Nrupal Das's Blog
September 29, 2018
Characters in my plot
When I started writing short stories I held this notion for a very long time that since it is a 'short' story, I do not have time to build a character. So, by default almost all my short stories were plot driven.
Personal Bias
I thought I was taking a very conscious decision based on my capability and the personal bias towards great plots. I tried a couple of times to weave great characters into my story but failed miserably. I was never able to showcase my characters in the same light I same them. Obviously it was a lack of talent, I assumed. However, I noticed that I was really good at drawing plots, surprises, twists and even memorable.
I had seen from tales of masters that they described physical traits of a characters, my childhood stories of Sherlock Holmes had plenty of them, and it helped me visualize my characters pretty well.
I tried to copy all the exterior aspects of how to build characters by reading other great story tellers but when I tried to re-create the same, I failed miserably.
I read Chekhov, O Henry, Tagore, Munshi Premchand, and so many more. I realised that they are able to build memorable characters even in a short story.
It was simple deduction, they are legends and I am mere mortal, so I left the pursuit of building characters in my stories and focused on interesting plots instead.
I was sporadic in my writing and in my busy professional life, I had given up writing stories for around 6 years.
After many years while reading Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life I realised one very important thing, I was not able to create my characters not because I am mortal and great writers are immortal, I seriously believed that, but because I was not internalizing my characters enough.
I will throw some light. I will go back few years back.
I often used to do Google search to solve my problems of building good characters. In one of my search I came across the idea that while you writing about your characters you should know them intimately, I could not agree more. Then as a science student, I came across a spreadsheet, writer self help tool, which had around 50 or 60 fields to be filled up for my characters. The fields were representation of appearances, taste, motivations, likes or dislikes etc.
I thought it was a great idea. If I know so much about my characters then I will surely write better about them. Hence I started a mundane task of filling in details about my characters into a spreadsheet. These were characters of a novel that I had started with great enthusiasm.
As I have mentioned above, I was into plot driven stories and at that stage in my writing, my characters were fillers in my plot. So taking an example of a character - Father of the protagonist, I decided to imagine him as my neighbor physically, emotionally like my uncle and decided to fill up the spreadsheet about his appearance, tastes, motivations etc.
I drew up some 4 or 5 characters using such methodology. I was content with my efforts and imagined that my effort will yield results soon. On the contrary, I started losing interests in my characters and slowly in that story, I left that novel or idea in whatever shape it was and never picked it up again. My characters didn't have any soul.
I loved my protagonist but I did not care about people in his life or around him. I wanted my protagonist to do amazing things. I wanted people is his life to be just anybody, I just didn't care.
But I did not realise back then that my protagonist draws his energy from people around him, if I do not care about them, then ultimately I am being careless about my protagonist. Slowly, I did not care about my protagonist as well and hence dropped the story.
Now, coming back to the present. I learnt many things organically and when I was reading Anne Lamott's book I reaslied what an idiot I have been for so many years.
My methodical approach to build characters was so stale and uninspiring that I lost interest in my characters and my story.
I think there was a sentence in her book which meant something like this - after living with your characters for sometime, you will know what they have in their left pockets.
There were certain sentences about letting your characters in your memory for sometime and then coming back to them. Many a times these characters themselves reveal their true nature or characteristics.
I started doing this exercises, not hurriedly bring a character to life by throwing at him his likes, dislikes, physical characteristics and emotional depth but my adding one layer at a time. I started giving my characters some space to breath and grow.
As I started doing it, I realised that I did not need a spreadsheet to note down all their characteristics and refer them when needed. On the contrary I was able to write all their characteristics in a spreadsheet because I actually knew them.
Now, after spending a decade in search of how to write about my characters effectively I have found answer which sits well with me.
I am sure many authors will find their own ways of settling down with their characters but this is my story of building my characters in my plot.
Earlier my plot were great but my stories were average or below average. There can be thousand different reasons for the same such as my style, grammar, voice etc but I realised that my poor characters were not able to bring the readers into the fold of my story.
If you do not love a character, will you care if he is hanging from a cliff?
A great plot with average character is very poor reading material. On the other hand an average plot with great characters is still good read. This is something I realised while looking at lives around me, I do not have something extraordinary going around me but there are some very interesting characters around me.
This is the small improvement that I have been able to do in last couple of years in my writing. I have a lifetime of improvements ahead of me but this was an important step.
This has helped me:
Think about that character a lot.
His motivation - Why?
His Feelings
His role in the overall story? Why is he or she in the story - How does he/she add to the whole picture
Everything you give him should have a why.
Example -
Why give his walk a limp?
Why give him less hair, why make him bald?
Why is he always angry with his wife? (Even for minor characters)
Once you think about him at a deeper level, you will know certain things about him or her.
1) Will she go to a costly restaurant to celebrate or she will take pains to go a familiar restaurant with memories?
2) If she is insulted will she forgive him or her. If yes, in how much time.
Note - You should ask questions 1 or 2 when it has no bearing to the story. The story should not have any situation close to your question, that ways you will know your character well and will organically decide what he or she will do in the story in a different setting. I hope I am making sense?
