Podcast #42: Gregory Frost

Podcast #42 is now available for download here.

As a guest lecturer at Odyssey 2010, Gregory Frost spoke about “Character, Viewpoint, and the Critical Voice of the Story: Why It Matters How You Tell It.” In this podcast, the second of two parts, Gregory continues his discussion of the properties, limitations, and challenges of each viewpoint, covering second person and first person. He describes different ways to use first person, such as the interior monologue, the dramatic monologue, the epistle, the diary, and the memoir. Gregory stresses the importance of considering the question, “Who is listening?” when a first-person narrator tells his story. He also provides a series of questions for an author to ask himself when choosing a point of view. Gregory explains the difference between viewpoint and voice. Voice is critical to establishing character and can create an image of the character more powerful than any physical description. He also describes the unique nature of voice and points out that voice can be a powerful source of originality in fiction. You can find part 1 of Gregory’s lecture excerpt in Podcast #41.

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Podcast #41: Gregory Frost

Podcast #41 is now available for download here.

Gregory Frost was a guest lecturer at Odyssey 2010. In his lecture, “Character, Viewpoint, and the Critical Voice of the Story: Why It Matters How You Tell It,” Gregory explained how to choose the best point of view for a story, how to create a consistent viewpoint and voice, and how to reveal character through voice. In this excerpt, the first of two parts, Gregory describes the underlying, pervasive importance of point of view to a story. All the elements of fiction are connected to viewpoint. The viewpoint also determines how the reader interacts with a story. Each viewpoint carries different rules; a writer must consider which viewpoint will allow him to do what he wants to do in his story. Gregory begins a discussion of the properties, possibilities, limitations, and challenges of each point of view, including third-person objective (camera view), third-person limited omniscient, and third-person omniscient; this discussion is continued in part 2. He explains the concept of psychic distance, which is critical to point of view. Controlling psychic distance and limiting shifts in psychic distance help the reader to more vividly experience the story. Failing to maintain a consistent psychic distance distracts and confuses the reader, as Gregory’s examples illustrate.

Gregory Frost is a writer of fantasy, thrillers, and science fiction who has been publishing steadily for more than two decades.

Interview: Gregory Frost

Gregory Frost will be a guest lecturer at this year’s Odyssey workshop. He is a writer of fantasy, thrillers, and science fiction who has been publishing steadily for more than two decades. His latest work, the compelling fantasy duology, Shadowbridge. and Lord Tophet (Del Rey Books) was voted one of the four best fantasy novels of the year by the American Library Association. It was a finalist this year for the James Tiptree Award.

His previous novel, Fitcher’s Brides was a finalist for both the World Fantasy Award and the International Horror Guild Award for Best Novel. Other novels include, Tain, Lyrec, and Nebula-nominated sf work The Pure Cold Light. His short story collection, Attack of the Jazz Giants and Other Stories was given a starred review by Publishers Weekly, which called it “one of the best fantasy collections of the year” while hailing the author as a master of the short story form. The collection includes James Tiptree Award, Nebula Award, Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award, and Hugo Award finalist fiction.

His shorter work has appeared in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Asimov’s Magazine, Weird Tales, Realms of Fantasy, and in numerous award-winning anthologies. His latest short story can be found in Poe (Solaris Books), edited by Ellen Datlow.

He is a Fiction Writing Workshop Director at Swarthmore College in Swarthmore, PA.

His web site is www.gregoryfrost.com. He’s on Facebook as Gregory Frost; on Twitter as gregory_frost; and his LJ blog, “Frostbites” is at http://frostokovich.livejournal.com.

Once you started writing seriously, how long did it take you to sell your first piece? What were you doing wrong in your writing in those early days?