Point of View Issue

2 CommentsUncategorized

So, I was writing a scene from the Lepterian’s point of view–an event that he is remembering–and I ran into an interesting Point of View problem. The scene is supposed to be locked into a tight third-person limited. The problem is that every time he refers to himself as “The Lepterian” the scene pops right back out of his POV. And if he doesn’t refer to himself as “The Lepterian,” the pronouns become incredibly confusing.

And there are no other POV options for this particular scene. Not good ones, anyway. I went over the other characters who could have been there, and found problems with all of them.

I never intended to give the Lepterian a name this early in the story. Lepterians earn names over the course of their lives, so he has a number to choose from. So, now, I have to decide which name has the most meaning for him, and which one he’d use to refer to himself.

Oh, well.  I guess that’s why I’m doing this.

2 Comments

  1. Eva

    Reply

    I thought about this for a bit.

    I think it actually does give an opportunity to sort of learn more about him. There may be a name that nobody else would use for him, or think of using. A name even he may think he overgrew. Or a name that was right then, not now. A name that might get shared only at some very late point, or in some very special circumstances.

    Another possibility woudl be for him to call himself by his then function. Like, “the officer”. Or “the pilot”. Or even “Jiri’s brother” – I mean, I realise probably not, but you know what I mean. Where the function he was fulfilling at the time – WHAT he was – would take precedence over WHO he was.

    I say, you have really got a totally fascinating world and culture here. it’s a privilege to read about it. 😀

    • Karen

      Reply

      I’ve been thinking about it, too. I have it narrowed down to a couple of choices, but I have to make sure that using those names now doesn’t break something, later. If it does, I may just have to give him a new name.
      Thank you for reading and commenting. I appreciate it. 🙂

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