My First Blog: Point of View

Dear reader,
         This is my first blog it is a project from my homeschool curriculum Writing Strands Level # 7. I highly encourage comments and critiques and hope that any who read will do so. I want to be an author some day and as a result the more critiques I get the more I can learn. Not all of my posts will be just like this one. There will be several creative as well as essay form post. Subscribe and you might be surprised. :) (but this is a little early for that isn't it.) The point of this lesson was to learn how to distinguish between the many types of narrative voice.

Writing Strands Lesson # 5

Point of View

EXPOSITORY ESSAY

On

POINT OF VIEW

            Hello, have you ever read a book or article that you really enjoyed? Did you come away from that piece thinking, “I really enjoyed the way that narrative voice told me everything.”? Of course not. You may, however, have thought that the author writing the piece portrayed his or her thoughts well.

            Why would I bring up such a silly thought? Well, when an author writes a story or article he or she does not tell you his or her thoughts directly; but indirectly, by the way of a narrative voice. This voice assumes specific angles and traits that help give a story depth and its own unique ring.

            With a little practice the many options that an author has, in positioning his narrative voice, can become recognizable and easily distinguishable from one another.

            Would you like me to show you? To create their narrative voice authors use these elements: Person, Number, Tense, Attitude, Involvement, Knowledge, and Perspective.

            The first decision an author must make, in the creating of the narrative voice, is which Person the narrative voice will assume. He can choose from First person, Second person, or Third person. However, I only know of a few examples where Second person is actually used.

            First person allows the narrative to voice refer to its self as I and allows it to become part of the story: “I shall not want.”

            Second person allows the narrative voice to refer to the reader as you and gives the reader a part in the story: “You look at the chariot to your left.”

            Third person allows the narrative voice to simply narrate without being part of the story. This form of Person is the most commonly used and refers to the characters as he or she: “He was smoking now in silence.”

            After choosing a Person for his narrative voice the author then may choose to give his voice a Number. That Number being either Singular or Plural. Here are the examples: First person, Singular, “I shall not want.” First person, Plural, “Let us alone that we may serve the Egyptians.” Did you notice in the Plural form of First person the subject of the sentence implies that the speaker is speaking for more than one person? Hence Plural.

            Third person, Singular, “He was smoking now in silence.” Third person, Plural, “They claim to have done everything before the people of the Shire.” Plural means the narrative voice is assuming the role of more that one.

            Next the author gets to choose a Tense for his narrative voice to speak in. These options are: Past tense, Present tense, and Future tense.

            Past tense makes the narrative voice refer to things as if they have already happened. This tense often adds an “ed” to the end of the verbs in the sentence. First person, Singular, Past tense, “I have not wanted.” Third person, Plural, Past tense, “They claimed to have done everything before the people of the Shire.” Did you notice the “ed” on the verbs “wanted” and “claimed”?

            Present Tense makes the narrative voice refer to things as they are happening. This tense may add an “ing” to the end of a verb. It may also leave the verb as is. First person, Plural, Present tense, “Let us alone that we may serve the Egyptians.” Third person, Singular, Present tense, “He is smoking now in silence.” Here the verbs “Let” and “serve” were not altered, but the verb “smoking” was given an “ing” ending.

            Future tense makes the narrative voice refer to things as if they have not happened yet but will happen. Future tense sentences often include “shall” or “will” in front of the verb. First person, Singular, Future tense, “I shall not want.” Third person, Plural, Future tense, “They will claim to have done everything before the people of the Shire.” Again the obvious points: “shall” was used before the verb “want”, “will” was used before the verb “claim”, and “done” was preceded by the helping verb “have”. There was already a “shall” in the sentence indicating Future tense.

            Those first three elements are probably the easiest to understand and recognize. In fact you probably know quite a bit about them. These next four become a little bit more involved but are nonetheless easy enough to understand given ample time and effort.             Element number four tells us that an author’s narrative voice has an Attitude. There are two forms of attitude, Objective and Subjective.

            An Objective attitude means the narrative voice neither cares for the characters nor for what is happening in the story. It simply reports what is sees. First person, Plural, Past tense, Objective, “You have left us alone so that we have served the Egyptians.” Third person, Singular, Present tense, Objective, “He is smoking now in silence.” As you can see Objective attitude isn’t very different than what we have been dealing with. It is also typical with most Third person novels that I have read.

            A Subjective attitude makes judgments on value. Such as the value of a character, his actions, his thoughts, his morals, etcetera. A narrative voice with a Subjective attitude also cares for the characters and for what they do. It lets the reader know that it cares by making comments that indicate a value judgment. In addition the Subjective element may add certain words, in a sentence, that describe how it feels about something. First person, Plural, Past tense, Subjective, “You have uncaringly left us alone so that we have served the cruel Egyptians.” Third person, Singular, Present tense, Subjective, “He is smoking that foul weed, certainly bad for his health, now in silence.” Though I am sure that this form of attitude can be found in a novel it is also likely to be found in an article.

