If you want to take your writing from mediocre to good and ultimately to great, you need to do several things. One of these is to write such vivid characters that they stand on their own. The kinds of characters that, as one blogger stated, people Google to see if they’re based on real people. As writers, we know that. We want the amazing people in our heads to come out on the page in full color. But how do we do that?
Now that I’m working on my second book, I’ve been asking myself just that. There’s something about that second book that opens a floodgate of self-doubt and questioning. [I recently learned that it’s not just me…there’s an actual second book phenomenon. But that’s another topic for another day.] I’ve been studying other books and researching ways to take my writing to the next level.
When it comes to characterization, many books and blogs start with things like character interviews. They make an excellent point: we can’t write realistic characters if we don’t know them well enough. I would argue that that’s probably what happens when authors say that their characters ran amuck and took the story in a different direction than they anticipated. Wasn’t it more likely that they didn’t really know who the character were, what they would want and what they would do under pressure? Then, when they put them into the fire, the characters acted in an unexpected way and the writer learned more about who they really are.
However, say that you already have a good handle on what your character believes at the deepest level, what she really, really, really wants – not just at this point in her story, but from life overall, and how she’ll respond to just about any situation. Then how do you show those things on the page???
That’s where I’ve been working lately. The situation is compounded by the fact that my current protagonist’s story spans over thirty years and starts when he’s only four years old. It’s particularly difficult to show a lot of things about a very young child. He’s hardly articulate at this point and has very little personal freedom. Still, I need to show a lot about who he is and how he looks at the world. Particularly since his character is going to change dramatically.
It helps that I read a lot of really good quality literature. I have examples of books in which authors have created incredible characters. And as I study these, I can see at least three different methods that the writers have used to bring these characters to life.
Dialogue
The first is dialogue and by that I don’t mean your run-of-the-mill conversation. If you intend to provide deep characterization using dialogue, it needs to be unique. It needs to stand out as something so individual to your character and in a way that points to the underlying personality of that person.
I’ll show you an example.
If you haven’t read Kelly Mustian’s debut novel, The Girls in the Stilt House, I highly recommend it. It’s very well written, even more so for a first novel. She tells the story of two young women, Ada and Matilda, two characters who are extraordinarily vivid.
Here’s a section of dialogue early in the book in which Ada is discussing her father with Matilda.
[Ada] “He claimed I’m going to have a baby.”
[Matilda] “I heard.”
[Ada] “He had me all mixed up with my mother in his mind, but…” Ada trailed her hand over the bloodstained towel still around her waist, over the tight little bulge that she had thought was nothing more than her stomach knotting up like it always did when she was anxious. “Do you think it could be true?” Ada asked the question of the shadowy girl as if she might still prove to be a heavenly being.
[Matilda] “I think I saved your sorry ass and you ain’t said spit about that, is what I think.”
p. 62
As I mentioned, this is still very early in the story, but readers can already see several things about each of them.
Ada is clearly a very subservient person. She isn’t relying on her own impressions of her body. Rather, she falls back on what her father said. He said that she’s pregnant, so now she questions it. And rather than forming her own opinion of the matter, she turns to Matilda for a second opinion. Ada has no capacity to decide anything for herself. Of course, there’s a good reason for that.
On the other hand, what do we see of Matilda? Her first response is already telling. I heard is an abrupt, seemingly indifferent, bordering on harsh response to another woman who might be pregnant. And after Mustian lays out Ada’s very innocent and helpless perspective, Matilda’s response crosses into the comedic. While Ada is viewing her as a heavenly being who came to help her, Matilda is angry and annoyed at Ada for her flighty nature. She wants her to realize that she’s in a different place than she had been now that Matilda has come into her life.
Matilda clearly has an edge about her, some underlying anger, but she also has a backbone. She has a strength that comes out in bold speech and fearless actions. She doesn’t cower, doesn’t hope for Ada’s gratitude or friendship. Rather she tells her what she thinks with no apology. And we see by her words that Matilda has helped Ada in some way that she was unable to do for herself. [Readers already know how at this point in the book, but I won’t give it away.]
That’s a lot of characterization for a small section of one page. The entire book is like this. In everything that Ada and Matilda say, we see so much about who they are.
Actions
A great example of deep characterization through action is in We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson. I mention this book regularly because it’s my favorite Gothic story of all time. Not because of the setting or even the plot itself, although I like those as well. Rather, it’s my favorite because of Merricat, the protagonist and narrator.
Jackson crafts what I believe to be the most interesting character in all of literature in the person of Mary Katherine (“Merricat”) Blackwood. She uses some dialogue, but primarily action to show readers who Merricat really is. The following section [I’ve abbreviated it] shows us what Merricat does when their Cousin Charles moves in and tries to take over the household.
