First person present is spoken of glowingly. Typical:
quote: The advantage of first-person POV (writers usually refer to point of view as POV, so let's call it that) is that it establishes the greatest immediate intimacy with the reader. (Sol Stein, Stein on Writing Stein On Writing
(Doesn't that make it sound a lot easier than it is?)
Sometimes the small print mentions that some readers hate it.
The two standard criticisms are (1) first person present is limited, and (2) the same effects can be achieved in third person past, presumably by accepting the same limitations.
Which seem to cancel each other out.
One of my questions is, as reader what is your POV when reading first person present?
Posted by EmmaSohan (Member # 10917) on :
In the following the author creates the Reader POV that the character is talking to me.
Surely that character is not real, though the author might want to create that illusion, and the character is not really talking to me, though the author deliberately created that illusion too.
I try to avoid that as much as possible.
If the character is talking to me, I can't be inside the character's mind. Right? Or at least it doesn't suggest that for me.
quote:I want to be awful. I want to do awful things and why not? Dull is dull is dull is my life. Like now, it's night, not yet time for bed but too late to be outside, and the two of them reading reading reading with their eyes moving like the lights inside a copy machine. When I was helping put the dishes in the washer tonight, I broke a plate. I said sorry Ma it slipped. But it didn't slip, that's how I am sometimes, and I want to be worse. Awful is easy if you make it your one and only. (mathilda savitch, Lodato)
The time clock is also off, but that seems to go with the character talking to the reader.
Posted by extrinsic (Member # 8019) on :
My reader Standpoint for first person, present tense varies by form, type, mannerism, and subjective-objective axis. Creative nonfiction is the domain of personal essay and all but wants first person exclusively, tenses optional, includes New Journalism. Fiction neither mandates nor excludes first person, present tense narrative point of view.
Mannerisms affect my Standpoint, how adept does a given writer work first person magics? More than half of first person fiction, to me, falls short of mannerism's challenges. Too much unnecessary narrator filtration and self-surrogacy, foremost. Syntax aptness is the preeminent mannerism shortfall. I, me, my, mine, or we, our, ours, and ourselves, trivial, excess, and unnecessary personal persona presence's syntax subject in too many, most, or all sentences and static voice of the third degree.
I see, hear, touch, smell, taste, feel, stand, sit, walk, reach, and so on, my home, or whatever, irrespective of tense, overly static stasis state of being, writer vanities of self-idealization and self-efficacy surrogacy, and narrator filtration.
First person, present tense's greater strength is subjectivity open for reader interpretations, period, compared to the several dozen or so other narrative points of view, which proportion greater objectivity degrees. Writers who under-realize, if at all, that subjectivity modality and appeal, do not work first person, present tense magic.
For me, a yet greater first person, present tense subjectivity appeal is if a first narrator-viewpoint agonist is by degrees unaware of the true circumstances which are contested. Not per se unreliable narration, which is by design, contrivance, or happenstance untrue and concealed, (The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, Agatha Christie), rather, a persona who is true yet oblivious to truth at first and through to a pivotal realization and consequent reversal.
More appeal yet if each of the several wanted dramatic pivots each occasion a persona's personal truth realization revelation and reversal (peripeteia, anagnorisis) -- up to, say, the seven or so pivot occasions. Outset crisis, incitement crisis, realization crisis, climax crisis, tragic crisis, reversal crisis, denouement crisis, each of which also applies to any narrative.
Rare though truth unrealized might be in many narratives, if that modality is deftly managed, then yet more appeal from dramatic irony. Readers become aware and soon enough know, writer knows, must know and intends, dramatic contestants do not, despite tangible want and problem satisfaction outcomes or not, otherwise truth oblivious even unto an outcome.
[ May 23, 2019, 09:50 PM: Message edited by: extrinsic ]
Posted by extrinsic (Member # 8019) on :
quote:Originally posted by EmmaSohan: In the following the author creates the Reader POV that the character is talking to me.
Surely that character is not real, though the author might want to create that illusion, and the character is not really talking to me, though the author deliberately created that illusion too.
I try to avoid that as much as possible.
If the character is talking to me, I can't be inside the character's mind. Right? Or at least it doesn't suggest that for me.
quote:I want to be awful. I want to do awful things and why not? Dull is dull is dull is my life. Like now, it's night, not yet time for bed but too late to be outside, and the two of them reading reading reading with their eyes moving like the lights inside a copy machine. When I was helping put the dishes in the washer tonight, I broke a plate. I said sorry Ma it slipped. But it didn't slip, that's how I am sometimes, and I want to be worse. Awful is easy if you make it your one and only. (mathilda savitch, Lodato)
The time clock is also off, but that seems to go with the character talking to the reader.
That's first person reflective, narrator self-reflections, a common personal essay convention.
If a reader chooses a Standpoint of being narrated at, so be it. However, first person reflective addresses a dramatic thought soliloquy to the self, and the reader Standpoint is vicarious witness access to the self's interior life.
The story clock time stalls for thought; the narrative clock time continues per reader content reading and comprehension rates. U.S. English read and comprehension average rates are one hundred fifty words per minute and seventy-five percent comprehension. Those above hundred or so words -- about two-thirds of a minute narrative time. Story time, about an eyeblink's indefinite span. Comprehension could be compromised due to several syntax glitches, two flat repetition gimmicks, sans amplification, and missed punctuation marks in the excerpt, though patent stream of consciousness.
[ May 23, 2019, 09:55 PM: Message edited by: extrinsic ]
Posted by Jay Greenstein (Member # 10615) on :
quote:The time clock is also off, but that seems to go with the character talking to the reader.
If this is what I think it is, an authorial interjection of information between live scenes, to show something necessary, but not worth a scene of its own, it's rubber-banding time and sewing two scenes together.
In third person it would be the same: the author talking to the reader for informational purpose.
Posted by EmmaSohan (Member # 10917) on :
Okay. Imagine an author has decided to follow just one character for the book, and to present the thoughts of that character and no other character.
Now what is the difference between first person present and third person past?
Extrinsic, is the first person present still reflexive? ("I thought I was going to lose." "John thought he was going to lose.")
Is there any difference in objectivity when the narration is the thoughts of the focal character?
Posted by extrinsic (Member # 8019) on :
quote:Originally posted by EmmaSohan: Okay. Imagine an author has decided to follow just one character for the book, and to present the thoughts of that character and no other character.
Now what is the difference between first person present and third person past?
Extrinsic, is the first person present still reflexive? ("I thought I was going to lose." "John thought he was going to lose.")
Is there any difference in objectivity when the narration is the thoughts of the focal character?
"I thought I was going to lose." Note the second clause's tense is past progressive future infinitive. Future tense is often subjunctive mood: subjective. Note the first clause's "thought" tag, tagged direct thought, though a paraphrase there. Thought is often reflective or reflexive, if interior of a self's thought.
"John thought he was going to lose." is an external observation of an internal reflection, tagged indirect thought, paraphrase, somewhat more objective than the prior, though due to the second clause's subjunctive mood still a greater weight of subjective to objective.
