Present Tense and story ratings

[StillStunned]

I always seem to start with first person past and then decide how to tweak it from there. It always sucks when you get far into the story and then realize you have to change it so it works better

I find that voyeur stories work best in 1P. Once I started one in 3P, but after a while I realised I'd defaulted to 1P anyway. Had to go back and rewrite it all.

 

[TheLobster]

You will write all the rest of your stories in 2nd person future tense. You will not be sure why, but you will be a contrarian, and you will be fed up by the same-old same-old advice you will get from the Author's Hang Out, so you will be likely to say, "To hell with it."

This doesn't sound so bad, actually. I think it might be perfectly publishable, just as long as you precede it with a suitable preamble.

I suggest "Your eyelids are becoming heavy..."

 

[knowhergne]

I find that voyeur stories work best in 1P. Once I started one in 3P, but after a while I realised I'd defaulted to 1P anyway. Had to go back and rewrite it all.

Agreed, they definitely do

 

[Writer61]

When I lay out my outlines, I'm never quite sure how I will write them. First person, present or past, third person present or past, or a mix of first person past or present, from two or three people's points of view. The choices are formed just before I begin to write, and I've been known to start over when whatever I chose isn't working for me.

I am embarrassed to confess that I have never thought about that until this thread.

In my recently finished but not yet published story, I made the effort to ensure it was 1P Present throughout.

For my current WIP, I am trying to stick to 3P Past, but I am finding it hard (ooh, er, Missus, do you like a good double-entendre?).

 

[SimonDoom]

Present tense, to me, has a kind of breathless, in-the-moment quality, so I can see why it would work for romance stories. 50 Shades is told in first person present tense. That's not exactly a recommendation, but it WAS successful, so its choice of tense and POV didn't seem to hurt its success.

I think you can make many of these artistic choices work, but you maximize your chances of success if a) you are mindful of your choice and why you are making it. and b) you are scrupulously consistent about it throughout the story.

 

[Britva415]

Thank, guys!

Although I suspect you're actually referring to two different stories: Into The Night and You Know You Shouldn’t.

Damn, it turns out he’s right about that, but it turns out everythin’ you said about Know You Shouldn’t turns out to be true about Into The Night too.

 

[Britva415]

This doesn't sound so bad, actually. I think it might be perfectly publishable, just as long as you precede it with a suitable preamble.

I suggest "Your eyelids are becoming heavy..."

And I thought people didn’t understand “framing”

 

[crookedletter]

And I thought people didn’t understand “framing”

I'm not sure it's a lack of understanding, as much as it is disagreeing with the extent to which you think it's necessary.

 

[Britva415]

Damn, it turns out he’s right about that, but it turns out everythin’ you said about Know You Shouldn’t turns out to be true about Into The Night too.

*ahem*

In short, I see these as re-voiced 1p stories. They aren’t one person narrating another person’s actions or experience to them. Now - that isn’t a requirement for grammatical adherence to 2p voice, but it is what the preponderance of 2p stories on Lit are. And it is 100% what sucks about most 2p storytelling.

By contrast:

There was one time when I hypothesized that a 2p story could be told in imperatives, and that it would be better. (I mean, not just any story. Most of the sucky ones simply couldn’t be re-told in imperative mood. A few could.)

Another time I read through (really!) a 2p story because it was a reminiscence told by one person to another who had been there and was in fact the subject (and, seemingly paradoxically, the object) of the reminiscence.

All of these are “different” ways to do 2p. I do have very specific objections to the kind of 2p which just powergames actions at “me,” and a 2p story which does have redeeming qualities would really have to grab me before I nope out, but it’s possible.

(I do understand that the “you” in someone’s 2p fantasy dictation isn’t “me.” It doesn’t matter, because reading it still feels like someone imposing theirself upon someone. As usual, an effort toward framing would completely mitigate that, but nobody ever does it.)

 

[Britva415]

I'm not sure it's a lack of understanding, as much as it is disagreeing with the extent to which you think it's necessary.

Yes, yes, it’s all a rich tapestry.

