Point of ViewHow do we (the reader) know what is happening in a story? Who is telling the story? Point of view has to do with the perspective of the narrator. It is important to differentiate between the narrator and the author--they are NOT the same. The narrator of a work of fiction or the speaker of a poem is a creation of the author, just as the characters in the work are. The narrator is a construction---not the same person as the author.
There are six key terms used in the study of narrative view point. Let’s take a closer look at each term. First-Person: In this mode, the narrator is usually the protagonist or central character in the story. But even if this character is not the protagonist, he or she is directly involved in the events of the story and is telling the tale “first hand.” First-person narration is easy to identify, because the narrator will be telling the story from “I’s” perspective. Readers should watch for the narrator’s use of first-person pronouns- “I, me, my, our, us, we, myself, and ourselves,” as these will usually indicate that the passage is narrated from first-person perspective. Remember, with this skill readers are trying to identify the perspective of the narrator; therefore, one must ignore the dialogue of characters (indicated by “quotation marks”)and solely focus on narration, otherwise one is not analyzing the narrator’s point of view. Sometimes first-person narrators are considered unreliable narrators. This means that, for some reason, their version of the story may not be totally truthful or accurate. You know how people say there are always two sides of every story? And people tell their version of events, sometimes leaving things out? That is the case with the unreliable narrator. Ask yourself if they have something to hide or may be biased in some way about the events of the story. Second-Person: In this mode of narration “you” are the agent, such as in this example: you walked down the stairs. As it is generally awkward for a story to be narrated from “your” perspective, this mode of narration is not used very often in narratives and stories. There are some exceptions, however, and second-person perspective is the primary mode of narration for choose your own adventure books and similarly styled writings. More frequently, directions and instructions and usually narrated from second-person perspective. Third-Person: With this mode of narration, the narrator tells the story of another person or group of people. The narrator may be far removed from or not involved in the story, or he or she may be a supporting character supplying narration for a hero. Frequent use of “he, she, them, they, him, her, his, her, and their” by the narrator may indicate that a passage is narrated from third-person perspective. There are three distinct modes of third-person narration: objective, limited, and omniscient. Which mode the narrator is using is determined by a single variable- how much the narrator accesses the thoughts, feelings, and internal workings of the characters and shares them with the reader through narration.
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