Not much substantive subjectivity difference or appeal strength for either, and more or less narrator tells either way. A stronger reality imitation show appeal might adjust persona syntax from subject to object, and add dramatic and personal idiolect contexture. And as well use preferred subjunctive mood constructs. Maybe -- huh, objective evidence details, emotional texture, and apt tense sequence, plus, locate the more emphatic idea at sentence end.
//Thoughts he would lose another scavenger hunt to Mikey and his posse bummed John out.//
//Thoughts I would lose another scavenger hunt to Mikey and his posse bum me out.//
Note "thoughts," now a plural noun instead of a verb.
Still tell (narration), though; partial tension reliefs, reflective conclusion segments of a tension entrainment sequence. Show would locate in-scene John or I's tangible, indicative mood, objective realization Mikey and them might win, through tangible and overt objective evidence external sensory details -- maybe John sees Mikey's posse carries more treasures than John's and is farther ahead along the physical journey (tension setup), and Sensation and Emotion instead of Narration mode, DIANE'S SECRET modes -- and John or I's likewise tangible responses to that realization, perhaps a temper tantrum, a tirade, or an angry gesture, etc. (tension relief delay); meantime, leaves open John might win after all (subjectivity, for full tension relief later).
Again, subjectivity occasions greater prose appeals compared to objectivity, that is, reader inferable subtext congruent and opposite to a viewpoint persona's actualities (indicative mood, objectivity) and anticipations (subjunctive mood, subjectivity).
[ May 24, 2019, 08:29 PM: Message edited by: extrinsic ]
Posted by Jay Greenstein (Member # 10615) on :
quote:Now what is the difference between first person present and third person past?
No difference because in both cases someone not on the scene is talking about what's happening, while using whatever tense and person they think best. The one living the story is living it in their present, no matter what the narrator uses. And they, not the narrator, are our avatar.
quote: Okay. Imagine an author has decided to follow just one character for the book, and to present the thoughts of that character and no other character.
Makes no difference. You still present the thoughts of the other people, in the estimation of the protagonist, through observation and speculation. For example:
Sid's smirk as he made that promise said there was no way in hell he meant it.
That smirk is what the protagonist notices. And since our protagonist is making his/her decisions based on their conclusions—not if Sid actually will (or plans to) keep the promise—that's how we should know the thoughts of the others in the story.
Since a story takes place in the now of whoever is the protagonist of that scene, it matters little of only one, or many characters take their place as the protagonist for a time.
Posted by EmmaSohan (Member # 10917) on :
Can a passage could be translated from third past to first present?
It's an interesting test. I think the normal assumption is no change. This is first past to first present. Note the verbs.
quote:Somewhere above, the helicopter's whup-whup-whup matched the beat of my heart. When I was in the Army, it was a comforting sound. (Crais, The Promise)
Somewhere above, the helicopter's whup-whup-whup matches the beat of my heart. When I am in the Army, it is a comforting sound.
Almost makes you want to argue with the translation, right? In the original, at least technically, "was" should be "had been." But I normally wouldn't notice, and it's really a tiny annoyance.
The same mistake then appears in first present translation, but now it's jarring. (He is no longer in the army.)
I am thinking that readers do not pay a lot of attention to past versus past of the past (past perfect in English). Both dump events in the past. But the difference between present and past is obvious, so the author has to get that right.
Posted by EmmaSohan (Member # 10917) on :
quote:Originally posted by extrinsic: //Thoughts he would lose another scavenger hunt to Mikey and his posse bummed John out.//
I think this is ambiguous in past tense, because the tense we use for future of the past is also used in the conditional. (I can't find terms.) So it could also be translated into present as:
//Thoughts I will lose another scavenger hunt to Mikey and his posse bum me out.//
You had: //Thoughts I would lose another scavenger hunt to Mikey and his posse bum me out.//
It's your sentence, so you would know which meaning you wanted in the original. It's just, when I talk about the potential for confusion in tenses when the POV is past tense, this ambiguity could be a problem for the reader.
Posted by extrinsic (Member # 8019) on :
//Somewhere above, the helicopter's whup-whup-whup matches the beat of my heart. When I am in the Army, it is a comforting sound.//
The word-for-word tense translation doesn't work for the second sentence. That shows that some tense changes want recasts. Actually, such a recast exercise shows several shortfalls of the as is sentence. Omission of "When" is a simple recast, and a semicolon instead of the comma separation. Plus, the "it was" syntax expletive wants recast, too, and the clauses flipped for logical causation, then, separate sentences.
//The sound is a comfort. I am in the Army.//
Back to past tense:
//Somewhere above, the helicopter's whup-whup-whup matched the beat of my heart. The sound was a comfort. I once was in the Army.//
Still trivial static voice to be verbs regardless.
Will, shall, and would, vary from realis mood indicative, to irrealis imperative, to subjunctive, respectively, dependent upon context and texture of those auxiliary verbs and main verbs.
Some examples of grammar mood helper words, no true mood word inflections per Modern English, except indicative mood sans helper words:
Realis, indicative: will
Irrealis moods
Subjunctive: would Conditional: if Optative (wish or desire): if only, would that Imperative: must, shall Jussive (optative-imperative meld, prescriptive): should, ought Potential: might, may Hypothetical: could have Inferential: might have
Deontic (potentially able): should, could, may Epistemic (possible or possible yet ill advised): may have
Interrogative is questions
And, of course, numerous overlap potentials. Modern English's three distinct grammar moods are indicative, imperative, and subjunctive. Any other mood is as much a matter of construction as intent and interpretation.
Simple past tense is a metaphor for simple present tense, just this immediate now moment happened, and as wanted for objectivity enhancement compared to simple present's subjectivity enhancements. The abstract cognitive inversion thereof, though, is a challenge for less experienced writers and readers.
//Thoughts he would lose another scavenger hunt to Mikey and his posse bummed John out.//
Dynamic voice thought time span, now definiteness and objectivity, albeit John's subjective truth, though open-ended time span for the bummed emotional state, and intimates stronger efforts wanted and contest forces increased: want and problem antagonism and motivation. Thoughts done; bummed continues until John thinks he might win or knows he will win or accommodates to the loss.
"would" Webster's past tense of "will" though "6 --- used in auxiliary function [subjunctive] to express probability or presumption in past or present tense"
Ten auxiliary grammar mood would functions, aside from past tense of will's seven verbal auxiliary uses.
Ambiguity and vagueness are, for prose, far apart. Artful ambiguity spans a greater meaning extent than a plain read of given words, in addition to, as well as, and more than a de dicto meaning, and sometimes most artful if ambivalent, too: two or more simultaneous, congruent opposite emotions. Vagueness of expression entails indistinct or altogether empty meaning conveyed.
Grammar mood, too, is a narrative point of view function of the subjectivity-objectivity axis, as well as a persona viewpoint function, irrespective of grammar person and tense.
