A narrative viewpoint is the position the story is told from, and it decides what the narrator is allowed to know. Composition tasks ask for narrative writing, and a steady viewpoint is one of the first things a reader senses, even if they cannot name it.
This lesson belongs to first-language composition and builds on how writers shape a narrator in first-language textual analysis.
How do you choose and keep a viewpoint?
Ask three questions before you write.
- Who tells the story? First person (我) or third person (他/她)?
- What can that person know? A first-person narrator knows their own thoughts and only sees the outside of others.
- How will the narrator show a guess? Use words such as 好像, 似乎, 看起来.
Write the answers as the first line of your plan. When you reach the middle of the essay and feel tempted to say what another person feels, glance at that line.
Worked example
Title: 《雨夜的末班车》. The writer and the people are invented.
Step 1, choose: first person. 我 is a student called 小玲 who waits for the last bus after an evening class.
Step 2, list what 小玲 can know: the rain, the cold, the empty road, the driver’s face and hands, her own worry about being late home.
Step 3, list what she cannot know: why the bus is late, what the driver is thinking.
Step 4, write the key moment with a guess:
车终于来了。司机看了我一眼，没有说话，只是把暖气调大了。我猜他是看见我在发抖。
The narrator reports an action (调大了暖气) and offers a guess (我猜), so the viewpoint stays inside 小玲.
The mistake to watch for
A common slip is to keep the 我 and then enter another mind.
Mistaken sentence: 司机心里想：这个女孩一定冷坏了，我得帮帮她。我低着头，不好意思地笑了。
The first clause is the driver’s private thought, which 我 cannot hear. The sentence also shifts from the narrator’s scene to the driver’s feelings.
Correction: turn the thought into something 我 can observe.
司机从后视镜里看了我一眼，伸手把暖气开大。我低着头，不好意思地笑了。
Check yourself
1. A first-person story says: 妈妈明明很累，却装作没事。What is wrong, and how could you fix it?
Show answer
The narrator states the mother’s inner state as fact. Fix it with an observed clue and a guess: 妈妈的眼睛红红的，却笑着说没事，我猜她其实很累。
2. Which narrator can say 他其实很害怕: a first-person narrator describing a friend, or a third-person narrator who stays close to that friend?
Show answer
The third-person narrator close to the friend. A first-person narrator needs a clue, such as 他的手一直在抖, and a guess word.
3. Write one sentence in first person that shows a stranger is nervous without stating their thoughts.
Show answer
Example: 陌生人不停地看手表，手指在书包带上绕来绕去。Any sentence that shows behaviour, not a stated thought, works.
Where this leads next
Once your viewpoint is fixed, you can choose what to show closely. Continue with developing description around a focal detail, then test the five skills together in the composition practice set.
If you can plan the viewpoint but your drafts still wobble, our teachers can look at your actual paragraphs in online one-to-one Chinese tuition.