The Character Must Be Interesting…
The evolution of the character begins with an idea, even a
silly situation, or a fleeting memory of a song and girl at a bus stop. For the writer, the easy part is the
inspiration, and then continues with hard work.
Maybe the character has form: eye color, lanky and tall, great singing
voice and then it is up to the writer to marry art with perseverance.
One of the most common recurring failures of many short
stories is the lack of well developed protagonists. The truly great characters that make us want
to read more don’t come out of the ether in one shake. We need to fall in love with them. One of the reasons we put stories down and
don’t come back is the lack of interest in the characters. The plot, story arc, all of the situations
presented may be fascinating, amazing, unbelievable and cool; but none of it
matters if the characters aren’t interesting, provocative, and a little
amazing.
There is a writer friend of mine who has notebooks filled
with character development. Back story,
pages and pages of back story. Rarely
are these words ever seen in the finished works, but nonetheless it fills the
writer with a defined world of vision and the character development is filled
with dimension. What is written in those
notebooks? It’s filled with stories of
first dates, job interviews, memories of vomiting in the neighbor’s bushes,
scary near misses and perfect scores in skeet ball. It is truly the tenacity of world building
that creates a work that is special. But
it also simplifies the work for the author.
When I create a character and start writing the story without filling
the void with facts about him or her, I find it more likely the story never
gets finished. The art of defining the
world of the story often comes with defining the characters prior to the first
word hitting the page.
The back story can be as detailed as birth, early school
days, collegiate life, or maybe hitchhiking across Europe. Pages of family history, especially the Mom
and Dad, first loves, sexual and intimate stories all fill the void in a
writer’s mind with details that will become vital for the story presently
coming into fruition, and for creating striking, complex and obviously human
characters and villains.
This is the perseverance.
I believe it is critical to consider the human being as
analogue to the characters and their development. Writers will tell you that a good character
can exist as the culmination of several people that really exist in life. The most important is to bring them to life-
for you the author. Once they are
successfully incubated, they can truly take on the forms and tell the story –
honestly and hopefully make readers fall in love with them.
Who are the characters that we love? The ones that we like better than real
people? Celia Bowen, Frodo, Lolita, Luke
Skywalker, Meursault, Prince
Andrey Bolkonsky, and so many more…
What is it
about them that we love?
Answering that
question may be one of the reasons I continue to write and read. Seeking the truth…
