what kind of character would be?
I was reading over what I just wrote, when it dawned on me how different I am from my main character. Though a lot of what goes on in her life was inspired by personal experience, Claire is not like me.
She says what's on her mind, while I tend to keep things to myself.
She acts on impulse, while I have to think things through.
Also, she's not afraid to do crazy things. In one scene she jumps fully clothed into a fountain and I would.never EVER do anything like that.
The point is: writers are not their characters. Though we take bits and pieces of ourselves and put them into our novels, our characters have a life of their own.
And the way I see it, our characters are the people we would like to be but can't be.
So that got me thinking: what kind of character would I be?
Well, let's see.
The type of character I would be is:
* a girl who stays up all night
* a girl who drinks tea to calm her nerves
* a girl who daydreams about other worlds
* a girl who strongly believes that music isn't good unless it's loud
* a girl who is afraid of everything from thunderstorms to being alone
* a girl who likes good movies, and writing down random lines of poetry
* a girl who wants to escape from the confines of her small big town
* a girl who has a Johnny Depp poster in her room
The list can go on and on and on.
But I guess what I'm trying to say is: if you have an idea for a dystopian or a fantasy or (insert genre here) kind of novel and you don't have any idea who your main character is: look deep inside yourself, find out what pieces of your soul you want give to your character(s) and give them life.
There's a character in all of us, you just have to be willing to look for them.
Hope everyone is having a great day!
Also, what kind of character would you be? And do you ever incorporate personal experiences into your novel?
1 comments:
I think one great misconception that some people have about writers, is that we write about ourselves. I think some experiences are alike, but the characters in a book live on beyond this realm for a reason.
REPLYSometimes characters do what I wish I could do, or could have done. Most of the time, they do things that I would never think about doing, act that way because they can and I'm just glad that I get to spend time with them and find out what sort of mischief they are going to get into.