POV: Third Person Limited vs Omniscient

[Venusian Broon]

Absolutely. Getting too interested in the market isn't going to help anyone, I suspect... After all, if you're not enjoying what you're writing, why should anyone else?

Depends if you've got next years Mortgage payments and other bills being able to be paid, if you are relying on your craft for that

But really, I agree with you and many others above, there's no point in putting yourself through all the trials and tribulations of writing if you don't at the very least enjoy it!

 

[TheDustyZebra]

My WIP is third-omniscient because there are three main characters and that's how it worked out. They are nearly always together, so there's no point in switching among them. I suppose one might consider it to be third-limited in the sense that it follows the three and not the other people that they interact with. So it's limited, but not to just one. Hmm.

Anyway, I would not think that first-person present tense was all the rage until The Hunger Games came out -- one makes one's own rage, I think.

 

[DrMclony]

Unskilled writers do NOT automatically turn to omniscient - that made me laugh. I can tell you from years of teaching experience first person is where that happens most.

The trashing of omniscient third person in recent years is ludicrous to say the least. It is just as valid, just as successful, and just as doable as the others.

Great writers write great writing, regardless of the approach they use. Mediocrity can not become greatness by changing POV. Fashion be damned, I will be true to my self and to my work. If that means omniscient, limited, first person, whatever, then so be it.

 

[hopewrites]

What I hear you lamenting the most, Brian, is the "cinematic approach" and more to the point, the fact that most young people have more experience with movies than with literature. I feel confident saying that most young people today know the ins and outs of cinematic story telling long before they are taught to read, so it comes out in the writing they do later in life.
Now this cant be a really new development, certanly it has been sped along with the advent of home movies and home theater set ups, but I remember when I was a very young girl (and that seems quite a whlie ago to me now) that my literature loving family members were lamenting a very similar thing; people not wanting to read the book, stating they would 'just wait for the movie.'

Rather than blaming the POV used, or any other outward extension of the root problem, lets look at the social changes that have led to, and will stem from the wide distribution of Sitcom Programed People.
now tell yourself honestly, how many people do you know who expect there to be a laugh track on queue for them? how many people do you know who feel hard done by if the thing they need most doesn't appear at a plot development appropriate moment? or who are allways trying to brake down a non-existent 4th wall in their real life?
The other social changer I would suggest we keep an eye on are these social media pages like myspace, facebook, and G+. Places where one can simply upload one's life. It eliminates a key part of communication, granted an often annoying part, but key none the less. As social creatures we need to do some Telling in our lives, a kind of sharing where we tell someone else how our life is from our perspective, a someone who will reciprocate by ether sharing how they feel about our perspective, or how they feel about their perspective, or ague that our perspective is wrong, or let us know that we are boring or in some other way unacceptable by not listening and/ or walking away altogether.
Now we can do our telling without having the check of someone "listening" while we do it. Got something to say? post it, tweet it, text it... but face to face conversations are slowly becoming archaic.
And I think that's sad. It takes the human element out of conversations, or at least a part of it.


I think that 3rd person omniscient is more about getting out of one's own head than about cinematic scope. 1st person is more personal in the telling, and if written well more personal in the reading. Personally I find it easier to slip into a Sweeping Epic Telling from 1st rather than any other perspective because then I can throw all my personal emotive weight behind the statements given. For example I once gave an account of my day in Sweeping Epic form, and it consisted of doing the laundry and cleaning the kitchen. The only way I could have pulled that off is with the drama of personal perspective and accounting.

Any form of writing will be susceptible to bad writing as well as good. Let's not condemn the flour for being made into glue when what we wanted was good wholesome bread.

 

[Bowler1]

Absolutely. Getting too interested in the market isn't going to help anyone, I suspect. In fact, it could make your work unoriginal if you end up moulding the writing to a formula. Write for yourself, then you can change things to get published, if it gets to that point. After all, if you're not enjoying what you're writing, why should anyone else?

