physical descriptions

I don't want the reader to have to gather up the bits and peices of my character's physical descriptions through the course of three chapters, but at the same time, it seems cheesy to me to have the introductory paragraph be dedicated to painting a portrait.

"Young Adrianne Benson had raven black hair, and peircing blue eyes. He aqualine nose.... her supple lips, a cupid's bow... her determined chin... bla bla bla"

I'm looking for a good rule of thumb for decribing character "looks" especially for those introduced by the narrator, not first seen through the eyes of another character.

Any suggestions?

Try weaving it in through action, responses, ect. Also, I wouldn't laundry list it, just enough at first to give the visual. for example:
Adrianne sat down in the waiting room of Mr. Person's office. She smoothed out the wrinkles of her tailored skirt and balanced the clipboard on her lap while she filled in the new patient forms. Her navy suit, her deep black hair tightly pulled back in a bun like a middle-aged librarian, all added to the illusion of a conservative twenty-something. Only the penciled-in box on the form could have predicted otherwise.

Cheesy, but I hope that helps at least a little.

How about a straight description in the narrative? Brief of course. Preferrably something that reveals the character as well, maybe even the plot, not just the physical attributes. Then apply Uncle Jim's rule: Does it work?

"Mark Forkill was the kind of guy women would divorce their husbands for: tall and dark, a chiseled face with sky-blue eyes, and dimples to kill. His latest victim was Becky Sanders, a young, gorgeous CEO at Simon & Maneater. She was married, of course, but not for long."

I don't normally give heavily detailed descriptions. I like to catch my character moving; describe them once in a way that tells a lot about them, and from then on refer back to that description.

She flipped her raven black hair to the side as she spoke, as though it were a punctuation mark in her conversation. She jutted her determined little chin at the person she was speaking to as though it were a telling blow to the solar plexus. Only when she was in deep thought did her mouth assume the supple cupid's bow men found so inviting.

Nice examples guys! Thanks. I'll work on it!

By the way, is "raven black" too much of cliche these days?

With very rare exceptions, I don't describe main characters at all. It's easy enough to SHOw that a character is tall, short, handsome, strong, weak, whatever. Descriptions just destroy the reader's illusion that the character looks just like him.

Who cares in the least that the protagonist has black hair?

Yes and no, James. It's the job of the novelist to paint as much as possible to help the readers visualize the characters and scenes. Some people are good at visualization, some not. As "artist" we need to give them enough information so that their imagination would kick in to fill in the rest. In general, I think "show" is much better than "tell," but in some cases it's better to just tell and get it over with.

Like any art, it's up to the artist, of course. Some paint like Monet, some paint Da Vinci.

Describing your character by showing through action, dialogue is good. But sometimes it's more economical and direct to simply describe the character briefly. I agree that the color of the character's hair might not be important -- if so, skip it. But if the race of the character is important, you need to let the readers know immediately before he forms an idea that the character is of a different race. And sometimes "show" doesn't quite work as well as "tell."

We had a thread on this same question not long ago. It should be hanging around on a back page.

As a reader, I haven't the slightest interest in the color of a character's eyes, unless they're demonic red or something.

I feel like the hair color is important. It shouldn't be, but I fear that it is. There's stereotypes about hair color.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer was a blonde, and that was part of the "joke" along with her very blonde name "buffy". The idea that this ditsy cheerleader type could be a vampire slayer was a real oxymoron back in the day.

James Bond has always has dark hair, with a few exceptions in the Roger Moore era, but still, Bond has never had wavy golden locks, or curly red hair. It just wouldn't be right.

Of course, if somebody's got green hair, you know instantly that they're a punk.

Again, you as the writer must decide if the hair color, eye color, etc. are important. In my first novel, I did not describe the protagonist's physical attributes at all, but you can piece all the information together and imagine what an Irish-Chinese American look like. But I did mention the color of the female character because it was important in a symbolic sense. Colors (green, red, blue, etc.) play a subconscious part in the novel. A casual reader would not notice or care, but hopefully some scholars at Harvard might find that interesting.

I feel like the hair color is important. It shouldn't be, but I fear that it is. There's stereotypes about hair color.

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I think hair color can be important, but far more so in movies and on TV than in novels. Viewers see hair color, but readers see what they want to see. They only know hair color if you tell them. Otherwise they'll give the character the hair color they think fits.

