Where do your characters come from . . . ?

[Lifelongdagger]

It has taken a while for me to realise this, but every character that I have ever 'created' has actually been me. Okay, so they have a different name, sometimes a different sex, often they are much older or younger, but they have all been parts of me. The bitter, drunken author, the naive simpleton, the lunatic in search of immortality.

I wonder if anyone else has this experience and what their characters tell them about themselves . . .

[Sesselja]

Of course, all characters draw upon my experiences in life, but some have been me - or rather aspects of me. I don't like to write about those characters. Not because it's uncomfortably close, but because it's boring and my writing become shallow (that says something about me, doesn't it...).

My next character is NOT me in any way. She came to me when I saw a picture of a woman I once got some emails from. The character is not based on her emails, just her picture, that sparked a lot of ideas and visions in my head. I cannot wait to write her down.

[NightWynde]

The MC for my current WIP started out as a situational-type character. I needed the former MC (now the antagonist) to talk to someone about what she knew about a serial killer. So, I started thinking about what kind of person she would talk to and went from there.

Specifically, since this was a cross-country serial killing, I wanted an Agent from the FBI. I also wanted someone who wasn't quite sure about protocol as far as who was on the case, so I made him a rookie. But even though he was a rookie, I wanted him to have some familiarity with interrogation procedure so I made him a former sheriff. And so on and so forth, until I could hear his voice.

[bsolah]

This is not uncommon. I do this too, and a lot of the time, your characters are drawn from you because the decisions you make as a person seem perfectly normal and right to you. It's only natural, if your character is also right, that he would choose the same decisions as you would in their situation. Of course, as writers develop, this applies less and less.

[seun]

My early characters were usually people who had qualities I thought I lacked. More recently, I've exaggerated some of my characteristics to make characters who fit the story even though my partner thinks the cynical and sarcastic MC from my last book was purely me.

[Bufty]

Maybe I'm lucky, but my characters just come on stage when they think it's the right time to introduce themselves. Then I find out what they are like as they speak and act and re-act. The developing story generates the characters.

[LeftUnsaid]

I find the process of creating characters to be highly interesting. One of them was molded after a person, someone who had actually spurred the need for this story. Now, while she still possesses a small number of that persons qualities, I would have to say that she grew beautifully into her own person. Maybe that's why I hate her, for having the courage to be what she wanted. Then I have another character who started out simply as my own cameo into my story, I needed her for one simple role. But she had ideas of her own and managed to get her self intertwined in this twisted web they all weave. I was saddened when I realized that I lost my cameo. And then there is the character who more or less is me. Hey, it's my story. But this is his story, really. The next book, the prequel, it will have him and it will really be My story. But regardless of where they all came from, one underlying thing remains true: I am littered throughout the entire story and throughout every thing they do. Even when they're not me, they still sort of are.

[Doctor Shifty]

There is a counsellor's dictum, "You can't help but tell your own story".

In counselling sessions in my work I am aware that even if the person is not telling the truth, the manner in which they tell the "not-truth" will arise from some part of their real story.

To some degree, this is going to be true also for the author. Even a character far from our own personality type will be processed through our own imagination.

[Lifelongdagger]

That is something I also find in my work as a counsellor, Dr. S. It seems to be that however a client expresses themselves, be it verbally or non verbally, they are telling me something not only about them, but also about me.

The parallel process of reflection never fails to astound me, and is definitely something that I am aware of in the characters that I write.

[Jamesaritchie]

Sometimes teh protagonist is me, or at least one side of me. Sometimes a minor character is me. But most characters are real people I've known.

[Doctor Shifty]

That is something I also find in my work as a counsellor, Dr. S. It seems to be that however a client expresses themselves, be it verbally or non verbally, they are telling me something not only about them, but also about me.



Ha, the skill of counter-story listening. A good thing for both the counsellor and the author to have up the proverbial sleeve.

[Becky Writes]

It's me, or at least me I think I would be given the situation.

One of my characters, the villian, is my sister-in-law. When my mom read my WIP, she spotted it right away. Evil witch!

[Cath]

I usually find my protagonist is who I would like to be, rather than who I am. But it's interesting to spot that the "good guys" tend to share my values, while the "bad guys" don't.

