Methods for Constructing Narrative Filters

1. Report: Third-person narrator reports on character's thoughts.

ex. "Smith felt that he was wrong to have done that."

2. Stream of Consciousness: this technique attempts to duplicate the flow of thoughts and sense impressions as they occur in a character's mind. Often ordinary grammar and punctuation break down in the effort to capture the flux of perceptions in that character's consciousness.

3. Quotation

a. Direct tagged quotation: third-person narrator can quote the character's thoughts directly, inside quotation marks and using "tag" phrases like "he said" or "she thought."

ex. "I was wrong to have done that," Smith thought.

b. Indirect tagged quotation: third-person narrator shifts the character's thoughts and the tag phrases into 3rd-person pronouns and usually drops quotation marks.

ex. He was wrong to have done that, he thought.

c. Indirect untagged quotation (also known as free quotation, free indirect style, indirect discourse, or narrated monolog): the quotation is indirect because the pronouns are 3rd person and "free" because there are no tags like "he said." (Note also that when converting a direct quotation into an indirect one, the tense of the verb normally shifts into past tense):

ex. He was wrong to have done that.

 

Examples:

Stream of Consciousness

James Joyce, from Ulysses

Quotation and Report

Hemingway, In Our Time

Free Indirect Style

Austen, Emma

Mansfield, "Miss Brill"

 

325 Points of view lecture: http://mason.gmu.edu/~rjann/325F08POV