[ May 27, 2019, 07:38 PM: Message edited by: extrinsic ]
Posted by EmmaSohan (Member # 10917) on :
Okay. Can third person past be translated to first person present? (Suppose there is a focal character, the story follows that character, and only that characters thoughts are described.)
Basically, yes.
Her heart slammed against her chest. (Double Homicide, Kellerman & Kellerman)
My heart slams against my chest.
DOES THAT CHANGE ANYTHING?
It certainly changes how things look. In the example above, she has just found a gun in her son's backpack. She is not going to be paying attention to her heart.
Do you ever think, "My heart hammers"? Wouldn't she feel it slamming? Wouldn't it be her rib cage? I guess from the author's perspective, that's her chest?
So, third past makes is easier for a writer to describe things the character would not notice or think about. Does that make the narration more powerful but less close?
Third past is more tolerant of an author's perspective rather than a characters? More powerful but less close?
It apparently makes it easier to replace progressive verbs with regular verbs. More powerful. Any problem?
[ May 26, 2019, 07:19 PM: Message edited by: EmmaSohan ]
Posted by Jay Greenstein (Member # 10615) on :
quote:Somewhere above, the helicopter's whup-whup-whup matches the beat of my heart. When I am in the Army, it is a comforting sound.
The translation is improperly done. The first sentence is intended to be in the protagonist's present, the second in their past, and so mist remain that way:
Somewhere above, the helicopter's whup-whup-whup matches the beat of my heart. When I was in the Army, it was a comforting sound.
Changing the tense you tell the story in isn't a matter of simply changing everything from past to present, or vise-versa.
Posted by extrinsic (Member # 8019) on :
Heart slams against chest, irrespective of person and tense, is a cliché, a paraphrase, a mime emotion, and a narrator tell.
More potent show would describe a viewpoint persona's objective evidence of a rapid and strong heartbeat, or more aptly another, more immediate and personal shock response, yet preserve subjectivity appeal. The instinct to use a verbal metaphor and overstatement are apt enough for subjectivity's sake, though stale and worn as is.
This is third person, close, limited's parameters, comparable to first person, by default close and limited: "only that [character's] thoughts are described".
Heart slams against chest translation from third person, past to first person, present demonstrates either narrative point of view's shortfalls of cliché and vanity descriptions substituted for viewpoint persona, objective, evidence-based detail descriptions.
Rapid and strong heartbeat is a last adrenaline, shock, fight or flight response and as common as breath among literature's corpus -- lacks personal uniqueness. A skilled writer would investigate more apt and personal responses to mental shocks.
A first, nonvolitional interior sensation (somatic sensation) might be first felt elsewhere and stronger: mind, stomach, groin, lungs, back of the neck. What's the stimuli cluster? wants asked, too. Menace, trust betrayal? Maybe first yet, what the handgun projects when discovered. Menace? What? Betrayal's insults?
However, the writer resorted to a cliché and mime shortcut instead. Economy of words? Shy of setup, therefore, little, if any, emotional payoff.
Third person, past, by default, accepts writer insertions, no more and no less than first person, present, or the opposite main tenses. A difference is third person narrator and viewpoint persona are separate personas and roles. First person narrator and viewpoint personas are one and the same persona and different roles.
Add to first person the often reader association of real writer self to narrator and viewpoint personas, a third dramatis persona and role of real writer. Implied writer role, too, if, say, a woman writer writes a male focal persona. Readers especially associate real writer personas to creative nonfiction personal essays, always first person narrative point of view, always real writer persona role as narrator and viewpoint personas and roles, too. Albeit, creative nonfiction and fiction first person little differ from each other, except for distinct aesthetic features.
"So, [-,] third past makes [it] easier for a writer to describe things the character would not notice or think about. Does that make the narration more powerful but less close?"
Less close, yes, though not per se more or less powerful. Prose's third person, past, close, limited's strength and magic is as little narrator insertion as practical, rare, if any, writer insertion, and what narrator participation is as an unfiltered pass-through, an invisible conduit, that is, for a focal viewpoint persona's received reflections, or reflexions, as a situation might want.
On another hand, a narrator's contributions, insertions, that is, might aptly express strong, or strongest attitudes (tone), and most powerful for the tone and of greatest appeal. Maybe even real writer or implied writer strongest attitude insertions, especially for creative nonfiction.
Perhaps the one substantial distinction between first person fiction and creative nonfiction: writer attitude contributions. Who is the strongest attitude holder? wants asked, too. If writer or narrator, then readers are meant to align with the strongest attitude holder: Standpoint rapport from tone's appeals. Narrator or writer role, or writer-narrator single role, selective omniscience is a variable middle distance to close narrative distance narrator access to a viewpoint persona. Remote, no; detached, no.
What a narrator might note and a viewpoint persona miss do not depend on narrator awareness, per se. Reader awareness, certainly, and often writer awareness, though not exclusively. Awareness is a function for subtext and one or more irony types. Henry James', The Turn of the Screw, 1898, is subtext and practical irony fraught, in which the governess's first person, personal misperceptions are reflected from her viewpoint. The governess's firm assertions of her narrated diary main action nonetheless reflects her unaware, biased perceptions and attitudes. Two frame stories and each's respective narrator also bookend one the other and the novella.
"It [third person, past?] apparently makes it easier to replace progressive verbs with regular verbs. More powerful. Any problem?"
Progressive tenses are natural auxiliaries of main present and main past. A consideration is whether a progressive tense predicate, participle, or gerund timely, judiciously suits an aesthetic function or two appeal more than a mere mechanical tic habit. "Any problem?" Yeah, too easy habit to use progressives to make up for and cover up temporal logic shortfalls: causation faults.
He ran downstairs, unlocking the vault door and rifling the contents.
Ing Disease, fused sentence, run-on train wreck. Cannot possibly be simultaneous actions: progressive tense causation faults.
Sequential same tense compound predicate clauses adjust for that fault type, plus, a distinct third clause affirms sequential actions. Still narrator tell, though, a paraphrase rather than verbatim, objective evidence detail, viewpoint persona received reflections. De dicto, too, no subtext or emotion, no subjectivity appeal. This below might do and work for a scene transition setup, or follow-through, delivery, or aftermath segment. Not much else worth the artful while, though.
//He ran upstairs, unlocked the vault door, and rifled the contents.//
Or
//He runs upstairs, unlocks the vault door, and rifles the contents.//
One other common tense "problem," fault, that is, progressive especially, is time sequence jumbled. Per sentence, tense sequence is clearest and strongest if one forward -- forward -- time direction only, from, say, most past pluperfect to present, or simple past metaphor; or from present, or past metaphor, to most future. Ideally, a sentence ought entail no more than two, maybe three tense times, also. The other way around, a now to a past time, or a future time to a now time, invariably causes a causation logic flaw, within a sentence.
Recollections notwithstood, which want a several-sentence transition sequence of at least two, maybe three time transitions, from a now setup to a now recollection delay to a past now delivery. And back again through a present now sequence once recollection completes.
And -- willy-nilly back and forth time in a sentence confuses time sequence causation logic and disrupts reader comprehension.
