Sacrificing Grammar for Realism

 

One of the advantages of writing in the third person is that you can zoom in to the POV character’s thoughts or zoom out to an objective account. To use a not very good example, here is the same incident from the two ends of the spectrum.

Blasted sand. Hot and gritty. Annoying when wearing shoes, but unbearably painful in bare feet.

On the hottest day of the summer, an elderly man walked along the beach carrying his shoes and scowling.

I tend to write nearer to but not at the closest zoom-in point, reflecting the character’s thoughts without getting right into his head. To use the same incident:

Dave hated the beach, especially on such a hot day where the sand burned his feet. If his shoes didn’t pinch so badly, he'd put them back on.

Here we get insight into Dave’s emotions (he hated the beach), his physical discomfort (the sand burned his feet), and his motivation in going barefoot (his shoes pinched). Yet we aren’t quite in his head since he wouldn’t think of himself as “Dave” or “he.”

In using this point on the zoom spectrum, I try to include the POV character’s prejudices and wrong conclusions. For example, if Dave thinks his wife doesn’t love him, the narrative would say, “Millie didn’t love him,” even though she does. I don’t say, “he thought Millie didn’t love him” or put those thoughts in italics, because that would zoom me out further than I want to go.

On the other hand, I may not follow his thinking completely if the grammar would make me wince. I’m not talking about dialogue here, where the reader expects to hear it the way the character would say it. But what about in narrative that is supposed to match his thoughts?

That’s the dilemma I am facing in my current writing project. My POV character, Matthew, is self-centered. Instead of “Pa, Jackson, and me,” he would think of “me, Pa, and Jackson.” I’ve been doing it the way he would think it, but it makes me wince. Worse, it makes me wonder if the reader will put the story down because he or she thinks I don’t know my grammar. So what am I to do?

Fortunately, I still have time to figure it out.

Dueling Points of View

 

I’m trying something new with my current work. I had already completed the story of a twelve-year-old girl crossing the Isthmus of Panama with her family while heading to the California gold fields in 1850. However, Across the Isthmus is aimed at middle-grade girls, and I wanted to do something similar for boys.

The female protagonist in Across the Isthmus has a fourteen-year-old brother, so I am challenging myself by trying to write the same basic story from his point-of-view. Nobody sees the same events in the exact same way, and one POV character may concentrate on entirely different matters than another does. Still, if both narrators are reliable, shared scenes should contain a lot of similarities. Finding the right balance between “facts” and “perceptions” is a challenge, especially when it comes to dialogue.

Most stories (including mine) need dialogue to keep them interesting, and, of necessity, both books share some dialogue. As in real life, the two characters are unlikely to both remember the conversation word-for-word, but the contents at least should be close (again, given that they are reliable narrators). But when the characters don’t remember it the same, how much variation can I get away with?

That wouldn’t be a problem if I could be sure that the two books would have no common readers. They are being written for different audiences—one for girls and one for boys—but that is no guarantee that the same person won’t read both. I don’t want a reader to say, “That wasn’t what it said in the other book,” but I also don’t want the reader to toss the second book aside as unrealistic because the two characters have such great memories that they remember the conversation (and the facts) exactly the same way. This is a real dilemma that I am struggling with as I write.

The challenge is to find the line between making the stories different enough to account for the two points of view but similar enough to show them experiencing the same circumstances.

These types of challenges make writing hard work.

But they are also what makes it fun.

__________

The photo at the head of this post shows an 1850 painting by Charles Christian Nahl titled “Der Isthmus von Panama auf der Höhe des Chargres River” (“The Isthmus of Panama at the Height of the Chargres River”).

Using Multiple Points of View

I recently finished reading Bloomability by Sharon Creech. In it, one of her characters tells the story of two prisoners sharing a cell that has a small window. One prisoner looks out the window and says, “What a lot of dirt,” while the other looks out the same window and says, “What a lot of sky.”

As the story illustrates, everyone is different. My murder mystery has two point-of-view characters—a female detective and the victim’s daughter. Each needs her own distinctive character and voice. So how do I accomplish that?

The two POV characters have different educational and family backgrounds, and that plays into it. So do their individual interests and personalities and the way they react to stress. But even more important is to give them different speech patterns and dialogue quirks.

