Creating Characters
When writing fiction, one of the greatest
challenges is to come up with compelling characters that both interest the
reader and fit the story. On the surface, fitting the story might seem like the
lesser of the two considerations, but it really isn’t. Beyond being
interesting, the character must also be the type of person who will respond to
your plot. Whatever the action of your story is, it needs to matter to your
characters. You have to care about why these things are happening to this
character, and take great interest in what the character will do, or will fail
to do, about it.
Most people’s ideas for a character begin
with some spark. That spark can come from anywhere: A voice, a look, a
profession, a line of dialog, or a plot you want that character involved in.
Whatever that original aspect is, that is what you need to explore first. The
best way to create believable yet interesting characters is to observe real
people. You can easily find all the character traits you would need from any
one person. It is not suggest you do this. It makes for a more interesting
character if it is composed from several different people.
Once you have moved beyond the first spark,
you need to create a picture of that character in your mind. This starts out
very simply. Are they male or female? Does he have a bald spot? Does she wear
glasses? What kind of clothes do they wear? How old are they? These are all
very basic questions, but it is surprising how often they are ignored.
Next, explore the character’s background.
What is their profession? Does the person even have a job? Where do they live?
What is their family like? What kind of friends do they have? What kind of
things do they own? This last question can be very telling. You can approach it
from several angles. What is in their home? What is in their office at work?
What do they carry in their pockets? How many keys do they have?
Once you reach that point, it’s time to dig a
little deeper. Ask yourself, what makes this character interesting, compelling,
different? Try to come up with a single-sentence description that will vividly
show a reader what kind of person this is. This isn’t necessarily the way you
will describe them when you sit down to write out your story, but it’s
important to have a clear image in your mind.
Listen to everyone you encounter during your
day to detect speech patterns. You can gather this information from your
parents to the woman in front of you at a check-out line. Make lists of odd or
unusual catch phrases you hear someone use repeatedly. Pay attention to how a
person's accent causes them to mispronounce words or use incorrect grammar in
casual conversations. (e.g. someone who refers to
everyone as "honey", or "son", or due to their accent, says
something like "Whatcha cookin'
in here?")
Some people would consider putting this
earlier, but really, until you have all these details, I would not get too
anxious to name the character. If a name has already come to mind, great, but
until now the character doesn’t absolutely need a name. At this point though,
it becomes important. You know who they are, you know what they’re like, now
give them a name. Names should match the character, but without being cliché.
Now you can try all sorts of ways to get
further into your character’s head. Interviewing the character is a good step.
Ask them questions as if you’re a reporter for Rolling Stone, People, or a
magazine appropriate to your character’s background. Ask them about themselves.
Let them speak. If you have other characters in the story, ask them about your
character. What do they think about this person? Do they see him or her
differently?
Another way to explore your characters can be
to visualize them in the midst of their everyday activities. How do they wash
their clothes? What route do they take to work? What stations do they pick out
on the radio? How do they act at a party? How do they respond to their boss?
What kind of expression is on their face? Do they smile often, or rarely?
Picture the character five or ten years ago, and five or ten years in the
future. Where will they be, and how will the circumstances of this story effect that?
After you’ve created your character, it’s
important to remember that they need to be treated as individuals with their
own needs and agendas. Don’t make a character violate their basic nature just
to suit the plot. If this character’s actions would change your plot too much,
you need to either re-examine the plot, or create a more suitable character.
Allow your characters to have quirks and contradictions though. Most people
have a thousand little contradictions.
The most important advice is to respect your
characters. Treat them as important people, whether you like the individual
character’s personality or not. Remember that their feelings matter to them.
What happens to them is important to them. If you don’t find your character
compelling and worthy of exploration, how can you expect a reader to?
Before
you begin developing your character, you need to consider these three elements
of characterization. They will help you to create a believable and interesting
character.
Element #1: Consistency
Consistency will make your
character believable. Everyone has traits that define who they are, such as
organized, honest, or brainy. It's the solid foundation of who they are. The
character will not stray from his or her consistency without a good reason.
Element #2: Complexity
A character must seem three
dimensional to readers. If a character
is too simple, there will be nothing that draws the reader in. Conversely, characters that have too much going on will overwhelm
readers. Don't forget- every person has
strengths AND weaknesses so try to keep it balanced. Too many strengths in a
character can make it hard for people to relate to him/her. Readers will tire
quickly of characters that are "too good to be true". A few
weaknesses will give them something to overcome and help keep the character
real in the eyes of the readers
Element #3: Individuality
There are thousand upon
thousands of characters in the literary world.
Successful characters are ones that have a hint of uniqueness. This is not to say that a character must be
so unique that he or she is almost unrecognizable to readers. However, a character should have one or two
traits that set them apart.
Questions to ask when
creating characters:
Name? Age? Height? Weight? Body Type?