[ May 26, 2019, 10:57 PM: Message edited by: extrinsic ]
Posted by EmmaSohan (Member # 10917) on :
quote:Originally posted by Jay Greenstein:
quote:Somewhere above, the helicopter's whup-whup-whup matches the beat of my heart. When I am in the Army, it is a comforting sound.
The translation is improperly done. The first sentence is intended to be in the protagonist's present, the second in their past, and so mist remain that way:
Somewhere above, the helicopter's whup-whup-whup matches the beat of my heart. When I was in the Army, it was a comforting sound.
Changing the tense you tell the story in isn't a matter of simply changing everything from past to present, or vise-versa.
That translation should always work. Part of it is that when the protagonist's present is described in past tense, then the protagonist's past is supposed to be described in past of the past (past perfect).
So the first sentence has the wrong tense for "I was in the army." But it's difficult to notice in third person, so tenses can be used loosely. That's my guess. Do you see something different? There are other possibilties, but they all play out the same as far as I can see.
The next sentence apparently has the wrong tense too:
quote:Somewhere above, the helicopter's whup-whup-whup matched the beat of my heart. When I was in the Army, it was a comforting sound. The heavy pulse of rotors meant someone was coming to save your life. (Crais, The Promise)
Posted by EmmaSohan (Member # 10917) on :
quote:Originally posted by extrinsic:
And -- willy-nilly back and forth time in a sentence confuses time sequence causation logic and disrupts reader comprehension.
quote:I sped up as the school came into view, a telltale yellow bus lumbering away from the curb. The soles of my knee-high boots clicked against the concrete sidewalk. (Lois Lane: Fallout, Bond
Is that actually disruptive? First person past. "Clicking" makes a lot more sense.
Posted by extrinsic (Member # 8019) on :
"'I sped up _as_ the school came into view, a telltale yellow bus lumbering away from the curb. The soles of my knee-high boots clicked against the concrete sidewalk.' (Lois Lane: Fallout, Bond)"
Causation about as jumbled as can be, disruptive, part from dread "as" coordination conjunction fault use. Plus, first person's filters and vanities galore.
The first sentence's participle third clause "lumbering" is at least a possible simultaneous perception-action to "sped up" and "school came into view."
"clicking"? What, another participle clause added to an already run-on sentence and out of causal time logic itself? If a progressive tense instead of simple past, the sentence would be incomplete. Nonsensical fragment.
How do soles click? Tap shoes? Hobnails? Steel plates? Reinforced stiletto tips maybe. Those click, clack, rather, regardless of pace velocity, on hard surfaces.
Shortfalls of emotionally charged, objective evidence-based detail descriptions all around, and not even apt stream of consciousness expression -- just mere convenient composition habits and tics and too much vanity Keep In Touch (C.J. Cherryh) with the writer-narrator-viewpoint persona perspective efforts.
First sighted? The school bus? Then the school? First aural sensation, before the bus and school sighted? Heel clicks whenever the walk on concrete began. "I sped up" is static voice of the third degree and a writer-first person narrator filtered perception, paraphrased at that.
Whenever "as" is used, substitute when or while to test for conjunction aptness.
//I sped up when [while -- nope] the school came into view// when? √ And "as" is inapt, is for correlation, not for simultaneous circumstance coordination uses.
However, that test also illustrates the inverted causation and a not-simultaneous mistake: "sped up" and then "came into view." Nope, illogical. Best practice, a dependent clause precedes a main clause, at least for force movement's sake, if not for causation cause and then effect logic; also, here, reversed syntax to cause then effect defuses a mite of first person vanity.
//When the school came into view, I sped up//
Maybe shoehorn the participle clause between the two clauses?
//When the school came into view, a telltale yellow bus lumbering away from the curb, I sped up.//
Or first?
//A telltale yellow bus lumbering away from the curb, when the school came into view, I sped up.//
What to do with the second sentence? Maybe tacked on participle?
//When the school came into view, a telltale yellow bus lumbering away from the curb, I sped up, my knee-high boots' stiletto soles clacking _faster_ against sidewalk concrete.//
"faster" to express a more definite time aspect of now and forward a faster pace.
Or single sentences in their apt causal sequence?
//The school came into view. A telltale yellow bus lumbered away from curbside. I sped up. My knee-high boots' stiletto soles clacked faster against sidewalk concrete.//
Still vain writer tell narration and wants so very hard to be viewpoint persona show reflections. That narration tell type is a common handicap for first person; because it's first person, writer narration tell is an all too convenient resort and, most of all, misses wanted occasions for artful and dramatic self-characterization.
Try an evaluation of a first person short story that the writer-narrator narration isn't vain and self-filtered, one that contains very few first person pronouns and is about a Specimen observed, through the observation reveals as much or more about the first person writer-narrator (subtext) as about the Specimen, mindful, writer insertions are ample and present, too, if not altogether writer-centered composition and narrative point of view.
The text contains first, second impersonal direct implied reader address, and third person, first person main, though more third person sentences; pluperfect past, perfect past, past, present, and future tenses, past tense main; main indicative mood objectivity emphasis, subtext subjectivity appeals; of every auxiliary to main narrative point of view facets; middle to close distance writer-narrator-reader Standpoint rapport alignment, remote to middle distance access to viewpoint persona, and overall a classic and model story of the anecdote tell type.
The worth of study thereof is how a narrative point of view takes all grammar persons, tenses, moods' objective-subjective axis indicators, and degree of narrator-writer and viewpoint persona access variants and auxiliaries. Albeit, O Henry's mannerisms are apropos of traditional writer-centered tell narration: outdated and out of vogue.
O Henry, "The Gift of the Magi" (American English, US State Department hosted PDF text).
Other O Henry anecdote tales available from the above site number fourteen, plus several other classic model US fiction stories and novels.
Compare and contrast O Henry's outdated mannerisms to, say, present day mannerism currency, likewise first person, Denis Johnson, "Car Crash While Hitchhiking," and Mark Richard, "Strays."
I've studied the pratfalls and strengths of distinct narrative points of view for years, mainly, to grasp the challenges and essentials of third, close, limited, and compared to first person's. At last, part due to concepts and methods gained from exhaustive study, and these several EmmaSohan interrogations and investigations and other discussions here at Hatrack, the ends I desire are within daylight sight.
[ May 28, 2019, 07:47 PM: Message edited by: extrinsic ]
Posted by extrinsic (Member # 8019) on :
quote:Originally posted by EmmaSohan: The next sentence apparently has the wrong tense too:
quote:Somewhere above, the helicopter's whup-whup-whup matched the beat of my heart. _When_ I was in the Army, it was a comforting sound. The heavy pulse of rotors meant someone was coming to save your life. (Crais, The Promise)
"When" is the operative word for the grammar mood's irrealis aspect and objective case verb "was". No longer Army from some indefinite past time, nor now or forward: "When I was"
"When I was" governs "comforting sound" and "was coming". Indefinite past time, not a perfect past time, a conditional "when" past time: irrealis mood.
