Have you read "Characters and Viewpoint" yet? I was just re-reading it the other day and there's a bit in there about unreliable narrators you may be interested in.
For instance, in the current series I'm reading, the Wheel of Time. In the second book, in the prologue, the masked character is addressed by something like, "The man called Bors". Later on, we learn who Bors is--if we haven't already guessed. In another, a camoflauged character is following two others, he goes unnamed, and eventually we learn his name, though I still doubt it's his true name. I'm sure I'll be in for a suprise.
Robert Jordan even does suprising things, like in a deep 3PL mode, switching to 3PO in the last sentence. Something like, 'But she didn't see the woman above watching her walk away.' If I hadn't gotten into attempted writing, would I even have seen this?
Of course, this rulebreaking must be done with care.
I recently read a story in which this trick makes an appearance for a very minor character. It was a pretty good story, but it would have been immensely better if the writer hadn't pulled such a pointless stunt. If he'd tried to pull this trick with one of the main characters, it would have crippled the story completely. Now this writer was very good. The cost to the story wasn't less, it was just that the story was more easily able to pay that cost out of the store of credit it accumulated otherwise.
If you choose to use an anonymous narrator, that's different. Narrators can have reasons to be self-effacing. But it doesn't work to simply make the main character the narrator, you must make someone else the main character of the story. Enziquelvinisensee Evelvenin in Hart's Hope is a good example of this. She is assigned the duty of narrating events (semi-anonymously) because she plays such a minor role in the main story. If she were a more active character, her version of events would be suspect. It is not of minor importance that she refers to herself in the third person even when she does appear in the story.
The flip side of this is that if the narrator uses first person and is one of the important actors in the story related, the anonyminity is pointless. Everyone in the world of the story (the world in which the narrator is telling the story, let us not forget) will be easily able to see through the pretense, so why does the narrator even bother?
Part of my idea was to contrast the old ''him'' with the new ''him'' , as bieng two different identies , each with it's own name..
[This message has been edited by discipuli (edited July 30, 2006).]
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The cost to the story wasn't less, it was just that the story was more easily able to pay that cost out of the store of credit it accumulated otherwise.
I really like this point and wanted to highlight this for all those on this site who like to complain about what established authors can get away with that the rest of us can't. This is WHY they can get away with it -- at least the good ones.
But I did want to reiterate that if a MC honestly does not think of themsleves by their "real" name, then it is ok to use a pseudonym. In fact, I would go so far as to say that if they have completely forgotten their birth name, then it is not their real name at all -- the pseudonym is. I would probably expect some kind of revelation to go hand in hand with the memory of their real name, when it comes into the story. (I assume it does or it wouldn't matter at all.) I would also like to say that, unless this is written in a diary format, this would work best in third person because a first person account looking back from a time *after* he remembers his birth name would clearly be a case of withholding information. On the other hand, in a third person account where everything is written in the present, then as long as he doesn't remember his name you are not keeping secrets or withholding information at all. The beauty fo a third person narrative is that the only information the reader is expected to be privy to is the information that the POV character knows AT THE TIME.
If you used omniscient viewpoint you would be keeping the secret. If you used first person point of view with a narrator who has remembered the name since the onset of the story, then once again you are keepin the secret.
Like I said -- read "Characters and Viewpoint" as all of this is in there and told much better than I ever could.
I guess I'm wondering what you hope to gain from this plot device, how you mean for it to add to the reader's enjoyment/understanding. That's the primary thing you should keep in mind, I believe. I never enjoy reading anything that makes me feel like a fool, at any point. I wouldn't want to invest a lot of time in your story/book, and then have you jump out from around the next corner and yell "GOTCHA!" However, if I experience some kind of revalation that changes my understanding of the character, that brings me closer to the story, I'd be perfectly content.
So, instead of making me think, "Oh, you've got to be kidding...I know I should have seen that coming, but I just didn't, and now I've got to go all the way back through all of this stuff and see what I missed..."--you should be aiming for, "AhHa. I get it now. Poor guy, that's why he did this and this and this..."
In other words, have everything in place and in plain view of the reader, so that the real name has immediate importance and reveals something about the plot and character that could not have been revealed earlier, with some other, less complicated, device.
(In a separate train of thought--I have some very basic doubts regarding the premise that someone can forget their given name. Additionally, if they are so removed from their original name that they have forgotten it, their reaction to learning it again would be minimal. I'm not sure I'd be convinced that the mention of their first name would bring about some kind of floodgate of old memories. Now, if you are talking about some kind of psychological "blocked memories", that's a different conversation. But simply forgetting your first name because you don't use it anymore is a tricky premise.)