            Now that we know the narrative voice can care about the characters, in a story or article, or even dislike them, we turn to Involvement. Involvement can be one of three things: Central to the action, Minimally involved in the action, and Non-involved.

             Central to the action means that the narrative voice is performing the action that is being described. Here’s an example: First person, Plural, Present tense, Objective, Central to the action, “We grab the dog by the scruff of its neck, and fling it away from the dead chicken.” Here the characters that the narrative voice assumes are directly involved in the action being described.

            Minimally involved means: the narrative voice is still performing an action, but not the one of interest. Here’s the example: First person, Singular, Past tense, Subjective, Minimally involved, “I stood in between the scavenger of a dog and the poor chicken while my brave, older brothers, in a very rough manner, grabbed the dog by its mangy scruff and flung it away.” Here the character assumed by the narrative voice is still performing an action but plays a supportive role. Not the main role.

            Non-Involved means just what it says. The narrative voice is not involved in the action but only observes the action. Third person, Plural, Future tense, Objective, Non-Involved, “They will watch the kids pull the cow dog away from the dead chicken, after they finish working the cattle.” The Involvement of the Narrative Voice is allowed to change throughout the story. For an example the character assumed by the narrative voice could be watching an event and then decide to aid the event to change the outcome. In the beginning of this sentence the narrative voice is Non-Involved but by the end it could be Central to the action.

            The next element Knowledge, though linked to Involvement in a few ways, stands alone as a very crucial part of the narrative voice. Knowledge is also made up of three parts: Restricted to observation, Restricted to participation, and Limited Omniscience.

            In Knowledge restricted to observation the narrative voice can only know what it can see. As if it were telling the reader what is happening in the park but it is looking through the window of a nearby house. In this knowledge state the narrative voice does not know what the characters are saying. Third person, Singular, Past tense, Subjective, Non involved, Knowledge restricted to observation, “He watched from his pool chair as the heartless man pushed the little, helpless boy into the water; as his concern grew he saw the life guard leap from her chair into the pool.” Here the narrative voice was limited to knowledge that could be gained from the man on his pool chair.

            Knowledge restricted to participation allows the narrative voice to only know information that it could have gained through actually participating in that event. Such forms of information as what other characters say and do. First person, Plural, Present Tense, Objective, Minimally involved, Knowledge restricted to participation, “We help the lifeguard by pulling the boy from the water; she lays him on his back, and begins to press firmly on his chest.” Here the characters assumed by the narrative voice could have known who pushed the boy into the pool if they had seen it happen. They could not, however, have known what he was thinking through Knowledge restricted to participation.

            Limited omniscience gives the Narrative voice a broad range of possibilities. It can be in many minds and know what is happening in many places. First person, Singular, Past tense, Subjective, Central to action, Limited Omniscience, “I pressed gently but firmly on the poor child’s chest, little did I know that the man, certainly devoid of conscience, who had enjoyed pushing the little boy into the deep end of the water, stood not far behind me,” Here the narrative voice knew that the man enjoyed pushing the little boy into the water and it knew that he stood just behind itself. Two things that the actual character could not have known without the knowledge of the narrative voice’s Limited omniscience. Limited omniscience can often be found with the Involvement form Non-involved, however I put it with Central to action to show that it can be paired with other forms of Involvement.

            The final element we will discuss is Perspective. The Perspective element of the narrative voice is either: Omnipresent overview or Limited to personal view.

            Omnipresent Overview gives the narrative voice omniscience. It allows the narrative voice to take the reader into the past or into the future, to tell the reader what happens in more that one place at a time, and to show the reader action from any angle or vantage point. It allows the narrative voice to know everything, as the narrative voice describes what the writer has to say. Third person, Singular, Past tense, Objective, Non-Involved, Limited omniscience, Omnipresent overview, “The child had been walking to the bathroom when the man who had been planning this for some time, and severely disliked children, pushed him into the water; fortunately, a bored man who had been sitting on a nearby pool chair, called out to the life guard who quickly dove in and handed the child to two older boys on the pool’s edge.” Hence Omniscience.

            When the narrative voice’s Perspective is limited to Personal View, the narrative voice is only aware of the things a normal character in the story can be aware of. This is true whether the narrative voice poses as an observer or a participant. First person, Singular, Present tense, Subjective, Restricted to observation, Limited to personal view, “I am strolling through the city park, near the community pool, when I am confronted with the most horrible sight that I have ever laid eyes on; a man purposefully pushes a young boy into the deep end.” Here the narrative voice could only know what it could see.

            Though Perspective may seem redundant, or even unnecessary, given elements like Knowledge, it is nonetheless a major part of an author’s narrative voice.

            As you can now see, discovering the elements used in a narrative voice can be easy or even fun if you take some time to learn their functions.

            With these 7 pieces of the larger narrative voice you can build your paper or book anyway you like.

            I hope that you have found this enlightening. Maybe the next time you read a book or an article you will look for its narrative voice and try to decipher each element with-in. Or perhaps I have thoroughly confused you. Either way we all know a little bit more about the narrative voice. J

           
           I used some content from other books. The Lord of the Rings, Into the Wilderness, and the Bible.