Note an apt past to future tense sequence stream, and force movement:
"The heavy pulse of rotors meant someone was coming to save your life."
"meant": simple past "was coming": past progressive "to save": future infinitive.
Though, for me, too much unnecessary to be static overall.
Posted by EmmaSohan (Member # 10917) on :
I think the Gift of the Magi is a little out-dated, and I am trying to read around that.
When I change it to first person, which helps me spot time and tense errors, I'm not finding any. That's very impressive.
O. Henry uses third person. There are moments where we do not know what Della is doing (and we probably would in first person). One is her bright eyes.
However, while I could understand the art and see the appeal, those moments lagged for me. I am definitely want the inside-the-mind experience. (This is the first story in a year that I have found that I thought seriously deserved rewriting.)
He uses the detached third person to describe the room. But the use of the mirror is an interesting first/present technique, right? Describing the main character is easy in third person, but it still stops the scene clock.
[ May 29, 2019, 02:08 PM: Message edited by: EmmaSohan ]
Posted by extrinsic (Member # 8019) on :
O Henry's scene clocks never tick. They're more or less stopped. O Henry's use of the mirror is as first person writer-narrator-external observer-centered, after-the-fact report, and, anymore, a worn-out mirror cliché, though revitalized. Albeit, the bulk of the composition is third person, past, the main person is first, past overall, and the "looking-glass" descriptions are mixed past perfect, past, and present tenses.
Much or all of O Henry's four hundred or so short works could do with Imitation and Fable updates, the progymnasmata rhetorical exercises: imitate the mannerism or dramatic movement, or both, and recast from indirect discourse (paraphrase: exegesis) to direct discourse (verbatim, reflected, objective evidence-based detail descriptions: mimesis).
How to renew and reboot "The Gift of the Magi" is a heady task. One, most relevant, is how to achieve the surprise outcome appeals yet alter the dramatic situation to a fresh and lively original. Least challenge, great challenge nonetheless, would locate Bella and Jim at greater personal contention between each other. Plus, updated to contemporary private social life realities, rather than the Magi's idyllic Romanticism emphasis.
What? Jim wants a gift Bella knows about and could never achieve and vice versa? Places their natural human vice and folly conflicts forefront. A surprise outcome would be how each actually gives modest gifts that are within each others' means, more apropos for the thoughts behind them, and of greater personal meaning, usefulness, and appeal. Or, my preference, equal, timely personal serendipity of the gifts yet preserve the substantial aspects of the surprise outcome: self-sacrifice counter to each's gifts and delayed gratification.
Surprise self-sacrifices counter to each others' desires (hair comb for hair too short to wear the comb, hair sold for the watch chain for an absent, hocked watch, which paid for the comb), gratification delayed, yet serendipitously satisfied anyway. Maybe change the sexes, whatever. Plus, consider fantasy and science fiction fantastic motifs. Meantime, an altogether different overall personal moral truth discovery message for most originality appeal.
[ May 28, 2019, 11:27 PM: Message edited by: extrinsic ]
Posted by EmmaSohan (Member # 10917) on :
quote:Originally posted by extrinsic: O Henry's scene clocks never tick. They're more or less stopped. O Henry's use of the mirror is as first person writer-narrator-external observer-centered, after-the-fact report, and, anymore, a worn-out mirror cliché, though revitalized. Albeit, the bulk of the composition is third person, past, the main person is first, past overall, and the "looking-glass" descriptions are mixed past perfect, past, and present tenses.
It's all third person POV. Unless you count the author's reference to himself ("While the lady of the home is slowly growing quieter, we can look at the home." But I take that as a given for third person POV. My definition of first person POV is "I" referring to a character in the story.
The Scarlet Letter (Hawthorne): We have a matter of business to communicate to the reader.
The scene clock has to be on for dialogue, and it's on a lot for The Gift of the Magi
Well, I want to make the reader cry; O. Henry was a master of clever, so that's a good part for me to steal. And, still off-topic, rewrites are a great exercise.
On topic, an interesting part is where we don't know what Della is doing. My first draft idea follows. To my surprise, I found myself following that, but making things clearer that the reader doesn't know and sharpening the hint.
quote:I study my face in our cheap mirror. I am presentable. And then I see the answer. My hair would make a queen jealous. It's... [hair description] Another tear comes out of my eye. Apparently I had one tear left. I kiss the image of my hair in the mirror, grab my coat and hat, and go out into the world to get Jim a Christmas present.
quote:Suddenly she turned from the window and stood before the glass. Her eyes were shining brightly, but her face had lost its color....She put on her old brown coat. She put on her old brown hat. With the bright light still in her eyes, she moved quickly out the door and down to the street.
Note also that old brown coat and hat are lovely details, and I wanted them in my story, but I couldn't fit them in my first person present story. (Or maybe I will find a way.)
[ May 29, 2019, 02:07 PM: Message edited by: EmmaSohan ]
Posted by EmmaSohan (Member # 10917) on :
I think extrinsic will like this.
quote:It was the screech that Hauk heard first. Grating. Terrifying. The red truck jerking to a stop right in front of their eyes. Don't Look Twice, Gross).
"Jerking" implies happening at the same time as the screeching. Which is true, but not the focal character's perspective. For that "jerked" works perfect -- it' something he experiences after the screech.
It continues:
quote:Then the man in the red bandanna leaning out -- not a man Hauk recalled later, barely more than a boy -- extending the short black cylinder as Hauk, unable to believe what he was seeing, stared at the protruding barrel.
So, the first description (short black cylinder) is from the focal character's perspective, and the second (barrel) is probably from the authorial perspective. In the same sentence!
There are other POV issues; those were really interesting.
Posted by extrinsic (Member # 8019) on :
Who narrates is the grammar person of a story, irrespective of auxiliary persons and quantity. O Henry personally narrates "The Gift of the Magi," and from only a few instances of first person pronouns.
quote:It was the screech that Hauk heard first. Grating. Terrifying. The red truck jerking to a stop right in front of their eyes. (Don't Look Twice, Gross.)
"It was" syntax expletive. Syntax expletives always give me pause. That one is trivial and unnecessary, though intended for accentual verbal emphasis and auxesis, sentence untimely sags instead.
The shortfall of the sentence's first clause is the singular subject placed in object position, "screech." The first clause's content becomes the second clause's subject if recast for apter diction and syntax, includes the viewpoint persona in sentence object position for dynamic and active voices. Locates the viewpoint persona in sentence object position and defuses name, self first vanity. "screech"? indistinct, could be eagle screech, fingernails on chalkboard, brake drums, motor torture, etc., nonspecific detail, albeit onomatopoeia.
//Tire and pavement squeals Hauk heard first.//
Still writer-centered narrator tell, and narrator filtered by "heard" main verb. Third person, close, limited wants viewpoint persona-centered reflections. Yet timely persona name introduction wanted nonetheless, which wants viewpoint persona in object location, after a predicate verb, or likewise from sentence object established in another short succession sentence so as to get and Keep In Touch with a viewpoint persona. Sensory detail descriptions best practice are given devoid of filter words and viewpoint persona sentence or clause subjects, like So-and-so sees, hears, touches, smells, tastes, stands, walks, emotionally feels, etc.