Ok, my writing isn't so simplistic that I have good guys and bad guys and never the twain... but the example holds.

[MidnightMuse]

Interesting. I hear this a lot, that the characters are the writer. This is never true for me.

My characters are people I want to watch and read about. Characters I find interesting or appealing, with traits I enjoy watching move about the page.

But they're never, not even once, me.

[Lifelongdagger]

So, I suppose the question now may be, at least for those of us whose characters seem to embody and express aspects of ourselves :

Is writing an enjoyment or a need?

The thing to contemplate on here is to imagine what it may be like if we were never able to write anything ever again. How would that affect us as human beings?

I know that I would be dribbling in a darkened corner before the day was out, but that's just me . . . :)

[davids]

Somewhere deep and dark and very inside of me

[Jamesaritchie]

Interesting. I hear this a lot, that the characters are the writer. This is never true for me.

My characters are people I want to watch and read about. Characters I find interesting or appealing, with traits I enjoy watching move about the page.

But they're never, not even once, me.

How do you know it's never true for you? I don't think it's possible for a writer not to put some of himself in most characters. Quite often, others see us in the characters, even when we don't see ourselves.

[Ken Schneider]

Besides the antag, and protag, whichever may be the MC, most come walking into the book on their own.

[Jamesaritchie]

So, I suppose the question now may be, at least for those of us whose characters seem to embody and express aspects of ourselves :

Is writing an enjoyment or a need?

The thing to contemplate on here is to imagine what it may be like if we were never able to write anything ever again. How would that affect us as human beings?

I know that I would be dribbling in a darkened corner before the day was out, but that's just me . . . :)

For me, it's an enjoyment. I never have bought into the need to write, or the write or I'll die scenarios. Both strike me as pyscho-babble. If I could never write another word, I'd fill my time doing something else. I think we all would.

Many things in this world are enjoyable. Many things in this world offer just as much challenge, just as much fulfillment, just as much reason for living. As often as not, I think writing is just the one we do because we don't have to leave home.

[MidnightMuse]

How do you know it's never true for you? I don't think it's possible for a writer not to put some of himself in most characters. Quite often, others see us in the characters, even when we don't see ourselves.

Well if that's true, then DANG I'm good lookin' and smart :D

[Lifelongdagger]

You are right, James, it probably is just some melodramatic psycho-babble. I just find that, for me, it is easier to express all of those dispirate parts of myself in the forms of characters in a story, unconsciously of course, rather than having to face their reality in the mirror each morning, . Sort of therapeutic, you know . . .

[laurel29]

If I couldn't write, I'd just tell stories to my kids. :). In all the stories I've written down, or even thought of, the characters have been shaped by what the story needed. The idea for the story comes before the character. My husband says that my characters are all different but he can hear my voice in the story...I'm not sure what he means by that. I have trouble writing male characters. I think that may be because I am often left scratching my head when I try to figure out the motivations of real males. :( I think I put pieces of people I know into characters, or I might write a character that embodies something I want to teach my kids - not flat and stereotypical characters (hopefully) but for example, someone who struggles with fear and self doubt for my daughter who also struggles with such things. That character won't be like my daughter in any other respect (because I don't want her to know I'm talking about her) but she will, hopefully, pick up on what I'm trying to show her, and bring it back to herself.

[CaroGirl]

Wow, I think I'd be bored with writing pretty quickly if all my characters were me. My characters are drawn a bit from me, a bit from people I've known, with a dash of something uniquely them. They grow out of the story itself, becoming whatever they need to be.

[Shadow_Ferret]

Wow, I think I'd be bored with writing pretty quickly if all my characters were me.

Not me. I'm so damned interesting. :)

My characters just come knocking at my door. They won't leave me alone. Even if I refuse to let them in they camp out on the front lawn having their little kegger party, trashing things, and making my neighbors complain until I'm finally forced in the end to let them in. But then they have to promise to just sit quietly in the basement with me as I write.

[ChaosTitan]

By and large, I find myself to be a very boring person. Of course, many of our characters are proably somewhat dull in their "real lives." Those characters just have the fortunate (misforunate?) experience of their lives being turned upside down (be it a cheating spouse, mutant dinsaurs, or aliens from Mars). They get to react accordingly. Heck, if my town was attacked by martians, I bet my life would seem a LOT more interesting.

