Since I received my 4th extract back from my mentor I’ve been thinking a lot about point of view.
What is meant by point of view in regards fiction writing? Well, this should be obvious, it is through who’s eyes you see the story.
The same story can look very different depending upon who is doing the looking.
There are a few different types of point of view.
First person. The novel is written as if by the narrator. I did this, I did that.
Second person. The novel is written as if the reader is the narrator. You did this, you did that. This is really unusual and is rarely employed by novelists. I can only think of a handful of examples- Bright Lights, Big City by Jay McInerney, parts of Complicity by Iain Banks and more recently Sum by David Eagleman.
Omniscient or the God Perspective. This is written as if from the perspective of a narrator who knows everything, can dip in and out of every character’s head and can see the whole thing.
Third person. This is somewhere between omniscient and first person, in that the novel is written as if from the point of view of a particular character, but the character is still referred to by name. As in Grace did this or Grace did that.
I have written all this out as a way of clarifying something to myself. My present work in progress is written in Third person, but in the draft that I am working from with my mentor it takes the POV of several characters.
Grace is the main character, but in parts of the novel we see through 3 other character’s eyes.
Now, this isn’t omniscient as there are very clear breaks between the sections and whilst we are in a particular POV we only see what that character can see.
In my last extract Tim asked me whether I needed Maximilian’s POV in order for the story to work and suggested that the tension may be increased by us not knowing his motives.
I came to the conclusion that he was right and am now spending a long time removing Maximilian’s POV from the story and ensuring that the information that was provided from these sections fits in elsewhere.
Without resorting to cliche, okay a little bit, a wee bit of a lesson has been reinforced here, you don’t need to show everything. In many situations not allowing the reader access to the full information makes for a more intriguing read.
Which having thought about this for a few weeks makes me now realise why I never really find books written in Omniscient as satisfying as those written in First or Third person.
As a reader I want to be transported into another life or world or mind of a character. I want to believe that I am that character and see through their eyes.
And despite occasional megalomaniac moments I just can’t get in the mind of someone or something that can see or know everything. It just doesn’t work for me.
