other ways to say "he", "him" and "his"

[Mr Orange]

I've got a prologue, which is kind of a teaser, so I don't want to identify the character mentioned in it... at the moment I have referred to him as the above, with lots of he's, him's and his's..... but I kind of feel there might be too many and it may not read so well. so, are there any other ways I can refer to him without giving any information as to who it is?

below is a little excerpt from it to show you what I mean....

The cold breeze that hit his face brought with it the briny smell of the sea. The fresh air, full of familiar, age-old aromas, was alive with familiarity and possibility. Behind the rough stone rampart the path was uneven, and tall weeds grew along the path at the base of the stone. He knew the tide was in, as he could just see the Channel from his station high on the Southwest wall .

cheers in advance

 

[jastius]

I do this a lot. the trick is to talk about things and remember its understood that its the character in question who is experiencing the feelings and making the observations or being spoken to. you are telling the story through his perspective. you do not need to identify him except for when there is someone else in the frame or when his personal perspective is different from what the reader is experiencing. but putting in that kind of insert is used for adding information usually, not for general story building.

The {bitingly}cold breeze [that hit his face] brought with it the briny smell of the sea. The fresh air, full of familiar, age-old aromas, was alive with familiarity and possibility. Behind the rough stone rampart the path was uneven, and tall weeds grew along the path at the base of the stone. [He knew] the tide was in, [as ] {and he}could just see the Channel from [his]{the/this} station high on the Southwest wall .

[extraneous]/ {new connective } optional word

ummm two familliars? perhaps you should change one or the other. how about; native for the first, or homespun ... and perhaps tradition/ traditional /homecoming/ welcome /fellowship /habit / nesting / comfort / community / solace/ consolation for the second, instead. just one or the other.

 

[David Evil Overlord]

If I remember correctly, the prologue of Look To Windward by Iain M Banks followed a couple of characters through a war zone. It referred to the two characters by name, but gave away nothing about their species (or possibly their sexes, although it's been some years since I read it).

And I've seen characters referred to by title...the scientist, the politician...

Hope that might be useful.

 

[J-Sun]

FWIW, I don't have a problem with what you isolated. Since it's isolated I can see what you mean and, if it goes on for pages, it might come to be a problem, but I don't mind the snippet.

If you really have to tinker with it, since the tide being in is an objective fact, it doesn't have to be personalized and that would eliminate one pronoun, at least.

The tide was in, as he could just see the Channel from his station high on the southwest wall.

 

[Abernovo]

You could try going for a direct approach, still keeping it 3rd person, but bringing the reader further into the experience.

The cold breeze was sharp with the briny smell of the sea. The fresh air, full of familiar, age-old aromas, was alive with familiarity and possibility. Behind the rough stone rampart the path was uneven, and tall weeds grew along the path at the base of the stone. The tide was in -- he could see the Channel from his station high on the South-west wall .

Anything which is a universal--the sea breeze would be experienced by everyone there, the tide would be in for everyone--you could take it out of his personal experience and put it as 'fact'.

Be careful of the words 'that' and 'just', as they can be fillers, and (courtesy of Chuck Palahniuk) ask yourself if you need your characters to 'think' things (know, think, wonder). If he knew the tide was in, then it IS in, again a 'fact', at least as he experiences it. Not saying never use the words, just ask yourself if you need them in a particular sentence.

The second sentence read a bit purplish. I quite liked it in some ways, but does it add anything that couldn't be explained by giving insight into how he felt? Are they age-old aromas to him, do they take him back to his childhood, do they leave him feeling refreshed and invigorated and full of hope after a poor night's sleep? Expanding can be as good as cutting.

Sorry if that's a bit rough for a simple question. I should point out that I liked the imagery, of which I got a lot from your very short paragraph. You're conveying a great deal with a few simple words, and that is good. Any (hopefully constructive) criticisms I have truly are minor.

 

[Boneman]

Abernovo's hit it on the head. If you want to remove all he's amd hims, you could use a passive voice on the last sentence:

The tide was in, and the Channel could be seen from this point high on the southwest wall.

 

[J Riff]

i mite do dis:
The cold breeze brought with it the briny smell of the sea. The fresh air, full of familiar age-old aromas, was alive with possibilities. Behind the rough stone rampart the path was uneven, and tall weeds festooned (*why not) the base of the stone. The tide was in, as he could just see the Channel from his station high on the Southwest wall .

 

[Ursa major]

Apart from sprinkling your text with he his and him, you're placing your character between what he's sensing, and experiencing, and the reader. This is fine when you want to make a point about how it affects the character, but can otherwise be a distraction.

Sometimes it's easy to simply remove the viewer, as where, in the first sentence, the character isn't the subject. Where the character is the subject of a sentence, removing him might leave a passive sentence (as in your last sentence).

In the far from perfect text that follows, I've tried to remove the character completely, which you may not always want to do. (Oh, and I'm sure there are more active ways to say 'was alive' and 'was in', but I'm unable to think of them at the moment.)

The cold breeze brought with it the briny smell of the sea. The fresh air, full of familiar, age-old aromas was alive with familiarity and possibility. The path ran uneven behind the rough stone rampart, the boundary between them marked by tall weeds. From here on the Southwest wall, glimpses of the Channel revealed the tide was in.

 

[Mr Orange]

cheers for all the replies and advice....

i think you guys have hit the nail on the head with making it more passive - so obvious now but i really didn't see it!

in terms of the second sentence, i'm not sure how the second familiar/familiarity crept in - when i pasted the text onto my earlier post i actually could not remember adding it in, and it definitely wasn't in the first few drafts....

david evil overlord - i can't give a name as the identity of the character in the prologue isn't really revealed until the middle of the novel

j-sun - the prologue is a few pages long and a bit too long to keep all the he's etc

i will re-write it to make it more passive where needed. then, seeing as i have reached the magic 30 posts, i might put it up for a critique

cheers again

 

[David Evil Overlord]

That's okay, Mr O, just thought you might be able to disguise the pronoun.