I find myself agreeing with the comment above. Developing a style that is different from the crowd is what makes a great writer and even if I never get there, I plan to have fun trying.

I think the 3rd person movie director is the early stages of learning to write, step one in developing writing skills and writing style. Usually fixed very quickly after they join this site.

Not all is lost, I Brian as the publishers do every so often move away from 3rd person. alt.human Is new on the shelves and is first person, it has loads of aliens and ray guns so many of you won't be surprised to hear me recommend it.

 

[Jake Reynolds]

Hey Brian, while I certainly agree with elements of your initial statement, I find third omni used well quite a lot, especially in horror. Stephen King has always used it, as have his imitators. I'm third limited myself, but man it would be nice to switch to omni every now and then. You know, just for things like a little smile from a character after the pov has left the room, and so on.

I think omni is one that can be lapsed into, and can be found in a lot of novellists' first drafts. The habit of remaining 'in character' takes a while to develop (not saying it's harder, just a different thought process). Omni has become very prevalent in pop culture such as comics and graphic novels (Meanwhile, on the Planet Badoomsh...etc), but I think it has a valid and worthwhile presence in any genre if, like with any style, it is done competently.

I'm reading Black House by King and Straub at the moment, and the first sixty or seventy pages is omni, filled purely with floating about and introducing every character one by one. Sounds laborious, but it works (in its way). Then, to casually drop that a certain child is soon to be taken by the serial killer adds a converse immediacy to this whimsical flow. You know what's coming, though not the details, and the story keeps you in so you can see what happens.

Not exactly the Canterbury Tales, but has got me thinking about omni again. I think, if anything, first person is the one that's getting a bit tired (but then again, that could just be me playing to your original statement!)

 

[Brian G Turner]

I've only tried a small sample of recently published sff books from the past few years, but where third person is used, it is almost always done in limited. However, it's not a great sample and I've tended towards my own genre of epic fantasy.

Are those who are writing in omniscient coming across this POV use in contemporary novels in their own genres?

 

[prizzley]

any recent books I've read are written in third person limited - with only "classic" books tending towards omniscient POV's.

I've just checked out my favourite sff authors. Spread over the last 3 decades, I have: 1 omniscient; 5 3rd person close; 1 1st person (2 characters POV); 1 mixed 1st (mostly in the guise of emails) and 3rd close; and 1 a mix of 1st, 3rd person close and omni. Since they all work for me, I can only conclude that POV doesn't matter.

But I suspect the readers who want instant results wouldn't read any of those books.

 

[Brian G Turner]

Spread over the last 3 decades

Editor and literary agent John Jarrold has warned that we should be looking at what publishers have published within the last couple of years, to get a proper idea of current publishing demands.

 

[HareBrain]

I've just started re-reading A Wizard of Earthsea. The last time I read it, I barely knew what POV was, so I hadn't clocked that it was written in omniscient. In this case, it works brilliantly because the narrative voice is very strong (being a traditional "fireside story-teller" voice). I'd hate to think that there might be works of similar quality being rejected by agents just because they don't fit the fashion, but I suppose that's possible.

It's occurred to me that one major consequence of this style is that you can cover a lot of ground much more quickly. I dread to think how many pages the first fourteen of WOE would expand to if they were rewritten in close third, and I wonder if this is one reason we're seeing much more very long books these days, because close-third POV tends to result in (even if it doesn't actually require) much more detail.

In WOE's case, I think such extra detail would have been pointless. The quality of writing is such that I can't imagine knowing the characters better than is already the case, no matter how tight the POV. It would just have been padding.

 

[Ursa major]

I dread to think how many pages the first fourteen of WOE would expand to if they were rewritten in close third, and I wonder if this is one reason we're seeing much more very long books these days, because close-third POV tends to result in (even if it doesn't actually require) much more detail.

