Emotional about your characters?

Delicious!!

 

First off I want to reiterate that I absolutely agree and love what @Lew said about Passion in writing, or just anything you do in live. Passion is important to the quality of work and I still say some of you on the "No emotions" side have it, even if you don't admit it.

Now, having said that, I will now give my two more cents of my own.

I as I said, I feel emotional and passion do play into writing a great story. Sure you can write a good story without those, but beyond the initial reading, what is going to get your readers to keep coming back to it. OH sure, they will have it on their shelves, and say "Oh, I like that story," but what is going to get them to sit down and reread it.

Plus without some sort of passion how can your characters have any proper depth or development beyond the single cold structured purpose they serve in your story. To me personally, it sounds like you are short changing your characters.

I.E. My own Character Kristol, does more than just serve her purpose as the MC, she has personality and has her likes and dislikes, you get a sense of who she is as a person (Metaphoric in a the writing terms), and when I look at other threads like "What is your MC's favorite Dish" or "Would your MC rescue your ass," , and I see a lot of personality coming out of the Characters shared by other users, without even reading their stories. That is freak'n passion and care for your characters,

When you can say, my Character would leave me for dead for killing off their lover, causing them to go into depression or my Character loves raising bran bread with cinnamon on it. Those don't drive the story but still they make your character more interesting, give them personality and give some silly tidbit for your readers to identify with, even if they say "Ew, I hate Cinnamon, Rebecca is fowl,"

My Kristol loves Roasted rabbit, her family owns a rabbit "Farm" and she likes to go out, get her own rabbit for dinner and even name it. She also knows how to crack the bones in a way to make a loud obnoxious sound with them. Kristol is a family woman, dedicated daughter, sister and mother but she is also a warrior and an adventurer, who loves going out and exploring the world around her, rock climbing, spelunking in caves and catacombs. Some of that has nothing to do with the story or comes into play later.

ETA: another thing I wanted to add, is a robot analogy. Now you can program a robot to behave like a human, they will do the functions that you programmed into them. But beyond that, beyond the surface of your writing , what personalities do your characters have.

I see a lot of mention of structure and writing good because of structure, but what about writing great because you can work beyond surface structure.

That's not to say I am some great writer, but ther are those who are. J. K. Rowling is one of these writers, and her material is known to everyone

 

I declare Cheung Weng the wynnr!

Hatari! Hatari!

 

Saturday morning. Wife walking the dog. Only time I could find time to read this thread. I love the passion that so many of you show. Passion makes things. Good.

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To me, fiction is a game (a serious game). It's played by the author and the reader. So it's the reader that I am invested in, not so much the characters in the story.

 

@GB reader My thoughts to "So it's the reader that I am invested in, not so much the characters in the story." Come in the form of a question, I've seen/heard many a artist/musician say they create first and foremost for themselves. I don't think this comes from a place of selfishness. How else can we as artists create, without emotion and the inspiration we crafted in ourselves first?

 

Are you sure that all writers consider themselves "artists"?

I certainly don't think of myself that way. I don't think of most writers that way, really. I think of writing as a craft - that is, there's an aesthetic/artistic element to it, but mostly it's about technique and effort and, well, craftsmanship.

 

I agree. Passion is vital in making a story great instead of just okay, mediocre or Good. It's nice to know the structure and the "Rules" of writing, which is an oxymoron if I ever heard one. (outside of basic grammar and sentence structure, your readers got to be able to read your book)

How can anyone be invested in your characters beyond a surface level, if you yourself as a a writer, an artist of words, or Wordsmith, do not care about your own work. It's the little tidbits that make characters memorable Also I get the "Create for themselves, first" , which is exactly what I do. Writing for myself first.

You can't create properly without emotions and passions, what I think \we see a lot of I like to call Factory Writing or Robotic Characters, just surface, adhering to the structure and doing nothing beyond what is considered "Safe" for sales. The story is structured and the characters are very flat to the point you can interchange them with characters from other books of that author.

Thankfully, I am not under the burden to make money off my writing, it would be nice one day to do so, but till then I write purely because it's a part of my being.

And yeah, we are fucking artists, the call musicians artist, Painters Artists, hell even house building is a art of it's own, so why not us, we also create and build...

 

With this in mind, I realised recently that whilst I have watched the Harry Potter films many times over, I actually don't like Harry Potter as a character at all! I don't see anything likeable about him as an individual. BUT the world that is created around him, and the other characters, are what make them enjoyable for me.

 

I have to care about my characters, otherwise I wouldn't be able to write about them! That includes the bad guys. You need to have something to be able to relate to, and that your readers can connect with. Otherwise you're just wasting everybody's time. That's my thinking, anyway.

 

, I can sort of agree with that. I do kind of like Harry, but I get how he can get annoying or be a twit at times.

