I very much agree, Mary-sueism is very bad when writing. Even though some on my characters (which I call OC's for original character, what does MC stand for?) have similarities to me, none of them are actually me. I see it as the same as my friends having similarities to me because personally, making all the characters I have completely different from me in all ways would be too hard in my opinion and I would feel like I am missing out on certain traits that I could have used well.
I have based my main character on general things about me - my race, a place I've holidayed at, some personality traits, but at the same time my MC is vastly different from me.
My main character is similar to me in many ways, but also dissimilar to me in other ways. (For starters, she's an adolscent girl and I'm not, which sort of limits how similar we can actually be.) For the most part, if I put her in a situation where I know how I would feel and react, I tend to give her the same feelings and reactions. As a result, she has a lot of my insecurities and fears.
My main characters tend to at least start off with my personality, advantages, disadvantages, mostly because I'm not comfortable trying to assume what another person in different circumstances lives like (a certain character named Victor non-withstanding). Most of my stories end up with the main character having some vast differences, but not much, and usually tend to be things I want to improve on myself. Perhaps I'll get over that reaction to creating main characters with time...
All of my characters are a little like me if I think about it, but they weren't written to be that way. The main character is the most like me because when I started writing, I joked with my husband that the novel would become a screenplay and then I'd star in the movie, so I jokingly made her look like me. Then I just kept it, but my little fantasy is just that, a fantasy. haha I think most of my characters have a little of me as well as people I know bled into them.
I've always found that my mcs are some kind of 'categorised' version of myself, e.g. 'If I was brilliant at science (instead of just okay) etc'. In real life, the person you are is hard to classify or capture precisely. I find it really refreshing to be able to write about people who capture elements or traits that you find in your everyday life, without the pressure of having to deal with that unmanageable complexity.
I certainly didn't set out to recreate myself when I wrote my first novel, and I wasn't even particularly aware of doing it as the story unfolded. But looking at it retrospectively, yes, the two main male characters definitely possess the best and worst of my quirks and qualities, probably in a slightly exaggerated form. I think it's almost unavoidable for the most part.
Eh, I don't know... I guess not really. I mean, all of my main characters are guys, but most of the time my characters are not normal people (assassin/starpilot/dystopian kid), so this kind of limits how similar to me they can be.
I think it's very hard not to incorporate at least one or two of your own characteristics into your MC/s, after all they are a figment of your imagination and they're likely to share something with you whether it’s as simple as the same hair colour or as complicated as your beliefs on a certain subject. Characters are a reflection of your writing just like the plot that's going on around them and no matter how hard you try they will reflect something from within you. It’s not necessarily a bad thing but if you start to go overboard then I think it’s time to redefine who your character is or should be. You don’t want someone you know to read about your MC and then say to you, “Hey they sound a lot like you.” You want your characters to come to life as their own person, someone you could walk past on the street. Well that’s what I think anyway.
OUCH!. Have you considered a little therapy? I think what you're missing here is that the OP does not create carbon copies of himself. He borrows from his own Id to breathe life into his characters. I think most writers do that to one degree or another whether they realize it or not. You might be allergic to shellfish. Sooner or later, some character in one of your manuscripts will be allergic to shellfish, too. You may have a penchant for chocolate or zero tolerance for people who run red lights. Those will probably also turn up in some character at some time or another. Those things actually help to smooth out the rough, unfinished characters and give them more life, make them feel more real. And, isn't that the point of fiction writing? Creating unreal people who feel real and believable?
There is a piece of me in all (most?) of my main characters. Also, I will make them what I wish I was, or simply what I like. (In one story I had a cheerleader that was my complete opposite, but I very much enjoyed writing her personality and dialogue.) I think it's inevitable to some degree. You write about what you know. But it's important to give them their own character too. Like someone said, get inside their (character) heads, and ask what they would do.
KrystalP, I would hazard a guess that ALL of your characters, not just the main characters, bear a bit of you in them. We are, after all, incredibly diverse and ... interesting beasts. Every human being has the capacity for extreme good AND extreme evil. Even the kindest, most gentle soul has the ability to kill, even murder, under the right circumstances. And the most seemingly vile person has compassion, tenderness, and love for someone. Creating characters that you believe are your complete opposite is really just an act of getting in touch with ... well ... your dark side? It's in you, you just don't commune with it if you can help it. Or, on the flip side, it may be that part of you you wish you could get in touch with but don't know how.
It's pretty impossible not to project your traits onto characters you write. Just try to spread them around a bit. If you don't, well, you get Twilight's Bella Swan. But writing about yourself, now that's hard. You don't want to overdo it, or else you'll sound smug. But you also don't want to heap on the self-deprecation, or else people will take that as empty angst.
I know exactly what you mean, but there's absolutely nothing wrong with that, unless they have no traits, quirks or characteristics of their own and look like you. Quirks are wonderful ways to make characters more lifelike and likable, and quirks can come from wherever you like. Think of it like adding salt and pepper. A pinch of myself, a teaspoon of my brother Jim, etc. If your characters all look too much like you, you're in trouble. Until just a few years ago, all my female characters looked like me, but better (that's an even worse problem >.<). But of course, all my plots back then sucked, so they served their purpose. :]
My protagonist nearly always resembles me in a way, though I try to take on other characteristics that I find in other people that I think could be relevant. I think it's normal for a writer to do this, especially if your character is an ordinary person
Three-ee is a magic number. A little pinch of him, a little pinch of her, then add in a little pinch of me. That makes three. It's a magic number. (And you are 2.) Just my way of saying I like the way you worded that.
I do see that in my writing too. I never set out to do that, but when I rewrite I often think.. Dang I do that too, or I would say or act so too. Someone somewhat famous once said, write what you know.. and since I know myself pretty well, I think it's only normal that I include certain traits in my writing, sometimes lessened in strength or exaggerated. It's great when others see you in the characters though. Because the traits I sometimes give my characters aren't always the obvious ones.
I love to put little strands of myself into my characters. I'm a heavy daydreamer, and much of the adventure I seek comes from me writing much of myself into the characters and placing them/myself through situations just to see how they/I would overcome it.
Quiet a few of my characters are a little dark and challenging, or they try to be. Stupidity also runs through a lot of them and the decisions they make. So yes..without doubt i'm present in them. Unless i did months upon months of research into a character and personalities traits, i don't think i could relly create one that was me free.
Yup, pretty much the way I write. I don't really put myself into my characters. I'd get bored with my own characters! I'd know them too well! Usually my characters develop themselves, they take me on the ride of discovery whenever I put pen to paper (fingers to computer keyboard, should I say). Interesting concept. I think a lot of people do it. I know my friend does it, I see her in a lot of her characters. The downside to doing this is... well... reading her short stories, I see that her characters are all pretty much the same, because she's basing them on herself (deliberately or not I don't know) and so they never change. If you can't create new personalities and new types of people each time, people will get sick of reading your stories.
Some of my characters tend to exemplify aspects of myself, but never my entirety. 1 character is the embodiment of my political and ideological convictions, another is that of my depression and nihilistic nature. 1 of my whimsical side, 1 of my neurosis. In that sense, my protags tend to represent the parts of me that I value, and my antags the parts of me I could live without. The problem with that is finding the right balance of flaws and strengths to make a person compelling, as it can become tempting to me to lump all my foibles onto one character, but then that person would likely be irredeemable, and useless for my purposes. somethin like that
In a way I suppose some of them are, but rarely the main character... Saying that every character has a personality trait I can relate to... it's very important to like all your characters equally I find
