DISCUSSION: First Person VS Third Person

[canisaries]

Or second person, I don't discriminate. What do you see as the strengths and limitations of each? Do certain tenses pair up better with some narration styles than others? If so, why do you think that's so?

I started with third person as most of the fiction I'd read had been in that format. I switched to first person to get better into the protagonist's head and to get a more personal feel to the narration. However, I'm planning a story with more characters that would be more suitable for third person. I tried a oneshot in third person to practice for this, but it felt odd and clunky to write. Does anyone have tips on how to make third person writing engaging and immersing? Or first person, for that matter. Or common flaws you come across in either. Let's discuss!

 

[lucarioknight56]

One advantage that third-person grants is the ability to shift between characters without confusing the reader. I like swapping perspectives in the middle of chapters as it allows the reader to more easily see time parallels. Plus, third-person allows me, the narrator, to describe environments a whole lot more than first-person, and I don't think I can live without that.

Of course, there are downsides. First-person is suited for examining a character's mind, and for stories that have a small main cast, or chooses to focus on a single individual, it would probably benefit from being in first-person. With third-person, it can become clunky trying to incorporate character thoughts in the narrative, as it isn't as simple as making a paragraph for the thought like in first-person. I haven't personally written in first-person, really, but I can make it a writing experiment sometime.

Second-person is odd. It essentially has the reader become a character in the story and become more immersed as a result. This is usually done in choose-your-own-adventure stories, and for a perfectly understandable reason: people don't always think like the protagonist the author intends to have. It is less often done, but I've noticed a rise in such perspectives as of late.

 

[Felly]

I'm very used to writing third person, tbh. I think lucarioknight56 hit the nail on the head with the pros and cons of third person and first person, so I won't regurgitate them for y'all (especially since the post is right above this one). In terms of my own personal opinion though, I prefer first person over third person if I really want to focus on one specific character or get into the mind of a character that I'm wanting to get into. I feel like first person lets you get more attached to one specific character since you're seeing just about everything through their eyes and not the eyes of another, or several others.

I feel like I struggle with third person for the reason that there's multiple characters with multiple thoughts all trying to be incorporated into the same story, and it's just a struggle. A lot of my more recent writing has been in third person, and I'll struggle with incorporating the character's thoughts into the story out of fear of being too rambly or including too much unnecessary detail. I feel like in first person, those same details can be shared freely with no judgement whatsoever.

Second person is an interesting one. I think I've only ever done one story in second person, if that, and it's not my favorite mode of writing. I use it sometimes in my journalism work or when I'm blogging, but it just kinda fits well there. In stories, I feel like it's awkward. It encourages reader participation, which is great, but I also feel like at the same time, if the readers aren't participating, the story dies out because it's left up to the author to decide what happens next in the story.

 

[Nitro Indigo]

I used to write in first-person, but I switched to third-person limited when I realised it was easier to change perspectives that way.

 

[CrystaI]

I am the opposite. At the beginning I wrote in 3rd person omniscient, then I switched to 3rd person limited, now I write in 1st person.

In case of changing perspective, you can also do that in 1st person POV. I do that as well for my current working project. The point is, I focus in viewpoint of one single character each chapter. If I want to change POV, I can only do so after finishing one chapter, there is no change of POV within a chapter. For my current working fic, I planned to change focus character every chapter, so despite it is 1st person POV, I get to exploring thoughts of many different characters, where I think that is interesting.

 

[Nitro Indigo]

That being said, back when I wrote in rotating first person, I was also bad at writing in general.

 

[Cresselia92]

I prefer to write in 3rd person as I like having the flexibility of describing the surroundings and events that are happening in a scene, especially during action-packed scenes like battles or chases. However, I also like to explore the thoughts of the main characters, which I showcase through inner monologues or “reader’s telepathy”, in order the help the reader get more into the character.

 

[unrepentantAuthor]

First and third person each have their advantages. I usually write in "close third" or what is sometimes known as "over the shoulder" perspective. This means I use third person language, but limit the narration to the point of view of the chapter's principal character. I find it gives me the flexibility to narrate without making the character the narrator, but focuses the story sufficiently that I can limit the reader's information to that which concerns the viewpoint character. I suppose you might consider it something of a compromise between third and first. This is actually quite a popular standard in modern fiction, but these things go in and out of fashion.

It's definitely my favourite POV. I find omniscient to be too detached, or if the narration lives in the heads of multiple characters I find that awkward, and that it prevents my identification with a focus character. First person needs to have the authorial voice of the character to work in my opinion, and I then have to enjoy that voice to enjoy the text. Of course, this makes me sound terribly grumpy, but I promise I don't discard stories because of their POV!

Shout out to second person, which is a wonderful party trick for clever authors, but rarely has the legs to run a whole novel's length. I like to play with it every now and again.