This week we are looking at characterisation. This means how to create believable characters, how much you should know about your character, their interactions with minor characters, etc.
The weekly reading is a short story by Shirley Jackson called The Possibility of Evil. It is really good for looking at characterisation as we are given a backstory, a day in her life, and all of her thoughts and interactions.
You should be using your notebook to gain interesting notes about how people behave, character descriptions of interesting people you see, and so on.
Today we're going to look at how to create a character.
However, I am going to start with the caveat that a character cannot be created over night, especially for a longer piece such as a novel. You need to get to know them, and this should help you do it.
Start with an external description, and write everything down in your notebook, perhaps even add a sketch - no one's going to see it! Describe their hair, their eyes, their skin, the size of their feet, everything you could think of about a person.
Do they have any defining features or mannerisms? This could even extend to internal or external dialogue - it's all part of building a character.
Next, you need to know all of their likes and dislikes. Do they like the rain or hate it? Are they scared of dogs or have they always wanted one?
What does a normal day look like for them? You might not necessarily be writing a life-in-the-day-of for a short story or flash fiction, but they could still inject humour by comparing what they are doing in the novel that's so different to what they would be doing normally. For example:
When I woke up this morning, I never dreamed that I would be half way towards the bottom of the ocean instead of half way to sleep in second-period maths.
They need to have memories. These can be generic, like feeding the duck, or drinking tea with their nan, but not everyone's life experiences are the same. They might have memories of arguments, or divorce, or death from a young age. You might not feel comfortable writing about this, but in a few months I'll be writing a week on painful memories and how to utilise them. Give them a few unique memories - even if you don't use them, they can help you shape your character.
What about their family? Do they have siblings, parents, grandparents? Do they have step-siblings, half-siblings, aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews? It can help to sketch out a family tree, even if you don't introduce the characters.
Do they have any secrets? They might only be small, or they might be crushingly big. If it got out would it ruin their life or change who they were as a person or how other people saw them?
If it helps, think about getting to know someone in real life - what would you start off by telling them? What would you tell them as the relationship progressed? What would you only tell the person you were closest to in life? What wouldn't you tell anyone? These are the things you need to know about your character. Make sure your notebook is full of character descriptions like these to help you practice writing characters.
Happy writing!
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