Writers: Third Person ___?

Cafe Society
1

Three questions about third person narration: (1) What types are there, and can you give me a brief example or description of each? (2) Also, can first person be omniscient? Consider this one example: " ’ I hate you, Billy.’ I yelled. But deep down, I didn’t really hate Billy. I was jealous of his high score on the test."

[I was under the impression that omniscient narration only went along with third person. But, now I am not so sure. Maybe I’m mixed up because it’s been awhile since my last English composition class. Is there a first-person omniscient…?]

(3) Last, do you have a favorite reference teaching examples and how to apply such writing styles?

Thanks,

  • Jinx
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I think there are third person omniscient (i.e., the narrator is observing the story without interacting in it, but knows the thoughts and feelings of each character), and third person observant (in which the narrator observes the story without interacting in it, but does NOT know the thoughts and feelings of the characters.).

First person can indeed be omniscient, but I’m not entirely sure the example given is correct. A little help from a fellow Doper?

I’ve made use of Writer’s Inc. and such, but I can’t recall if it has examples of points of view. I use it mostly for mechanics and spelling.

Good luck with your writing, if you’re doing any!

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Thanks, Buckleberry Ferry. Yes, I am having trouble finding the best writing style for my story. I guess I must first decide who is telling the story. After much debate, I believe the first person has the advantage of drawing in the reader and taking the reader along on the adventure.

OTOH, third person omniscient allows the reader to gain insight into the main character’s psyche, for one - without going into painful details, excessive use of flashbacks, etc., IMHO. I want the best of both worlds! And, this is where I’m stuck.

What style would you say “Winnie the Pooh” or “Frosty the Snowman” is told in? It is almost like a third-person limited omniscient where the narrator tells the story, but knows a bit about what’s going on…or just doesn’t want to say too much.

What about a story like “Watership Down”? Again, the author seems to narrate to connect scenes, but still clams up enough to let the characters tell the tale. I guess I can’t always recognize the style. I’ll have to pull the book off the shelf and take a second look…

What style works best for you, as the reader? Can the SDopers help me get over this hump? I got a story to tell! Or, my main character does, anyhow! :wink:

  • Jinx
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There’s third-person omniscient:

Bob and Steve were heading out West, from a trip that would eventually end in their unexpected deaths.

Obviously, no one could know this except an omniscient narrator, since their deaths are going to be unexpected.

There’s third-person limited:

Bob and Steve were headed West on an adventure, seeking gold.

Simple enough: They don’t know how it’s going to end, and neither do we.

The example you gave is just regular old first-person. Omniscient narration involves the narrator being able to see into all the characters’ hearts, see what’s behind every wall that the characters don’t know about, etc. Your example doesn’t involve that; everyone knows their own heart, so as long as the first-person narrator isn’t seeing into things that he, as a character in this story, couldn’t know, you’re still just first-person.

First-person omniscient would go something like this:

I walked right past a car that had a bomb in it with a timer. Fortunately the timer didn’t work and the bomb never exploded and I never in my life found out it had been there.

Kinda goofy, since it would entail the narrator knowing things that the character doesn’t know, but since first-person entails the narrator and one of the characters being the same person, it gets a little hinky.

Nope. I don’t teach this stuff anymore and I’ve repressed as much of it as possible.

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Thanks, Jackelope! You mean first person is not just telling what the first person is doing, but it is also sharing his thoughts and feelings. What about if my example read as follows:

" ‘I hate you, Billy!’ I shouted. But deep down, Bobby didn’t hate Billy. Bobby was just jealous of his friend’s high test score. Bobby was always jealous of anyone who did better than him on test since pressure from his parents made him so competitive."

I wager this is third person omniscient, and maybe it is technically incorrect to say “I shouted”, huh? Or, the name “Bobby” should be replaced with “I”. I suppose one would say my example is not in a proper format by mixing the two? And yet, could the main character know it’s his parents’ fault for making him act a certain way??? Hmm…maybe the two styles can be mixed? - Jinx

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I would think children’s books like these are in third person limited; they don’t know any more than any outsider would, and they do not interact with the story.

What sort of story are you writing? Certain points of view may be more suitable for certain genres. Of course, style is entirely up to you, so whatever you feel best writing with is best for the story.

Personally, I prefer third person limited stories. You get a clear overview of what’s going on, you get to see what’s happening in places your main character isn’t, and you don’t learn too much too fast. It’s rather slice-of-life without being too real.

Again, good luck; I always hope for authors to succeed. If you’ve got a story, tell it.

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In this case, you’ve got a narrator and a first person character…I’m not sure if that’s been done…your example gave me the feel of the movie A Christmas Story and the show The Wonder Years. It’s almost as though the older first person character is narrating the events of the younger first person character’s life. For your example to be third person omniscient, change “I” to “Bobby;” for first person omniscient, vice versa.