Face Type? Complexion? Eyes? Hair? Clothing?
Voice? Demeanor? Career? Prejudices? Strengths?
Weaknesses? Hobbies? Talents?
Creating Adversity For Your Character
There are very few happy stories in the
world. This is not to say that there aren’t happy endings, and that there
aren’t happy characters, but very few stories revolve around the good things
that happen to a character, and if they do, there is generally a downside to
the ‘good things’ that happen to them. Stories are about adversity and
conflict. How characters deal with adversity can create comedy, drama, romance,
action, mystery and a world of other emotions and themes, but without adversity,
there is no story to tell. Here are some examples of how adversity and conflict
are created. Any longer work will contain most or all of these adversities.
Physical adversity: Physical adversity is death, injury, illness, and the
threat of each. This, depending on the writer, is generally the most adverse
situation that characters face. The death of a friend or relative, or an
injury/illness that can happen to a character someone they are close too. Death
is a universal theme that dates back to the very first stories ever told.
Miscommunication
and Deception: This is a
classic plot complication. One character misunderstands another character or
circumstance and all of the characters must deal with the consequences.
Displacement: Displacement is another popular adversity that
characters face; it is when a character or characters enter a local or
situation in which they are uncomfortable or at odds. This can be as fanciful
as
Desire: Every character has unfulfilled wants and needs.
Sometimes they are stated and sometimes they are unstated. Unfulfilled desire is as key
to action novels as it is romance novels. The witches’ cryptic messages ignite Macbeth
and Lady Macbeth’s desire for power, but it is their desire that dooms them to
destruction.
Relationships: Relationship conflicts run a wide spectrum, and are
not limited to human relationships; they can extend to animals, nature and
environment. Relationship adversity is often the result of the previous
adversities, but it is worth a separate category because this is where most
resolutions are centered. A character must change the relationship, be changed
(or even destroyed) by the relationship, accept the relationship or be doomed
to fight the relationship (such as in the Jean Paul Sartre’s No Exit).
There are many other conflicts and types of
adversity that a character can run into, but the adversity itself is not the
key component of a story. The key is in how
the characters react to and deal with adversity. It is difficult for the
reader to care whether or not the adversity is overcome unless they care about
the characters. It is equally difficult to care about characters that have no
complications in their life.
The key is to use adversity as a tool for
character development rather than use the characters merely to further the
action. To do this, you must explore your characters. Not only do you need to
develop a clear sense of what decisions they would make normally, you must develop
how their thinking process changes or fails to change as a result of their
actions. If a character makes the same decision two times and it does not work
either time, the character has not learned. This does not mean the character
has not developed, just that they have failed to change their actions as a
result of their circumstances. This is as much of a character trait as a
character changing their actions. A patriotic character may sacrifice themselves for their country more than once, only to be injured
or to lode something important to them. They have repeated the same action, but
has their reasons changed? The exploration comes in
why they choose to make the same sacrifice again, if it did not help the first
time. Are they more resigned to their course or do they start to waver? What
thoughts lead them to repeat the same action without reward? On the other hand,
a patriot might sacrifice the first time and not the second. This is a major
change in thinking, and for the people reading or watching the story, the
choices must not only be within character, but they must develop the character.
Accomplishing the development of character
through adversity is a challenge for even the most experienced writers. The
keys to accomplishing this are:
Know your characters well. The more time you spend analyzing your characters and
deciding what their thinking process is, the better prepared you will be to
decide how they will react to the adversities they face. For more information
on developing characters see Creating Memorable Characters.
Decide how you want your character to
change and how you want them to remain unchanged. If you know how you want your character to develop,
then you can adjust your plot accordingly. This does not mean that you tailor
the plot to the character. If you want the story to be about blowing up a
building or developing a vaccine, then that is your plot. What you want to
analyze is how your character would go about accomplishing that task, and what
obstacles they would face.
Don’t be afraid to change the
circumstances. An idea that
seemed good in the planning stage may not always work in execution. Sometimes
events must happen to develop a plot but in the writing process your characters
might have strayed from your original ideas for them. Take the time to work the
conflict through. Sometimes the same event can take place if you change one or
two minor details in a story. It is simply a matter of being creative.
Mix things up occasionally. Some actions are out of character only until a character
does it. You may think that your character would act a certain way in a given
situation, but sometimes you’ll want to experiment with having them do
something else. People are full of contradictions, and they don’t always act
the way they think they act. A self-image can be a very deceptive thing.
In the best stories, plot development and
character development work together. Rather than sacrificing one to develop the
other, each is used to the benefit of the other. It is the proper blending of
plot and characters that makes great stories work. When a great story is over,
the reader should feel like the distinct way it developed could only have
happened with those set of characters, yet they should find that entirely
acceptable. While it is OK to think that a character should have dealt with the
adversity differently, the reader our audience should not think that that
character would have done it differently.