Stay with your characters for sometime. They will reveal stories about themselves.
Personal Bias
I thought I was taking a very conscious decision based on my capability and the personal bias towards great plots. I tried a couple of times to weave great characters into my story but failed miserably. I was never able to showcase my characters in the same light I same them. Obviously it was a lack of talent, I assumed. However, I noticed that I was really good at drawing plots, surprises, twists and even memorable.
I had seen from tales of masters that they described physical traits of a characters, my childhood stories of Sherlock Holmes had plenty of them, and it helped me visualize my characters pretty well.
I tried to copy all the exterior aspects of how to build characters by reading other great story tellers but when I tried to re-create the same, I failed miserably.
I read Chekhov, O Henry, Tagore, Munshi Premchand, and so many more. I realised that they are able to build memorable characters even in a short story.
It was simple deduction, they are legends and I am mere mortal, so I left the pursuit of building characters in my stories and focused on interesting plots instead.
I was sporadic in my writing and in my busy professional life, I had given up writing stories for around 6 years.
After many years while reading Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life I realised one very important thing, I was not able to create my characters not because I am mortal and great writers are immortal, I seriously believed that, but because I was not internalizing my characters enough.
I will throw some light. I will go back few years back.
I often used to do Google search to solve my problems of building good characters. In one of my search I came across the idea that while you writing about your characters you should know them intimately, I could not agree more. Then as a science student, I came across a spreadsheet, writer self help tool, which had around 50 or 60 fields to be filled up for my characters. The fields were representation of appearances, taste, motivations, likes or dislikes etc.
I thought it was a great idea. If I know so much about my characters then I will surely write better about them. Hence I started a mundane task of filling in details about my characters into a spreadsheet. These were characters of a novel that I had started with great enthusiasm.
As I have mentioned above, I was into plot driven stories and at that stage in my writing, my characters were fillers in my plot. So taking an example of a character - Father of the protagonist, I decided to imagine him as my neighbor physically, emotionally like my uncle and decided to fill up the spreadsheet about his appearance, tastes, motivations etc.
I drew up some 4 or 5 characters using such methodology. I was content with my efforts and imagined that my effort will yield results soon. On the contrary, I started losing interests in my characters and slowly in that story, I left that novel or idea in whatever shape it was and never picked it up again. My characters didn't have any soul.
I loved my protagonist but I did not care about people in his life or around him. I wanted my protagonist to do amazing things. I wanted people is his life to be just anybody, I just didn't care.
But I did not realise back then that my protagonist draws his energy from people around him, if I do not care about them, then ultimately I am being careless about my protagonist. Slowly, I did not care about my protagonist as well and hence dropped the story.
Now, coming back to the present. I learnt many things organically and when I was reading Anne Lamott's book I reaslied what an idiot I have been for so many years.
My methodical approach to build characters was so stale and uninspiring that I lost interest in my characters and my story.
I think there was a sentence in her book which meant something like this - after living with your characters for sometime, you will know what they have in their left pockets.
There were certain sentences about letting your characters in your memory for sometime and then coming back to them. Many a times these characters themselves reveal their true nature or characteristics.
I started doing this exercises, not hurriedly bring a character to life by throwing at him his likes, dislikes, physical characteristics and emotional depth but my adding one layer at a time. I started giving my characters some space to breath and grow.
As I started doing it, I realised that I did not need a spreadsheet to note down all their characteristics and refer them when needed. On the contrary I was able to write all their characteristics in a spreadsheet because I actually knew them.
Now, after spending a decade in search of how to write about my characters effectively I have found answer which sits well with me.
I am sure many authors will find their own ways of settling down with their characters but this is my story of building my characters in my plot.
Earlier my plot were great but my stories were average or below average. There can be thousand different reasons for the same such as my style, grammar, voice etc but I realised that my poor characters were not able to bring the readers into the fold of my story.
If you do not love a character, will you care if he is hanging from a cliff?
A great plot with average character is very poor reading material. On the other hand an average plot with great characters is still good read. This is something I realised while looking at lives around me, I do not have something extraordinary going around me but there are some very interesting characters around me.
This is the small improvement that I have been able to do in last couple of years in my writing. I have a lifetime of improvements ahead of me but this was an important step.
This has helped me:
Think about that character a lot.
His motivation - Why?
His Feelings
His role in the overall story? Why is he or she in the story - How does he/she add to the whole picture
Everything you give him should have a why.
Example -
Why give his walk a limp?
Why give him less hair, why make him bald?
Why is he always angry with his wife? (Even for minor characters)
Once you think about him at a deeper level, you will know certain things about him or her.
1) Will she go to a costly restaurant to celebrate or she will take pains to go a familiar restaurant with memories?
2) If she is insulted will she forgive him or her. If yes, in how much time.
Note - You should ask questions 1 or 2 when it has no bearing to the story. The story should not have any situation close to your question, that ways you will know your character well and will organically decide what he or she will do in the story in a different setting. I hope I am making sense?
Stay with your characters for sometime. They will reveal stories about themselves.
