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Q&A How do I draw attention to a girl's chest without making it overly lewd?

the current viewpoint character is going to introduce a... very well-endowed character This sounds like first person (the internal narration of the viewpoint character to the reader) or third ...

posted 6y ago by Eater Of Books‭  ·  last activity 5y ago by System‭

Answer
#3: Attribution notice added by user avatar System‭ · 2019-12-08T10:04:58Z (almost 5 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/39948
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#2: Initial revision by user avatar Eater Of Books‭ · 2019-12-08T10:04:58Z (almost 5 years ago)
> the current viewpoint character is going to introduce a... very well-endowed character

This sounds like first person (the internal narration of the viewpoint character to the reader) or third person favoring the viewpoint character's perspective.

First person:

How the viewpoint character states their observation does help define their character, and their internal attitude/voice. (Which can be very different than their external voice, as a character trait.) The fact that the viewpoint character even thinks this is worth mentioning says something about them, but what exactly it says depends a lot on how their narration spins it. The central question is why the viewpoint character thinks this is worth noting, and how they express themselves. There are a lot of possibilities (and some examples):

- Bland, Clipped description of the other character, listing that as one of their features, along with their eyes, hair, clothing, etc. (And you can work in more subtle references to bust size as part of describing clothing, or just the way the character moves around during a scene, rather than frontloading it in an initial description.)

- Focus on the other character's own experience (shared with the viewpoint character): "We had to shop through halfway through the mall before we found a large enough bra." "She's always complaining about backaches from those things."

- Focus on the previously observed reactions of others to the character: "Guys are always hitting on her, staring at her chest the whole time."

- Focus on the reaction of the viewpoint character to the previously observed reactions of others: "It's pretty obvious all the guys who come on to her are just after her sizeable breasts. Creeps." (Alternatively - "Can't blame them - those are pretty impressive." Or any other potential line showing a particular attitude toward those assets.)

- Go for the hilarity: "I'm pretty sure her boobs generate their own gravitational field - they're just that big!" "Her largest assets are on her chest." (Oddly, humor usually defuses lewdity for these sort of descriptions.)

- Give an anecdote illustrating the size: "I've seen her put her breasts on a desk and use them as a pillow when she falls asleep in class."

- Hit the comparison note: "Those are way bigger than mine. I don't even want to think about what they're doing to her back." (Or the usual light novel jokes about being jealous of cup sizes, or wondering about drinking milk or whatever.) Doesn't seem like the tone you're looking for, though.

- Go full Regency/Edwardian, and describe her as having a "healthy, or even generous figure, particularly around the chest."

- Hit such a ridiculous description it's more ridiculous than sexy. Full Lovecraft Purple Prose about "heaving bosoms barely restrained by a low-cut blouse and a jacket whose button protested like an angry monk nailing theses to a church door." Only certain viewpoint characters can pull this off.

- Just don't bother describing that feature at all unless it's relevant, and let some other character either react to, comment about, or describe them for the viewpoint character at a later point. (If the viewpoint character doesn't have a reason to / think they're worth calling out herself.)

Euphemisms are very equivocal in all cases - they could be used because the viewpoint character is embarrassed about the topic in general, or because 'well endowed' 'bombshell figure' 'DDs', 'they are pretty large', 'those things', etc. sounds better in their head than clinically describing 'the feature in question'.

Some of these are better ideas than others, but **the focus here should always be on how and why the viewpoint character thinks about this feature of the other character** , not necessarily on the feature itself.

Third person (favoring the viewpoint character):

- Third person narrators get a lot more leeway (even if they 'favor' the perspective of the viewpoint character) to just give a flat description, without the fact that the viewpoint character even explicitly notices this feature entering into the discussion.
#1: Imported from external source by user avatar System‭ · 2018-11-06T20:38:24Z (about 6 years ago)
Original score: 2