Narrative Essay Present Tense Or Past Tense Text

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past perfect simple tense

what are narrative tenses?

narrative tenses are the tenses that we use to talk about past events and to tell stories. The past perfect simple and the past perfect continuous can help us to say what we want more effeciently. However, it should be remembered that almost any story can be told using the past simple.

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Reading simplified stories is one of the best ways to improve vocabulary and see how words and grammar are actually used. Figures of the past: luke, mother and daughteroffred, a victim of the patriarchal society of gilead, reveals her story through narrative in the present tense. Using the past tense, she describes her memories of her mother, daughter and her husband, luke. The memories of her family also provide an escapism to her happier, freer life.the characters of the mother, daughter and luke show a contrast to the present life she is living. She wears a green night gown with a sunflower on the frontae 157 , the laces of her trainers were red, purple, pink and yellow with a design of heartsae. Richardson defines unnatural narratives as anti mimetic texts that move beyond the conventions of x27 natural x27 narratives, i.e. This text constantly alternates between the past and the present tense which entails that the figure of the subject is brought into doubt.

In order to understand this i will explain in more detail many tales rely on a narrative, for example, in which blame is distributed. On the top of that it is incorrect to say that one narrative is necessarily truer than the other, or more. Even within the last passage, jane narrates experiences ten years old as if they were present ones, in part by using present tenses, such as they were both of that order of people, to whom one may at any time 157. The use of may 157 rather than could 157 suggests a current opinion: a thought in the present, and when placed in the context of jane x27 s description of past events, it gives the reader a sense that the events are happening now, as he is reading. Frederick douglass wrote a book called narrative of the life of frederick douglass: an american slave. Having the personal connection to douglass, we are able to feel the tenseness of all events during the occurrence of many events.

I feel that the story of his life in the tenseness and physical abuse of the true happenings ties the book together as a whole. It has a more real present feeling, than the books that consist of no imagery that would allow the book to be interesting. This essay seeks to discover how atkinson uses the past, footnotes, setting and her post modernist style as a technique in the treatment of time.the narrative is a common first person narrative, but at the same time, it is very unusual. Ruby speaks in the present tense but knows the future and what people are thinking. The footnotes are able to give us space between the present tense and the past tense, which is an effective treatment of time.the setting also plays a very important role in this story.

emma darwin teaches creative writing and is currently working on her third novel.  we asked her if she could outline the advantages and disadvantages of present tense and past tense in writing. its one of the apparently simple, but huge, decisions you have to make, right at the beginning: will your main narrative be in past tense, or present tense? it is  always possible to change your mind later, but it can be anything between a nuisance and a nightmare. So its well worth thinking hard, and looking at how writers you admire work with both, before you start. I’ll nail my colours to the mast: i’ve always felt that past tense is how stories are told. after all, a story you’re telling has already happened, either in real life, or in your imagination. And now i know why i feel as i do, thanks to david jaus essay, remembrance of things present, in his marvellous book, on writing fiction: rethinking conventional wisdom about the craft.

Some of these thoughts come from his much fuller exploration of how and why present tense works, and why it’s become the default for many writers and editors: do track his book down. past tense the advantages manipulating time: a year in a sentence or a day in 600 pages, a story told backwards or inside out or from both ends inwards. flexibility of pace: you can quite naturally change speed and gear in narrating events creating suspense: we know there is  a future to this story because its being told from there: it’s a mystery but not a blank.  backstory and flashbacks are much easier to handle because there are so many more kinds of past tense than present tense. characterisation is easier and potentially deeper when you can handle the then and now of your story so fluently.

Narrator and actor in the story are separated by time, even if theyre the same character  free indirect style  comes naturally, to help evoke voice, character and consciousness. Past tense sets the action in the wider context of people and their pasts and futures, so there’s scope for dramatic irony and greater understanding. A secret alchemy past tense the drawbacks the events of the story are over: the reader knows it, and knows that the narrator, at least, probably didnt die. Informing the reader, where you should be evoking the minute by minute tension of action. handling past tenses is trickier for novices, because there are more to choose from, and the had had  problem with flashbacks needs a bit of thought. combined with third person   its easy for learner writers to slip into a rather distant, bland narrative style, remote in psychic distance. present tense the advantages immediacy: the story is projected into the readers now.

Realism in time: the action is continuous and forward moving, as it is in real life. Disorientation: the stream of one thing after another after another suits any narrative where the point of view character is disoriented. The eternal present suits characters who forget or repress their past and future, and stories where the theme is the evanescence of the present.

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Defamiliarisation: when present tense was a rarely used technique dickens used it, but after that no one much till the 1950s its effect was strange and estranging. It simplifies handling tenses: mostly just simple and continuous present to grapple with. Present tense closes the gap between narrator and actor: what the actor is experiencing is all that the narrator can know. Mathematics of love present tense the drawbacks immediacy is also inflexibility: the narrative proceeds at the speed of the physical action. Theres not much scope for expanding and compressing, and time shifts are awkward or abrupt. Realism in time puts the focus on immediate experience, not wider context and understanding. Realism in time tends to include trivia of action and setting which with past tense you could skim over at will.

By being eternally in the present, the narrative takes the story out of time. It loses touch with the sense of how the past pushes us onwards and makes us act. Combined with first person, theres less scope for narration that works with the wider implications of what’s happening, unless the character actually stops and thinks. Combined with first person, the fact that a character is both narrator and actor in the present creates a sense of detachment from the events: some of i must be observing, while the rest is experiencing.

Then, of course, theres the narrative which works with both past and present tense. Either switching between separate chunks, or in one continuous thread as with the different structures of then and now in the three threads of a secret alchemy . The logical way is to use present tense for the most recent sections, and past tense for those further back in time. But the reverse might work even better: the disoriented feel of present tense can make it perfect for memories. While the more solidly anchored past tense can make it perfect for the more sophisticated relationship to time that a main narrative needs.

In other words, because past and present tense have such different effects on the experience of the story, youd be mad to make sweeping assumptions about either, or refuse to use it. After various jobs including publishing social work books, driving a sandwich van and selling musical instruments, her first novel the mathematics of love was published in 2006 and was shortlisted for the commonwealth writers best first book, and other prizes. She’s now writing her third novel, and teaching creative writing for the open university and elsewhere.

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