For example, the victim’s daughter is a college student whose mother was a lawyer, while the detective and her parents all have high school educations. Since the daughter is better educated and grew up with an eloquent mother, her dialogue and thoughts contain higher-level language. She uses metaphors and a more advanced vocabulary than the detective, who tends to use simple, direct sentences. But their adherence to grammar rules are not what you might expect. Since the daughter is comfortable with her use of language and status in life, she doesn’t feel bound to the traditional grammar rules. Instead, she uses some sentence fragments and often starts sentences with “and” and “but.” The detective, on the other hand, is very conscious of her lower class and wants to appear as educated as possible, so she follows traditional grammar rules unless strong emotion takes over.

The ultimate goal is to create characters so distinct that a reader can open the book in the middle of a chapter and, without any context clues, know whose POV it is in.

But making sure I get there is hard work.

__________

I took the photo in February on one of the Iles du Salut in French Guiana, which was the site of a famous French prison opened in 1852.

Don't Confuse Omniscient and 3rd Person Points of View

The other day I was watching the game show Common Knowledge when it had a question about point of view. The question went something like this: “Which point of view is it if the narrator knows what every character is thinking?” The choices were A) 1^st person, B) 2^nd person, and C) 3^rd person. I wanted to yell at the TV, “None of them, you idiots. It’s omniscient.” But I didn’t because I never call anyone an idiot even if they can’t hear me.

The host stated that the correct answer was 3^rd person because in that POV a story can have multiple narrators. Yes, it can, but that doesn’t make the original statement true. Even in multiple 3^rd person the current POV character doesn’t know what the other characters are thinking. And we never see inside the heads of the many secondary characters who don’t have their own POV sections.

Given the options, I would have chosen the answer the show was looking for because I would have assumed that they knew it wasn’t 1^st or 2^nd. Still, their wasn’t that unusual an error. Even experienced writers can confuse 3^rd person and omniscient.

I have never written a story using omniscient POV because it is too hard. Yes, you heard me. Some people assume it is easier because you don’t have the limitations of the other POVs, but that’s a trap. I have read my share of books where I can’t tell if the writer is attempting to use omniscient or 3^rd person. If omnisicient POV is done wrong, it looks like a multiple-third-person POV riddled with errors: a mistake rather than a choice.

Done right, omniscient immediately clues the reader into the POV.  It also helps to have a narrator with a distinctive voice, as in Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol. Or the narrator can tell us up front that he or she is telling a story that took place many years ago, as George Eliot does in Mill on the Floss.

But however it is done, a good writer will know and honor the distiction between the omniscient and 3^rd person points of view.

Can You See It? Creating a Movie with Words

When I read a good book, I see the characters and the setting and the action in my mind, playing much the way a movie does. But notice the adjective. Only a good book does that.

Today’s blog post discusses those elements that make a good book play a movie in the reader’s mind. As general categories, they cover “show, don’t tell,” action, and description.

Show, Don’t Tell

Objective: To keep the reader interested by showing those aspects of the story that are most important to plot and characterization and telling the rest.

Given that objective, the category may be misnamed. It would be more accurate to say “when to show and when to tell,” or simply “show versus tell.” However, the concept is usually described as “show, don’t tell,” so I’ll stick with that.

I’ve read many different definitions of “showing.” Some limit themselves to action, while others include descriptions of persons, places, and things that include enough detail to visualize the subject. Some definitions embrace entire passages that mix action with simple statements of fact, while others parse out the two. We won’t get into that debate here. For our purposes, if it helps you visualize the scene, it is showing. The best way to describe the difference is with examples.

TELLING: Brian kissed Karen angrily.

SHOWING: Brian grabbed Karen’s arms and gripped them as he smashed his lips into hers.

The writer should show only those aspects of the story that are significant elements of plot and characterization. Showing takes more space than telling does, and if a writer shows everything, the book will be massive. Massive and boring.

It’s impossible to do justice to this concept in the limited space I have here. You can learn more about it in the blog posts linked below.

For purposes of the rubric, the proper use of showing versus telling is worth 10% of the score.

Action

Objective: To use strong verbs and limit actions to those that either develop a character or move the story along.

