So while third person Omniscient POV is common, the first person POV isn’t…as far I know. As an author, I find myself unsure of the proper format when I write from a first person POV because I am developing a character who is omniscient while also having the first person POV. I had always wondered what they said about me. If they were not internal dialogue they would be written like this: “I had always wondered what they said about me. I thought, “How creepy.” OR I thought How creepy.

Your second and third sentences are both examples of internal dialogue since they are the exact thoughts of the character. I looked around this scene and thought, Everyone was caught in a suspended reality… I looked around this scene and thought, “Everyone was caught in a suspended reality…” OR If it were actual internal dialogue, the sentence would be written like this: I looked around this scene and thought that everyone was caught in a suspended reality… In your first sentence, the word that indicates that it is not actual internal dialogue. The sense of the sentence tells us that she did not think these exact words. Indirect internal dialogue refers to a character expressing a thought in the third person (the third person singular is he or she, the plural is they) and is not set off with either italics or quotation marks.Įxample: Bev wondered why Charles would think that she would forgive him so easily. You may also use italics without quotation marks for direct internal dialogue.Įxample: I lied, Charles thought, but maybe she will forgive me. Notice that quotation marks and other punctuation are used as if the character had spoken aloud. (The first person singular is I, the first person plural is we.)Įxample: “I lied,” Charles thought, “but maybe she will forgive me.” Internal dialogue is used by authors to indicate what a character is thinking.ĭirect internal dialogue refers to a character thinking the exact thoughts as written, often in the first person. NOTE: Please see our article Diving Back Into Dialogue: Part II, for an expanded discussion of this topic.

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