Characterization on the page?

[NINA28]

So I wrote three short-stories then posted them for critique on two other forums and the number one concern was the lack of characterization. The character feeling flat seemed to come up several times.

I can sit and write out a detailed plan for the character (goals, motivations, conflicts, flaws, personality, character arc etc) but I can't seem to translate the planning to the page. It doesn't come across.

What can I do to change this? How can I make my characters feel more real?

Thank you.

 

[Ninten]

Are these POV characters or side characters? For POV characters, it's easy to slip into their thoughts and focus on their emotional reactions to things. You can also highlight their unique personalities by what you do with the narration (different characters will pick different elements of a scene to focus on). Have them make tough decisions--characters shine best when they have to deal with conflict, especially if that conflict is internal.

For characters whose POV you can't show, you can highlight their personalities through their dialogue. Give them a distinct way of speaking. This doesn't mean they have to have an accent or verbal tic (in fact, that sort of thing is very tricky to pull off right). But a character could have a wry sense of humour. They could respond with minimalistic dialogue. They could get excited and ramble on and on about their favourite things. Also, give the characters quirks! Quirks help characters to really stand out. Maybe they bite their nails when they get nervous. Maybe they're always chewing on licorice. Maybe they're constantly clicking a pen or sketching things because they need something to do with their hands at all times.

 

[Woollybear]

What Ninten said. Give the viewpoint character thought--the more judgmental the better, and the more the better.

"Dialog" said non-POV character.

"Response," said POV character, hoping her nerves didn't show. This hit job was sliding into a complete disaster. How would she ever come clean with Guido? If she botched tonight, he'd have her head. At the moment, though, that felt like the least of her problems.

"More dialog." Non-POV character reached for the sriracha.

"More dialog." Thank God he finally went for the sauce. The poison, according to the chemist, degraded quickly in hot sauce. "More dialog."

I'm taking notes what Ninten said about non-viewpoint characters. that sounds right too.

 

[Ari Meermans]

How well do you know your characters? Not just their goals, flaws, and quirks but who they are and how they present themselves to the world—and how their world really sees them. Too often when we describe our characters we waste our descriptive powers on a catalog of hair colors, eye colors, and the like which really tell us nothing about the person. Know your characters' insecurities and vulnerabilities and show them on the page through their mannerisms and their physical attributes and how the other characters interact with them.

Take for instance one of the most famous first lines ever from Graham Greene's character-driven novel The Heart of the Matter published in 1948 which is still held up as an example today: "Wilson sat on the balcony of the Bedford Hotel with his bald pink knees thrust against the ironwork." ("bald pink knees" wow) Can't you just see him? Why is he in shorts? Why are his knees pink? Where is he? Why does he rate only the name "Wilson"? Is it his given name or his surname? For that matter, why is he not given an honorific such as "Mr."? Don't you already know something's off about him, like a fish out of water? Someone maybe to be pitied or scorned? Especially why does he even rate a whole novel? Now you HAVE to read on to find out. (just sayin')

If you want to nail characterization, add character-driven novels to your reading list. The best books on writing will give you techniques and examples but the only sure way is to immerse yourself in character-driven novels.

 

[Tepelus]

Nathan Bransford just blogged about this. This may be helpful to you.

 

[Odile_Blud]

Think about how they respond. Their character will come out through their actions and dialogue. It will also show through the clothes they wear, the way that speak, the they stand, the way they walk. People show themselves through some of the most trivial things such as watching a movie. If it is a sad movie, do they cry? Do they laugh? Do they sigh out of boredom? Little details like that can show a lot about who a person is.

 

[bugbite]

Hi Nina, you might remember me from one of the posts you mentioned.

I would say that adding subtle things here, and there is a good way to give a character a unique identity, and make them stand out a bit more. And it's great because it doesn't require an immense amount of planning. Some of this can be used on the fly as you are writing.

I'll explain... So if I write a story about someone who is a fan of American football, I can introduce this by mentioning memorabilia they keep in their room/house/villa/fill in the blank. Or maybe they'll have a shirt of their favorite team. The key is to be subtle, but feel free to experiment and bring as much, or as little attention to this as you would like.

So with this in place, we can expand on it later in the story. For example: The character is waiting for an important letter in the mail, and he checks his mailbox one morning and there it is, so he uses a football reference "Touchdown!", or "Six points,", or "Go for one." (all football references). So from here we can kind of flesh out who the character is. It creates an avenue to make this character a rowdy person who lifts weights, and likes loud cars.

 

[BPhillipYork]

I can sit and write out a detailed plan for the character (goals, motivations, conflicts, flaws, personality, character arc etc) but I can't seem to translate the planning to the page. It doesn't come across.

What, based on all that information you have about the character, makes them unique? Lots of people go through similar experiences in life, going to school, playing sports, having relationships, but some interactions or experiences drastically alter how people perceive and interact with the world, so can you find some experiences those characters had that then changed how see the world then reflect it in their dialog, or actions or description?

 

[Barbara R.]

