points of view in telling a story or givin a report'

points of view in telling a story or givin a report

 First Person Point of View In presenting your story, and you may decide to relate it in such a way that your reader will feel that you are presenting your personal experiences. It must not necessarily be a story of your real life – an autobiography. In this point of view you will use the first person pronoun ‘I’ and this ‘I’ in the story is called the narrator. In the first person narration, the story is viewed as authentic and reliable especially where realistic landmarks and dates are mentioned. The only constraint is that it has its own limitations because the narrator can only relate the incidents he/she witnessed, or state his source of information. In multiple narration, the story is told by different characters in the novel. In the letter narration also known as the epistolary like Mariama Ba’s So Long a Letter is 51 presented in form of a letter. The narrator, Ramatolaye starts the novel with “Dear Assiatou” and ends it with “Ramatolaye”. She recalls the incidents that are familiar to both of them and narrates the ones her friend, Aissatou, is not aware of. Other advantages of this point of view is that it is the most personal point of view as the reader identifies easily with the narrator. It conveys the impression of a firsthand account and through it the author reaches the reader in an informal yet more intimate manner as though the reader was sitting beside him and seeing the story unfold. (Ike 91) Telling the story through the same person (often the hero) also helps to hold the story together. 3.4.2 Second Person Point of View This point of view makes use of the second person pronoun, you. It is really difficult for someone to tell another person (2nd person) a story by saying “you did this, you did that…” The argument here could be that, there is no point for you here (the narrator) to tell me (2nd person) what I have done and what I have not done. It does not make sense. The insertion of dialogue in this point of view is difficult I have not read any novel that is written in this point of view but I have seen a short story that is relayed effectively in the second person point of view. Here is an excerpt from Akachi Ezeigbo’s “Fractures”. Wetness is to winter as dryness is to harmattan; winter spawns snow as harmattan hatches dust, two climatic conditions you detest. Dry leaves falling to litter the earth, everything brittle, breaking to the touch, trees shedding their leaves, naked and dying to the world. Features common to both seasons in varying degrees. You exchanged the harmattan for winter because you wanted to, nobody forced you and you cannot claim persecution drove you 52 away as so many exiled souls. You have asked yourself time and time again why you chose this as your country of self-imposed exile. You have learnt to live with the cold and get on with your life. The job you are doing is not the best but it is a job you are lucky to have and keep. The holiday was a bonus you received with gratitude. But things did not quite go the way you expected. They ended in an anticlimax You ask, “why do things go wrong at the time one is happiest”? This question creeps into your mind because you are suffering. You are in pain; you have lived with pain for twenty-four hours. You are sitting in the waiting room, in an orthopedic hospital, waiting for the surgeon to see you. One thought dominates your mind and it is not a happy thought. You feel you have fractures in your knee. The pain is unbearable and you think only a fracture could produce so much pain. Extremity in anything is morbid, so you allow hope to curl up inside your heart like a green snake, whispering that you might be wrong, that you are wrong. Should there not be some swelling if a bone is fractured? You cling to this hope, as you train your gaze on the paramedical staff engaged in getting patients ready to see the doctors. One of them has scrutinized your papers, your insurance cover and taken other details from you. 3.4.3 Third Person Point of View You may decide to use the third person point of view, in which case you will use the third person “he/she” or the character’s name in the third person narrative, we have the omniscient point of view and the objective point of view. The omniscient 53 narrator sees and knows everything that happens in the story. This means that the author knows what each character is doing at any point and when necessary presents a character’s innermost thoughts and feelings. It is the most popular form of narration. Most novels you read are in the omniscient point of view which is also referred to as ‘the Eye of God”. Objective point of view is also told in the 3rd person but unlike in the omniscient narration, the objective narrator does not intrude in the story, does not try to describe the characters, probe their inner feelings and thoughts, or comment on their actions. The reader is left to interpret the characters words and action and draw conclusions or make his/her judgment. Since, as the author using this point of view, you would not comment on or interpret actions, you will need to inject a lot of action in the story which is realized mainly in dialogue for it to be successful. One episode leads to the other, consequently, the story tells itself in a dramatic form. The advantage here is that the story moves at a faster pace. The disadvantage is that the scope is limited to only the words and actions that the reader can hear or see physically. The reader is not exposed to the thoughts or motives of the characters and so may not be able to understand a characters growth or transformation or unravel some complications in the plot. Sometimes this objective point of view forms part of the omniscient point of view. 4.0 CONCLUSION Creative writing is an imaginative art that is presented to entertain, to inform and to educate the reader. The artist chooses the genre to write and chooses a particular medium to relay his/her message while at the same time entertaining the reader. Each genre of literature has its own peculiar mode of presentation and it is 54 important for you to learn the different modes of presentation to enable you choose the best one for your work. 5.0 SUMMARY In this unit, we have exposed you to various ways of writing your creative piece. We used some illustrations from renowned writers to make our points. You cannot be a good writer if you do not read wide. If you intend to write a novel, start reading as many good novels as possible. Try to spend at least an hour a day on the genre of your choice. You will benefit from the masters but please do not copy what someone else has written.