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I read a lot. I write dark fiction.
I edit and publish it, too.
Every week I’ll endeavor to post some
helpful tidbit on some aspect of writing, editing, or publishing
fiction. So bookmark my page and come back often.
Narration: An Introduction
May 19, 2008
A narrative is a story or account of events, whether
true or fictitious. Narrating is telling the story,
recounting the plot’s action.
Fiction is a form of narrative that is related through a
voice. In other words, it’s told by someone: the narrator.
The key issue in studying narrative voice is knowing who
speaks, or who tells the story. There are three types of
narrators:
| Type of Narrator
| Description
|
| Heterodiegetic
| Is not a character in the story. Hovers above the story
action and may know everything about the story and characters.
|
| Homodiegetic
| Is a character in the story.
|
| Autodiegetic
| Is a character in the story, and that character is the protagonist.
|
As you can see, narration is partnered with point of view,
or focalization, which I’ll discuss in a future Word of the Week.
It’s important to understand that in fiction the narrator is
not the same as you, the author. Narrators can hold opinions that
you don’t hold. You can create a narrator of the opposite sex
without undergoing reassignment surgery. Your narrator can be
guilty of murder and all kinds of crimes without you risking
incarceration. These are a few things that make writing fun!
Next week we’ll take a look at the narrative communication
levels and focalization.
–Lee Allen Howard
Source: Cheney, Theodore A. Rees.
Getting the Words Right. Cincinnati, OH: Writer’s Digest Books, 1983.
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