I think the hardest thing for any storyteller to do is to come up with good, organic characters. It’s my personal fear that anybody I create will be too much like someone I know in real life, or they’ll be too static or one-dimensional, that they’ll come across as doll-like or boring. I mean, let’s face it: characters, in any medium, are a creator’s baby. They grow as the story grows; they develop from the creator’s subconscious to be reflections of him/herself. In many instances, one character can personify a single concept or idea central to a story’s plot. To criticize a character is to criticize the creator’s psyche.
The first thing you have to realize is that you will never, ever make a perfect character. Unless he or she is to personify perfection or purity or virtue, it is natural for your character to have flaws. Look at the cast of people in your own life: Why do you like them? Why do they get on your nerves? What makes them different from everybody else? What makes them the same as everybody else?
The biggest problem I see young writers (such as myself) run into is that they try to make their protagonists too special or different. This character usually becomes a Mary Sue. Those of you in the writing world know what I’m talking about, but for those who don’t, TVTropes.org (link at the bottom) does a fine job of describing her:
The prototypical Mary Sue is an original female character in a fanfic who obviously serves as an idealized version of the author mainly for the purpose of Wish Fulfillment. She’s exotically beautiful, often having an unusual hair or eye color, and has a similarly cool and exotic name. She’s exceptionally talented in an implausibly wide variety of areas, and may possess skills that are rare or nonexistent in the canon setting. She also lacks any realistic, or at least story-relevant, character flaws — either that or her “flaws” are obviously meant to be endearing.
She has an unusual and dramatic Back Story. The canon protagonists are all overwhelmed with admiration for her beauty, wit, courage and other virtues, and are quick to adopt her as one of their True Companions, even characters who are usually antisocial and untrusting; if any character doesn’t love her, that character gets an extremely unsympathetic portrayal. She has some sort of especially close relationship to the author’s favorite canon character — their love interest, illegitimate child, never-before-mentioned sister, etc. Other than that, the canon characters are quickly reduced to awestruck cheerleaders, watching from the sidelines as Mary Sue outstrips them in their areas of expertise and solves problems that have stymied them for the entire series.
If you’re worried your character might be too perfect, you can check out the Mary Sue Litmus Test here, where you fill out a survey about your character and receive a ballpark score and an assessment of your character in its current stage of development. It’s by no means a final say in how well or badly written your character is, but it gives you a good estimate on how hard you’re trying to make your character special.
The Mary Sue brings up another interesting website you might want to reference as you flesh out your story, not only your characters: TV Tropes. You can find it here and browse at your own leisure. It’s a lot of fun to click through the articles and find archetypes in your favorite shows and characters; it’s not limited strictly to television.
There’s also a litmus-style test for cliche bad guys (almost exclusively for fantasy writers, sorry folks) you can find here.
If you’re not worried about a Mary Sue or accidentally writing the next Voldemort, then you’re probably just worried about your characters coming across as genuine and organic. This is a very real concern of writers, both published and hobbyists, myself included. I think the best way to create real characters is to live with them. Go through your day with your character in the back of your mind, thinking to yourself “now what would x do here?” Like waiting for the bus, or eating lunch alone, or getting stuck in a noisy section of the library. You might find that your character parrots your own actions, in which case you might need to expand on writing diversity. I do this pretty often with the characters I create and it helps me breathe more life into them.
Another thing you can do in order to create realistic quirks for your characters is to ask them questions you’d want to be asked yourself. What’s your worst fear? Biggest dream? Most embarrassing moment? Why? Not only does this help you get a feel for your character’s voice, but it also helps you develop their own back story, whether or not it becomes relevant in the main story arc or not. Side characters may not need as much attention as they’re more often than not plot points, but it’s important to sit down and have a little interview with anyone you think might be important. Even if the back story doesn’t come out in the plot, it will be visible in their actions, words, and maybe even how they look.