Thursday was my most powerful day. It was the right day to settle with Charles…I went upstairs into our father’s room, walking softly so Constance would not know I was there. The first thing to do was stop our father’s watch which Charles had started…I could not turn it all the way back to where it had formerly been because he had kept it going for two or three days, but I twisted the winding knob backward until there was a small complaining crack from the watch and the ticking stopped. When I was sure that he could never start it ticking again I put it back gently where I had found it…
During the night I had gone out in the darkness and brought in a large basket filled with pieces of wood and broken sticks and leaves and scraps of glass and metal from the field and the wood…While I altered our father’s room I took the books from the desk and blankets from the bed, and I put my glass and metal and wood and sicks and leaves into the empty places…I poured a pitcher of water onto our father’s bed; Charles could not sleep there again. The mirror over the dresser was already smashed; it would not reflect Charles…
pp. 86 – 87
There’s so much more to Merricat, but this shows the early stages of how she tries to deal with the threat of Charles in her and her sister’s life.
Immediately we see something interesting about her. Thursday was my most powerful day is the kind of comment that someone very superstition would say. Jackson follows that statement with descriptions of ritual magic. Merricat is trying to do several things here.
First, she’s practicing ritual magic in an attempt to drive Charles away. She wants his spirit to be restless (he can’t see himself in the mirror that she smashed), he can’t rest in the bed (that she destroyed), he can’t gain any sense of time and place (since she stopped the watch).
Second, she’s trying to restore her life and that of her sister, to what it was before Charles came. She makes the statement [to herself] that she can’t put the watch back to where it had been because he’s been running it for two or three days. We see more evidence of this throughout the rest of the book. Merricat is trying to board up their castle so that no one can come in and alter the lives that she and Constance have there.
Whether you love her or hate her, this is an example of a character who is so real that she jumps off of the page. It’s her unique [and often sympathizable] actions that set her apart from every other character in every other story.
Inner Thoughts
If you want to study deep characterization, you couldn’t do any better than to study the works of Ray Bradbury. He’s a master. His coming-of-age story, Dandelion Wine is an example of that.
The book tells the story of a summer in 1928 in the life of a twelve-year-old boy, Douglas Spaulding. Like Jackson, Bradbury also uses dialogue and action in brilliant ways, but here’s an example in which Douglas has gone with his father and brother to pick wild grapes in the woods. His brother is trying to talk to him while Doug is lost in deep reflection.
No! Douglas squeezed his mind shut. No!…And at last, slowly, afraid he would find nothing, Douglas opened one eye.
And everything, absolutely everything, was there.
The world, like a great iris of an even more gigantic eye, which has also just opened and stretched out to encompass everything, stared back at him.
And he knew what it was that had leaped upon him to stay and would not run away now.
I’m alive, he thought.
His fingers trembled, bright with blood, like the bits of a strange flag now found and before unseen, and him wondering what country and what allegiance he owed to it…
The grass whispered under his body. He put his arm down, feeling the sheath of fuzz on it, and, far away, below, his toes creaking in his shoes. The wind sighed over his shelled ears. The world slipped bright over the glassy round of his eyeballs like images sparked in a crystal sphere…
I’m really alive! he thought. I never knew it before, or if I did I don’t remember!
pp. 9-10
Oh, Bradbury. I love, love, love his style of writing. It’s so full of description and metaphor. I cut out a lot here for the sake of time, but readers see so much of Douglas in this short section.
He’s clearly one of those young boys who is full of life, so full of life that he can hardly contain it. And he has a depth of perception that’s rare, even in adults. In this book, Bradbury explains it as a coming-of-age phenomenon. Douglas is coming into an awareness of the world and his own presence in it that marks a crossing of a threshold: into that gray state between childhood and adulthood. But in reality, Douglas is reflecting on things that few people probably consider.
Lastly, we see a powerful ability to connect with his imagination. Douglas is using his imagination in ways that, rather than escaping reality, help him to understand it more clearly. All of this paints a picture of a very likeable and unique young boy. He isn’t just picking grapes with his family, or enjoying the feeling of the grass between his body. He’s reflecting on his role and place in creation. He’s experiencing his own strength and the possibilities that he possesses because he’s alive, he has a body, he can move through the world exploring it and understanding himself more clearly.
Bradbury gives us this because Douglas’s inner thoughts are vivid and descriptive in a way that tell us who this character is.
What Should You Do?
Ideally we should use as many of these as possible as we write. We can use every bit of dialogue, action and inner thoughts to show readers a clearer picture of our characters. But sometimes it isn’t possible.
Sometimes your character is alone. Sometimes, as in my book, the character is very young and has a personality that’s not particularly expressive. In that case, inner thoughts are where we should focus our attention.
Sometimes the character is in prison, or in some other way incapacitated. We can use their inner thoughts, but we can also use dialogue in very creative ways.
Sometimes the character is in a relationship or situation in which there’s no longer a place for words. Then actions should take center stage.
The key is to use whatever we can, all when possible, to craft something that says more than simply what’s happening with the plot. Our readers want to see what sets these characters apart, what makes them different from the characters in any other story!
If you enjoyed this post, share it with your friends!