Unearthing Character

A post at Writer Unboxed: Unearthing Character

Of all the skills writers need most, creating authentic characters is probably the hardest to achieve.  Each character is unique, and the techniques that writers use to bring them to life are so complex and layered that it’s nearly impossible to talk about them in general terms.  I suspect that the writers who are best at it aren’t even aware of how they do it.  That’s why they often talk about finding a character rather than creating one.

Not being able to break characterization down to teachable principles is a source of real frustration for those of us who teach writing and those of you trying to learn it.  But there may be a way to spot and study clear examples of genuine, deep, authentic character and see – or feel — what they have in common.

I find this post immediately interesting because I do think this — creating characters that readers will love — is not very teachable. But it seems to me that a lot of posts hither and yon treat it as though it IS teachable. I mean all the posts like this:

Writing How-to: Create Characters Your Readers Love and Hate

How to Build Characters Your Readers Will Love

Creating Young Adult Fiction Characters Readers Will Love

And on and on, ten thousand similar posts, all of which operate on the idea that you can boil down “creating authentic characters” to a bulleted list of tips and anybody can read the list and off they go, creating great characters that feel like real people to readers. And obviously that’s not actually possible, and it’s nice to see a post that says the techniques that writers use to bring them to life are so complex and layered that it’s nearly impossible to talk about them in general terms.

This may, of course, just reflect my perception as an intuitive writer. Maybe all kinds of much more analytical writers are saying, No, it’s honestly more like a bulleted list, we just do characters like paint-by-numbers. That’s just hard for me to imagine. For me, it seems much more reasonable to say But there may be a way to spot and study clear examples of genuine, deep, authentic character and see – or feel — what they have in common. Because to me it seems very reasonable to say Think about how these characters feel, create your own characters by feel.

So what does this linked post from Writer Unboxed actually say about this topic? Where does this author go to find characters that feel real, so that these characters can be used as examples?

You can break out of your own head by reading books from earlier eras.  Everybody’s thinking is shaped by unconscious cultural stuff that gets steeped into our heads from childhood.  And that cultural baggage is where a lot of flat, lazy characterization comes from. … When I read older books, every once in a while I hit a passage that strikes me with how modern it sounds.  These passages can be anything from an offhand observation or a line of dialogue.  But these moments represent true, authentic character – individuals with views on life that aren’t simply a rehash of whatever’s current in the culture at the moment. … if you read older books, be alert for the passages that strike you as strangely modern, that you immediately connect with.  When a character fifty, or a hundred, or five hundred years ago says something you can see yourself saying, you’re in the presence of genuine, authentic character.   Steep yourself in those moments, learn how they feel, and you may find it easier to create them yourself.

That’s an interesting observation. I mean, the idea of breaking out of your preconceptions by reading older books, that’s fine, and by the way well-written Historicals can do the same thing, and obviously fantasy with non-contemporary settings and a lot of SF and so forth. Anything whatsoever that involves a well-drawn setting that is not like the modern American setting, where characters have attitudes and expectations that a carbon copy of modern American attitudes and expectations. (Or modern wherever, fill in with any other contemporary society.)

I think what this post is observing is that human nature doesn’t change …

“I am heartily ashamed of myself, Lizzy. But don’t despair, it’ll pass; and no doubt more quickly than it should.” 

“Adulthood isn’t an award they’ll give you for being a good child. You can waste years trying to get someone to give that respect to you, as though it were a sort of promotion or raise in pay. If only you do enough, if only you are good enough. No. You have to just . . . take it. Give it to yourself, I suppose.”

“Some humans would do anything to see if it was possible to do it. If you put a large switch in some cave somewhere, with a sign on it saying ‘End-of-the-World Switch. PLEASE DO NOT TOUCH’, the paint wouldn’t even have time to dry.”

“It’s an odd thing, happiness. Some people take happiness from gold. Or black pearls. And some of us, far more fortunate, take their happiness from periwinkles.”

Gold star if you know where each of the above quotes came from.

Anyway: Human nature doesn’t change, and people are variable but not infinitely variable, and creating characters who feel true depends at least on part on creating characters who are true — in the sense of being consonant with what people are actually like. But, because the protagonist is the protagonist, probably a little exaggerated, maybe a lot exaggerated — wittier, kinder, braver than most people ever can be. But still true to what people are really like, or really ought to be like. I think that’s what the linked post is talking about — literature as a guide to what people are like and how to create characters who are like that.