All About Character

Where do writers get their characters? It’s a question I have been asking myself while I rewatch the James Bond films and the original Star Trek. There is nothing similar between
James Bond, James Kirk, and the characters I create. So I’ve been asking myself where these characters who live in my head have come from. I think I have come up with an answer.

When a writer creates a character (in whatever way works for them) there are a multitude of ways. Often it is people we know. I have a few characters like this that were done
quite deliberately. More typically, I create an amalgam of different traits from different sources to create one character. These traits come from both real and fictional sources. The scene I initially wrote in my Galactic
Confederation universe had a character who was mostly Han Solo, though as I wrote the character drifted from that first scene.

One of the most important pieces that goes into each character a writer creates is the writer themself. No matter where a writer draws inspiration for a character, ultimately,
it filters through them. That means that every character has some piece of the writer. That might be anywhere from the writer putting themself in to their work to the writer’s interpretation of someone they know or an archetype.
I’ve noticed this to some extent with my writing. I think the hallmark of a writer good at creating characters is the ability to make the characters different. Give each their own motivation while each one is still a facet
of the writer.