There is a lot of overlap between this element and the previous one. Action is the strongest way to show. However, it deserves its own category.

There are two points here. First, a good writer will use strong verbs to convey the action at hand. Rather than walking slowly, a character could amble or shuffle along. Or instead of just blowing, the wind might gust or wail. This eliminates those pesky adverbs, too.

Second, we don’t want to hear every detail of the protagonist’s morning routine. If the fact that he had cereal for breakfast becomes important later, then tell us he had cereal for breakfast (a perfect example of when telling works best), but don’t show him pouring it into the bowl, adding milk, and taking a bite. Not unless those actions help develop his character or move the story along, that is. And if nothing about breakfast is important to the story, leave it out. You can find a more extensive discussion of this issue in a post I wrote for the Indiana Writers’ Consortium blog (linked below).

For purposes of the rubric, action is worth 5% of the score.

Description

Objective: To use strong nouns and limit description to that which is a natural part of the story.

The first part of the objective concentrates on using strong nouns. “House” doesn’t say much. “Shanty” and “mansion” do. This is also a good way to eliminate adjectives and tighten your writing.

Then there is the question of how much detail to provide, which may vary with the audience. Some people like to be spoon-fed with a complete physical description of every major player and location. When I was younger, I liked that too. Now I want just enough detail to give me the flavor or atmosphere and let me use my imagination to fill in the rest.

Of course, there are usually some items that are important to the story and need to be described. I’m currently working on a book that takes place during the Civil War siege of Vicksburg. The residents lived in caves, and the setting is crucial. If I left the cave description to the reader’s imagination, the reader would probably imagine something from his or her own experience, which would probably be wrong. So I described the cave and its furnishings, right down to the fact that there were quilts on the sleeping platforms instead of mattresses. But I didn’t describe the quilts, because that isn’t necessary.

Point of view is important here, though. If I had a POV character who loved quilts and examined every detail, then I’d bring the reader along as she did it. For example, “Charlotte ran her fingers over the outline of the log cabin pattern. The blue and green pieces brightened up the dark space, but how long could the quilt survive in the cave before the fabric became dingy and stained?” My character doesn’t think about those things, however, so I didn’t describe them for my readers.

Point of view also affects how the protagonist is described. A person doesn’t normally see himself unless he is looking in a mirror, and even then he might be paying more attention to shaving his face than to admiring it. Furthermore, the mirror trick is often a lazy writer’s tool that doesn’t sound natural. That doesn’t mean you can’t describe your protagonist, but you have to be creative.

For purposes of the rubric, description is worth 5% of the score, giving the movie aspects a total of 20%.

__________

TO LEARN MORE:

If you want more of my advice on these issues, here is a list of earlier blog posts.

Show, Don’t Tell:

·       The Greatest Show on Earth (March 9, 2015)

·       Writing Lessons from A Christmas Carol: Show Me, Too (December 14, 2015)

·       Flavor-Added Telling (October 2, 2017)

Action:

·       Brushing Teeth and Cleaning House (IWC Blog, September 18, 2013) ]

Description:

·       How Much Description is Enough? (IWC Blog, May 4, 2016) ]

·       Describing Characters (February 20, 2017)

Whose Story is It? Using Point of View Properly

Point of view errors can confuse readers and jolt them out of the story. That’s why the proper use of POV is an important element in evaluating fiction.

As a reader, POV errors drive me crazy, so you had better have a good story if you want me to finish the book. As a writer, using point of view correctly often spurs creativity, which, for me, is the most enjoyable part of the process.

The choice of a point of view character has a significant effect on the story being told. Imagine how Wuthering Heights would have changed if written from Heathcliff’s point of view and how different Gone with the Wind would have been in Melanie’s POV. However, that’s a creative choice and isn’t appropriate for evaluation.

The type of POV the writer uses is also a creative choice not appropriate for evaluation, but the way it is used is. Using POV properly involves two objectives, both included in this rubric.

Objective 1: To make it easy for the reader to identify the POV character and style.

If point of view is done right, readers may not even think about it. They just accept it as part of the story. But if it is done wrong, some readers can’t stop thinking about it, and not in a good way.

