So much talk about Point of View. POV is what writers call it and many are obsessed by it to the point where aspersions on parentage and references to body parts are invoked during discussions of it and even threats to person are not unheard of. On the off chance that you are a reader and not a writer, perhaps I should explain.
The accepted wisdom is that in any story, there must be an MC (no, not a Master of Ceremonies – a Main Character) and the MC is the one through whom the story is told. Now, that won't be an earth-shattering revelation to most people and one would be forgiven for wondering why the concept excites such passion amongst writers. Well, as I understand it, in 1965 an American gent by the name of Dwight Swain wrote a book called “Tricks and Techniques of the Selling Writer”, which has been elevated to the status of a religious text in many quarters of the writing world. (He also wrote a number of other books including the wonderfully titled, “The Terror Out of Space” and “Peace Mission to Planetoid X” about which, curiously, one hears very little, these days.
Swain it is, apparently, to whom we must turn if we wish to discover the arcana of POV.
From what I can make out, like the founders of many religions, Swain's words have undergone something of a metamorphosis at the hands of his followers so that many now believe that it is tantamount to heresy for a story to have more than one POV.
“Head hopping”, they call it – when the action is viewed and interpreted by more than one character. If the Swainites (Swainians?) spot this in a story, their inquisitors pounce and the unfortunate apostate is cast into outer darkness for all eternity. Or ridiculed, which is much worse.
In order to cleanse their work of any such horrors, the Swainians (I think I'm coming to prefer the term) are very fond of writing in first person. This is the equivalent of the cilice, the spiked chain worn around the thigh of the strict adherent to Opus Dei. Or the legendary Mormon body stocking. It's uncomfortable but a sure and certain way to avoid slipping into sin. For, in first person narrative, only the narrator's experience and opinion can be shared with the reader and (so the doctrine states) a relationship between the two is forged.
The third person with omniscient narrator is often frowned upon but can be tolerated so long as the writer is utterly subsumed by the “Voice”. The “Voice” is not really the writer; it is the character played by the writer so, in first person, there is no problem but in third, God forbid the narrator should know anything more than what his characters experience.
Now, there is nothing wrong with this. It is a way of writing. The trouble is that, for many and particularly for many Americans, it is pretty much the only way. Why the Americans should feel this way, I can only guess but I reckon it has much to do with two things: first, a “screen” rather than a “textual” vocabulary. The camera is the dispassionate eye, which for the most part, simply shows what is happening; second, the American belief in the sanctity of the individual that is, it seems to me, the unquestioned common thread in much American writing and cinema.
Most writers reading this will have learned little but to readers it may be news. Next time you read a novel, perhaps you might spare a thought for the technique employed and wonder how much of it stems from the teachings of the author of “Peace Mission to Planetoid X”
The accepted wisdom is that in any story, there must be an MC (no, not a Master of Ceremonies – a Main Character) and the MC is the one through whom the story is told. Now, that won't be an earth-shattering revelation to most people and one would be forgiven for wondering why the concept excites such passion amongst writers. Well, as I understand it, in 1965 an American gent by the name of Dwight Swain wrote a book called “Tricks and Techniques of the Selling Writer”, which has been elevated to the status of a religious text in many quarters of the writing world. (He also wrote a number of other books including the wonderfully titled, “The Terror Out of Space” and “Peace Mission to Planetoid X” about which, curiously, one hears very little, these days.
Swain it is, apparently, to whom we must turn if we wish to discover the arcana of POV.
From what I can make out, like the founders of many religions, Swain's words have undergone something of a metamorphosis at the hands of his followers so that many now believe that it is tantamount to heresy for a story to have more than one POV.
“Head hopping”, they call it – when the action is viewed and interpreted by more than one character. If the Swainites (Swainians?) spot this in a story, their inquisitors pounce and the unfortunate apostate is cast into outer darkness for all eternity. Or ridiculed, which is much worse.
In order to cleanse their work of any such horrors, the Swainians (I think I'm coming to prefer the term) are very fond of writing in first person. This is the equivalent of the cilice, the spiked chain worn around the thigh of the strict adherent to Opus Dei. Or the legendary Mormon body stocking. It's uncomfortable but a sure and certain way to avoid slipping into sin. For, in first person narrative, only the narrator's experience and opinion can be shared with the reader and (so the doctrine states) a relationship between the two is forged.
The third person with omniscient narrator is often frowned upon but can be tolerated so long as the writer is utterly subsumed by the “Voice”. The “Voice” is not really the writer; it is the character played by the writer so, in first person, there is no problem but in third, God forbid the narrator should know anything more than what his characters experience.
Now, there is nothing wrong with this. It is a way of writing. The trouble is that, for many and particularly for many Americans, it is pretty much the only way. Why the Americans should feel this way, I can only guess but I reckon it has much to do with two things: first, a “screen” rather than a “textual” vocabulary. The camera is the dispassionate eye, which for the most part, simply shows what is happening; second, the American belief in the sanctity of the individual that is, it seems to me, the unquestioned common thread in much American writing and cinema.
Most writers reading this will have learned little but to readers it may be news. Next time you read a novel, perhaps you might spare a thought for the technique employed and wonder how much of it stems from the teachings of the author of “Peace Mission to Planetoid X”
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