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WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE?
The difference between a POV and a narrative perspective is that POV is the narration style, the way you're supposed to see the story as a reader. On the other hand, a narrative perspective is important for understanding who sees the story and who's telling it.
POINT OF VIEW
In literature, there are a lot of options for how to write, specifically how you want the reader to see the story, based on who is telling it. Because the story can vary from different points of view.
The author can choose to tell it from the protagonist's point of view (therefore in first person), or it can be told from a third-person perspective - the author/narrator's (NOT the same thing). However, the third-person perspective is divided into two types. But about that later. First and third person are the most common types, especially in fiction. There are two more narrative perspectives: second person and multiple points of view. Let's break them all down.
FIRST-PERSON NARRATIVE
This is a subjective narration. The reader has a close relationship with the narrator, however, they are limited to only one person's thoughts and feelings. Therefore, they don't know the other characters' minds. The pronouns 'I' and 'We' are used.
One of the best examples I could think of is Chuck Palahniuk's Fight Club (1996):
"I am Joe's Cold Sweat.
From the bus, I can see the floor-to-ceiling windows on the third floor of my office building are blown out, and inside a fireman in a dirty yellow slicker is whacking at a burnt panel in the suspended ceiling. A smoldering desk inches out the broken window, pushed by two firemen, then the desk tilts and slides and falls the quick three stories to the sidewalk and lands with more of a feeling than a sound.
Breaks open and it's still smoking.'" (1)
The narrator is the actual character. We only see how he sees what's happening around him. We can't be sure that's how the scene looks, we only know the character describing it sees it that way.
SECOND-PERSON NARRATIVE
This type of narrative implies that the reader is a part of what's happening. The narrator uses the pronoun 'You' to include the audience. It can go back and forth between the narrator's experiences and feelings and the reader's.
Half Asleep in Frong's Pajamas by Tom Robbin uses the second person's narrative (2):
"Your propensity to be easily, blatantly embarrassed is one of the several things that annoys you about your lot in the world, one more example of how the fates love to spit in your consomme. The company at your table is another.'" (3)
It definitely works if you want to drag the reader into the story. Helps when the text is relatable to the audience.
THIRD-PERSON LIMITED NARRATIVE
This is the narrative perspective with the narrative being focused on only one character's point of view. But it's not as subjective as the first person's POV, the audience has more objectivity despite seeing only one character's mind. The author uses the pronouns 'He', 'She', 'They', 'It'.
J. R. R. Tolkien's The Hobbit uses this narrative:
"This was Thorin’s style. He was an important dwarf. If he had been allowed, he would probably have gone on like this until he was out of breath, without telling any one there anything that was not known already. But he was rudely interrupted. Poor Bilbo couldn’t bear it any longer." (4)
The author is telling us about Thorin, how he loves to talk, but it's not from the perspective of an all-knowing narrator, but we're seeing Bilbo's interpretation of Thorin.
THIRD-PERSON OMNISCIENT NARRATIVE
The narrator is all-knowing, can use foreshadowing, sees into multiple characters' minds, comments on situations and places, and there are even examples of the narrator (which can be the author) criticizing the characters or misleading the reader (that's called an unreliable narrator).
Though, I'd like to put Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen (1813) as an example of a third-person omniscient narrative:
"Occupied in observing Mr. Bingley’s attentions to her sister, Elizabeth was far from suspecting that she was herself becoming an object of some interest in the eyes of his friend. Mr. Darcy had at first scarcely allowed her to be pretty; he had looked at her without admiration at the ball; and when they next met, he looked at her only to criticise. But no sooner had he made it clear to himself and his friends that she hardly had a good feature in her face, than he began to find it was rendered uncommonly intelligent by the beautiful expression of her dark eyes." (5)
We can see the narrator talking about both Elizabeth's and Mr. Darcy's thoughts. They're not yet foreshadowing anything, maybe just Mr. Bingley's interest in Elizabeth's sister, but that's pretty much clear from the very beginning of the book. And the narrator also feels like they can tell exactly what the both of them are feeling. Again, they're all-knowing.
MULTIPLE NARRATIVE PERSPECTIVES
There can be also used multiple narrative perspectives, dividing the story, and possibly revealing the unreliable narrator (Jennifer Niven's All the Bright Places).
NARRATION AND NARRATIVE PERSPECTIVE
Narration is how a story is told. The point of view is how the story is written and who is telling it. However, the narrative perspective encompasses the narrator's voice, point of view, worldview, and a focaliser. (6)
Focaliser is what the narrative focuses on. There are three types:
internal
one character's point of view, only what the character knows
external
story is told by a narrator, who doesn't say everything the characters know
zero
the narrator is third-person omniscient, all-knowing
author of the page: Nela Porubová
Sources:
(1) PDF version of 'Fight Club' by Chuck Palahniuk. https://english227fightclub.weebly.com/uploads/6/7/4/7/6747209/fight_club_-_chuck_palahniuk.pdf, cited 21.10. 2023
(2) StudySmarter, educational app. studysmarter.co.uk/explanations/english/language-analysis/narrative-perspective/. cited 21.10. 2023.
(3) StudySmarter, educational app. studysmarter.co.uk/explanations/english/language-analysis/narrative-perspective/. cited 21.10. 2023.
(4) https://primarysite-prod-sorted.s3.amazonaws.com/gobowen-primary-school/UploadedDocument/db3a2424ab834ade94f16606d5567712/the-hobbit-1.pdf, cited 21.10. 2023
(5) https://web2.mlp.cz/koweb/00/04/35/43/25/pride_and_prejudice.pdf, cited 21.10. 2023
(6) StudySmarter, educational app. studysmarter.co.uk/explanations/english/language-analysis/narrative-perspective/. cited 21.10. 2023
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