Tuesday evening at Fulham Library felt like dissecting the architecture of storytelling itself. The third person workshop gathered twelve writers around tables that had seen countless creative struggles, and I found myself examining my own narrative choices with fresh skepticism.
The session centered on mastering distance – that delicate balance between intimacy and objectivity that third person demands. Limited versus omniscient perspective became less about rules and more about surgical precision. When do you step closer to your character’s consciousness? When do you pull back to observe from above?
Working through the exercises, I realized how often I unconsciously slip between narrative distances within single paragraphs. This inconsistency, which I’d previously dismissed as stylistic freedom, suddenly appeared as technical weakness. The workshop leader pushed us to maintain strict boundaries – choose your distance and commit to it.
The community feedback revealed something unexpected. Other writers struggled with the same issue – that temptation to drift between minds, to explain rather than show. We’re all fighting the urge to control reader interpretation instead of trusting narrative structure to carry meaning.
For my current project revisions, this becomes crucial. The protagonist’s psychological complexity requires consistent limited third person to maintain authenticity. No jumping into other consciousness. No author explanations. Just disciplined observation of one mind navigating its reality.
The evening confirmed what I suspected – technical mastery isn’t restriction, it’s liberation. Knowing precisely how narrative distance functions allows for more sophisticated manipulation of reader experience. The craft serves the art, not the reverse.
— Writer Anastasia Dubinina