 

Oh absolutely, it's how you give them depth beyond the surface of "structure", where they start to develop traits, personalities and Likes and dislikes that have nothing to do with the story but give you tidbits about the Characters. I feel being reliable beyond a surface level is important for a great story,

It's also just fun, even for yourself. You gotta have fun writing, fun exploring the lives of these characters and the world they inhabit, even if its'a small slice of it. Of course this varies on genre of course. But still, Cry, Laugh, have your WTF moments with the stuff you have written.

"Wasting Time" I think depends on what the reader is seeking, not everyone wants depth in their stories. just something that is quick read and satisfies that itch they have. But, I think that is more contributed to the lowering quality of work that is being published now a days.

ETA: I realized I forgot to mention the badguys, they are equally important for the book. I have one who after dying takes over Hell.

 

It's interesting that many of the "passion" people seem so focused on having this be a universal thing. They have passion for their characters, therefore everyone else must or else just be writing crap. I mean, largely that's just because the internet is the Land of Overstatement, but I wonder if there's something else happening?

I'm not quite sure what... but maybe a sort of predisposition to see things emotionally rather than rationally? Would those of you arguing that good writing can only come from authors who are passionate about their characters say that you approach life in general from a really emotional perspective? Heart over head?

ETA: Then again, you're writing here, too, so possibly this is just something that comes out when you're writing, even if you're not writing fiction?

 

I'm definitely a heart person by instinct, but I don't let it always have it's own way. If I did, I'd have had a fair few interesting encounters with people!

I think we need all types of writers, as there isn't simply one type of reader, so literature needs to reflect that too. Something for everyone. There is no one size fits all. I've noticed that with films generally. A lot of the ones I see getting rave reviews I think are utter rubbish! But then not everyone would like the films I do either. Everything in a balance.

 

It's not that. I just find his character to be very dull. I get he's an orphan and all, but why should I care about that? He feels very flat to me as a character.
I really like Luna, personally. That's probably because she's quite like me though...!
In a way, I think that sometimes it can be the bad guys who are the best characters, because they usually have that extra depth to them to try and explain their evil behaviour, or whatever it is.

 

Oh, Of course. Emotions are great but don't let it interfere with your writing. If your MC needs to loose horribly and be humiliated to learn a lesson, then do it. Even if it requires the blunt part of a spear smacking them in the face.

Agreed, Variety is the spice of life and naturally there isn't one type of writer, not everyone wants depth in their stories. Just something to read and not get invested in. This is why I play GTA some times, because it's a brain dead game to me. Yeah, ratings is a funny thing, and If I don't like something I don't bother giving it a negative review because I know others may enjoy it and I don't want to spit on their enjoyment of the film or material.

 

I think the real challenge comes in trying to write an evenly matched hero for the villain, really. They both need a lot of work, otherwise it's not a fair fight, so to speak.

 

, we both like the same Character, Luna. I rather enjoyed her and her free spirit. I get what you mean by Harry being dull, makes me think JK wanted you to explore the world and other characters more maybe. because yeah, everyone else has more personality.

Bad guys can be cool, every watch Swordfish with John Travolta. What's worse is when you find yourself cheering on the bad guy.

 

I confess to having read one book which I found to be utterly atrocious, and I have told people about how bad it was! It didn't make any sense, and nothing was ever resolved. I didn't even understand the ending. I don't know if the people died, or lived!!

 

I haven't seen that, no. I liked Pulp Fiction a lot, and I also enjoyed Lock Stock and 2 Smoking Barrels. Funny stuff.

 

Right, I do have one villain who outclasses the MC, but seems himself as more of a teacher to the MC and even horribly tortures the MC for him to learn.

What book was that, "Empress Theresa" by Norman Boutin.

Gotcha, Swordfish isn't fun, pointless violence but it's pretty fucked up in it's own way.

 

It was called The Dogs of Littlefield by Suzanne Berne. Apparently some people liked it...but I really don't get how.

 

Holy shit, I think that cover gave me eye cancer.

By the way, you might enjoy these reviews from Good Reads.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25205416-the-dogs-of-littlefield

 

This was the line that summed it up nicely!
"Without a definitive ending or even a substantial plot line, it does not work well for me."

 

And back to the topic of the thread - those elements, to me, come from the head, not the heart. That is, they're craft, not passion. Right?

So hopefully we all agree that passion isn't enough to make readers care about our work? The author of the story you didn't enjoy may or may not have been passionate about her writing, but even if she was, too bad, if she didn't have the basic structure of a satisfying story in place.

Now, I don't think anyone in this thread has directly argued that passion is all that's needed, but I feel as if it's been implied in some of the posts - If I care about my characters, other people will care about my characters. But that's really not the way writing works.

 

So then the answer is surely that you need both elements? If you have a flat character, but can tell a good story, it's only half-baked as it were. On the other hand, if you have a great character, but a dull plot line, that won't work out either. There probably are some exceptions, but I would say this is a general rule for literature and films.