This brings me to another point. Unless you’re relying on heavy symbolism within your own characters, you need to remember that there is diversity everywhere. If you’re creating your own world (which will hopefully be another post on its own) you can create any race or ethnicity you want. You can have it be completely whitewashed (which is a little boring, but you do what you want) if you want, or it can be a melting pot like the actual world we live in. Don’t throw in a queer character to give your queer readership a bit of representation; do it because you feel it would be right, because in a room of ten people, there is a chance that one of them belongs to the LGBTQ community. Write out of your comfort zone. Do research.
Here are some good links on writing diverse characters:
A good way to shape a protagonist is to write a character bio. If you think linearly, a picture like the one below might help you out:
courtesy of the internet.
It provides a helpful checklist of all the things you could possibly think of that can help you develop a character.
One thing I cannot stress enough is the name of your character. Goodness gracious. Choose a name you love, of course, but don’t name a character something you’d want to name your own child, because that name would be ruined for you, and if you get published your kid will hate you forever.
A lot of people are drawn to symbolic names, but you need to remember that there was a point your character was born, and their parents most likely didn’t say, “well, she’s destined to save the world when she grows up, so let’s name her Sacha (French, Defender of Mankind).” Of course, if your character has an inflated sense of self and it’s totally in character for them to rename themselves, then that could make for interesting reading. They also aren’t going to know their kid’s personality the moment it’s born, so choosing a name based on how they look (Bianca, for example) or how they act (Vivienne) is a huge mistake. If you happen to like these names, then by all means, use them because you like them. I’m not saying to avoid interesting names, but you have to remember that realistically, there are going to be boring names in real life, and there are going to be interesting, exotic names. Just don’t name every lackluster side character Jane or Susan, and not every bitchy, typical antagonist is going to be a Tiffany or Brittany. Name the bad guy Michael. Name the good guy Jim. Name the evil villain queen something innocent like Charlotte.
Here are some instances that special names could work: If your character is an orphan and a priestess of the temple of Artemis happened to find her in the woods bathed in moonlight, it would be appropriate for the priestess to name her Selene, Serena or Luna, or something moon related. If your character was born in a time of change, strife, or prosperity and their parents wanted to name them accordingly, then that works too; naming a child Natalie could be appropriate if the mother’s pregnancy coincided with a time of wealth and peace, as Natalie means “light.” If you want your character’s name to have historical significance that also foreshadows their fate, then something like Isaac could work, if he had to commit the ultimate sacrifice to restore balance in the world or something (Look into the Akedah, it’s really interesting stuff). If you want something mystical and foreshadowy, by all means pull out that name dictionary! Just remember to be smart about it. If it’s something you might scoff at yourself if you read it somewhere else, then it’s probably best to change names.
Also be aware that a name you love could already have a reputation attached to it. Names like Zelda, Edward, Harry, Dean, and Alice are so popular within popular culture that readers or viewers are already going to have preconceived notions of the name and the character before going in. It’s not fair, but it does happen. If I see a character in a book named Zelda, I’m going to go in reading, looking for parallels between the Legend of Zelda series and whatever it is I’m reading.
With writing back stories, the cardinal rule is this: Tragic back stories explain bad deeds, but they never excuse them. Sometimes you don’t need a tragic back story to make anyone good or evil though. Maleficent, the antagonist from The Sleeping Beauty, was evil for evil’s sake. She seriously put a curse on an entire kingdom just because she wasn’t invited to a party. Tough going. Sometimes, the simplest histories are the best. Not everything needs to be complicated. If you get confused writing it, your readers will probably get confused reading it.
I hope to go more in depth on character development in later posts, but for now, I think I’ll leave it at this. If you liked what you saw but you want to see more, let me know! If you have any questions about anything in particular, or want me to address something specific, please comment. I love feedback!
As always, stay magical (but reasonably so, you Mary Sue, you.)
-Camille
P.S. Have this fun video of me being the 21st century Mary Sue. I made it just for you all.
The Magic Words 