IN DEFENSE of the FIRST-PERSON NARRATOR and DOG VIDEOS

By Kasie Whitener

My favorite quarantine video has been the BBC’s rugby announcer narrating his dogs. The voice is familiar to watchers of the sport, the cadence is familiar to anyone who watches any sports at all, and the actions of the dogs are exaggerated and made into a story by the narrator lending his voice. If you haven’t watched it, click here.

Several things are true about this video. First, quarantine has rendered many of us “nonessential” in the workforce. Sports broadcasters join the ranks of waiters, actors, and retailers when we are all forced to stay in our homes.

Second, pets are a fantastic source of entertainment. Some of the best memes, videos, and social posts have been the Secret Life of Pets revealed. One has a woman’s voice narrating for her own dog who says something to the effect of, “If these people don’t go back to work soon, I swear, I’ll do something unforgiveable.”

And that brings me to the third truth about our BBC announcer’s video: Great narration is underrated.

In writers’ circles, we talk extensively about point-of-view as an extension of the narration conversation. First-person narrators have the advantage of telling the innermost thoughts of the character to whom we’re the closest in the story. Even if that person isn’t the protagonist (Nick Carraway), the first-person narrator makes that character the most important contributor to the story.

The second person narrator and a collective first-person narrator make the reader essential to the story. You Choose Your Own Adventure in those classic 80’s kids’ books, or you become one of the neighborhood boys (we) watching The Virgin Suicides unfold. The second person relies too heavily upon the reader’s interpretation of the work.

The third person narrator perches on the shoulders of characters, trying to see from their point of view but not so close as to exhaust the reader with the mental gymnastics of the first person POV. The third person narrator is the dullest of all. It removes entirely the editorial, the judgement, and the messy reality of being a person. It reflects and reports, like a journalist.

The first-person narrator, while limited to just what the narrator sees, nevertheless delivers a rich vocabulary, the neuroticism of internal monologue, and the skewed and unreliable interpretation of the actions of characters who are not the narrator.

The first-person narrator is powerful. It is (one of) the author’s alter ego(s) springing forth and frolicking through the story. It is untamed. Natural. Authentic. And risky. Because when readers don’t like your first-person narrator, they don’t like your book.

Narrators make the story. They turn nothing into something. They infuse the drama, they raise the stakes, and they drag the reader through the pages. Like the rugby commentator animating his dogs with well-placed vocabulary and inflection, the narrator conducts the story. Without a good one, the story is just lifeless words on the page.

Or dogs lying about on their living room floor.