8

If one of the characters in the story is *telling us *the story, it’s first-person. In your example, if the first sentence said, “‘I hate you, Billy!’ Bobby shouted,” then we’d be in third-person. The narrative voice is not acting in the story, but just observing and reporting.

The terms “first person” and “third person” refer to the promouns being used. First-person pronouns are I and we, while third-person pronouns are he, she, it, and they (and second-person pronouns are you and you, like in those old “choose your own adventure” books). Is there an “I” telling the story? Or is it all “he, she, it, and they”?

Honestly though, if you’re writing a story, I wouldn’t worry about all the technical terminology like this. I’d just decide how I wanted the story to sound and start writing it like that.

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Others have given good responses to your first two questions, but I’d like to chime in with a response to this one.

The best book I’ve read that dealt with viewpoint is Characters and Viewpoint by Orson Scott Card. Granted, the discussion of viewpoint is not the sole focus of the book, but Card deals with it quite thoroughly, and provides excellent examples.

10

Buckleberry’s comparison to Wonder Years or A Christmas Story hits it on the nose. I never thought about it, but it is a fair statement. This makes the perspective very hard for me as I feel I am waffling as the story unfolds. I want the reader to live vicariously through the eyes of the main character; yet, I need a narrator to fill in. In fact, I foresee a tale told in sections (as some books have as well as chapters). I foresee the first section relying heavily upon narration, but when the story gets cooking…I want the main character to take the ball relying less on narration. I am struggling to get this right, but this is how the story must be.

I appreciate the input! It helps to get input from others. I am too close to the material to see it for myself. - Jinx

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Jinx, might I suggest reading In God We Trust, All Others Pay Cash by Jean Shepard? The movie A Christmas Story was based on a few chapters on this book (in fact, the author is the narrator in the movie, as well as in line to see Santa in one scene!) I think it might have a sort of narration theme that you’re looking at. It starts with the narrator in present time going back to his home town, then in a sort of flashback, relates the events of his childhood (these episodes are in seperate chapters from the present day narration). It’s also quite humourous; if you enjoyed the movie, I’m sure you’ll enjoy the book. Happy reading and good luck on that story!

12

American Beauty (which I thought was a totally overrated movie, btw) had a somewhat omniscient first-person narrator in Kevin Spacey’s character. He opens up the film telling us in voice-over he’s going to die at the end of it.

Jinx, you might want to check out something like “Heart of Darkness” by Joseph Conrad. The entire story, except for brief opening and closing segments, is a quote; a character named Marlow tells the entire thing in his own voice, so we get the first-person voice of “I was there and this is what happened,” plus omniscience because it happened in the past and Marlow is telling it to us now, so he knows how it’s all going to come out in the end.

Just a suggestion.

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By Jinx
" ‘I hate you, Billy!’ I shouted. But deep down, Bobby didn’t hate Billy.

Hmm…maybe the two styles can be mixed? - Jinx"

Read this again, you’ll see why it doesn’t work. It forces the reader to break his train of thought. The reader must pause, ask himself: “Who’s Bobby?” Then have an “Oh yeah he’s the ‘I’ guy” moment before he reads on.

Good luck with your story.

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One thing not mentioned so far is plot. Will there be important events happening that you want to show that your first person narrator cannot be at? Are there descriptions that your first person narrator cannot see? Sometimes first person narration makes your story contorted.

An example I still remember after 40 years. In the novelization of The Absent Minded Professor, the narration is first person by one of the teenagers. There is a scene where the Fred McMurray character meets with the IRS in his house. This is crucial to the plot, and the only way it ciould be shown was to invent a hole in the floor the narrator could look through. This was so lame that I still remember it.

I used to like first person, but found it too limiting.

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Just something to think about–you say you want one of the characters to be the POV for the story, but you feel you’ll need a sort of omniscient narrator to fill in details he/she won’t be able to convey to the reader. (At least, that’s how I’m interpreting your dilemma). While omniscient 3rd is a perfectly good way to frame a story, and it does give you that narrative “throw the information in when you need it” kind of freedom, I find that sometimes it’s more effective to imply what you want the reader to know, rather than just say it straight out.

There’s nothing technically wrong with this, but you can show Bobby’s parents pressuring him, without having to point it out. And you can make the dialogue say more about Bobby than he really intends, which added to what we’ve already seen of his parents, will tell us everything we need to know.

That’s not very good, but you see what I mean. It’s not the easiest way to tell the story, but as I said, I find it can be very effective–an example can hit you in a way a simple statement doesn’t. They both have their place, but the implying rather than stating is an important skill.

Write your story in the voice it seems to need, and when you’ve got things to tell the reader that don’t fit the voice, try and see if you can demonstrate rather than tell the information. that’s what I’d recommend.

