The 4 Types of Point of Views Used in a Story

Point of view is very crucial in allowing readers to ‘see’ what we want. The prime understanding of how point of views (POV) can extremely change how the audience read your work.  It is however, one of the most things that are ignored by many beginners.

What exactly defines POV? It is basically the idea of who is telling the story. It may be the reader, a character, or a third person. When you choose a type of POV, you are given the limitation to filter or the freedom to give information to the reader.

So what POV  types of point of views are there?

1. First person

This type of POV is when the story is told through the experience of a character. Here, the character is refered as “I”. It is basically us understanding how this character sees the world. Therefore, the reader can only see from his eyes, what he sees, what he thinks about, what he feels, etc.

Consider this excerpt taken from the Hunger Games, the reader can feel Katniss’s emotions in a deeper understanding as it offers the author to depict the action, physical setting, and emotion of the character:

I stand there, feeling broken and small, thousands of eyes trained on me. There’s a long pause. Then, from somewhere in the crowd, someone whistles Rue’s four-note mocking-jay tune. The one that meant safety in the arena.

However, the cons of using this POV is that the readers only understand what the character does. When telling a bigger idea, they might refer to what other people say. First person is also quite subjective in nature.

2. Second singular and plural

This POV is rather rare in creative writing. It employs the word ‘You,’ that refers to the readers. Sometimes the author may use plural pronouns such as ‘you all,’ or ‘you guys.’ While it does makes the reader more interactive, it is sometimes troublesome. However in children’s literature, choose-your-own-adventure books are very common. Often, at the end of the page, the author offers the reader a choice as to how they want to proceed.

Take a look at this example of Jay McInerney’s Bright Lights, Big City where the reader is taken through a journey in Manhattan:

Eventually you ascend the stairs to the street. You think of Plato’s pilgrims climbing out of the cave, from the shadow world of appearances toward things as they really are, and you wonder if it is possible to change in this life. Being with a philosopher makes you think.

I have to say that I’ve never written something in second POV because it often acts as a limitation in Fiction stories.

3. Third person limited

Third-person point of view provides the greatest flexibility to the author as it gives them the freedom to pick information they want to tell. However, there are two types of third person POV. The first one is limited. Here, the narrator possess a limited perspective. They may have access to the thoughts and feelings of one character, or maybe none at all.

An example of this POV is taken from my favorite book of J.K. Rowling: Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. Here J.K. uses a limited point of view to tell the horrible doings of the Dursleys. However, their actions are mostly filtered through Harry’s thoughts.

The Dursleys hadn’t even remembered that today happened to be Harry’s twelfth birthday. Of course, his hopes hadn’t been high; they’d never given him a real present, let alone a cake – but to ignore it completely…

Even though we don’t know Harry’s feelings, J.K. was able to use words like “of course” as if we’re reading from Harry’s perspective. This type of POV works well when we want to show how other characters may affect your main character.  This POV is also very common in setting mysterious tone as we don’t know what the characters are thinking about.

4. Third person omniscient

The second type of third person POV is omniscient. Here, the narrator knows all the thoughts and feelings of the characters. They can even look at different character’s point of views. They are often considered to be God-like narrators as they have the freedom to every aspect of the story.

A fine example of this POV is Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice. If we read this passage, you can see Elizabeth’s perspective but we also know what she doesn’t realize. This POV lets the narrator jumps between different characters’ thoughts, and provides more universal statements.

But no sooner had he made it clear to himself and his friends that she hardly had a good feature in her face, than he began to find it was rendered uncommonly intelligent by the beautiful expression of her dark eyes. To this discovery succeeded some others equally mortifying. Though he had detected with a critical eye more than one failure of perfect symmetry in her form, he was forced to acknowledge her figure to be light and pleasing; and in spite of his asserting that her manners were not those of the fashionable world, he was caught by their easy playfulness.

It is important however to note that there are pros and cons for each POV. After all the POV also depends on what kind of story one would like to write. I suggest practice writing in different kinds of POV to understand the different limitations to each POV. If you are lost in ideas, this link will take you to a blog that gives you pictures and or phrases to write about.

What should I write about next? Comment below if you want to request an entry.

Until then.

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