I will warn you, be very careful of this. I had planned on writing a story where the MC does things that the reader cant know about, and it is tricky to do it right. You _must_ declare a POV character, and know that they never knew or come to know his name.
I still agree with Novice that it souldn't be some "Gotcha!" moment. Instead of creating gaps and trying to fill them in with this name, create questions, and answer them with this name.
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Re-learning his real name is the que to introducing the reader to his past and how it is related to the currant situation....
I don't know what you mean by "how to do it." Usually, you sit at a computer and start to type. Alternatley, you can get a piece of paper and a pen and write longhand.
This is a learning process. If it's a short story, I'd just write it and see what people think. If it's a novel, that isn't quite as easy to do but you could put together an outline and see if anyone would be able to help you. Without knowing quite a few more details, there isn't much else we can say about your specific story. There are just too many variables.
Try F&F...I think it may help you. Good luck!
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the MC himself knows his name , just refuses to recall it for personal reasons...He goes by a false name to keep his identity secret...
Don't blame us for your lack of clarity.
As an example: The Sixth Sense.
POSSIBLE SPOILER****
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Now, it wasn't a charater's name being withheld, but it was something just as basic to his identity. My impression is that you are attempting a similar kind of thing. The only reason The Sixth Sense worked is that, by the time you learned the character's secret, it fit neatly into the puzzle. All of the clues were in place, all of the reasons, and all of the repercussions. Some viewers had already figured it out.
This takes a lot of planning. You HAVE to provide enough information to give the reader a chance to guess, or it simply won't work. Without having everything in place, you'll get "HUH?" instead of "OH!" You have to give the reader the clues...the same clues you'll give the character, the ones that lead to his own revelation. Then the reader will be able to share the moment, instead of feeling kicked out of the story because they didn't see it coming.
Note that a main point of the plot is that the character did not realise what his secret was. He was putting it together as we did and as we get a big "AH-AH so that's it" just as he gets it.
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Re-learning his real name is the que to introducing the reader to his past and how it is related to the current situation....
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the MC himself knows his name , just refuses to recall it for personal reasons...He goes by a false name to keep his identity secret...
These are two very different things and how they are handled is very different.
On plot line 1 (re-learing name and past) -
1) there needs to be more than a renaming or refusal to know who he was;
2) As long as the POV (presumably him) doesn't know and you sprinkle hints that the POV "sees but doesn't see", then you are in the Sixth Sense realm of story telling. It can be done effectively. The reader needs to be able to look back and say "Oh, that's what that was."
**** SPOILER *********
For example, the scene in Sixth Sense where he looks in on his wife while she's sleeping and she pulls the covers up over her shoulder. That's a hint. Just because, I didn't get it at the time doesn't matter. When the "Secret" is revealed, there is that "Oh" moment and not a "what?/ Why did I just waste two hours on this?" moment.
********* Spoiler end ***************
On plot line 2 (secret identity) -
You can definately do this but if this character is your POV or your POV is Omni, the reader needs to know almost instantly about the name change. Although, I am not sure what you mean by "refuses to recall."
After all, why would Clark Kent be interesting if we didn't know he was also Superman from the beginning?
In my current project (Omni POV) both MCs are using false identities to protect themselves. The reader learns why and the new names in the prologue. Throught the story everyone, including those who know the secret use the "false" names. I had originally hidden the male MC's name change. After being here for a bit (and getting feedback from friends who discarded the idea that he was who he really was) I realized that in trying to create suspense I was just being annoying.
The comments by others who posted to avoid this "trick" were not meant as an attack. It just points out that a lot of readers are going to feel betrayed if they should have known something and you withheld it. If you betray a reader, he/she probably won't pick up the next book or short story you write.
What I learned is that it is NOT fun for the reader. It is frustrating to have information withheld, merely for the sake of withholding it. What I had to learn was the difference between withholding information because it's part of the plot that the character doesn't know, and information I was withholding because I had some unfounded belief that it created some "mystery" to a story.
Mystery, like every other plot element in a story, needs to have purpose. Withholding information just to tweak the reader's emotional response tends to backfire.
That's all you need to say. In first person you have the benefit of hiding information that the narrator wants to hide from you. Information hiding is allowable in first person if its intentional.
Just make sure you mention early on that there is a secret the narrator is not telling so that when it comes out, we are not thinking deus ex machina.
Hint and foreshadow.
In third person, such information hiding would be nearly unforgivable.