First Person PoV is like writing a journal?

Wordcraft · Dec 6, 2011

Or so I've been told. But how can that be, because when you write a journal you are writing about what has happened, whereas a first-person-pov story would usually be largely made up of what is happening...

So the advice - which I've read in various places - to pretend you are writing a journal, seems misleading...

No?

yamikuronue · Dec 6, 2011

You can do first person in past tense as well as present; in the past tense, it's like someone telling a story that happened to them, or like a journal entry.

Brukaviador · Dec 6, 2011

There's also the distinction of tense to consider.

1st person present tense is things I'm experiencing now.
1st person past tense is things I have experienced.

So it can be either.

RobJ · Dec 6, 2011

Wordcraft said:
Or so I've been told. But how can that be, because when you write a journal you are writing about what has happened, whereas a first-person-pov story would usually be largely made up of what is happening...

So the advice - which I've read in various places - to pretend you are writing a journal, seems misleading...

No?

Do you have a direct quote for what you've been told?

veinglory · Dec 6, 2011

A journal generally doesn't include a lot of reporting of detailed blow-by-blow events. So 1st person may or may not be much like that.

Wordcraft · Dec 6, 2011

No, no direct quote - just read it on various forums/blogs.

Yes, I understand that a book in first person can be written as a series of journal entries, but I think the context of the advice I read was applying it to first-person generally.

Does anyone know of a good source online for writing in the first person.

I dislike first-person POV when I read a book (not sure why), but I want to give it a go (for the first time) as a writer...

I want to keep an open mind

kuwisdelu · Dec 6, 2011

Hmm, I wouldn't say 1st person is anything like a journal, unless you're explicitly using the conceit of telling the story from a set of journal entires...

Mr Flibble · Dec 6, 2011

kuwisdelu said:
Hmm, I wouldn't say 1st person is anything like a journal, unless you're explicitly using the conceit of telling the story from a set of journal entires...

First past is often (not always) more like the character telling the story to someone else.

The best source for writing it would be (IMO) reading it.

mirandashell · Dec 6, 2011

I wrote my first WIP as first person past. And I saw it as being sat in a pub with a group of friends telling them what happened. Only more literary.... I hope! LOL!

I think writing FPP as a journal is a very specific way to do it and most FPP novels are not written that way.

LindaJeanne · Dec 6, 2011

No one would pay to read a novel that read like one of my journals.

Just sayin'.

(A journal is inherently self-indulgent. You can't get away that kind level of self-indulgence in something you expect someone else to read.)

kuwisdelu · Dec 6, 2011

mirandashell said:
I wrote my first WIP as first person past. And I saw it as being sat in a pub with a group of friends telling them what happened. Only more literary.... I hope! LOL!

Depends how eloquent said group of pub friends is.

LindaJeanne said:
(A journal is inherently self-indulgent. You can't get away that kind level of self-indulgence in something you expect someone else to read.)

Depends how interesting your self-indulgences are.

mirandashell · Dec 6, 2011

OY! Of course my friends are eloquent, they're my friends!

Tsk!

:tongue

Wordcraft · Dec 6, 2011

Yes, I have a copy of "I Capture the Castle" somewhere, but can't seem to find it...

So it's best to think of it as telling a personal story to a friend?

kuwisdelu · Dec 6, 2011

The way I think about first person tends to vary from scene to scene and what kind of section I'm writing.

Sometimes I think of it as stream-of-consciousness, sometimes I think of it as telling another person story, sometimes I think of it as a voiceover. Depends what effect and tone I want that particular section to have.

yamikuronue · Dec 6, 2011

I do first person like an internal monologue, and I've been told it works fairly well since I tend to be better at getting inside a character's head than telling a story per se. But no one technique is going to work for everyone.

Mr Flibble · Dec 6, 2011

Wordcraft said:
So it's best to think of it as telling a personal story to a friend?

I don't know about best. It depends on the story. Might work better as a journal or any number of things. But it might be a way to start if you're unsure. It really helps me anyway, for voice etc, if I picture my POV telling it to a specific person.

Brukaviador · Dec 6, 2011

Obviously I wasn't reading the subject line clearly enough.

Ignore me.

BethS · Dec 6, 2011

Wordcraft said:
I dislike first-person POV when I read a book (not sure why), but I want to give it a go (for the first time) as a writer...

The best way to understand it is to read a lot of it. No getting around that.

If you don't like it well enough to read it, though, I have to wonder why you'd want to try writing it yourself.

Wordcraft · Dec 6, 2011

Just to see what it's like, I guess.

mirandashell · Dec 6, 2011

Try writing a flash piece in first person. That will give you a taste of it.

Jess Haines · Dec 6, 2011

Maybe you just haven't been reading the right first person POV novels.

Generally, I dislike first person present tense, but past tense is just fine. That's just my personal tastes.

What genre(s) have you read that were in first person? I found Jim Butcher's Dresden Files and Kim Harrison's Hollows series to have done it very well, but then, I adore fantasy novels, so... *shrug*

Wordcraft · Dec 6, 2011

Well, I've looked at the first page of quite a few first-person novels

I do remember trying to read "I Capture the Castle", and some Bernard Cornwell ones, but couldn't get through them...though I got through Azincourt (written in third person).

I looked at one of the Percy Jackson ones recently, and it caught my attention a bit more...which is what piqued my interest in "having a go"...

BethS · Dec 6, 2011

Wordcraft said:
Just to see what it's like, I guess.

Fair enough.

Nothing wrong with that. But reading it will give you a feel for what works and what doesn't.

Diana Gabaldon's works (Outlander, et al) are written mostly in first person, and very well done. I would have recommended Bernard Cornwell's Anglo-Saxon novels (The Last Kingdom, and so forth) but you said you already tried those. (I will say that the second of those books is much better than the first one.)

Or if you want something more contemporary--are you familiar with Vicki Pettersson? Her modern-day, dark urban fantasy series set in Las Vegas is written in first-person. The first one is The Scent of Shadows.

Bushrat · Dec 6, 2011

I don't see why you can't write first person POV as you would deep 3rd. It's almost the same thing, in my view.

First person has nothing at all to do with writing the story as a series of journal entries, you can fashion it as you would using deep 3rd throughout. It allows you to tell the story from (usually just the one, but you could play around and use deep 3rd of other POVs for some chapters) the very intimate perspective of one person.

KyraDune · Dec 6, 2011

I wrote a novel in first person past tense, so it was like my MC was writing down his story himself. So yeah, like writing in a journal.

First Person PoV is like writing a journal?

Wordcraft

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