Comments on Pens Fatales: Dating Your Characters

Maybe we are all just characters in our CHARACTERS...

2009-06-17T13:31:26.502-07:00

Maybe we are all just characters in our CHARACTERS' imaginations...and we're pissing THEM off by behaving badly... Hmmmm....

I have one story I'm writing and well the char...

2009-06-16T12:04:37.878-07:00

I have one story I'm writing and well the characters created the story. I mean I know these people, they are inside me and have a story they want me to tell. I don't know what it is but I know them. I know what they eat, how they dress, who they hang out with, but this story they want me to write, well they are dishing it out to me in fragments and when I put it together all wrong boy do they get pissed. LOL

The other story, I know the story I want to write but the people in the story, I'm getting them all wrong, over and over. It's making me nuts!

Isn't it kind of scary the way they can rebel ...

2009-06-16T10:28:31.569-07:00

Isn't it kind of scary the way they can rebel like that? The first time I had a character give me the raspberry because I tried to make her do something she didn't want to do really baffled me.

I read The French Lieutenant's Woman in a lit class in college, and there's a scene where the author breaks the third wall and tells us the main character wanted to stop and get a drink, when he (the author) didn't want him to. I remember my prof saying, "Now, what is the author saying here? Because we know that isn't really what happened..." I didn't have the courage to speak up and tell her that it was exactly what the author said. Wish I had.

AGH! You guys are killing me - how do you do it? ...

2009-06-16T09:45:48.038-07:00

AGH! You guys are killing me - how do you do it? How do you write character? Can't you just MAKE Angela like cheese? Can't you just shove some gruyere down her throat and say "mmm....tasty!"?

Sigh. I wish I understood. I'm not worthy. I'm not worthy.

Great post. probably the biggest aspect i struggle...

2009-06-16T07:49:39.522-07:00

Great post. probably the biggest aspect i struggle with is characters. I guess I eel like I have to know them before I start writing, but maybe I don't and it's an evolution. My best characters come when I let them take over though, but I do have a tendancy to pen them into my vision of the story. Maybe the next time I sit down to draft I'll start with the character, not the plot and see where it goes. :-)