POV, that hateful bitch

[lunabee34]

One aspect of my writing that I continue to struggle with is POV. I have trouble remaining consistent with the POV I choose and have to proofread carefully for that mistake. Once I’ve chosen a POV, I have difficulty deciding how to include necessary information that the character from whose perspective I’ve chosen to write wouldn’t know. And then there’s the whole thing where I can’t seem to successfully manage any POV except third person limited.



My least favorite POV to read in fanfic is first person. First person feels too intimate for fanfic. As most of you know, fanfic for me is all about the self-insertion. I put myself in the place of one or more of the characters and so enjoy reading on two levels—one in which I am a voyeur/participant in a character’s body and the other more detached level on which I am appreciating plot and language and character insight, etc. When the fic is in first person, I feel like what I’m inhabiting is the author’s version of that character instead of the character. Which I know is an incredibly inarticulate way to say what I mean as of course all characters in fanfic are the products of their authors’ versions, regardless of POV. But first person feels too intimate, too close to me. I need the extra layer of distance that third person affords.

I usually don’t enjoy second person, mostly because I find it annoying and highly alienating to the reader. I also haven’t come across much fic written from this POV. However, I have read a handful of second person fics that I think work really well. For example: You Never Had it So by mandysbitch: You don’t ask Sam why he’s remembering Reno in Texas. Ten minutes ago he asked if you remembered the time he caught you getting a blowjob from a waitress behind a diner in Arkansas. You told him ‘no’ because there are some parts of your shared history that do not warrant nostalgia. Sam finds it amusing now, but at the time you were both horrified. He was thirteen and he still looked up to you. You liked to think you sheltered him.

I generally write from third person limited, and find myself worrying to an extraordinary degree (like scary out of proportion degree) that I remain consistently within the POV I’ve chosen. For example, the last SPN fic I wrote was from Dean’s perspective and included this line originally: Sam notices the clench of Dean’s jaw and relents. “You just had a twenty-four hour bug. Your fever was pretty high, and that’s probably why you don’t remember anything.” On proofreading, I changed the line to read: Sam finally remembers his survival instincts, or else notices the Very Serious clench of Dean’s jaw, and relents. “You just had a twenty-four hour bug. Your fever was pretty high, and that’s probably why you don’t remember anything.” I’ve never back-buttoned a fic because of a lapse in POV, or really even noticed that being much of an issue in fic that I read period, but apparently I am terrified that there’s some flame wielding contingent of fic readers who will immolate me if I’m not slavishly consistent to POV.

I think the second-most difficult POV to write from is third person omniscient. It seems like that should be the easiest POV to write. I certainly enjoy reading it. There I am inside everyone’s heads equally and nobody can keep any secrets from me, no sirree. But when I attempt to write from that POV, I invariably default to third person limited without even realizing it. I find it really difficult to stay inside the heads of an entire cast of characters when I’m writing.

Close third person is my absolute favorite and, I believe, the most difficult POV to write from. This is the third person limited POV in which both the narrative, expositiony bits and the dialogue are all written in the POV character’s voice. ana_grrl is the queen of this POV for me. (From The End that Crowns Us: "I'll haunt your gorram ass, don't think otherwise," he says, giving Jayne his best hard look. And Jayne, he's never believed in ghosts, but he figures that Mal would do something like that. Just to be difficult. Once he's dead, once the oxygen wears out, once his body's blue and frozen and drifting along in Serenity. But Jayne still ain't going to promise not to mess with Inara, once they're off in the shuttle. Hell, he knows better than her what needs to be done. He should be in charge. So he ain't making promises to a man what's going to be dead soon enough.) I’d never been able to get this POV to work for me until recently when I started writing in SPN. I tried with Firefly fic but bombed, mostly because I could get Jayne’s dialogue right, but couldn’t stop the narrative bits from waxing poetic in words the big lug would never dream of using.



All of which leaves me with the following questions:

*What are your issues with POV?
*What about the occasional and subtle lapse of POV in fic? Eyeball bleeding deal breaker? Doesn’t even register? Somewhere in between?
*What are your favorite and least favorite POVs to write from? To read? Why?
*What are your reasons for choosing to write in a certain POV? Do your POV choices change depending on the fandom, the character you’re highlighting, the plot of the fic, or something else?

Comments

here via METAFANDOM [Part Two]

[faith-chaos.livejournal.com]

* Ah! Tricky question. It depends on which story I wanna tell, I guess. Some stories I have to write in Second because otherwise they just don't work. There's something special about Second Person POV. You can say so much with it... like, this, for example: "And you felt safe, didn't you? As if he was gonna shiled you from the world and keep you close to him forever and ever and all that bull you always thought fairy tales were all about. You never dreamed you could have it, but now it's here and you know, from the way he looks at you and the strong hands around your waist, that he's never gonna let you go. He wants to protect you from the world, has told you so himself, but you can't help but ask yourself, who's gonna protect you from him?" See, with that last question, the story goes to a different level. You can go places with Second Person POV. I've only ever done it twice myself cause I don't think I could sustain it for long. But some people can, and I love to read it.

Now First Person I've only used once, and that's because someone reviewed one of my stories saying I had a very bad Xander voice and I got all kinds of paranoid about it so I decided to write a short fic in Xander's POV, using First person. I don't like First Person a lot, because, like I said, it's very limiting.

This was fun! I liked it lots and it did make me think lots, so thanks.

Re: here via METAFANDOM [Part Two]

[lunabee34.livejournal.com]

Thanks for answering in such detail. It's really fascinating to see how everyone's preferences differ and where many of us seem to feel the same.

Regarding second person, I think it can be a successful method of storytelling, but for me it's very alienating to the reader. I think it creates a sense of distance between the story and the reader. For some stories that sense of alienation works really well. I think it would work less well for say, something porny.

Re: here via METAFANDOM [Part Two]

[faith-chaos.livejournal.com]

I think it's all about the how. Some people can pull it off, though I agree with you in that it could get strange when it comes to smut. Alienation, I think it works sometimes, in fact it is kinda great sometimes. And by the way, the passage I paraphrased above was from a book called The Incredible Tale of How I Met My End, or something. It was in Spannish so I don't know the exact translation of the title.

And it was my pleasure, really, answering these questions. Like I said, it was fun!

Re: here via METAFANDOM [Part Two]

[lunabee34.livejournal.com]

The second person story I link to in this post has a sex scene that I think works really well simply because the sex is confusing and somewhat disturbing and alienating to the characters who are experiencing it.