First Person Narration Using an "Observer"

In a nutshell, first person narration using an "observer" means that the narrator/viewpoint character is an observer of the protagonist, not the protagonist themselves.

Before talking about this variety of first person narration in detail, let me first go right back to the basic logic behind it...

Novels written in the First Person Point of View are usually narrated by the protagonist. So in The Catcher in the Rye, for example, Holden Caulfield is:

• The protagonist - the one the novel is "about,"
• the narrator - the one telling the story (from a point in time after the novel's events are over), and
• the viewpoint character - the one through whose eyes we witness the events and whose thoughts and feelings we have access to.

First person narration using an observer is different because the narrator/ viewpoint character is not the protagonist. So in the Sherlock Holmes novels:

• Holmes is the protagonist.
• But it is Doctor Watson who is the narrator (the one telling the story after the events are over) and the viewpoint character (the one whose eyes we see through).

Other than using a character who is not the protagonist to tell the story, first person "observer" novels are exactly the same as traditional first person point of view novels.

All you have to remember is that the story's focus should always be on the protagonist, not on the narrator.

The narrator will have some role in the events, other than merely observing them - they will have their own goals and encounter their own obstacles, and so on. But their own story will nevertheless be very much a subplot to the protagonist's main plot...

• The novel will be "about" the narrator to a small extent.
• But first and foremost it must be "about" the protagonist.

The next question to answer is this: why bother with this variety of first person narration at all? The answer is that some stories will simply lend themselves perfectly to it.

Here are four circumstances under which you might consider using an observer...