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To make a decision for how to write your story, I would definitely begin with the needs of the plot.

Does the plot require you to describe action in more than one place at a time? Does it require the reader to become aware of the subtext behind the actual quoted statements of the characters? If so, first person story-telling becomes problematic; consider third-person.

Watership Down is told in a third person style that does not require a high level of omniscience. The rabbits in the book do not require much more than some basic biological behaviors; the rabbits do not have sarcasm or irony or hidden motives or ulterior designs. What a rabbit says (in Adams’ book), that rabbit means. When Fiver says he is frightened but he doesn’t know why, Adams asks the reader to take this at face value. When Hazel is confused and isn’t sure what to instruct his followers to do next, Adams tells us so. Limited omniscience works because the rabbits do not pretend or lie or be other than what they are. (Perhaps this is why the stories of El-ahrairah are so enchanting to the rabbits.)

It is a similar technique – but for opposite reasons – used in writing a whodunit or mystery. The author wants to keep the reader guessing, so he plays his cards close to the vest. He keeps his characters’ motivations secret to the degree necessary to conceal the true criminal until the last possible minute. The author limits his own omniscience so the reader is left with only specific physical clues (and cues). This way he can control the flow of information to the reader.

Also consider Carl Hiaasen, who writes more of a satirical thriller. In Hiaasen’s stories, we know who the villain is and what he is doing at all times, how the villain thinks, and what the villain wants. When the villain’s plans begin to go bad, we see the villain’s reaction. By contrast, however, we often don’t know what the villain or the hero is going to do next. This way, the plot unfolds as a surprise, and we get to sit in gleefully on the villain’s shoulder as his entire plot disintegrates around him. Hiaasen’s books are a guilty pleasure because we get to watch how the actions of the hero cause the villain to suffer ironic and poetic justice, while we cackle with mirth at his suffering.

But in The Lord of the Rings we almost never see into Sauron’s heart. We don’t know what Sauron is up to, except through interpretations of other characters. Gandalf is convinced Sauron will do one thing; Denethor is convinced of something else; Saruman has his own beliefs of what Sauron will likely do. Similarly, in The Belgariad we never know what Torak or his minions are up to; and in Asimov’s I, Robot we are not told why the various robots malfunction or what they are “thinking,” only the behaviors they exhibit externally.

So the question becomes one of plot, as I said. What information must you tell your reader in order to tell the story in the most satisfactory way? If you must communicate multiple simultaneous remote events, first person will be difficult. If you must communicate subtext, hidden agendas, emotions – not necessarily all of them, but some of them – then third person omniscient (or mostly omniscient) will probably work best.

Also, I don’t advise that you make up a brand new kind of mixed-first-and-third-change-on-the-fly perspective until you have mastered the straightforward perspectives. It’s not easy to do, and as the first-person or third-person-omniscient ground has been trod before, there’s plenty of good examples to follow.

FISH

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I think others have said this, but I’ll try and put it in a few words: you can get away with something that feels like first person omniscient if you’re talking about an event in the narrator’s past, usually distant past (like The Wonder Years). You can totally eliminate drama with that style if you’re not careful. I realize, as I’m putting this style down, that The Great Gatsby and Lolita are both written that way, and I love those two books. I think it’s hard to write that way and not just lay everything on the table. I agree with Bren Cameron that that style makes it easy to just state everything, which is not a good thing.

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This is technically known as a frame story, although it is colloquially known as a “bar story” because so many of them involve tales told to others in a bar or similar setting.

It was an extremely popular style in the late 19th century, but it makes for a static and stiff telling of a tale. In fact, many times it became the sort of bad example of a story that the adage “show, don’t tell” was invented for.

People still write this style today, but mostly only when they are going for a deliberately archaic tone. One recent example is Neil Gaiman’s “Closing Time” in the McSweeney’s Mammoth Treasury of Thrilling Tales anthology.

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Maybe I’ve been taught differently, but I know 3 different styles of “third person,” one of which sounds like what you want.

First is completely omniscient. The narrator knows the thoughts of every character.

Second is limited omniscient, where the narrator only knows the thoughts of one or two characters. This is a cross between first person and third - you can cut to other scenes, show them, but still only delve into the inner workings of the one character you generally follow.

Third is objective, which is purely what you can detect with sight, hearing and smell. Taste and feel are generally too subjective for this style.

20

Not only, that, the narrator rather smugly talks about how peaceful death is and how we’re all going to learn that, someday.

Sunset Boulvard beat it by fifty years, though.

I’d give one word of advice about writing third-person omniscient, though: only concentrate on one character at a time. Give them each chapters so you can spell out their backstories and motivations and whatnot. Don’t try to get in the heads of two characters at once. Ayn Rand was bad for stuff like that, having two characters argue along the lines of (paraphrased):

Oy.