Narrative Forms

Question 1

First Person Narrator

Answer 1

a story is revealed through a narrator who is also explicitly a character within his or her own story.

Frequently, the narrator is the protagonist, whose inner thoughts are expressed to the audience, even if not to any of the other characters.

Question 2

Second Person Narrator

Answer 2

the narrator refers to at least one character directly as “you”, suggesting that the audience is a character within the story.

This is a common type of narrative point of view for popular music lyrics (in which the narrator often directly “speaks” to another person) and certain types of poetry, though it is quite rarely found in novels or short stories.

Question 3

Third Person Narrator

Answer 3

the third-person narrative mode, each and every character is referred to by the narrator as “he”, “she”, “it”, or “they”, but never as “I” or “we” (first-person), or “you” (second-person).

This makes it clear that the narrator is an unspecified entity or uninvolved person who conveys the story and is not a character of any kind within the story, or at least is not referred to as such.

Question 4

Third Person Subjective Narration

Answer 4

describing one or more character’s personal feelings and thoughts

Question 5

Third Person Objective Narration

Answer 5

narration not describing the feelings or thoughts of any characters but, rather, just the exact facts of the story

Question 6

Third Person Omnicent Narration

Answer 6

narrator has, or seems to have, access to knowledge of all characters, places, and events of the story, including any given characters’ thoughts

Question 7

Third Person Limited Narration

Answer 7

narrator knows information about, and within the minds of, only a limited number of characters (often just one character).

A limited narrator cannot describe anything outside of a focal character’s particular knowledge and experiences.