Thursday, January 29, 2009
Posts Tagged ‘characters’
Maybe it’s because I’m a writer or maybe just because I’m an oddball, but I’ve always had a strange, mystical fascination with names. I play a name game where I combine names of people who, if married, would have unique monikers (i.e. if Brady Quinn married Tom Brady, he’d be Brady Brady) (gender never matters, it’s the name). I love the “are you serious?” names (once had a student named Rusty Nail in class) and I truly believe that many people who have the same names have something in common (not making examples for that one public due to possible retaliation).
So imagine how fun this article was for me this morning! Really…your name can determine your criminal potential. Who knew?
Boys With Unpopular Names More Likely To Break Law
I can’t help but wonder what Rusty is up to these days. And I’m so glad I named my son Jason!
Friday, August 1, 2008
Best of…Character
Hard to believe this is the last day of camp and I’ll be home soon. Hopefully the advance post option in Blogger is working (for you). If not, at least I’ll have lots to post when I make it back on Monday!
Today’s Best of…features character-building and how to know your characters well before you start writing. Since I’ll be starting a new contemporary novella in a few days, I can use this advice myself…lol.
Best of…Characters at the Fountain Pen, Inc. blog
Happy writing!
Beth
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
Oprah Magazine and the Art of Character Development
I’m a huge fan of life coaches, especially Cheryl Richardson and Martha Beck. I don’t think I’ve ever heard anything from either of these ladies that didn’t make sense to some part of my life.
In the July issue of Oprah Magazine, Martha’s “Advice, etc.” column shows that she’s not only a very funny writer (which you can pick up by reading her books as well), she’s got some serious insight into human emotions, most notably in this article, regret.
I wasn’t reading for any particular reason other than I like her stuff, but when I got to the second step, “Separate regret’s basic ingredients”, it struck me that this isn’t only a blueprint of human emotion, it’s also one of our fictional characters’ emotions.
That second step alone is worth its weight in gold when it comes to figuring out what our characters are feeling. Rather than lump “anger” or “happiness” or “remorse” into a one-word description in our stories, we’d be far better served (and get to the heart and meat of the character, which in turn deepens the reader’s reaction and emotional engagement) to figure out what elements go into that emotion for that character at that point in time. Not only will it add depth to the story and character, it might even lend itself to a few scenes or a future action that can highlight the problem (remember, show, don’t tell).
If your character is angry, why is she angry? It isn’t enough to know she’s angry because someone backed into her new car. One character might be angry because the car represents her life savings and now she has to find a way to pay for repairs. Another might be angry because the person who backed into her was driving drunk, and her brother was killed by a drunk driver. (ooooh, backstory and emotion. Like that!). A third might be angry because the accident is making her late for the most important court date of her lawyer career. And a fourth might be mad because he was borrowing the car from dad…without mentioning it to dad that he was leaving. Four characters, four stories, four drastically different points of view…from one emotion.
Read the article for a more in-depth presentation of what I’m trying to summarize. What it really comes down is…..Get to the root of your problem and infuse your stories with the detail you discover. Your readers will thank you for it.
It's pretty simple, really. I'm a writer who loves writing about writing, and sharing all the tricks of the trade with other writers. And when I'm not writing, I'm thinking about writing. I have a hunch you know what I mean :)