Nanosecond Refresher course on Third Person...

Star · Sep 17, 2007

Dear Fellow Scribes,

I'm embarking on the journey to second-book-hood, and I need a bit of help with third person limited. Yes, I've read almost every fiction book under the moon (I read at night), but I'm still not clear on this:

I understand that third person limited means that everything that ahappens, must happen in my protagonist's presence, but does that mean that I can't jump (quickly) into another character's head? The following is not from an actual story - I just want to know if this works:

Jesse ran to the market to buy a six-pack of beer. He dashed inside, grabbed the cans, and slid them onto the counter in a huff.
"Your ID," the stout store clerk demanded, staring at Jesse as if he were a fool.

Question is: Can I, as narrator, get into the store clerk's head? Can I share his thoughts BRIEFLY. Or am I only allowed to show the action and dialogue of the store clerk without sharing any interpretation of his actions? Does my question makes sense?

Enraptured · Sep 17, 2007

You can't go into another character's head in third person limited, at least not without switching to a new scene and writing the whole scene from that character's point of view.

Star · Sep 17, 2007

Ahhhh, thank you.

So aside from the lack of literary merit, I CAN do what I did with the store clerk excerpt?

JLCwrites · Sep 17, 2007

"The clerk eyes Jesse with suspicion. He really wonders how this kid thinks he can pass for 21"

Something like that?
I think it would be fine.

qdsb · Sep 17, 2007

My understanding of 3rd limited POV is that you can (sort of) do what you're doing in that clerk excerpt and remain faithful to Jesse's 3rd limited...in that you can interpret the clerk's look from Jesse's POV. In your example, the clerk's look makes Jesse feel like a fool.

You couldn't, however, have the clerk start making internal conjectures, like "The clerk knew he couldn't possibly be legal" without problematic head-hopping.

amber_grosjean · Sep 17, 2007

Yea, the excerpt sounded good. Your choice of words revealed a little about the clerk. He sounded as though he was having a bad day or something. Or he just didn't like his job.

If you want to be able to give insight on other characters, you can use the other third person instead of the limited but by not giving that information, the reader will want to turn the page to see why someone is acting the way they were. It would make the story a little more intense. My book recently published is limited. It wasn't before and the editor felt it would be better limiting to just the MC's POV and then switch it at the end using breaks. I think it worked out better because now the character will keep wondering about the woman in the story instead of being told what she's doing. Adds suspense as well as keeps the feeling of the thriller which is has been written under.

Amber

Devil Ledbetter · Sep 17, 2007

Star said:
Ahhhh, thank you.

So aside from the lack of literary merit, I CAN do what I did with the store clerk excerpt?

What you can do is show what the store clerk is thinking by his actions and dialog. I think you've done this in the example provided.

"The clerk eyes Jesse with suspicion. He really wonders how this kid thinks he can pass for 21"

Something like that?
I think it would be fine.

That reads like a head-hop to me, Turkey.

Prawn · Sep 17, 2007

I think also the difference is that you stay in the head of one person, and the reader doesn't know anything the character doesn't such as

"If only Hero Protaganist had down the pizza was poisoned, the would never have taken that fateful bite."

The character doesn't know it, so the reader doesn't know it.

Star · Sep 17, 2007

Thanks everyone!

I think I'll stick with limited.

maestrowork · Sep 17, 2007

Star said:
Jesse ran to the market to buy a six-pack of beer. He dashed inside, grabbed the cans, and slid them onto the counter in a huff.

"Your ID," the stout store clerk demanded, staring at Jesse as if he were a fool.

Question is: Can I, as narrator, get into the store clerk's head? Can I share his thoughts BRIEFLY. Or am I only allowed to show the action and dialogue of the store clerk without sharing any interpretation of his actions? Does my question makes sense?

That would be head-hopping. 3rd limited stays with the POV character, but you can switch POVs between scenes. That example could have been easily rewritten to avoid head-hopping:

"Your ID," the stout store clerk demanded, staring at Jesse as if he was accusing Jesse for being a fool.

The "as if he was accusing" lets you stay in Jesse's POV -- Jesse is speculating what the clerk is thinking by his stare.

JLCwrites · Sep 17, 2007

Thanks for the explanation! I had it wrong too.

Star · Sep 17, 2007

We're learning together Turkey...uh, I'm not calling you a turkey...uh, that's your name, right?

Ravenlocks · Sep 17, 2007

qdsb said:
you can interpret the clerk's look from Jesse's POV.

I do this ALL THE TIME. I write in third-person limited, but my characters make lots of assumptions about what the other folks around them are thinking based on expressions, gestures, tone of voice, etc. So I get the info in there about what the other characters are probably thinking (except when the viewpoint character is wrong about it) without leaving third-person limited.

Nanosecond Refresher course on Third Person...

Star

So cool I am

Enraptured

Narrator

Star

So cool I am

JLCwrites

qdsb

Cynical Idealist

amber_grosjean

AW Addict

Devil Ledbetter

Come on you stranger, you legend,

Prawn

Writing is finite,revising infinite

Star

So cool I am

maestrowork

Fear the Death Ray

JLCwrites

Star

So cool I am

Ravenlocks

How novel.