Well said, Juro. Echo of something Hemingway was supposed to
have said
about first person narration being diarhea of the mouth. In
line, too,
with whole modernistic tendency to "show" or dramatize,
rather than "tell"
or summarize/comment. Limited third person is more dramatic
and
supposedly cools the author's temptation to play god, or its
modern
variant, to play therapist. [Is this so, writers? Does choice
of limited
third act as a constraint?]
HOWEVER I have some sympathy for mystery writers who want to
build
character from one book to the next in a series. They want to
avoid the
old adventure series trap: exactly the same guy in "pick your
place"
encountering "pick your villain." So a # of writers seem to
be pushing
their characters into changes, whether relationships, aging,
or injury, so
that the books have a "life plot" or "growing up story" that
continues as a
second level of interest, beneath the crime plot. For someone
like P.D.
James or Tony Hillerman, this feature builds character
loyalty among the
fans. As the characters accumulate a "history," there may be
more reason
for reflectiveness. There's danger here, to be sure, but,
finally, I'm in
sympathy with the authors who attempt some density in their
major (and
minor) characters, even if it slows things down.
But I'm also with Juro, Dan and others who are tired of the
little internal
"self-talks" or set-piece heart-to-heart talks with minor
characters who
just don't matter very much.
Bill Hagen
<billha@ionet.net>
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