Written by Lisa Hislop | Copy edited by Lisa Guglielmi
In this article, Lisa shares how to help new writers understand and choose suitable points of view. You can attend Lisa’s session, Helping Your Author Pick a POV That Pops, at the 2024 Editors Canada Conference.
When a writer asks me to explain narrative point-of-view (POV), they’re not looking for a definition. They’ve done their research and understand the main differences between first-person and third. Where they’re stuck is the glossary of associated terms: limits of perception, degree of objectivity, narrative distance, and narrative bias. They want to know how these aspects relate to each other and the POV they’ve chosen for their story.
To give them a complete grounding, I invite them to translate the POV of a story, which I’ll illustrate here for you to use in guiding your writers.
POV translation
I choose a story written in the objective third-person and ask the author to translate it into the subjective first-person. Of course, you could choose any POV, but these two are opposite each other in every aspect mentioned above. The difference between their translation and the original story will give plenty of opportunities to demonstrate how POV works. Note that translation is the key word here. They are not to change the story, only switch the POV and reorganize information logically.
Today, I’m going to use “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson and make Tessie the first-person narrator. (This story is available online. Email me if you would prefer a story from another genre.)
Limits of perception
In “The Lottery,” our first problem will be how to convey the introductory information and the tension built by Tessie’s delayed arrival, or the limits of perception and its effect. The objective third-person narrator is useful for providing situational context to the reader without the character’s presence or knowledge. It uses the lack of access to the characters to build tension. The subjective first-person narrator is useful to give the reader insider knowledge. It uses a lack of access to situational context to build tension. How does the access to information and how it builds tension change with the new narrator?
Degree of objectivity
After her arrival, Tessie’s reaction to the lottery evolves the closer she gets to “winning.” This is contrasted by the reactions of her children and friends. By making Tessie the narrator, we meet our second problem: the shift in perspective from objective to subjective. The objective uses facts and the observation of factors perceivable by the five senses to inform the reader about how the lottery is progressing. The writer must work within Tessie’s ability to observe herself, her situation, and those around her from within her limits of perception. Will the new narrator be able to provide the reader with a comparable overview of the lottery?
Narrative distance
Closely related to the degree of objectivity is our third problem: narrative distance, or the perceived intimacy between the reader and the character. In the original, the reader gets equal information about every character. By changing the narration to first person, the reader will receive intimate knowledge of Tessie and superficial information about other characters. Will knowing Tessie’s internal thoughts make the reader invest less in the rest of the characters? How will these changes alter the impact of the story?
Narrator bias
Inextricable from the aspects of POV we’ve covered is our fourth problem: the narrator’s interpretation of the action, or bias. In the original, the narrator doesn’t express an opinion about any of the facts they share. They report what is observable with the five senses and leave the rest to the reader’s interpretation. If we locate the narrator in Tessie, how will Tessie’s thoughts and feelings about the lottery affect the reader’s interpretation of the story?
Putting it all together
As you and your author go over their translation, you will encounter these examples and many more that demonstrate how the limits of perception, degree of objectivity, narrative distance, and narrative bias of POV function independently and together to support or undermine the story. Your author will leave feeling confident to experiment with POV and return having chosen one that supports their story and its telling.
If you want to learn more about helping your author choose their POV, join me at the 2024 Editors Canada Conference for my presentation, Helping Your Author Pick a POV that Pops.
About Lisa Hislop
Lisa Hislop is a professional editor specializing in the preparation of short stories, anthologies, and collections for submission, query, and publication. Lisa is a founding member of the Neurodivergent Publishing Conference and an ambassador for Editors Canada. She holds a Certificate in Editing from Simon Fraser University and a BA in French literature from the University of British Columbia. You can find her at www.theshortstoryeditor.com or connect with her on LinkedIn.
About Lisa Guglielmi
Lisa Guglielmi is a candidate of the Simon Fraser University Editing Certificate program and currently works as a freelance content strategist and copy editor. For the past year, she has leveraged her 20 years’ experience as an English language instructor to improve websites for various ministries within the BC government. She believes that information should be accessible to everyone.