Post 24 Character Development \u2013 Keeping notes.<\/p>\n
My first bit of advice about character development is simple \u2013 keep notes.\u00a0 Especially if you want to write a story laden with multiple characters it\u2019s very important to strive for consistency in characterization.<\/p>\n
I know, I know\u2026 we\u2019ve all read and seen stories where the coward suddenly overcomes his or her fears and bravely saves the day (so much for consistency, you say), but that\u2019s a clich\u00e9 unless it\u2019s done very carefully.\u00a0 Consider Han Solo in the original (1977) Star Wars<\/em> movie.\u00a0 He\u2019s a rogue, a scoundrel, but not a coward.\u00a0 Somehow you know he\u2019s struggling with his inner demons when he decides to leave, and deep down you know he\u2019s going to come back at the very last minute to save the day.\u00a0\u00a0 I always think of these as the Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane moments, where a character struggles with accepting his or her fate, with doing what they deep down know they have to do.\u00a0 You can probably picture Solo sitting in the Millennium Falcon, arguing with himself, before veering off to rejoin the fight.\u00a0 But based on the character you followed through the movie, you accept that he would do the right thing (the redemption of Darth Vader, on the other hand\u2026well, I don\u2019t want to get into an argument with Star Wars fans). As a counterpoint consider Gollum from Tolkien\u2019s Lord of the Rings<\/em>.\u00a0 Throughout his interaction with Frodo we\u2019re watching a battle for Gollum\u2019s soul \u2013 will it be redemption or damnation? While you may hope Gollum succeeds, you understand how much he\u2019s been terribly damaged by the Ring and have to recognize that he\u2019s losing the battle. \u00a0If LOTR had been a tv script Gollum would probably have appeared at the Cracks of Doom as Frodo claimed the Ring for himself, taken it from Frodo and tossed it into the fire before rescuing the two hobbits. Happy ending all around!\u00a0 Luckily, JRRT was a much better writer than that.<\/p>\n So how do you avoid the clich\u00e9?\u00a0 Like I said at the beginning \u2013 take notes.\u00a0 Understand your characters.\u00a0 What motivates them?\u00a0 You should have a well developed backstory for each major character.\u00a0 In many cases you may never include much of this information in your book, but you should know it like the back of your hand nonetheless. (BTW this also holds for world building.\u00a0 You may never explain things, you may never delve into your world\u2019s history, but you should know it as well as if you were a historian living there.\u00a0 China Mi\u00e9ville never explains the origin of the world where Perdido Street Station<\/em>, The Scar<\/em>, and Iron Council<\/em> take place, but I know he knew it, because \u2013 while I may be wrong – I think I had a sense of that origin after reading The Scar.)<\/p>\n This all comes down to having a profile (on your computer, or in a notebook (paper or electronic), or even a set of old fashioned index cards) for each character.\u00a0 List the physical attributes (height, build, hair color, eye color, complexion, etc.), a brief psychological description (confident, ill-at-ease in crowds, narcissistic, etc.) and important aspects of their life history.\u00a0 For major characters you might end up with a few pages of notes (or more), while for minor characters a single paragraph may suffice.<\/p>\n Once you\u2019ve worked with a character for a good amount of time you\u2019ll find yourself referring to your notes less and less because you will know them so well.\u00a0 But until that time notes rule!<\/p>\n Next time (coming eventually): Where do you get ideas for your characters?<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Post 24 Character Development \u2013 Keeping notes. My first bit of advice about character development is simple \u2013 keep notes.\u00a0 Especially if you want to write a story laden with multiple characters it\u2019s very important to strive for consistency in characterization. I know, I know\u2026 we\u2019ve all read and seen stories where the coward suddenly…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":259,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,4,28,29],"tags":[7,8,42,9,6,26],"class_list":{"0":"entry","1":"post","2":"publish","3":"author-photophoosk100","4":"post-464","6":"format-standard","7":"category-jotting-and-stray-thoughts","8":"category-musings","9":"category-on-writing","10":"category-writing-your-book","11":"post_tag-getting-published","12":"post_tag-novel","13":"post_tag-rules-for-writing","14":"post_tag-writers","15":"post_tag-writing","16":"post_tag-writing-a-novel"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tomwolosz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/464","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tomwolosz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tomwolosz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tomwolosz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/259"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tomwolosz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=464"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tomwolosz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/464\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":465,"href":"https:\/\/tomwolosz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/464\/revisions\/465"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tomwolosz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=464"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tomwolosz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=464"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tomwolosz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=464"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}