What Does She Want?
Earlier this month, I went to Vermont for ten days for my second residency in the Vermont College of Fine Arts Writing for Children and Young Adults MFA program. I had the ENORMOUS luck to be placed in a special full-novel workshop with Amanda Jenkins, where we worked on approaching the novel from a character standpoint (versus plot or structure). In addition to this, I’ve been matched up with Coe Booth, who is my faculty advisor for the next six months. Together, these two women made me see a huge gaping hole in the story that I was so proud of meticulously plotting out (a fantasy trilogy, no easy feat!): I had no idea what my character WANTED.
Say what?
It was such an oversight, such a rookie mistake, that I sort of sat there dumbfounded when Coe politely listened to my fabulous plot and then said, “But what does Nalia want?” Nalia, my feisty protagonist caught in the midst of a raging civil war, a coup, and a slave trade that crosses universes – Nalia, who is badass, a magical knight among other exciting things, torn between her shady master and the leader of her land’s revolution…And I had no idea what was driving this girl to do the things she does. Major duh moment. I mean, I have a theatre degree – how many times did we agonize over our scripts, trying to figure out what they wanted? (“Moscow!” for you Three Sisters fans).
I love what Coe said when I said that I guessed she wanted revenge : give her a sibling she has to rescue…or something.
See, I thought it was enough that my character wanted revenge, but as my husband so rightfully pointed out, revenge as a motivation is boring – just look at Quentin Tarantino movies. Yeah, they’re fun, but the characters often lack depth (I have to disagree with him about Kill Bill, but that’s a subject for another day). Coe was right – Nalia needed something to fight for not against. There is such a difference between a character who has a goal that they push toward, despite it being constantly thwarted, and a character who’s just pissed off. If Nalia’s sole motivation had been revenge, we’re sort of left with a “and then what?” scenario. What a bummer way to end a trilogy! Not only that, but it doesn’t leave room for any emotional growth, unless she decides along the way that revenge isn’t the way to go.
Once I figured out what Nalia wants, I discovered who Nalia is. Everything else fell into its rightful place in the plot. Suddenly, all these fancy plot points had meaning and some of them had to be chucked out entirely because they didn’t mean anything – they were just tricks to dazzle my reader with. Once I figured out what Nalia wanted, it enriched my secondary characters, as well. Suddenly I could see places where their desires lines were crossing – lining up or maybe at odds with one another. Eureka! Now I had conflict and tension that came out of character, not out of a plot I, as god of my story, imposed on my characters.
Looking at your story from a character standpoint means having the plot come from your protagonist’s wants and needs. It means listening to them. Often in our workshop, Amanda would correct us when we said “I want my character to…” She would say, “It doesn’t matter what you want. What does your character want?” And it’s taking that leap of faith and letting your character guide you that will ultimately lead you to an emotionally resonant story and (hopefully) help you avoid some cliches along the way.
Some things she suggested to help you get there were talking to your character, asking them questions, and doing a lot of side writing that may or may not ever get into the book. She also said it could be helpful to write things out of order. Maybe if you write those scenes that are really important or exciting to you, you can work backwards to try to figure out how the character got to that point. It’s like emotional archeology. At first, I was skeptical. I’m one of those people that likes to plow ahead. But I have to say that doing the side writing helped me understand Nalia’s backstory better and my interviews with her and one of my really significant secondary characters gave me a chance to get closer to them. Asking lots and lots of questions and talking it out with my writer friends is what finally unlocked the key to what Nalia wanted. I dug deeper and deeper, finally hitting story gold. At least, I hope it is. There’s a lot of fool’s gold out there on story mountain.
So what does your character want?
Happy Writing!