The most common types of POV are first person, third person, multiple third person, and omniscient. Each has its own limits and challenges.

When using first person and third person, the reader can only see, hear, and know what the POV character sees, hears, and knows. So the biggest challenge, and the one that gets my creative juices flowing, is figuring out how to bring in facts that occur outside the POV character’s experience. If she is standing in the library staring into the fire, she can’t see what is happening in the dining room, so your reader can’t see it, either. But maybe there is an argument in the dining room, and she hears it even though she doesn’t see it. Or somebody who was there reports it to her after the fact. Or maybe you are using multiple third person POV and a different POV character is in the dining room at the time. When using this last approach, however, you must be careful how you weave those scenes together. (More about that under Objective 2.)

This doesn’t mean the reader has to draw the same conclusions that the POV character does, however. As long as they are viewing the same events, they are free to interpret them differently.

Some people use omniscient POV (a narrator who sees and knows everything, including each character’s thoughts) to get around the limitations of first and third person. But omniscient POV has its own challenges, and I personally think it is harder to do right. And if it isn’t done right, it sounds like a sloppy third person POV.

I did a series of blog posts in 2015 discussing the different types of POV with their advantages and challenges. You can find those links below.

Objective 2: To use POV consistently and without awkward jumps.

Most writers know better than to mix first person and third person, but less-skilled ones often mix third person and a faux omniscient. This confuses the reader and may annoy her as well.

Readers also get confused and annoyed when the writer is in one person’s head and suddenly jumps to another person’s head within the same scene. In it’s worst form, it even occurs within the same paragraph. These POV jumps are awkward and can jolt the reader out of the story. Multiple POV can be a good choice, but only if each POV character has his or her own scenes.

But what about experimental fiction where a writer intentionally combines various types of POVs? There may have been a few successful attempts, but I’m not aware of them. And they certainly would be rare. Most of us are better off sticking with conventional POV forms and finding creative ways to deal with their limitations.

For purposes of the rubric, each objective is worth 5% of the score, giving POV a total of 10%.

__________

TO LEARN MORE:

If you want more information on point of view, here are links to my 2015 series.

·       POV Matters (July 6, 2015)

·       He, She, or They (July 13, 2015)

·       Playing God (July 20, 2015) ]

·       Near or Far? (July 27, 2015)

First or Third?

Several weeks ago, I read a chapter from my current work in progress to my writers’ group, and it sparked a discussion on point of view. Here is a sample from the manuscript.

     Fannie Stewart stabbed her fried chicken with a fork. “Why does Julia have to come here? Why can’t she stay with friends in St. Louis?”

     [The conversation continues for several paragraphs, and her mother reminds Fannie that it is only for six months.]

     Even one month with snobbish cousin Julia was too long. Julia, who thought she was so grown up. Julia, who looked down on Fannie.

     Six months would be unendurable.

This chapter is written from Fannie’s third person point of view. We know it is third person because the chapter identifies Fannie by name and uses third person pronouns—“her” in the example, but also “she” and “hers.” A first person point of view would use “I,” “me,” “my,” and “mine.”

But if you look at the last two paragraphs in the example, those are Fannie’s thoughts, not that of a neutral narrator. So shouldn’t I use first person or at least italicize Fannie’s thoughts?

No.

Both first person and third person have the same major constraint—the reader can only know what the POV character knows. But it is easier to get around the disadvantages of that approach when using third person.

In first person, you are stuck in the character’s head. But third person is like a camera that can zoom in and out. It can zoom in on the person’s thoughts in a way that tells the reader that it’s a close-up shot. No italics required.

Or if you want to keep a secret, you zoom out. The reader still only sees what the character sees but doesn’t hear the chatter in the character’s head.

Large jumps are disconcerting, but small ones are barely noticeable. In the example above, the first paragraph is middle-distance or less. We are sitting at the dining room table with her, but we judge her feelings by her actions and her words rather than reading her thoughts. But just a few paragraphs later, we do. That lens adjustment is restrained enough that the change works. Or at least I think it does.

After our discussion, I did experiment with rewriting my manuscript in first person, but it sounded unnatural. Besides, I wanted my characters to have a few secrets from the readers until later in the story. If you are inside someone’s head, readers expect you to be honest with them and tell them what the character is thinking all the time. There are a few tricks a writer can use, but they wouldn’t work in my story.