My characters usually come from an image and are a product of the story I want to tell. Very rarely do I come up with the characters first, and then seek a story to tell (those are all sitting in the Idle Story Ideas folder). Sometimes they are amalgams of people I've known in real life, people I've met briefly or read about in the newspaper. I think many writers are natural observers; we watch and we absorb the people around us.

And in writing this response, it also occurred to me that in my two completed novels (and in each of my WIP's), there is one character in each that is very close to me emotionally. They have a similar temperment, react to stress and fear in comparable ways. Their backstories are very, very different from mine (not to mention their gender), and half the time they don't live now (near-future for most of them). My beta could probably figure out which characters they are (and maybe family if/when they ever read my stuff).

Character creation is great fun for me, but that probably comes from years of online PBEM gaming, and creating OC's for various games.

[Jamesaritchie]

Well if that's true, then DANG I'm good lookin' and smart :D

Of course you are. I guess we all knew that but you.

[Papa'sLiver]

They're all parts of me, or how I wish I could be.

[Ken Schneider]

I think the reason they say the writers interject themselves into the characters is that they can reach deep within themselves to project feelings.

Everyone wishes they were something else, a super hero, or whatever.

You can take the basis of your own life and liven up a character, and on draw your own feelings about a subject and empower your chracters.

It is likely that writers make their characters feel how they would feel in certain situations.

[sunandshadow]

My characters are not all me - one is me, one is my dream lover, one my imaginary best friend, and one a lover for him, and that bully who tormented us all in highschool, etc. I usually create a new character in response to having a character who needs a counterpoint. And usually I draw on a character archetype I really liked in an anime series or movie and researched by reading lots of fanfiction about to see how lots of different artists handled that character in slightly different ways.

[bsolah]

You have to remember, that in real life, no one is the bully, the psycho, the 'whore with a heart', but to them, they're the main character and the camera is on them. [I'm paraphrasing King, if you haven't noticed]

[WriterInChains]

At a workshop given by a local writer, he said something that I had an "ah-ha" moment over -- the gist of it was that most writers are observers, and when a story is centered around an observer it's not as immediate and gripping as one about, say, a criminal/superhero/someone who actually does things instead of watching them. The "ah-ha" came when I realized why my trunk novel may remain in the trunk for a long time -- the protag is at least half-based on me. [Plus, she doesn't really feel much for the first 2/3 of the ms, and he also said that a story about a numb MC only gets started for the reader/viewer when they start to feel things again, which made sense when he put it that way. :)]

The MC in MS#2 & #3 aren't much like me at all & they're much more interesting and well-rounded than the first one. Come to think of it, #1 was the only MC that I ever "made up." The rest just pull up a chair in my head and start talking. I write it all down and shape it later.

[sunandshadow]

You have to remember, that in real life, no one is the bully, the psycho, the 'whore with a heart', but to them, they're the main character and the camera is on them. [I'm paraphrasing King, if you haven't noticed]

Fiction is not particularly like real life, but that said I think they're both the main character in their own story and the stereotype - if you've ever heard of personal mythology, or performativity, this is the idea that even in our real lives we think of ourselves as playing one or more stereotypical roles, and we act and speak according to the roles we think we are playing.

[Thomma Lyn]

My characters are either (1) composites of people I know, or they are (2) my take on what people I don't know well might be like, then imagination takes off from there.

And of course, there are pieces of me in all my characters - dribs and drabs, here and there, some of the pieces bigger and some of them smaller.

[Serenity]

Well, let me just say this: I only ever created one character that was based on me in just about every way except for gender.

I killed him.

It's not that I don't like who I am, I do. For the most part, anyhow. But I like to write more about the things that I would either like to do, or things I know I would never do. I will put in tiny pieces of me like giving a character a love of classical music, having working class parents, or speaking a different language.

But by and large, they are most definitely inspired from somewhere else.

[emsuniverse]

Let's see... My villian is a woman from high school that I hated. It's probably pretty obvious, but it was such a joy kill her off.

The MC is me, but not exactly me. She's strongwilled, stubborn, calculating, but also trusting and has a soft spot for her family, as insane as they are.

