Glossary

Point of View (POV)

The perspective from which a story is told — whose eyes and consciousness the reader experiences events through.

Point of view is the narrative position a story is told from: first person (I), second person (you), or third person (he/she/they). It governs whose thoughts the reader can access and how much they know at any moment. POV is one of the earliest and most consequential decisions in a draft, because it shapes intimacy, suspense, and voice.

Beyond grammatical person, POV includes distance — how close the narration sits to a character's inner life. A distant third person reports events from outside; a close one lives inside a character's head. (For the close variety, see deep POV and third person limited.)

Example

First person: 'I didn't trust the lawyer, and I told her so.' Third person limited: 'She didn't trust the lawyer, and she said as much.'

See also: Third person limited POV (blog)

Related terms

Third Person LimitedA third-person POV confined to the perceptions, thoughts, and knowledge of a single viewpoint character.Deep POVA close third-person technique that removes narrative filtering so the reader experiences the story directly through a character's consciousness.Free Indirect DiscourseA technique that blends a character's inner voice with third-person narration, without quotation marks or 'she thought' tags.
Point of View (POV) — definition & example · Muze Writer