 

[StillStunned]

In short, I see these as re-voiced 1p stories. They aren’t one person narrating another person’s actions or experience to them. Now - that isn’t a requirement for grammatical adherence to 2p voice, but it is what the preponderance of 2p stories on Lit are. And it is 100% what sucks about most 2p storytelling.

"Into The Night" was inspired by the Bruce Springsteen song "Night", which I thought would make a great cyberpunk adaptation, with the "real" world based on 1970s New York. But as I was running the lyrics through my head, I realised that it's all 2P - and the story immediately took shape in my head as 2P.

I suspect that what makes it work is that the focus is almost all external, on the world and events and people around the Magic Rat, which probably sets it apart from a lot of 2P.

There was one time when I hypothesized that a 2p story could be told in imperatives, and that it would be better. (I mean, not just any story. Most of the sucky ones simply couldn’t be re-told in imperative mood. A few could.)

"You Know You Shouldn't" is essentially a series of imperatives, albeit in the negative.

 

[Britva415]

"You Know You Shouldn't" is essentially a series of imperatives, albeit in the negative.

Nah. If someone were to write You Know You Should, it still wouldn’t be imperative.

You Must or You Do would be imperative.

 

[TheLobster]

You Must or You Do would be imperative.

What about Do, or Do Not; There is no Try?

 

[yowser]

I checked a half dozen for sale Romances earlier and every one was 1P present. It's not the rule here, but I think it is far more common among professional writers. (Also holds for YA, I think)

I find 1P past uncomfortable for exactly this reason. I expect 1P present or 3P past.

I would appreciate a more expanded take on this. I usually think of first person past as a natural story teller's approach.

I went to the store today, a little distracted. I ended up reaching for the same bunch of carrots as someone else. We each muttered 'sorry!' at the same time and it was only then that I noticed her, with big dark eyes and a moon face and a sensuous cleft chin.

Surely this is intimate, the narrator is talking to the listener (reader) relating something that happened (just now maybe, but in the past.) It would be very different in present tense.

If you could explain how you find this uncomfortable, I'd be grateful.

 

[old_prof]

I would appreciate a more expanded take on this. I usually think of first person past as a natural story teller's approach.

I went to the store today, a little distracted. I ended up reaching for the same bunch of carrots as someone else. We each muttered 'sorry!' at the same time and it was only then that I noticed her, with big dark eyes and a moon face and a sensuous cleft chin.

Surely this is intimate, the narrator is talking to the listener (reader) relating something that happened (just now maybe, but in the past.) It would be very different in present tense.

If you could explain how you find this uncomfortable, I'd be grateful.

I think of first person as being inside their head, not as they tell the story sometime later, but as they experience it initially. For storytelling like that, I'm much more comfortable with third person. I get what you are saying about someone relating a story, but it just grates on me.

To me, first person is experiencing it as the MC/narrator. You never experience in the past tense. I always want that to be thrrd person.

 

[PennameWombat]

Can you articulate any more about why it bothers you so much. You are certainly not alone, but I absolutely don't get it. I have to think about when I'm reading or I completely forget about perspective and tense. As long as the author has me immersed in the story, I don't care. And I really don't get people who do.

It's kind of like some of us can actually taste broccoli, and everyone else, with their defective genes, think it tastes good. There must be a 1P present gene that lets you see it's actually awful that I just can't perceive. I really want to understand why.

Sorry for the delayed response. Life gets in the way.

The main thing about present tense is I notice it. When I'm reading or listening to an audio book (the latter a major amount of my leisure reading now), if the book is past tense, whether first or third, I just go with the flow. I hit that immersion you describe.

But if it's present tense, I notice it. I have to consciously push my focus to be on the actual story, as opposed to the word choices. I can't get immersed.

Now. Is it because when I was young (yeah, that was decades ago), all of my reading happened to be past tense? I've only ever read a couple of fan-fiction pieces, which I know tend to use present tense often, but present tense was never a regular part of my reading. I cannot definitively state my "issue" in any better way.

