it's the latter, I use first person.
Once I had to use first person in a short story because there was no appropriate gender pronoun to use for the main character in 3rd. :o
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Well I had both versions of my opening reviewed and both liked the First person version better. I found this odd cause when i read over it i thought it was crap but i usually think everything i write is either terrible or at least not good enough to get published.
I'll continue to pursue the first person style for a while and see how it turns out when i have more than two pages.
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I ask myself, is this story being told by me, or by my character? If it's the latter, I use first person.
But that deprives you of the fun of telliong a third-person story through the filter of an unreliable narator with biases and agendas.
Once I had to use first person in a short story because there was no appropriate gender pronoun to use for the main character in 3rd.
heh. Some of us reject gendered pronouns in day-to-day life, and once you get that working, not doing it in fiction is easy.
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On the subject of putting information out there to generate the OMG - I should have seen that coming reaction; I recommend "Hamlet's Hit Points" by Robin Laws; it's meant for DMing, but it utilizes analysis of storytelling in a really cool way.
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But that deprives you of the fun of telliong a third-person story through the filter of an unreliable narator with biases and agendas.
That's so incredibly awkward at times, it's what I'm currently working on, third person but only with knowledge a given character would have(For the most part, there is a little outside narration when necessary. Hardest thing, before a new POV character knows everyone names and your referring to characters as the male voice or the female voice with an odd accent.
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That's so incredibly awkward at times, it's what I'm currently working on, third person but only with knowledge a given character would have(For the most part, there is a little outside narration when necessary. Hardest thing, before a new POV character knows everyone names and your referring to characters as the male voice or the female voice with an odd accent.
I don't see how that's hard, really. I see how it's convincingly realistic.
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I've been handling this in a bit of an odd (or maybe a good) way.
When folks first meet, they are primarily referred to by race, or by their profession, etc. in the mind of the current POV character.
It's only after a character gets to know another character that they actually begin referring to that person by their given name.
*shrug*
seems right to me
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I don't see how that's hard, really. I see how it's convincingly realistic.
Awkward and difficult aren't especially similar, it's just weird because the reader knows the characters names and with any luck knows who you're talking about.
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Awkward and difficult aren't especially similar, it's just weird because the reader knows the characters names and with any luck knows who you're talking about.
I may be misreading what you are talking about here; if you're talking about character A describing character B when character A has only just met character B and does not yet know character B's name, how does the reader know character B's name ? Is that something set up elsewhere in the story ? I thought you were talking about writing with a single viewpoint character.
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I've been handling this in a bit of an odd (or maybe a good) way.
When folks first meet, they are primarily referred to by race, or by their profession, etc. in the mind of the current POV character.
It's only after a character gets to know another character that they actually begin referring to that person by their given name.
*shrug*
seems right to me
Yeah, I love it so much when authors do that. I chuckled everytime I heard Dresden refer to "Liverspots" in Dead Beat. And that's just the one that came off the top of my head. I can't even remember all the awesome nicknames Harry assigned to people throughout the series.
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I may be misreading what you are talking about here; if you're talking about character A describing character B when character A has only just met character B and does not yet know character B's name, how does the reader know character B's name ? Is that something set up elsewhere in the story ? I thought you were talking about writing with a single viewpoint character.
Nah, bouncing between characters while restricting the character to their own knowledge is where i gets awkward. For instance I introduced a POV character about 70 pages into a story. The main characters had shown up on her doorstep and she was listening in via spell to find out who was there. At that point the characters were, Her Uncle, male voice, and female voice with odd accent. To anyone who had read the previous 70 pages they knew these characters by name, but the character didn't. Was a little awkward.
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At that point the characters were, Her Uncle, male voice, and female voice with odd accent. To anyone who had read the previous 70 pages they knew these characters by name, but the character didn't.
Seems to me that if you do that at all well it's going to be self-evident who the characters are she's interacting with, so I'm not seeing that it has to be awkward to the reader.