//Tires squealed on pavement.//
Yet wants the sudden surprise and force movement emphasis of the clutter-flop syntax expletive original. Plus, wants diction that characterizes the observer-viewpoint persona.
//Brakes screeched from a turnoff onto Exxon station pavement, jangled Hauk.//
Clearer, stronger, still a writer-centered tell, wants Hauk's emotional response shown instead of told. Say, startled, he drops the sandwiches and drinks he selected. The drinks burst and splatter.
The first two -ing words are apt enough sentence fragments. The third and its sentence are a non-brief incomplete sentence, a fragment, yes, though an Ing Disease tic, the short succession repeated -ing words aspect, not per se the other aspect of not-simultaneous action-events, and a missed occasion for a tricolon's force movement appeal, that is, an aesthetic function that supersedes the mechanical aspect, instead of a tapered off catacosmesis force sequence decrease. Fragments' prose strength and function are from brief, excited, strong, and clear someway emotional and forceful at least, exclamations.
"right in front of their eyes" is an indeterminate place, preposition shortfall more so, an idiom that intimates somewhere nearby enough though misses occasion for emotional overstatement and stream-of-consciousness persona characterization diction and, hence, clarity and strength.
//Grating. Terrifying. Jerking, the red truck stopped right to the front of their eyes.//
Ing words there are short succession two syllables, three syllables, two syllables, close enough for a loose tricolon's auxesis feature. Scaring or similar might substitute for "Terrifying" or three-syllable words substitute for "Grating" and "Jerking," either, for a regular tricolon and force emphasis.
quote:Then[,] the man in the red bandanna[,] leaning out -- not a man[,] Hauk recalled later, barely more than a boy -- extending the short[,] black cylinder as Hauk, unable to believe what he was seeing, stared at the protruding barrel.
More Ing Disease: short succession and unearned aesthetic. Both "cylinder" and "barrel" refer to a small handgun's snout, albeit a machine pistol. Unnecessary and trivial "Then" adverb, and out of place from its verb. Then belongs antecedent to the verb modified, never a standalone conjunctive adverb unless punctuation separated, and is always trivial. Missed commas. Unearned "the" definite articles' fake-forced force. Dread "as" coordination conjunction use. The interruption dashes are gimmicky and trivial, mimes apropos of formal essay functions though not prose's want for emotionally charged aesthetics emphasis. Another clutter-flop sentence. Nonetheless writer-centered narration.
Jumbled expression mistaken for stream of consciousness appeals are akin to any way willy-nilly photo album arrangements or motion pictures' gimmicky clip sequences for audience visual tension stimulation designs. The intent is to show a high-drama scene, of a fearful stroboscopic sensory reflection experienced by a viewpoint persona, yet writer-narrator filter insertion intrudes there.
//A man in a red bandanna leaned out, extended a snub-nose gun. Not a man, really, Hauk thought, little more than a boy. The short, black cylinder -- unbelievable -- the barrel borehole stared at Hauk.//
Albeit the thought tag is a writer insertion, near invisible otherwise, apt if timely and judicious for get or Keep In Touch functions.
Willy-nilly stream of consciousness, such as the above excerpts and others sampled for these discussions, the haphazard, everyday conversation habits and tics don't work for me. If an aesthetic function supersedes the happenstance mechanics, yes. As per, say, Denis Johnson, Jesus' Son, or Mark Richard, The Ice at the Bottom of the World.
For a rigorous narrative point of view study and guidance and attendant test bench narratives, see Wayne Booth, The Rhetoric of Fiction, 1961; Chapter Six, "Types of Narration," pages 149 - 165, and special focus for a third person, middle distance "psychic access," limited narrative point of view, Chapter Nine, "Control of Distance in Jane Austen's Emma," pages 243 - 266. Most of the book's text someway relates to the several who, when, where, what, why, and how aspects that a given writer and writers storytell narratives.
Mind that Booth is of the Chicago Rhetoric School of Thought, and which favors traditional writer-centered narration, little emphasis given for contemporary preference "non-narrated" narratives' viewpoint persona-centered, received reflections, which Seymour Chatman, Story and Discourse, 1978, someway explicates to a greater extent, though not as deeply as might be wanted for present-day and near-term future narration method studies. Booth: deep and obtuse first read, eases from subsequent reads and external investigations and contrasts and comparisons.
[ May 30, 2019, 05:40 PM: Message edited by: extrinsic ]
Posted by EmmaSohan (Member # 10917) on :
To hopefully say the obvious, there is no narrator. (Except audiobooks.) I think it always improves the discussion a little to talk about the narration instead of the narrator.
For example, sometimes it is said that the focal character in first person is the narrator. But that character is fictional.
A book sometimes tries to create the illusion of a narrator. Just as it tries to create the illusion that a world and the people in the world are really. But it's just an illusion created by the narration.
I worry that creating the illusion of a narrator would contribute to the "this is a book" Reader Perspective. That can be a good choice, I just don't think it's harmless.
Posted by extrinsic (Member # 8019) on :
Written word imitates oral narration, and since the ancient Greeks. Though written word is not aural, written word is as verbal as oral and aural expression. Audio books merely return to narrative's roots: from aural to written and to again aural. Creative discipline, thought, and imagination roles notwithstod.
Distinctions among aural oration-narration and written is vocal intonations and non-verbal language are challenges to translate into writing. Words and punctuation are the total of a writer's tools, no vocal intonation and no body language except what can be communicated through words and punctuation. A live, aural-oral narrator is not so restricted to such.
The participants in, contributors to, and performers of a written narrative are real writer, implied writer, narrator, viewpoint persona, narratee, implied reader, and real reader, without any one of which a narrative is a mere ink-blotted sheaf of velum, parchment, or foolscap leaves or codex.
No narrator? If a written-word narrative can be read aloud, the reader thereof is the narrator's stand-in. Narrative cannot be without narrators, overt or covert, or each by turns and degrees.
[ May 31, 2019, 07:43 AM: Message edited by: extrinsic ]
Posted by EmmaSohan (Member # 10917) on :
quote:Originally posted by extrinsic: ... No narrator? If a written-word narrative can be read aloud, the reader thereof is the narrator's stand-in. Narrative cannot be without narrators, overt or covert, or each by turns and degrees.
When I write a book, I try to avoid creating any illusion of a narrator, because I want to avoid the this-is-a-book reader perspective. If you insist on imagining a narrator for my story and that impairs your enjoyment, I feel like that's not my fault.
I suppose destruction implies a destructor, but the destructor could be in the past. Can the narrator be in the past and the narration in the present?
It seems too easy to ridicule the notion of narrator. Have you ever tried to do that? If Donald Sutherland replaces the narrator in the book (in an audiobook), then if I read a book aloud in an otherwise empty forest, do I replace the book narrator?
Do we know anything at all about the narrator? Male? Female? Verbal skills identical to what the author displays in the narration?