Perhaps it does. But should it? In theory, a close PoV (First, Close Third) should have far less everyday information than an omniscient narrator describing what would be exotic to us (but not to anyone living there). What is added are personal thoughts about what is going on (but only the thoughts of the PoV character). Those thoughts and reactions should be very focused on the task ahead, what's really interesting in the present, some relevant thoughts about the past, but on little else.

Where the bloating comes from is thinking that the PoV character has an inbuilt multimedia recording device which supplements the PoV's personal view with all that's going on around them, whether interesting or not, or relevant or not.

So, in a way, one could say that many close PoVs are nothing of the sort, unless being close to the interests and views of the author is what close means. (It isn't.)

 

[HareBrain]

I think the extra detail is partly unavoidable. For example, in those pages of WOE there is a description of a battle, in which the main character's experience is dealt with in only a couple of lines, the detail of the MC's experience being largely irrelevant to the omniscient narrator. But if it were written in close third, the reader would surely feel cheated if the POV character's part in the battle were brushed over like that -- we expect to experience an event as important as the character's first battle along with him (assuming it's within the time-frame of the story) and I doubt that could be convincingly done in less than a couple of pages. Similarly with his first use of magic, and so on.

 

[Ursa major]

Yes, but that's still only a few pages, not hundreds of them. (And one can only have one first battle.)

To condense my previous post (I was in a hurry, so couldn't make the post shorter ):

Close PoV narration provides only what is of interest to the reader, and only from what the PoV character knows, can sense and is of interest to them.
​

 

[Brian G Turner]

I've noticed quite a few thrillers using omniscient to provide mystery and suspense. It seems an especially useful tool - especially if the thriller writer needs to hold back something to play to these (arguably traditional) strengths in the thriller genre.

However, when I see it in fantasy I tend to associate it with trying to be cinematic, not least trying to paint a pretty picture. My personal bias - at present - is that this is always in danger of being a weakness rather than a strength in sff in general. After all, surely it's more powerful to be immersed in another world, rather than simply look at it?

 

[Ray McCarthy]

when I see it in fantasy I tend to associate it with trying to be cinematic

That's people using it wrong
But I'll have to examine the shelves here to find a fantasy or SF Omni-view done right. It's only in last lot of months (fault of this place) that I have taken note of POV at all in stories!

 

[psychotick]

Hi,

I don't think any writing style is necessarily good or bad. I do think that some like third omniscient are extremely easy to mess up for less experienced writers. Too often the work becomes a head hopping problem.

Personally I write third close, but like others have moments where I slip a little. There are two slips I'm constantly having to think about in editing. The first is the world view where massive events are occuring which the MC can only see perhaps a part of but which I sometimes over describe to include things he can't see. That I think is forgiveable though should always be controlled as best as possible. Some will be upset.

The other one which catches me out is the thoughts and feelings of other characters. This I stomp on hard because I hate head hopping. But I constantly face this battle where speaking from character "A's" POV I say that character "B" was saddened etc. It's a pain because while it could be interpretted as saying that A realised B was sad, I could equally be saying that B felt sad - ie B's POV. Wherever I find one of these I end uprewriting, and it isn't always easy. Sometimes I switch from telling to showing. Sometimes I add a word like "clearly" to clearly show that the POV is not B's - eg "B was clearly sad."

These issues cause me pain as I say. And I'm sure they hit others of third close as well. They aren't however generally so serious as to completely ruin a work. In fact provided the slips aren't too egregious, readers won't even notice them. But for the third omnisicent writer, head hopping - moving from the narrator to the various individual POV's is much more devastating as problems go. The entire work becomes confusing, you have no idea who you as a reader are, and as a reader I soon give up.

My thought is that if you're going third omniscient you need to be very strong in your writing, brutal in your editing and use a distinctive narrator voice, especially if you're newer to the writing game.

Cheers, Greg.

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

Editor and literary agent John Jarrold has warned that we should be looking at what publishers have published within the last couple of years, to get a proper idea of current publishing demands.

