Thoughts on First Person Narrative

About a year or so ago I heard from several different sources that publishers of historical fiction want first person female, preferably royal, novels. If they can be Tudors, so much the better. I also heard that first-person female is all the rage with historical romance. I did some unscientific surveying to find out if, as I had been told, women don't like to read first person male, the results basically being that no one really gives a damn one way or the other.

I spent some time agonizing over whether the novel I am writing now needed to be turned into first person. It certainly offered an intimacy and a look into the main character, a woman who goes to crusade disguised as a man. I quickly discovered that first person has its own limitations. Primarily, it requires that the narrator either be present for all events described or be told about them. Frankly, this gets tiresome. In one novel I read recently the fact that the two narrators were isolated from most of the action meant that dozens of messengers had to run back and forth to court or visitors needed to be up on the latest doings. It gets awkward. It turned into a textbook case of telling, not showing, quite literally.

I have read many first person novels over the years. I have come to some conclusions about using the technique that authors, agents, editors and readers all might want to consider, especially editors at publishing houses. To pull off first person narrative, these elements must be in place:

The use of first person must offer more than just storytelling. One novel I read used this style skillfully to reveal the character's unreliability as a reporter not only about his surroundings but also his own motivation. This lent a level of interest and insight into the novel.
The author must be fully acquainted with his/her narrating character and be able to speak in his/her voice consistently. The novel I read with two narrators failed to reveal that much about either character, nor to make their voices distinct from each other.
The narrating character must have a good reason to know everything going on. One novel I read required that narrator was an obsessive eavesdropper, a fact that actually resulted in comments from readers about her busybody activities. So much sneaking around, listening at keyholes, hiding in the shrubbery, and so forth, made the character less believable.
I have read two first person narrative novels where I came to the conclusion that the authors themselves had limited depth of experience and understanding. I suppose the authors could have intended to portray the characters this way, but I don't think so in these cases. The result was shallowness not only of plot but of character. In one case I drew the conclusion that the author had been popular in high school and saw the world in that light, though her character should have had quite different experiences.
A mystery can be quite suitable for first person, as one steps into the detective's persona and therefore has exactly the same clues. One Elizabethan era sleuth series has a female narrator who is consistent in voice, totally convincing, and fun to read. Through her one has the opportunity to try to solve the crime, having no more or less to go on than the sleuth.

In general I prefer third person and its capacity for dramatizing the actions of more than one person and event. I decided to stick with third person in my work in progress primarily because of scenes, like one where Raymond of Toulouse is icily treated by the Emperor sometime before my protagonist has even returned to Constantinople, which cannot have been experienced by a single narrator.

Think about novels you have read that would have been ruined if written in first person. I immediately thought of Dorothy Dunnett's Lymond Chronicles. It is absolutely vital that Lymond himself be all but unfathomable. You need to watch him and draw your own conclusions. Your confusion and impatience are part of the magic of the reading. First person would simply either give too much away or make for a lousy uninteresting novel.

First person when it is done well and for good reason can be excellent. A good reason may be insight into the narrator, portraying a unique personality, or, like a mystery, a way to control access of information to the reader. Unless you have that good reason, first person is in danger of producing a shallow novel, little more than gossipy discourse in costume.

Perhaps publishers married to this cant about first person female, if they exist, should consider whether any given novel, author or character really is better served by the first person narrative approach.