Again, there is no real narrator and it's not useful assume there is one.
Posted by Reziac (Member # 9345) on :
If you want to grok first person done right, go forth and absorb the Travis McGee novels.
My general dislike of first person (except for gumshoes, which seem odd in 3rd) was initiated by present tense (which contrary to popular myth does not create "immediacy", but instead most often produces a stop-motion effect), and solidified by the common tendency to static telling loaded with filtering: I'm not IN the POV's head; I'm being narrated TO by the POV character, and am constantly reminded that I feel and think and see stuff, just in case I forget whose eyes I'm supposedly looking out from.
It's distancing and annoying, especially with the tendency toward retrospective voice (which tells us what happened yesterday or last week, not what's happening NOW). It's given me a settled habit of "First person? Back on the shelf."
The best first person is so nearly indistinguishable from tight/close third that afterward, you can't remember which the book used. The worst is stiff and choppy, rivaled only by what I call RPG voice: third person present tense.
All can be done well, but in my observation first and present take more skill, and some natural voice, and are therefore more often done badly. And they tend to entrench a novice's bad habits, to such a degree that when I become dictator, every writing student will master third-past before being permitted to experiment with first or present. This will save a lot of beatings out behind the barn to correct unfortunate habits.
"It is very dark. You may be eaten by a grue."
Posted by EmmaSohan (Member # 10917) on :
First, do you happen to remember the names of any of those first person presents you didn't like?
I was just wondering if writers shouldn't learn to write in first person present before attempting third person past!
The question is, what limitations do you have to accept to achieve "tight/close" third? If that means describing things from the focal character's point of view, I suspect that happens more often in first present, but "deviations" are uglier, with third person past hiding them much better.
Posted by EmmaSohan (Member # 10917) on :
Filtering. (Broken metaphor? Camera filter? Water filter?)
It would seem to be needed when the narration does not reliably describe the character's current thoughts. That seems common.
What about in first person present?
quote:I feel like an idiot and I'm blushing.
I have no idea how to rewrite that without including the intruding "feel". The point is not that she's an idiot.
I use it as a typical way of technically not stopping the scene clock to describe the setting:
quote:I look around the lunchroom. There's ....
My favorite: Lot of intimations that Ruskin died, then...
quote: I see Ruskin's empty body lying on the floor.
I didn't want the reader focusing on Ruskin's body on the floor and reacting to that; I wanted the reader focusing on her feelings when she saw his body on the floor. I didn't want the reader puzzling over what an empty body was; I wanted the reader to understand that's how she saw a dead body.
I don't know exactly what I'm trying to say. Thanks to extrinsic and Reziac for using this term. It seems like "filtering" (there has to be a better word, right?) can be done badly. But you can say the same about adverbs, metaphors, and periods. And everything.
quote:Filtering forces the reader to step back and to watch the character, rather than the action. It moves the reader away from the events on the page. ( Emmert)
That is so biased. It assumes the events on the page are not the character's thoughts. If the events outside the character's head aren't important, then of course describe the events, not what the character is thinking. But then why are you writing in first present?
(And, still annoyed, on that page filtering gets rid of the large stones in sand. The filter removes the large stones from narration leaving only sand?)
Posted by EmmaSohan (Member # 10917) on :
Added. Is it still a filter in third person?
Lennie watched them go. (Of Mice and Men, Steinbeck)
Posted by EmmaSohan (Member # 10917) on :
I just checked a list of the top 10 songs of 2018 and they are all written in first person. In singing, first person refers to the singer. So it would seem to be especially limiting.
It could be because the pronouns are easier to handle. I am guessing it's because it makes the song more powerful.
I won't even bother checking, I know jokes are in third person. I'm guessing it's for the same reason only backwards -- the joketeller doesn't want the listener empathizing with the characters in the story. [Added: except self-deprecating jokes]
I know, if extrinsic leaves the discussion I'm probably on my own after this many postings. Sorry, I really have been trying to avoid posting.
[ June 10, 2019, 02:44 PM: Message edited by: EmmaSohan ]
Posted by Robert Nowall (Member # 2764) on :
Paul McCartney once said something about how he thought "She Loves You" was kind of a breakthrough because it wasn't an "I" song. (John Lennon once condemned this approach, as he evolved to where all his songs had to be about him.)
Posted by EmmaSohan (Member # 10917) on :
Interesting, partly because that song contains
I saw her yesterday
So even when he thinks the song is not about him, he still ends up in it!
I changed what I was writing to reflect the idea that singers naturally intrude themselves. I used Mack the Knife as an example. It's a story about Mack but it mentions "our boy".
Posted by Robert Nowall (Member # 2764) on :
Well, there are story songs, too---songs like "The Wreck of the Old 97" or "The Sinking of the Titanic," or, more recently, something like Bob Dylan's "Hurricane." Sometimes there's an "I" in it, often because the narrator / singer is a character in the story in the song---say, "The Battle of New Orleans," where it's told by one of Jackson's soldiers.
Posted by Reziac (Member # 9345) on :
I think songs wind up mostly in first person because that way they don't have to establish a character -- it's just assumed to be the singer. When you've only got a couple dozen lines to work with, economy matters. Also, probably easier to achieve a thrilling delivery that causes repeat listens and therefore increased sales, given that most singers don't have the storytelling power of Stan Rogers, or more recently, Sabaton.
"Our boy" to my ear indicates an omni narrator, which isn't quite the same thing, even when the narrator intrudes: He did this, and this, and this, and he even did this -- I tell you, it's true! That's more a framing device than a POV.
As to which first person present tense I didn't like... eh, pretty much any of it. I can only think of one writer (AFAIK unpublished) whose first-present I actually find comfortable (meaning it doesn't interfere with the pleasure of reading), and it's her natural voice, to the point that she doesn't write well from other POVs. (No, I don't recall who; was on Another Forum[TM] that I no longer frequent.)
As to the one that sensitized me to present tense... it was a 1970s[?] trilogy, mighta been by Jo Clayton; IIRC in third present. Ugh.
As to filtering -- basically it's anything where you tell the reader ABOUT the action, rather than writing the action directly. Sometimes it's necessary for proper perspective (but officer, I saw him do it! You were passed out on the couch and oblivious, but I saw her sneak out!) but most of the time it's just weasel verbiage: the writer is unsure that the reader is "getting it" so tries to emphasize what the POV character experiences, or whose POV it's from. To which I say: we know who's experiencing this, you don't need to TELL us that!
A favorite (real) example:
Tim sat down and appeared to relax.
Um... did Tim actually relax, or did he just LOOK LIKE he relaxed?
It can easily get ridiculous (and yes I've seen this done too):
He appeared to be walking quickly.
Er, okay... maybe he's actually levitating??
Posted by Jay Greenstein (Member # 10615) on :
Singing in first person?
It's a form of verbal storytelling, in that the singer's performance is central, both acting out the emotions and using vocal tricks for that. And in that situation, "this happened to me," is more personal, and engaging than third person.
