Character

I’ve always been the kind of writer that allows my characters to develop on their own. When I start writing something new, I do very little planning. More often than not I don’t even know what my main character’s name is when I start to write their story. But as the story unfolds they begin to develop independently of me and I get to know them well through this process.

However, I am in the process of writing my creative writing dissertation and when my supervisor discovered that I didn’t know the name of my main character she set me some homework. She asked me to carry out the standard tasks of writing character profiles for every person in my story and drawing family trees. But she also asked me to do something a little more interesting.

She told me to start writing my characters. Not to start writing my dissertation but instead to write ‘a day in the life’ of each of my characters, to write letters and diary entries and even just short stories about my characters, none of which will appear in the final draft of my dissertation.

This may seem a tad unproductive. But, in fact, just as my supervisor intended, it has helped me to know my characters inside and out. Writing from your character’s perspective helps you to get to know them far better than writing lists of character traits and character profiles could ever do. And the fact that I’m not limited to scenes that I want to appear in my final story means that I get to know what my characters are like in all aspects of their lives. And because of this I can write them much better than I could have if I started writing before I really knew them.

I appreciate that not everybody has time to write pointless stories and diary entries and letters that don’t contribute to their final story, especially if you’re writing for a close deadline. But if you do have the time, I’d highly recommend doing this. If you do, it can feel like you’re not making any progress towards your final project but the reality is that you are and that you’re creating characters so real in your own mind that your readers won’t be able to help believing in them too.

This will also help your story to be more subtle. Rather than forcing your point across, you’ll know your characters so well that your point will come across on its own.

Don’t feel limited by what you want your story to be. Just write anything that pops into your head without giving a thought to whether or not it would fit in with your story. Anything you write will contribute to the final story, even if it doesn’t directly end up appearing in it.

Good luck and thanks for reading.