(no subject)

[graculus]

Oh no, spamming the livejournal...

Anyway, here's the thing: I'm writing a story which has a character who has amnesia (yes, just in time for my cliché panel at connotations!) and I'm writing it in third person kind of from his point of view.

So, character A has amnesia and for a certain reason, he actually thinks he's B. Is it reasonable for me to call him B once he comes to the conclusion that's who he is (even though that conclusion is wrong, he's going to get told it's wrong but initially not believe it and then discover it is wrong), or am I stuck with calling A 'he' all the way through until he finally does get his memory back? Because I can't call him A if he doesn't know he's A, can I?

And does this make any sense at all? No? Fair enough. ;)

Comments

[rach74.livejournal.com]

I think calling him 'He' would save confusing the reader

[manna]

Yes, I would go with calling him 'he' until he decides who he is, then 'B' once he come to that conclusion. Especially if it's written in pretty close third.

And then I would get it betaed to hell with a high-power microscope, because I know if it was me I'd be typing the wrong name all the damn time. :-)

[amycooper.livejournal.com]

I'm writing it in third person kind of from his point of view

My creative writing profs called that "over the shoulder third person."

And yeah, I think you can call him B during to part of the story in which he thinks he is B. You could call him A or B in italics. I think it will all work.

Or, over analyizing it to break it down further...

Even though the character thinks he is B, the narrative voice does, I assume, know better. Hence he could be called A.

By calling him B in the narration, the narrative voice is getting inside his brain, so to speak. Also you might want to call him "B" or even B which indicates something in between.

[amycooper.livejournal.com]

Also, I'm a sucker for amnsia stories. Who is it?

[katyabaturinsky.livejournal.com]

I vote for calling him B, if it's from his POV; otherwise it seems to me that you'd be tainting his POV with omniscient POV. And I think that his realization of his error would come across more powerfully, or appear more deeply felt, if he had to switch from calling himself B upon discovering the truth. But YMMV, of course. (I believe I've read some amnesia stories that used this type of device -- or something along these lines -- to fairly good effect.)

[khek.livejournal.com]

Yikes! You don't ask easy questions!

I think I've seen it written both ways. Does the reader know that he's not B? Because if the reader *does* know, then I think I would stick with calling A A. If the reader *doesn't* know, then I'd go with calling A B. I think you could carry off either though. :)

[nakeisha.livejournal.com]

Totally reasonable, IMO, to call him B. As you say calling him A wouldn't make sense, if he doesn't know he's A.