There's a science fiction author (Peter Cawdron) who writes "First Contact" stories, has about 20 of them. Not a series, all but a couple of duologies are stand-alone, just different scenarios of humans encountering aliens. He uses third-person present. I pushed myself through a couple, because the ideas intrigued me sufficiently. But I always had to force refocus on the story, not the verbiage. A third wasn't compelling enough. He also has some other flaws in his writing, which likely explains why he's a successful enough self-publisher to get about a third of his books done as audio deals through Podium, but not a general publisher. That said, the use of present tense doesn't allow me to overlook the minor flaws.

Not sure this is coherent, or answers your question. I unfortunately can't explain it better.

 

[Britva415]

I think of first person as being inside their head, not as they tell the story sometime later, but as they experience it initially

Hi again Since I read the above, I’ve been keeping it in mind as I read 1p present-tense stories around here. And some of what’s written does seem to adhere to it. But then there are times when an author who seems to be writing one of these will exposit a bunch of past-tense stuff, and it just doesn’t come off as internal experience of reminiscence, or as anything else which would be part of the MC’s realtime thoughts. It comes off as storytelling.

If it’s done well, then it comes off as the MC doing the storytelling, which we have discussed. If it’s done less well, it comes off as the author doing the storytelling in the MC’s voice. Either way, it subverts the frame of “this is supposed to be the MC’s stream of immediate experience.”

There are stories which avoid this and can plausibly be taken as one of those “you’re being the MC” type stories we have mentioned in previous posts. There are also stories which are more-or-less explicitly framed as storytelling on the MCs part, such that the reader is in the position of some audience the MC is aware of and is intentional about narrating for.

Then there are these ones which seem in-between. It’s trying to be a “be the MC,” conveying the supposedly realtime experience stream to the reader, but then it’s got these expositions of past facts which are very clearly there because the author needs them to be and hasn’t figured out how to either do without them entirely, or else how to plausibly put these thoughts into the MC’s mind as part of the realtime stream of experience.

One trick which can make this less contradictory is for the author to write something along the lines of “I think about what brought me here:” and then have the MC reminisce upon those past facts, in order for the author to achieve the exposition. But it does strike me as a trick and, at best, not very natural or suitable for a story which is intended to be the 1p stream-of-consciousness we’ve been discussing. At worst, it fails as a trick because people don’t spontaneously start telling themselves the story of some chapter of their own past. Especially not right in the middle of them experiencing something presently. I find it clumsy and not believable as “this character is experiencing these thoughts” in their stream of consciousness or experience.

This is why, to me, many 1p stories shouldn’t try to be that. Certain ones should be framed as an actual telling of the story in some fashion to some audience of some type by the MC. Because then there’s no incongruity at all between exposition of the past and the telling of the present story. It’s all part of the MC’s act of telling, or writing, or recording, or whatever the storytelling mode is supposed to be.

Now: This does bring up the other matter, which is about what tense to even write the story in at all. A 1p story that’s framed as an actual telling (verbal, written or what have you) would be written in past-tense, with exposition of previous facts maybe in the past-perfect. (And then you could get the haddy-had-had problem .) Meanwhile the kind of 1p story that’s framed as the MC’s direct and immediate experience would be written in present-tense, like we’ve been talking about in previous posts. And, ideally (to me), one of these would have no exposition section storytelling past facts, if you see what I mean. Except to the extent that singular and particular ones of those facts might plausibly enter the MC’s mind in real time.

This is how thoughts happen: One might experience a brief tangential awareness of something remembered, attaching itself to a moment of realtime experience. Not a whole-ass paragraphical backstory. Sure, someone could take time out to sit and ponder, ruminate on the past, and it’s OK to put that in one of these 1p-realtime-experience stories, but too often a slab of exposition is shoehorned in to a narration when stuff is supposed to be happening. Ideally, to me, that is 100% not the place to jam in a narrative section dedicated to exposition of past facts.

Unless it’s framed as a 1p act of storytelling and not as a narration of 1p realtime experience. Nobody’s got time to play back the mental tape about their career and their divorce and shit when they’re busy mustering up the brass to flirt with that hottie, amirite

Thoughts?

I guess mine is, this is why I feel it’s easier to write 1p past than 1p present and, to me, it’s effective from the reader’s side as well. It makes it easier to not leave authorial fingersmudges like that.