Yes and no, James. It's the job of the novelist to paint as much as possible to help the readers visualize the characters and scenes. Some people are good at visualization, some not. As "artist" we need to give them enough information so that their imagination would kick in to fill in the rest. In general, I think "show" is much better than "tell," but in some cases it's better to just tell and get it over with.

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I think nearly all readers have a great deal of imagination. If they didn't have very good visualization skills, they'd be watching TV, rather than reading a novel. I fully believe in painting pictures with words, but not physical descriptions of people. The last thing I want is to have the writer tell me what a protagonist looks like. Show me, yes. Tell me, no.

And even if you give no physical description at all, the reader will give one back to you. They will imagine the character in great detail.

Telling does save time, but I don't think it's nearly as effective, or nearly as pleasing to most readers. And if I do my job right, the reader won't get the race of a character wrong, but as often as not, if he does, then so much the better. I think it can be a very GOOD thing to have the reader form an image of a character as white, and then learn he's black or Asian or Hispanic. Or to never find out at all.

If race is an important issue, sometimes telling is good, but even then, I'd rather show.

I remember reading that the producers of the tv series Perrry Mason might be difficult because Earle Stanley Gardner had gone to great lengths to avoid actually describing him in the novels. Ok, he had longer legs than Della and she had to run to keep up. Not much there.

Yet the minute Raymond Burr walked in the room to audition they all agreed, "That is Perry Mason."

Yet the minute Raymond Burr walked in the room to audition they all agreed, "That is Perry Mason."

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I seem to remember reading that somewhere, too. I just read a few Perry Mason novels, and there's zero description of Mason, yet I could see him perfectly.

there's zero description of Mason, yet I could see him perfectly.

Did he look like Raymond Burr?

But then there's Harry Potter with that damn scar and bispectacles.

Here are some show examples:

His chest was a fruit salad of tin and brass. It hurt to look at his shoes; you could cut your finger on his pants crease.
His spa instructor approached with a hip-hop. When she landed she didn't stand there; she struck a pose. He took a tenative step back. She looked like something Michael Angelo had carved out, her hair looked to be afire.
Everytime time she looked into his eyes she saw the ocean. Even his hair looked like a wave about to break.

IMAGINE

Triceratops

I was rereading King's On Writing and he has a few great pointers about physical descriptions. He says he seldom describes his character in terms of hair color, facial features, etc. However, he does give you the information up front for you to draw your own images.

Frex: Carrie is a high school outcast with a bad complexion and victim of fashion. Everyone would have a different image of what that should be, depending on their personal experiences, but it won't be too far off (like they wouldn't be visualizing Halle Barry).

When writing short stories you would pick out one feature and concentrate on it through the story.

That feature might be hair, which they would pull, comb, pull, twitst, ect.

It might be a pair of glasses they would adjust, tap, peer through, etc.

It might be highly polished shoes or the habit of wearing a tweed suit.

I sometimes find myself doing this when writing novels.

Actually, Mason did look a lot like Raymond Burr to me. I read several of the Mason books back when they were first published, and from the first I visualized him as tall, thick, and with black hair that looked like Burr's.

From the things he did, the way he moved and reacted, he just seemed like someone tall, strong, and who had black hair.
Burr was Mason all over from a personality standpoint. Even when he wasn't acting, he still seemed like Perry Mason.

That brings us to an interesting topic...

Name the actors in TV shows or movies that you think are perfectly cast, based on the description or just the way you visualize the characters in the books.

Raymond Burr was one, as Perry Mason.

I thought Jake Gyllenhaal was pretty well cast as Homer in October Sky.

For me, both Spenser and Hawk were perfectly cast in the series. Robert Urich played Spenser, and Avery Brooks played Hawk. I thought the casting was the best. Both were exactly as I visualized them.

Perfectly cast: Oprah Winfrey as Sofia in The Color Purple.

For me, both Spenser and Hawk were perfectly cast in the series. Robert Urich played Spenser, and Avery Brooks played Hawk...

Indeed... so much so, really, that when Star Trek: Deep Space Nine premiered, i did a doubletake upon seeing Hawk in a Starfleet uniform.

Continuing the "physical descriptions" part of this thread, I only describe a physical attribute of one of my characters if it is A) necessary to the plot or B) a metaphor of the character.

E.G.