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· Dec 15, 2021

thanks for the input everyone, gonna start with the lion. i will try imagining c.s. lewis reading this to me in a kindly grandfatherly voice

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closely related is that the narrator is an actual character - he says "i" at several points, says to the reader that he will not be telling the reader certain things, stuff like that - and i feel like modern fiction mostly doesn't do this and is worse for it

(with the notable exception, off the top of my head, of n.k. jemisin's the hundred thousand kingdoms, where the narrator is a specific character in the story and it's a major reveal who)

the narrator character is written in such a way as to establish a relationship between him and the reader, and it's a wholesome relationship - the narrator is obviously trying to teach and parent the reader, it really shines through

9:39 PM · Dec 18, 2021Twitter Web App

modern fiction with a third-person omniscient narrator has a narrator who is basically a camera. not a person, doesn't have a personality or a point of view on events. there's something subtly weird about this imo. it's a kind of pretending to an objective pov that doesn't exist

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this specific paragraph where aslan’s name is spoken aloud for the first time really, really sticks out to me also

The Abominable Dr. Vibes

@madamscrewhead

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god, yeah. It's weirdly characteristic of post-postmodern/whatever-the-fuck-we're-on-now literature in general and I do hate it. bring back weirdo modernist narrators waxing poetic

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I read somebody (Gene Wolfe in interview?) that all narrators are unreliable, and it made me enjoy fiction much more than I already had.

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