Did you ever see one of those old-fashioned books about human anatomy that has pictures of each body system printed on clear plastic, so when you layer them, you see the whole body with all its systems integrated?

Creating characters is a similar process. It's not done all at once or apriori. You layer one scene on another and another, until the whole character takes on depth. Every scene in which a character appears should reveal something about the character. Imagine a tough guy striding down the street; he sees an old lady trip and fall on her face, and he stops to help her. That's one more aspect of the character that you've shown. When readers combine it with all the other glimpses you've shown them in other scenes, a 3-dimensional figure begins to emerge.

Make sure your characters are always working on their own agendas, not just on yours. If they don't have agendas, they're not human enough yet. Say you've given your detective hero a girlfriend so he has someone to talk to about the case. Fine, that' useful for you; but what does the girlfriend want? Why is she sitting and listening to the detective puzzle through his case? What's her angle? All characters, even secondary ones, need to have their own goals and agendas, or they'll feel like the tools they are.

 

[Pastelnudes]

Sounds like you really need to let go, and fully inhabit the character. Any character. Become that person, rather than moving them around like pawns, or grafting on quirks / physical attributes etc. This is the essence of 'voice'.

In the past, I've used automatic writing, or talking almost in tongues as a particular character, to get myself started.

It's a messy business, fiction.

Be prepared to dirty your hands, and open your heart.

 

[NINA28]

Thanks for the help guys.
It just seems that no matter how much planning I do, I'm always being told my characters feel 'flat' and 'two dimensional'.

I'll definitely try some of your tips and have done my own research. Have been reading today about the "characteristic moment".

 

[Roxxsmom]

Others have talked about this already, so I may just be repeating it. A lot of characterization comes from getting inside you characters' heads when you write them. With viewpoint characters, it's a matter of thinking about how they feel and what the stakes are for them in a scene. What do they want in this moment in time, what are they worried about, how do they feel physically?

This doesn't mean telling the reader all of this in so many words, though. There are many narrative viewpoints, styles and narrative depths, so there's no one way to accomplish this. In general, it's about communicating a character's thoughts and emotional state without simply saying "Bob was angry" or "Kate was sad" or whatever. It's an aspect of the whole showing thing--making scenes come to life by showing a character's motives and emotional state via their thoughts and actions, and of course via the use of narrative voice, or simply via character voice in dialog for non viewpoint characters or for characters shown from a more omniscient or external viewpoint.

Are there any writers you think are particularly good at characterization? What techniques do they use? Are the readers who are saying the characters feel flat telling you why they feel so or giving you any ideas what they think specifically is wrong.

It might be helpful to get some feedback from a fellow writer or two, one who can be more specific in their feedback without simply trying to make you write exactly as they do.

We do have a share your work section on AW, where you can post a sample of your story and get some feedback.

 

[BPhillipYork]

Thanks for the help guys.
It just seems that no matter how much planning I do, I'm always being told my characters feel 'flat' and 'two dimensional'.

I'll definitely try some of your tips and have done my own research. Have been reading today about the "characteristic moment".

It sounds kind of like you might be overplanning. You might try doing some small writing exercises, take a character write them doing something ordinary that doesn't take place in your story, like making breakfast. What do they eat? Do they like coffee? Half and half? Sugar? Do they wash the dishes right after breakfaster or leave them in the sink or all over the place? Little things like this can actually reveal a lot about someone's character.

 

[angeliz2k]

It can be VERY hard sometimes to wrap my head around characters. Of course, they need to be complex, or they read flat, which is what makes it so hard and what makes it so rewarding when you succeed. I'm afraid no amount of planning is going to build a three-dimensional character. What builds a well-rounded character is learning about them through the situations you put them in and how they react.

I have found that, often, one aspect is the key to a character. I was having trouble with one character, who seemed to be indistinct and was all over the place--was she an innocent ingenue, or a schemer? Then one word came to me ("pride"), and I was able to wrap her character around that core. How does she react to her mother being an obvious flirt always trying to sleep her way into a better situation? With disdain, because of her pride. How does she react when her lover publically announces his engagement to another woman? With anger and, again, disdain (for him). How does she get back on her feet? Pride.

In another case, I was having some trouble distinguishing two brothers, who were two of four POV characters. Both were troubled and depressive. As I wrote, I realized that they actually reacted differently: one reacted with fear and withdrawal, the other with defensiveness and sulkiness.

See, it's much more about the inner mechanisms of the mind than the surface manifestations (the particular likes and fears, etc). It's not all about the character's history, either; people with similar life stories end up very differently, after all. It's about how they deal with their own pasts and how it informs their reaction to the present, and how the present affects their future reactions.

 

[Michael Myers]

A difficult subject. I found it most useful to learn how to inhabit a character. Took a while to figure out how to do that. It is easy to get in, but sometimes hard to get out. My personal (i.e. hired) editor once wrote "Mike, you are in love with her. IN LOVE. Knock it off. YOU are not her hero. Neither is Serge. She is. She must get up from the mat[SUP]*[/SUP] on her own."

* Figuratively speaking.