I was wondering yesterday about a scene in the end of my novel where the mc gets (verbally) "attacked" by another character, and I want to show if from his (the "attacker) POV, but does that somehow imply that I'm taking his part or can it still be perceieved as objective? I am not taking any ones part, they both have reasons for behaving like they do/have done. In general does your choice of pov suggest who's side you're on or is it just the lens through which you see the scene?
I don't consider POV choice as "taking sides" with a character. For me, it is a tool to show the scene in the most interesting perspective. POV can also help you reveal or hide info from the reader, e.g. Sherlock Holmes stories wouldn't be as mysterious and intriguing if he were the POV character even though he is the main protagonist. Hope this helps.
This is very true. Loads of stories have parts written from the villains' POV, or just from another character's. You don't take the side of the character you're symphatic toward when writing in someone's POV: you write from the POV of the person whose side is needed to convey to readers a certain piece of information not accessible to your protag, or add an extra layer to the plot.
I agree. POV isn't so much taking sides as it is showing things from a different perspective. And I think changing the POV in that scene could be pretty cool.
You do run the risk of making the POV character more sympathetic to the reader. Readers tend to be more forgiving and want to side with the POV character in my experience.
For me, it's disgusting to feel that the author has picked sides and is tainting the story with his personal opinions, not in the choice of story and characters (which is unavoidable) but in the reality inside the story. If at any point something happens and I feel the author made that happen because he agrees with one character more than another, I'll probably stop reading that story. Having said that, moving the PoV doesn't have to imply the author is siding with the PoV character. In many cases it will be the exact opposite, placing the favored character in the exterior as a way of keeping him above the rest.
thank you all for your opinions. I had never even reflected on this when writing the rest of the story, it was just when I came to this particular scene that it struck me. I'm glad to hear that it will not make me in any way less objective. Maybe even the contrary; if I would have writtwen the scene from the point of view of the MC it might have gotten the "victime"-effect over it, don't you think? I have tried the entire book to not seem like i'm favouring the MC, she has got flaws too, like everyone and Im not trying to make her seem perfect or justify her bad choices.
Take into account that creating a perfect character is not favoring her. The problem doesn't come from the character's attributes but from the author bending reality to favor her. For example, justifying bad choices is "less bad" than making them work out fine just because she's the character. The problem is the reader feeling that whatever she decides the world will bend to fit.
I'm assuming this scene at the end of the book isn't the first scene that is from a different PoV. It would jar me completely out of the story if an author decided to have a scene at the end of a story from a different PoV without having anything previous. I really like it when different scenes are from different points of view. It helps give a better picture of what is really happening in the story. Someone will probalby bring up head-hopping which of course is not good but that's a whole different can of worms.
I think I might have expressed myself badly, what you say is exactly what I aM trying to avoid, I'm not trying to create a a´character that everyone likes and who never makes bad choices or does things that hurt other people. she does those things and stuff does certainly not always end up good because she is the mc. No, I have more than one pov-chatacters in this novel (3, to be precise) plus this fourth one that is in the story all along but gets his own point of view at a certain point somewhere after the middle. I agree, it would be completely confusing if suddenly one scene is from a different pov than all of the rest. I am so near the end now, I'm basically closing it all up and it feels great to soon be able to start editing, because now I have the plot and development that I wanted from the story, yay!
