Put simply, psychic distance is the distance between the narrator and the reader. In other words: How close is the reader to the narrator’s interiority?
Consider this excerpt from The Midnight Children:
Ravani Foster watched the house across the street while he ate breakfast. He watched it while he refilled his bird feeders around the yard. He watched it out the bathroom window while he brushed his teeth.
All the while, the house stood silent. No doors opened. No curtains moved. No faces appeared. No voices rang out. The house looked as empty as it had every day since Mr. Croward had moved away.
Compare to this excerpt from Paula Chase’s MG novel Dough Boys. This narrator here is named Simp.
Before Chris moved in, all Rollie had cared about was balling. Now all he talked about was playing the drums. And it wasn’t like he ain’t play drums before. Shoot, he was always banging on something and coming up with new beats. But once Chris moved into the Cove and started talking about how the TAG program was gon’ help him get put on in the music industry, it was like all of a sudden Rollie thought that was gonna happen to him, too.
A hundred million people was out there trying get put on to rap, sing, or be in a band, and these two fools was acting like being in some little after-school program was gon’ put them in front of super producers or something. It was crazy to Simp.
He wasn’t trying to dead Rollie’s dream, though.
These are both written in third person, but notice how much closer we are to Simp’s interiority compared to Ravani. Dough Boys is written in Simp’s voice, using his language and his interior thoughts. The psychic distance is narrow compared to The Midnight Children, in which there is some distance between the reader and Ravani. Virtually all fairy tales have a wide psychic distance, and The Midnight Children—though not a traditional fairy tale—has the tone of a fairy tale. (This is why it’s so important to understand the tone of your novel.)
When psychic distance is at its narrowest, third person will feel like first person.
Consistency is an important aspect of successful narration. When psychic distance is inconsistent, it can be difficult for readers to connect to the narrator as closely as they should.
Think of psychic distance as a sliding scale, with close third on the narrowest end and omniscient on the widest. It’s okay to tiptoe through the spectrum to some degree, but middling from one end to the other without intention can make flatten the emotional tenor of your prose.
When readers say things like “I couldn’t relate to the character” or “I didn’t connect to the character,” without being able to explain why, psychic distance could be the culprit.
Let’s look at an example.
On Oak Street, a fourteen-year-old girl named Janice Stevenson gets on her bike and gives herself a hefty push out of the driveway. She’s wearing a heavily stuffed backpack and her face is full of determination. Today, she’s going to run away.
It’s dark, nearly midnight, and everyone in the house behind her is asleep. She left a note in her loopy, messy handwriting. It wasn’t very long, but it would accomplish her ultimate goal to let her parents know she was leaving and never coming back. She wanted to tell them it wasn’t anything they did. It was her. Something was wrong with her and she wanted to figure out what it was. She put that in the note.
She wondered where the road would take her. It’s not that she didn’t have a plan. She did. She had maps and bus schedules saved on her phone and even had a paper map in the backpack. Unless she forgot it. Did she? She thought about stopping right there and double-checking, but she didn’t want to stop her momentum. She was the kind of girl who thrived on momentum. It was one of the reasons she did so well in cross country.
It’s not terrible, right? But there is some space between the narrator and the reader. It feels close, but it could be even closer.
Let’s look at a revised version.
Janice Stevenson got on her bike and pushed herself out of the driveway. The backpack was heavy, but what could she do? She needed to bring as many things as possible. She was prepared.
At least she thought she was.
It was dark—of course it was dark; it was midnight—but she didn’t expect it to be this dark. Oh, well. No turning back.
She thought about the letter on the kitchen counter, written in her loopy, messy handwriting, spelling it all out for them. I’m not coming back. It’s not you, it’s me. Something’s wrong with me. I need to figure out what it is. I’m a burden, blah blah blah.
But where was she going, exactly? I mean, she had a plan. Sort-of. She had maps and bus schedules saved on her phone and even had actual maps stuffed at the bottom of her bag.
Wait—did she? Shit, she may have forgotten them. She searched her mind, trying to remember if she’d packed them, and nothing came up. She slowed down. Maybe she should check, just to be sure. But she didn’t want to stop. Didn’t want to have to turn back. She thrived on momentum. It was one of the reasons she did so well in cross country.
She pumped the pedals harder. No turning back.
Notice how these two passages are essentially saying the same thing, but the second excerpt has much narrower psychic distance, which gives you greater access to Janice as a character. It may not seem like it makes a huge difference from this small excerpt, but it definitely has an impact over the course of an entire novel.
This is not to say that all books need narrow distance like this. It depends on your book’s voice and tone. This is why it’s important to understand these elements of your WIP—so you can draft and revise with intention.
Incredible! Thanks for sharing.
Fantastic explanation of a craft issue I feel many writers internalize through reading but often don’t think about when starting out writing!