On the page we have a full cast of actors, so the intrusion of a narrator among the actors kills a sense of reality.
Posted by EmmaSohan (Member # 10917) on :
quote:Originally posted by Robert Nowall: Well, there are story songs, too---songs like "The Wreck of the Old 97" or "The Sinking of the Titanic," or, more recently, something like Bob Dylan's "Hurricane." Sometimes there's an "I" in it, often because the narrator / singer is a character in the story in the song---say, "The Battle of New Orleans," where it's told by one of Jackson's soldiers.
Yes. Silent Night is also in third person. But the question is why "the Battle of New Orleans" is told by one of the soldiers. It didn't have to be.
Or, why Hurricane, which is very much a story, slips into first person.
quote:Couldn't help but make me feel ashamed to live in a land Where justice is a game.
I can't think of any writers switching to first person for commentary. There must be some, but it isn't our go-to POV.
But the bigger point is why first person dominates in singing. I think everyone is including "bigger emotional response" in their answer, one way or another. And that might have something to do with writing, or it might not -- they're use of first person seems different from ours.
Posted by Robert Nowall (Member # 2764) on :
Since "The Battle of New Orleans" (which has many more variant versions than the one sung by Johnny Horton) celebrates the victory in the battle, the "we" is appropriate.
As for switching to "I" in a story, if I recall right, Le Guin's "The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas" strays into "I" several times, though it's far from certain who "I" is.
Posted by EmmaSohan (Member # 10917) on :
I'm currently reading a book in first person and it's aligning with the criticisms I have been hearing but not understanding.
The book is constantly describing the focal character's thoughts and feelings. My books do that too. But in my books, the thoughts and feelings ARE the story. In this book, they aren't; they have nothing to do with the story.
It's like the author is imitating first person but misunderstanding what it's supposed to do.
The "filtering" becomes annoying because I don't care about her feelings.
Maybe if the author had created a more interesting focal character I wouldn't have this reaction. The focal character talks to the reader, which I also don't like. So everything is going wrong.
Posted by EmmaSohan (Member # 10917) on :
quote:Originally posted by Reziac:
As to which first person present tense I didn't like... eh, pretty much any of it. I can only think of one writer (AFAIK unpublished) whose first-present I actually find comfortable (meaning it doesn't interfere with the pleasure of reading), and it's her natural voice, to the point that she doesn't write well from other POVs. (No, I don't recall who; was on Another Forum[TM] that I no longer frequent.)
Every time I react badly to third person present, which seems frequent, I remember Mr. Mercedes (King). It doesn't bother me at all. (And I wish I knew why.) Does it bother you? The start after the prologue:
quote: Hodges walks out of the kitchen with a can of beer in his hand, sits down in the La-Z-Boy, and puts the can down on the little table to his left, next to the gun. It’s a .38 Smith & Wesson M&P revolver, M&P standing for Military and Police. He pats it absently, the way you’d pat an old dog, then picks up the remote control and turns on Channel Seven. He’s a little late, and the studio audience is already applauding.
He’s thinking of a fad, brief and baleful, that inhabited the city in the late eighties.
Posted by Reziac (Member # 9345) on :
Mr.Mercedes reads like stage setting for a play. Brief bits might be all right, but it does border on irritating -- partly because of the authorial intrusion in the middle:
It’s a .38 Smith & Wesson M&P revolver, M&P standing for Military and Police.
That breaks the fourth wall by halting to describe the gun to us, as if we need to know that right this instant (probably not. This sort of detail needs to be relevant to the story, not just the author basically bragging on their descriptive powers.)
And from that point on, it's more top-down omni than third -- it observes him, it doesn't act with him. I don't care about these trivial details of his life; they mean nothing to me.
In answer to something above -- POV can zoom in and out in both first and third. In first, it becomes the narrator telling us about somewhen or somewhere else. In third, it becomes omni.
The divisions can be and often are fuzzy. A good example of that is Rosemary Sutcliff's The Eagle of the Ninth. It's technically in omni, but feels like tight third. I've met readers who remembered it as being in first person. A good example of how one should concentrate more on a compelling voice, and not worry overmuch about nuances of POV. Readers don't care so long as it flows naturally from page to brain.
Posted by EmmaSohan (Member # 10917) on :
quote:Originally posted by Reziac: Mr.Mercedes reads like stage setting for a play. Brief bits might be all right, but it does border on irritating -- partly because of the authorial intrusion in the middle:
It’s a .38 Smith & Wesson M&P revolver, M&P standing for Military and Police.
Hmmm. Present tense locates the story in a present, and time doesn't stop there. So a stopped story could be annoying.
Past tense can be thought of as locating a story in the past. Time is stopped there. So in a way it makes sense that stopping the story would be less annoying.
Is that why stopping the action bothers you in present tense? I'm pretty sure stopping the story is more common in past tense, for exactly those reasons. (Or at least as common.)
[ June 19, 2019, 09:37 AM: Message edited by: EmmaSohan ]
Posted by EmmaSohan (Member # 10917) on :
quote:Originally posted by extrinsic: Simple past tense is a metaphor for simple present tense, just this immediate now moment happened, and as wanted for objectivity enhancement compared to simple present's subjectivity enhancements.
Does anyone know what happened to extrinsic?
I decided that present tense is about an imaginary present.
Present tense is schizophrenic. It too is usually considered to be located in a present. So it's just like present tense except for using a different verb tense.
But it's easy to slide into the idea that it's about an imaginary past. Pasts are much bigger than presents, and time doesn't move in the past like it does in the present.
So third person doesn't have a promise of being in a present, and sometimes authors talk about the story like it was in the past.
It took me a long time to get to that. I hope extrinsic is happily editing Wikipedia or something like that.
Posted by WarrenB (Member # 10927) on :
Been wondering the same thing about extrinsic, EmmaSohan... After such devoted engagement, it does seem odd that he's vanished. Will try dropping him a line.
Posted by EmmaSohan (Member # 10917) on :
Thanks. Weeks ago I tried sending an email to his email address here. No answer.
Posted by WarrenB (Member # 10927) on :
Yeah. I don't think he checks it. Just wait and see, I guess. In general, this place has gone awfully quiet all of a sardine.
Posted by Grumpy old guy (Member # 9922) on :
It happens from time to time. It'll get busy again.
Phil.
Posted by EmmaSohan (Member # 10917) on :
It's hard not to fear the worst about extrinsic. From my perspective, he was always here and active until he suddenly wasn't.
Posted by Grumpy old guy (Member # 9922) on :
He may be busy. He has other extensive commitments which may need his attention at the moment. I won't think worst case just because he isn't here.
Phil.
Posted by WarrenB (Member # 10927) on :
Yeah. It is a bit odd though. He seemed to find the time to post far more extensively than anyone else, even while up against editing deadlines. I hope he's taking a well-earned break or working on a project of his own. But there's little to be gained from speculation. Perhaps we'll find out at some point. Anyway, online anonymity makes any follow-up is virtually impossible. (Hmmm. Online... Virtually... Was that almost a pun?)