Have you ever written a character that made you feel uncomfortable? I wrote a character in a novella I really detested. He stole laptops from schools, picked spots on his face and wiped the pus on his trousers. I just couldn't wait to get rid of him. Every minute writing from his point of view was uncomfortable. How about your characters that made you feel uncomfortable?
I have a character that makes me feel uncomfortable but I don't detest him and really want to get rid of him. Then again, I haven't written much on his section yet...
back when i was writing commercial fiction, i guess you could say my villains made me feel somewhat 'uncomfortable' because i was creating them to be monsters and i'm not one... i don't see how it could be otherwise, unless the writer is the same type of person s/he is writing about, or at least admires same... love and hugs, maia
I think that's what being an author is about really. Most of my villains start of as despicable monsters, but after spending a while in their shoes, and watching their backstories develop, I'm often more sympathetic than anything.
I sort of feel uncomfortable when writing from the villain's point of view. It almost feels as if I'm the one doing all those bad things, lol.
Whoa, I learn something new every day. I'd LOVE to read some of that. Can you point us to where this commercial fiction is? Thanks
I've not really been uncomfortable with a character as such, maybe it might start now as I'm doing a new novel, but so far, nope. Depends on the author, like someone said.
My rule is that if I feel uncomfortablewith any of my characters and I shouldn't, something is wrong. If its a chracter that I think I've vdeveloped well and that I like then I'm always comfortable wtih them no matter what I ahve them do.
Personally, I believe every character should make you in some way uncomfortable, either through their actions or their emotions- everyone does bad things at some point, regardless of intentions (road to hell and all that). My characters invade my head when I write about them and refuse to get out, shaping my perceptions for hours, and occasionally days, afterward. Usually, it's the nice ones that make me the most uncomfortable, because I tend to be more offended by stuff in general...
Well most of my characters are monsters. One of my novels, The Male Dog, is about four people who wander in towns destroyed by war and rape and kill anyone in their way. They kill a 9 year old girl in one of scenes. In another, A Brief Analasis on Sex, my hero is boy addicted to porn. All other characters of the novel have some sort of sexual disaster. But do they make me uncomfortable? Not really. I know that's not "me" who's doing those things.
Course I do. But I don't want to get rid of them. I know evil exists and that's the reason there's even a plot.
Not really. I've had one of my main characters kill his girlfriend before, and I hated doing that, but I hated it in the good way... if that makes sense. A general rule for me is if I don't like the character in any way (such as feeling uncomfortable writing him/her), then the character is wrong in some way and needs fine tuning or replacement. I never, ever write characters that I don't like, because for me, the characters are the absolute most important part of the story. Good characters can make a bland story interesting. But that's not completely relevant. Other than one guy killing one of my favorite characters I've ever made, there is nothing I've made a character do that made me feel "bad." I've killed my favorite character in a story, I've killed the main character in the same story, I've killed the main character's father, and I've killed the main character's pet. I share their pain, but I don't feel wrong most of the time.
It's just great when you're writing and you come to a point where it feels natural to kill off a character. For some reason, I always seem to find I've accepted the fact long before it happens.
I've always added a part to my characters that I didn't like. I always felt it make them appear more real if you add a darkside.
Stinger, sounds interesting. Any of your works up for display? I've not ventured into characters actually being 'bad' yet, want to see how you would develop that.
I... don't feel "disgusted" with my characters. It's all perspective - for me, if a character is utterly despicable to everyone, then it's not a character, but a caricature. Even villains should be able to invoke empathy. Even Hitler had admirers - and he undoubtedly liked himself, to some extent.
I'm writing a story that the characters make feel very uncomfortable. But thats what I like. I know most of the time if the character makes me feel uncomfortable its going to make other people uncomfortable as well. I like characters that disgust you and make you feel uncomfortable. Cause they are the characters that I always think about. Oh he's really disturbing I want to know more about him. Is what I think.
I actually like writing about the evil characters of my novel. Its so fun! I keep on thinking of the various evil things he can do, and i usually come up with something good.