I’m glad I tried first person, though, because now it’s not the right approach for this book.

But maybe my next one will be in first person.

Near or Far?

Now that you have chosen a point of view, how closely do you want the reader to identify with the POV character or characters? Do you want us to look into their eyes and see their very souls? Or do you want to put some distance between us?

 

A distant POV is just what it says—distant. The reader views the character and his or her actions from across the room, seeing what any observant bystander does.

 

Middle distance is more like standing near the person. The reader can see the character’s expressions and guess what he or she is thinking or feeling, but it’s just a guess.

 

Close third person POV—sometimes called deep POV—takes the reader inside the character’s head. Readers know what the character is thinking and feeling as soon as it happens. And because we’re inside the character’s mind, the writer doesn’t have to use italics or say “he thought” or “she thought.” In fact, that ruins the moment. When you see an adorable baby coming toward you in a stroller, you don’t think, “I think that’s an adorable baby.” Your mind is much more direct. “What an adorable baby.” That’s the way it works for characters, too. And if you are trying to bring the reader up close and personal, use the character’s own wording. If he would use contractions or slang, put them in. If she uses stilted language when she talks, have her think that way, too—unless she’s pretending to be someone she isn’t.

 

Imagine that your POV character is a pyromaniac who just set a building on fire. Now he is standing nearby and watching it burn. These examples get increasingly closer.

 

A man stood in a doorway and watched the fire trucks arrive at the warehouse across the street. It had only taken them ten minutes, but the fire was already burning out of control.

 

As Marty watched the fire trucks arrive, a smile tugged at his lips. They had gotten there quickly, but the building was already a sheet of flames.

 

The colors were beautiful. The orange of the flames. The red of the fire trucks. Momma’s lime-green dress as she stood frozen at the top of the stairs. But nothing was as satisfying as her screams. Nine years ago now, and they were fading faster each time.

 

In the first example, we see what any observer can see, but we have to get closer to see the smile that wants to escape. And the last example takes us right inside Marty’s mind.

 

Playing with distance is like taking pictures with a zoom lens. Staying at the same setting all the time makes for boring pictures and, with some exceptions, for boring story-telling. Varying the distance can change the effect and add interest. But do it gradually or at a paragraph or scene break. Abrupt changes take your reader out of the story.

 

These techniques work well with third person and omniscient POV. They are less successful with first person since that POV puts the reader in the character’s head all the time. But there is still some room to play with distance. There was no “he” in the last example above, and it could be either first or third person. Adding “I” moves the camera a little farther away.

 

Now go out and write that novel. Experiment with different POVs and distances. Then choose what works best and do it right.

 

Because POV matters.



Playing God

Omniscient point of view is a little like playing God.

Imagine that the leopard in the picture is actually outside the fence, looking in. She is not involved in the action of the story, which occurs on this side of the wire. She can see the entire plot from beginning to end, and even before and after. She can also see into each character’s thoughts. If she uses all her knowledge when narrating the story, that’s an omniscient point of view.

Omniscient POV does not require the narrator to see things through a particular character’s eyes, and head-hopping within a scene is allowed. The writer talks to the reader directly rather than through one or more characters, although she might not identify herself as the writer. This POV was popular in the “olden days” of Charles Dickens and George Eliot but is mostly out of style now.

I said “mostly,” because some modern writers have used it very effectively. But here’s the rub, as Hamlet would say. If the omniscient point of view is done wrong, it looks like a multiple-third-person point of view riddled with errors: a mistake rather than a choice.

As a reader in the 21^st century, I find that the omniscient point of view works only if I am clued in immediately for a short story or within the first page or two for a novel AND before the first character in the story speaks. Here are some examples of what works. 

• Fairytales and folk tales tend to be told in omniscient point of view, as are some modern-day fantasies. The classic “once upon a time” clues the reader in.

 

• In Holes, Louis Sachar talks directly to the reader, and he makes sure you can’t miss it. After a short first chapter that describes Camp Green Lake but contains no dialogue and no defined characters, Sachar begins the second chapter this way:

     The reader is probably asking: Why would anyone go to Camp Green Lake? 