And my MC's grandmother, a side character that seems to be becoming more and more prominent, is based on my real grandmother - widowed, whiny, needy, dependent, complete with two birds who probably have emphysema and a stocked liquor cabinet.

[NightWynde]

Well...the one character in my WIP that's based off of me? That would be the serial killer.

I'm gonna spend freakin' years in therapy trying to figure that one out. :flag:

[Mayor of Moronia]

I collect characters from the people I know or am acquainted with. I did psychological evaluations for many years and interviewed 1000s of people. So my characters are collages of these people. If I need a real ding-bat I simply hobble 6 or a dozen of these folks into one.

[Doctor Shifty]

The Doctor's Quote of the Day.

Every author in some way portrays himself in his works, even if it be against his will. - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

I guess it also works for women. :)

[Southern_girl29]

Not all of my characters are me, but I usually can find one character that is a lot like me. I tend to write that character as I wish I could be. But, a lot of my characters are drawn from real life people. My favorite character I've ever written is built around a lot of good Southern men I've known over the course of my life. My MC in one of my books is based on my father. And, one of these days, I'm going to write about my Granny. Actually, my very first novel that I ever finished has a MC that is my grandmother, but the writing stinks, so I'm going to have to redo it.

[earthshoes]

Most of my characters are created spontaneously and from thin air, so I suppose they are pieces of me. Perhaps it's a good thing that I had to do a fair amount of research before I could write my first sociopath?

In Witness Tree, one of the characters was inspired by an artist I was friends with for a few years. He was a highly unique personality and simply deserved to be in a book. "Writing him" turned out to be the easiest thing I've ever done.

The villain in the book I'm plotting now is drawn from a long-time online friendship. He sparked an entire paranoid train of thought by (very generously) sending me a box of books. Being me, after looking through the box, I began thinking about the power that gifts have over us--especially books which tend to become a part of us once we read them and connect us to other people who read them. Dunno if he'll like being an evil warlock or not, but that's his role. :) I think I may owe him a dedication page. Or two.

[Oddsocks]

I don't know to what extent my characters are me. I can certainly relate to them - I have to at least understand their moral perspectives, so in that sense they can't stray too far from me, be they protagonist or antagonist. Otherwise, I guess they have characteristics I find interesting in people, so that can encompass a fair range.

Whether characters are the writer or not, they always represent the writer's experience in some way.

[Simon Scarrow]

I think that characters inevitably embrace aspects of the author, if only because they have to come from some breadth of experience attained by the author and then projected onto the characters created. That's not to say that the characters are like the author (thank god) but that it is only possible to create a character by walking in their shoes to a degree and colonising that mind. The real stroke of genius in character creation is in the formation of a character that has so few homologies with the vast majority of readers, YET they sympathise with him/her. It's easy to do characters people can identify with, that's why they are so eminently forgetable. But someone like Macbeth for instance is the product of genius. In a way that Hannibal Lecter isn't. I can believe in the realness of the former whereas the later can only exist in fiction.
Anyway, just a thought.

[Zolah]

Our characters have to be 'us' in order to exist. Nothing they do, say, think or believe goes on the page unless we've said, thought or believed it in our head first for them. They're rooted in us, they grow from us. If you're writing a character who is the opposite of you in every way, your ideas of what YOU are informs the creation of that opposition. Even if you are taking a character from real life and re-creating them on page, you filtering their actions, mannerisms and motivations through the net of your perceptions. Maybe it's more accurate to say that we are our characters, even if only for the time that it takes us to understand them, examine the inside of their head and heart, and write it down. Or else how would we write it down?

[Carrie in PA]

Some of my characters are me, some are people I know, but most are spawned from snippets from lots of people, some of them I know IRL, some from TV, etc.

[SeanDSchaffer]

Like the OP said about his/her characters, so mine are also part of me. Some of those parts are very disturbing to me, others are what I wish I could be as a person. In any case, though, the characters I create are based somehow on my own self or my ideals.

[DamaNegra]

That's not true, in my case. One of my MCs in my current novel is a completely different person, while the other MC is the way I'd love to be. So it depends.

[Axeminister]

Bufty said it best for me on page 1. Characters walk along and I grab them and put them in the story.

I start with one character against the world, he picks up allies as the pages turn. It's fun because I get to be a reader as I write. =)