But if we stick to that eventually the whole genre will end up in a rut. Maybe it is already in a bit of a rut and it is time for some changes. The first writer with a truly fresh voice that comes along and finds a publisher brave enough to publish their work may sell millions of copies.

Of course it is not wise to count on being that fresh voice or revolutionizing the genre—people who try to do that usually fail horribly—but we should be true to ourselves, and whatever style we choose** (and that includes POV) we should learn to do it the best way we possibly can. I think it is always best to play to our own strengths rather than try to duplicate somebody else's. That's fine for experimenting until we figure out what our strengths are, but we shouldn't end up forcing ourselves into somebody else's mold.

Besides, 3rd person limited POV is not the only thing that attracts readers right now. If a novel hits the mark on several other counts and delivers in a big way on all of those, a publisher or an editor is not going to turn it down simply because it was written in omniscient POV.

_____

**Or that chooses us

 

[Toby Frost]

Firstly, I think that a lot of interest in close 3rd person comes from the fact that a few very successful books are written that way: in particular Joe Abercrombie’s work (very close 3rd person) and of course A Game of Thrones. I’m not sure if it’s been suggested, but there is nothing necessarily worse about 3rd person omniscient. Both tools have their advantages, and both are probably equally easy to do badly. I wonder if the current interest in close 3rd person comes in part from the modern fixation with feelings, making it easier to feel what the characters are doing. In the past, it may simply not have seen as necessary to go so close to the character.

Omniscient works very well for comedy or any other medium where it’s useful to contrast what one character thinks with what is really happening, or with another character’s thoughts. With a suitably strong or wry narrative voice, it can be very effective. It enables the writer to comment on the story (usually not directly) rather than the characters to experience it.

There’s also the issue of the closeness of the 3rd person. In The First Law, you could change “he” to “I” and it would turn into a first-person narrative almost instantly. Not all close-3rd is like that, and nor, I think, does it have to be. Overall, if you want to write something a lot like A Game of Thrones, this is the way to go. But as Teresa says, it really isn’t everything, not by a very long way. I think writers would be much better off worrying about the quality of their work rather than the closeness of the viewpoint, so long as they stay consistent.

 

[Dan Jones]

After all, surely it's more powerful to be immersed in another world, rather than simply look at it?

I see the point, but I suppose it depends on what you're trying to do. I think VB said earlier in the thread that omni is artsier - I see the point. You could conceivably create a literary vehicle using omni that forces the reader into adopting a voyeuristic attitude towards whatever world is being presented. If you were, say, writing something from a postcolonial perspective this could be a very powerful way in forcing the reader to reconsider how they view certain things (ie other cultures, people etc).

It would take a skilful hand, but I think that would be perfectly credible and indeed admirable approach.

Oh, and going way back...

Or am I simply being a wannabe publishing nazi,

That's the first time I've ever seen someone invoke Godwin's Law unto themselves, and in the very first post of a thread

 

[Ursa major]

Omniscient works very well for comedy

I agree.

It's probably because I accept that the degree to which I must apply suspension of disbelief -- no, the type of suspension of disbelief I must apply -- to out-and-out comedy is different compared to that which I'd apply** to other types of fiction. I know, when reading a comedy, that I'm not only dealing with the characters, I'm reading a narrative by an unnamed third party who is feeding additional humour into the narrative (on top of events that are naturally comedic in themselves).

When I first really got into looking at the mechanics and restrictions of very close third person PoV, and seeing how various published works matched up, or didn't, to my rather onerous standards, I recall reading a passage in one of your Space Captain Smith books and noticing the perspective as it moved from character to character. Other than noticing this (and, as I said: at the time, I was actively looking for examples where strict PoV slipped), it didn't bother me at all. I could see no other way for the humour in that passage to be brought out even half as well as you'd done it.


** - I also adjust my PoV standards when reading older works, as I accept that how PoV is used is, to some extent, a fashion, not a matter of right and wrong.