• In this example from Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, notice the clear author intrusion in the second paragraph. I’ll give you the opening paragraph as well.

     Marley was dead: to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that. The register of his burial was signed by the clergyman, the clerk, the undertaker, and the chief mourner. Scrooge signed it: and Scrooge’s name was good upon ’Change, for anything he chose to put his hand to. Old Marley was as dead as a door-nail.

     Mind! I don’t mean to say that I know, of my own knowledge, what there is particularly dead about a door-nail. I might have been inclined, myself, to regard a coffin-nail as the deadest piece of ironmongery in the trade. But the wisdom of our ancestors is in the simile; and my unhallowed hands shall not disturb it, or the Country’s done for. You will therefore permit me to repeat, emphatically, that Marley was as dead as a door-nail.

• Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone is less direct but equally effective. The first paragraph reads like this:

     Mr. and Mrs. Dursley, of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much. They were the last people you’d expect to be involved in anything strange or mysterious, because they just didn’t hold with such nonsense.

J.K. Rowling has planted at least two clues in that paragraph. First, it starts with “Mr. and Mrs. Dursley” rather than focusing on either of them, as is normally the case when using a third person point of view. (E.g., “Mr. Dursley liked to tell his wife that the Dursleys were a perfectly normal family, thank you very much.”) Second, the next sentence contains language they might use to describe themselves in appropriate circumstances but not before they knew something strange or mysterious was coming.

And if that isn’t clue enough, the fourth paragraph starts by addressing the reader (“our story”) and telling us something about the future—something that is clearly not within the Dursley’s knowledge at the time.

     When Mr. and Mrs. Dursley woke up on the dull, gray Tuesday our story starts, there was nothing about the cloudy sky outside to suggest that strange and mysterious things would soon be happening all over the country. Mr. Dursley hummed as he picked out his most boring tie for work, and Mrs. Dursley gossiped away happily as she wrestled a screaming Dudley into his high chair.

     None of them noticed a large, tawny owl flutter past the window.

The first paragraph could conceivably be a POV error, but when followed by the fourth, we know it was intentional. That’s why we don’t question the fifth paragraph, which tells us something outside the Dursleys’ knowledge. By now we understand that this is an omniscient narrator and we are not confined to anyone’s head.

Even when the author tries to clue the reader in, omniscient can still be a bad choice. Since head-hopping is allowed within a scene, many writers think they can use it whenever they want. But that can be just as jarring in omniscient as it is in multiple third-person. And the practice makes sophisticated readers wonder if the author is ignorant about POV.

While omniscient can seem like a godsend (pun intended) for a lazy writer, it actually tends to highlight that laziness. So unless you are an experienced author who fully understands omniscient POV, I don’t recommend it.

In the examples given above, the storyteller never identifies himself or herself as anybody other than a disembodied author, making it a purely omniscient POV. Another option is to use a sort of hybrid POV that combines elements of omniscient with elements of first or third person by providing a flesh-and-blood narrator who tells the story after-the-fact. This could be either one of the characters involved in the main action or a bystander who knows the story. As with omniscient POV, however, you need to start by identifying the POV for the reader, usually by introducing the narrator and making it clear that the story is being told after-the-fact.

Here is how Barbara Gregorich does it in Dirty Proof:

     She wrenched the door open as if doorknobs were disposable, nuisances rather than aids. I flinched, scattering a handful of index cards across my desk. Of course, I didn’t know it was a she when the doorknob clattered, so I’m not telling the story in its proper sequence. But what burst in was a she, very definitely.

It doesn’t have to be a conventional storyteller, either. In The Book Thief by Markus Zusak, the story is narrated by Death. When I said to make it a flesh-and-blood narrator, I used that phrase figuratively. The narrator needs a personality and a presence but not necessarily a physical body.

There is one other point of view that (barely) deserves mention, and that is second person. This is the story where the narrator is identified by “you.” I have read only one or two second-person stories in recent years, but that is more than enough. I found second person very disrupting, and I never read that author again. So if you want to gather a loyal following, don’t try it.

Next week I will cover psychic distance, which can be used effectively in both third person and omniscient POV.