Creating Character

1
Creating Character
Emotions
by Ann Hood
2
Influence of other GOOD Writers

• Remember the bad story exercise before you
  choose an author to emulate
• Read widely and from the perspective of a writer
• Choose an author whose writing you admire and
  read everything he/she has written.
• Forget that you ever read anything when you
  write write from yourself to discover.

3
Feeling Characters Emotions

• Reader must feel characters emotions
• Fiction is not real life exaggerate and make
  your character different in some way
• The character is not you, even if you are
  creating a story from your memoir
• Range of emotions in a real-life day is high
  worry, confusion, guilt, happiness, hopefulness,
  celebration, hurt, irritation, anger, sadness,
  fear, excitement, gratitude, hate, surprise,
  revenge, passion, love, hostility

4
Fictional Emotions

• Emotions have to hold weight
• If using a real-life event in fiction, leave out,
  add, make the character NOT YOU. but still tell
  the truth
• Of emotions, the writer must ask
• importance of emotion in Cs life
• what does it say about the C
• what does it reveal about back story and future

5
Clichés

• Green with envy
• butterflies in her stomach
• Solution write the second thing that comes to
  mind, not the first (Carol Bly in The Passionate,
  Accurate Story)
• Example fresh description of a drab classroom
  No one ever fell in love in this room.

6
Laziness

• Laziness sometimes keeps a writer from doing what
  Flannery OConner called painting a picture with
  words.
• Force out significant details
• Where did she work when she moved?
• Did she make any friends?
• What did she want from the move?
• Example p. 9 of Hood shows the effect of concrete
  details

7
Exploring Our Own Inner Lives

• Tap into your own emotions
• Explore your own histories
• Revisit unpleasant things
• Dont label an emotion explore it
• Look at one of your favorite literary characters
  what is his emotional journey?
• Note what brings that character to life.

8
Consistency

• If your character is mourning a dead wife on p.
  4, he shouldnt be happily shopping for a new
  pair of jeans on p. 5.
• There has to be a believable emotional journey.
• But Aristotle said of characters they should be
  consistently inconsistent.
• Characters should have a range of emotion

9
Fresh Language

• No clichés
• Instead of My heart pounded, try
• I could feel the awkward, scared tumble of my
  heartbeat

10
Power of Suggestion

• Rather than state emotion, use props.
• For sadness
• shredded tissues in someones hand
• open scrapbook on a bedside table
• too many empty wine bottles in a recycling bin.
• Try having her deny the sadness, tell her mother
  shes fine, even happy (exaggeration of voice).

11
Point of View

• Character who sees only tragic stories in the
  daily paper
• Lies in bed all day watching home shopping
  channels.
• Character can also show feelings by what she says
  or doesnt say (e.g., a couple on the verge of
  divorce talking abut a chipped plate from their
  wedding china. They say nothing about feelings.)

12
The Unpredictable

• Indirect action (furiously chopping wood)
• Beware of stating emotion
• Do the unexpected after a death, have people
  laugh, or make love, or something else unexpected
  (Chaucers fart in The Millers Tale)