Anyone who has struggled with building fictional characters knows from experience that figures from “true” life don’t import well into fiction, especially if you try to preserve the full range of their complexity. The law of diminishing returns starts to kick in, causing the character to be come less, not more distinct.
By contrast, a good character in fiction, one who successfully projects the sort of complexity you’re talking about, without being swamped in it, is actually a simple one or two-trait machine, no more.
But wait a minute–the goal of fiction is to represent life and living characters in all the richness of their complexity, isn’t it?
Sure it is, but if you’ve ever tried importing a full load of real-life complexity into a work of fiction, you’ve seen first-hand that raw complexity simply comes across as confusion….
And yet– simplifying it down to one or two functional traits carries its own peril: you have a character so simple as to be predictable, even boring.
How do you keep your characters functionally lean ‘n’ mean and still manage to bestow the illusion of complexity?
The simplest and best way I know of is to “rough them up” with some unexpected, contradictory character information:
• A protagonist, the character we want to succeed, possesses the essential qualities of courage and determination, but is also a depressed alcoholic, constantly doubting himself.
• An antagonist, the bad guy standing in the road, is a stock villain, predictable, boring until you add genuine charm and vulnerability. (Hannibal Lector, anyone?)
• A friend, a lover, a mentor, etc. help the protagonist succeed, and stories need that. But even though a 100% percent faithful friend is good to have in life, in fiction it’s a yawn. So try this: your loyal buddy lacks moral strength and is tempted to betray you. This wonderful little detail of character not only roughs up the Pollyanna pal, it sets him up to sacrifice everything later, even his life, to undo whatever harm he committed.
Trust me, no one is going to yawn at that.
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
Hi Bill, I love your site and am tracking your brilliant work in progress.
I have a query re writing process that might be out of sync here but what do you think re storylining and chapter summaries?
I kept to a rough storyline and have had a ss published by Penguin (NZ) and have a strong story but it is still in first draft stage after years of work and I feel I need to get to end (I do feel the urge).
I recently did a chap summary (after writing the chaps) and it gave me some interesting info: that I’d deviated with too much detail and extra stuff, slowing down the tension and leaving the action and what comes out of it (which is the best part) coming in too late. I will keep going forward but think the chap summarising has given me good info for chopping and tightening in next draft. Would really like to know your view on these tools.
YOU JUST FIXED A PROBLEM I WAS TRYING TO FIGURE OUT!!! Thank you so much and please pardon the caps but I’m very excited about this. I have a secondary character who has his issues but is mostly a very good, loyal friend to my main character and it’s been bothering me that he’s almost a little too nice. You just helped me realize what he’s about to do that will impact how she sees him and throw an anchor around his conscience that he’ll have to contend with for a long time. Ha! Thanks so much.
Hi Bill,
That was a really good angle on character development. Too many character traits like too many quirks can create a boring character.
Thanks for the wisdom.