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At Heaven's Door, Blog, Characters, Comic Books, Dungeons & Dragons, Inspiration, Television, Vampires, Writers, Writing
Sorry for the two week delay, affairs of state and so on.
I mentioned in my previous blog I wanted to do a series about writing and the art of character creation as I see it. This part 1 of 3.
Let’s lay our cards on the table. One of the first things most fiction writers do is base their characters on people they know. And yes, that includes themselves, because writing is one of the most intimate things a person can do. At the very least, aspects of some characters are based on you. I mean, from a creation mythos kind of way yes, all your characters come from you so you are their creator and they are a part…blah blah blah blah. That’s not where I’m going with the first part of my series on character creation.
When generating the written word you go with what you know, or rather in this case, who you know (in many cases it’s also how you perceive people). These are generally people you love, hate, are in between, but they seem interesting to you. They have one thing in common: you know them, or at least you think you do. And you know yourself, so even if you don’t realize it or are in denial, when writing, with certain characters you are going to leave a big part of yourself in them. As you develop your art you get better, or at the very least you merge several of the overall scopes of character creation and evolve as an artist. But more on that later.
Probably from your early works you are most likely going to use friends or family as a template. I tend to stay away from family myself. I think because I was the youngest in the family I didn’t have a lot in common with my siblings until much later and by then I had been writing long enough that I had weaned myself from that. The same with cousins, I wasn’t that close to them so I never adapted them as a template. As a matter of fact, a short story I wrote about a tumultuous moment with a group of siblings never happened and the characters are nothing like my family. No, I mostly drew from friends. In my first (and later aborted) book, I based most of the characters from a Dungeons and Dragons game we were all playing in high school and used their personalities and what they put into the characters they played (more on gaming systems and how I use them in character development next time). I would use their interests and ticks and create profiles I used for the novel I started but never finished. Yeah I know, but at least I’m here now.
So yes, close friends, and even some loose associates I’ve met and gotten to know or at least shared an occasional drink with, have influenced some of my characters.
Some friends had interesting or attractive qualities that I wanted to capture; others had something that I started off with, but evolved into something more, but that aspect laid a foundation. I think I also wanted to immortalize aspects of my relationships so I could keep them frozen in time (well, okay the pages of the book). I know I’m not the smartest guy in the world, but I’m not the dumbest either. Even I know nothing lasts forever. Some relationships end, by distance, a difference of opinion, or death.
So it goes, to quote one of the greatest voices of my time.
So I take these ticks and their voices and I integrate these people I know into the story. Sometimes it begins, “What if me and my friend Eric actually encountered a werewolf in real life right now?” and the story idea goes from there. (Spoiler alert, we all end up going to Trader Vic’s for piña coladas*). Other times I’m writing a scene and I hear a voice of someone I know, and they insert themselves into one of my characters. Because it feels so natural I use it. It’s familiar and comforting because they help guided dialogue into something to make it more organic and not so stilted. The whole writing process feels right and not relegated to the realm of cliché dialogue. “Dead or alive Gorgon Jr., you’re coming with me!” Yeah. No.
*Two points if you get the reference
With the evolution of my writing there will always be voices in my head (obviously), but now I can shift and cherry pick, and make unique characters who are finally their own person. Plus, I do have intent from time to time with my characters, as you will see in the next part of this blog.
The oldie but goodie. There are going to be people you dislike in life, but perhaps dislike is too strong a word. What I mean to say is there are people I really hate and I would love to see a Steinway grand piano fall on them. Now I could go on about how I deal with these people in one of two ways. The first means involving several law enforcement agencies and me locked up with the Joker and Hannibal Lector as my roommates while I wear a straightjacket.
The other way is I use these people in character creation and I do away with them in an epic fashion, but in a fictionalized setting where the only way I kill them is with my pen or keyboard using poetic license and literary tropes. I’m not sure this way is any healthier, but with the writing part I save tons of money in legal fees.
C’mon, I know if you write fiction you’ve killed several characters based on people you hate. I have and I will continue until someone stops me. I will have my revenge…Mendozaaaaaaa!!!!!
Oh sorry, I digress. For me, people I do not like have become villains, minions, or inept obstacles that were humiliated and/or just plain killed off. They get their comeuppance and het put in their place. Or a fiery death followed by the dropping of a piano.
Personally I think more insulting is the fact that I relegate my annoying past into everyday people who wander into a situation and get smacked by life and are either destroyed or sent on their way, humiliated. Yes I admit, one of the darker and more indulgent aspects of writing, but strangely satisfying. Is that wrong? Should I have not said that?
Ironically, some of my stronger villains can also be based on me because of the cool factor, mainly the factor that I wish I was cool, so they are my surrogates. Remember from an early blog, if you are doing the villain right they don’t even think they are a villain. They have their motivation that while it could set them against your story’s protagonist/hero, it doesn’t make them evil…in their eyes. Ultimately they are wrong, hence being the villain, but motivation makes for strong story telling.
Never said I was perfect. This probably explains why I became a writer.
Now back to what I said about surrogates for me. Adding elements of myself to character, yep I’m guilty as charged and I freely admit it. One particular character was my avatar in an online community I was a part of, in the Vax days of the internet. Everything was text- based and you went to virtual parties as your character. My persona was anti-goth and a joker who was a means of being the opposite of most characters that you would find in a supernatural/horror novel. I laugh so I do not cry, or some other such saying. But it added an element of humor in an otherwise unfunny (at times) environment. Later on I used that persona as one of the main characters in a novel. As I kept writing it I added more characters and learned that I’m more comfortable using an ensemble when writing a novel. So with these additions I added more pieces of myself in these new characters. Some were from my cynical side, the aspect that is curious about everything, and the hopeful youth I let go in my first year of university.
And I had my friends, and enemies, and people I thought I knew, and used them as elements in my first (completed) book. But even my aborted works had that. You use what you know and you eventually marry several elements into a character; simple yet complex evolution. But ultimately, pieces of you are on paper or in megabits. Immortality at last, where is my trench coat and sword?
So what do you think so far? Am I right? Am I wrong? Am I a narcissist and should then direct my attention towards politics? How did you develop your first characters?