This is about writing?

Question

I've been writing for almost eight years, but it's merely a hobby. But I've grown love the art so much that I really would like to publish something. I think I have a pretty good plot for the story but my characters seem almost two dimensional, and I really want more real and complex characters. I just don't know how to verbalize it. Do you think you can help?

Thanks

Answer 1

Your characters probably are two dimensional and that is probably because you jump right into writing without doing the background work. Before you start writing a piece - do you spend a lot of time doing detailed character studies? Do your characters have vivid pasts? Dreams for the future? Do you know things like whether they brush their teeth up and down or side to side? What kind of animals they like? What they were like as a child? All these things and a zillion more add up to a fully rounded character. Without them, your character is flat. With them your character is fleshed out and alive.

Think about someone you know very well. A best friend. Think about all the things you know about that person. Most likely you know their life story. You have to consider your characters as best friends and know them that intimately to make them three dimensional.

Once you know that much about them, you will be able to base your decisions concerning the things the character does on the character itself. Could you predict how your best friend would react in a certain situation? Probably. If I asked you if your best friend would rather go out for Chinese food or Italian food, you could probably tell me. But can you tell me what your character would do? You should be able to.

It is those little fine details that make characters rich and alive. Sure, people watching at the mall is a good way to get ideas about people, but again when you see someone at the mall they are no more than two dimensional to you. You don't know a darn thing about them other than what they look like and what they are doing while you watch them. You can certainly use that for a base for a character, but you have to do a whole lot more. You have to use your own sense memories or the memories of people you know and add that to the characters.

When you read a book that has really vivid, alive characters, there is always that kind of information. When I do my character studies, it generally takes me a week or more to flesh out each character in note form. I "borrow" from people I know. Perhaps I have a friend who is afraid of spiders. One of my characters might turn up with that phobia. Or as anyone who knows me would be able to tell you, I am a fanatic when it comes to buying shoes. That translated into one of my characters. I once built a very funny scene concerning a woman and her shoes in one of my books.

Stored in your brain is a million bytes of information about all the people you have ever met. Use it, but mix it up. Use one thing about your best friend and blend it with something your dad once told you about something he did as a kid. You have an almost endless supply of character information inside your head.

When I teach creative writing classes, I do specific exercises to make up characters. People are often shocked at how many things they really do know about the people in their lives. I am going to put my Boot Camp for Writers program online one of these days for people to use. I will include some of those exercises.

This should get you started. Pax - C

Answer 2

Each character you write about should be placed in the mind of the reader. They want to know what kind of person he/she is. What do they look like? Where do they work? You see, all your charcters have a life. They do something else besides walk down an old alley and fine a bag full of money.

The reader wants to know if they are on vacation. Maybe they got fired. My point is that every time this character shows up in your story, the reader should be able to visualize that person. You don't have to go into great detail with every character you have, but the antagonist and protagonist are very important.

Don't bore the reader with 'the sky was blue the grass was green' type of thing. But give them something to see in the back of their mind. This is also true for places.

The people here have giving you some good advice. After eight years of writing, even as a hobby, you should be able to come up with your own Lancelot or Galahad.

Remember one thing, too. Women can be just as powerful a figure as a man in your story. It's not all about physical strength. Don't put them on the back burner.

Good Luck!

Answer 3

There are few things that I think will help you.

Show, Don't Tell
I think understanding the principle of "show, don't tell" can help you. Instead of telling us what the characters are about, show us. This let's us explore the subtext of their actions. For example, you can say "Alex has a cold" or you can create a scene with action and dialogue that will let the reader discover that Alex has a cold. At the same time, Alex's actions will reveal the character about him.

Decisions and writing in the gap
We reveal what we're made of when we make decisions in a moment of crisis. In your story you will have scenes that force your character to make decisions. How he makes these decisions will display his true character to the readers. You need to write it so that the decisions are progressively complicated to test his character.

Multi-Dimensionality
You characters should not be all bad or all good. No one starts their day saying they want to be evil. When someone steals from someone, it is often rationalized in a way that makes them good. People believe they're good. When you show your characters, let us see the rationalization process and understand it. When giving your characters choices, make them choices that test their character and show their dimensions.

Dialogue
When you write dialogue, what they don't say is more important than what they do say. Let the readers discover the subtext.

Writing from the inside out
You must always know what your characters want. If you don't know, who does? When you know what they want in every single scene, you can place yourself in their shoes and write from the inside. Ask yourself, "what would I do if I was this character?" then write. Of course that means you've created scenes with scene objectives and an overall object of desire for your story arch.

Answer 4

Listen to a crap load of music. Since the guitar is obviously very simular to a piano, I find listening to many classical pieces, speradically puts something into my head. One other thing, I usually start out playing a riff extremely slow. I am talking like 15 to 20 BPM. This gives me an exact feel for what I am playing from the start, being able to remove misplaced notes, or even an entire scale. Then while escalading the tempo more things come to light. So in my obscure process the start to a riff may be the same or total oposite from the original when 20 BPM turns into 200 BPM

Answer 5

Study some other writer's techniques. Read--read--read.
You could get some good coaching in a creative writing class, and some good advice from a writer's group.
Look around your community for a group. I'm currently in an 'online' group, but it is not very lively and it's hard to get together for sharing our knowledge.
A real face-to-face group is much better.
By the way, writing as a hobby is very rewarding. I've been doing it for almost 20 years, but, like you, I am now looking at getting published.

Best wishes

Answer 6

Go people watching, or borrow the traits from your friends and give them to the character. You just sort of have to put yourself in thier shoes. Pick one, really good identifying trait to continue to bring up through out the story. The little things make them the most real. Go deeper and tell the reader more of what the character's thinking, but not too much, you want the reader to imagine the character in thier own way. It helps to bring up events from thier pasts that reminds them of whatever's currently happening.

Answer 7

Sometimes, when I'm writing, I won't really know who the character is until I give them dialog. Then it really comes together. Try writing some scenes, even if they won't go into the book, with lots of dialog for your characters. That helps me to figure out who they really are.

Also, show how your characters clash and rub against each other, because for them to be real, they won't get along all of the time, even if they are friends.

Answer 8

okay, when you're walking down the street, or mall...w/e. close your eyes. (you should probably stop for this....there are other people....and walls.) listen for a minute. when you hear a sentence that you really like, imagine one of your characters saying it. take the attitude, tone, everything into account. base your character on somebody who it seems would say this. You'll never actually know what the person who originally said it looks, or acts like. But you'll know your character.

Answer 9

Writing about what you know is the best base. I have come to understand 4 levels of writing in poetry for example which can transcribe to creating characters too. 1) They write about how they feel. 2) They then write about their interpretation of how people they are close to feel. 3) They then feel comfortable writing about how strangers may feel. 4) They then become honest with writing how they feel.

Answer 10

Try basing your characters on people you know or have met, the best way to make characters realistic is to base them on real people.