Put hints as to the characters' appearance and ethnic background. The reader will create a mental image based on their experiences and the people around them without these hints. No hints can make it easier for someone to put themselves in the place of the main character(s), but some would argue that not describing what a character looks like renders the illusion incomplete. You don't need to constantly remind the reader about the appearance of the character, neither should the description be left out until the very end - if the reader has developed a mental image which doesn't equate to the description at the end of the book, they could feel a bit cheated. For example, my MC has a vaguely far-eastern / oriental appearance, but she doesn't know who her parents were or where they came from. Her co-adopted brother teases her about Chinese food in one line in the prologue. The description about what happened in the lines after that tell the reader how she feels about being teased AND gives them something on which to base their mental image of her, which should endure through the rest of the story, even though nobody else mentions her ethnicity.
Consistency should be in mentioning what is important to the understanding of the characters and to the understanding of the story. Going into great detail for a secondary character when that information may not be crucial to the story is inconsistent. Going into great detail for a secondary character when that information *is* crucial is warranted and consistent with the guideline of distributing need-to-know information. Readers will understand the story significance for the need of this description, and there should be no confusion whatsoever. Readers are smart enough to understand when a character description is necessary for the story/that character or not. Then create a story/character reason for this character to have this appearance. That's the best way to do it, in my view. You CAN just do whatever you want, but I vastly prefer an organic approach to marry the characters with the story.
Reading this, I'm just puzzled. Why do people keep saying skin colour is irrelevant? What issue do you have with stating skin colour and ethnicity of characters? Why? The way we look and our physique in general is intimately connected with who we are. In many ways it also determines our path in life, how easy or difficult, how people respond to us, what jobs appeal to us, what we are good in, what interests us, all that can be traced back to appearance, then culture and context. It is inconceivable that 'appearance doesn't matter' or that a writer attempts to elicit an emotional response in a reader, habitually, without describing people the reader should try to relate to. You don't have to be cheesy, lame, repetitive or irrelevant, description is a hard skill to master, but to avoid it and even advise against it, just because you haven't mastered the skill, well, what's the point in that? If you are avoiding it for other reasons, they better be good reasons rather than something utterly trite like 'skin colour/appearance doesn't matter'. Of course it matters! Appearance is what we are judged on first, the first impression. I also echo @T.Trian's concern regarding forming my own mental image and then, 50 pages later, be told 'when it's relevant to the story' (or whatever other irrelevant statement in context of brief physical description) that the character looks completely different. In fact that's extremely poor storytelling. I did this in my novella that was being read chapter by chapter, and in the first post I put a picture of a brunette, just for illustration. When, a few chapters later, I described that character as having blonde hair, there was an outcry by some readers. They were convinced the character was a brunette and they really had a hard time seeing her as a blonde. Bottle blonde of all things, easily changeable. Skin colour is not changeable, it's permanent. How can it not be important? Not in terms of stereotyping, but visual image. (DISCLAIMER: I am not advocating that writers have to include all ethnicities in their stories, I would hope that kind of general conclusion would be left aside because that's not at all what I'm saying.) Arguably one of the most famous and best storytellers today, Murakami, describes characters all the time. Certainly first time we see a character, basic physical description is essential and you see this in good novels all the time. Just because someone doesn't know how to do this kind of thing well, doesn't mean it should never be done or that it should be avoided. All it means is that each writer needs to learn how to do it. Obviously, some people might disagree, so I'm only speaking my mind here, but it is common to introductory-describe people and things in fiction, it's common sense.
I don't think a physical description is at all 'necessary'. Why not allow the reader to see the characters in whatever manner they wish? Even with my favorite authors, I frequently find their physical descriptions irritating. So often authors' idea of good looking is completely the opposite of my own, for example. Tell me (or show me) that they are considered good looking - but don't expect that a flaming redhead is attractive to all readers.
@shadowwalker : I couldn't agree more, author's fantasies as well as value judgements can be irritating, and anything irritating is bad writing (at least subjectively speaking). But all good writers, from Chekhov to Murakami and most in-between, habitually offer physical descriptions. In fact, they sometimes revel in it and the end result is some of the most vivid characters and stories ever told. Maybe we have crucially different tastes in literature, I don't know, but I wonder whether you read Murakami. I know I go on about him every chance I get, but he is a master at physical description. Another one that comes to mind is JK Rowling. Here are couple of her examples:
Maybe that is a reason to avoid describing a character's appearance: to prevent the reader from prejudging the character. This is kinda evidence to contradict that, but when I read fiction, even when a character is described, I tend to forget what the character is supposed to look like unless I am reminded ad nauseam. It is just so hard for me to create a tangible, lasting mental image of a person from words. Sometimes, I finish reading something, then I read it again, and I encounter a description that makes me think "wtf? This is the character I was reading about?" But then I finish rereading, and that new mental image did not really affect how I think of the character. And that is how I know that particular set of physical traits is unnecessary to describe.
@daemon Obviously, you have the right to your opinion and I'm not trying to tell you what to do. But the reason why I disagree with your statement is because fictional characters aren't people, they aren't lucky or unlucky to be born with certain physical characteristics (unless it's relevant to the story and you set it up that way). Fictional characters look the way you, the writer, want them to look. The way they need to look in order to fit their role in your story. The only 'wrong impressions' are those you engineer, either through deliberate and clever contrasting for plot purposes (think Sherlock Holmes dressed as a gypsy beggar and not even Watson recognises him) OR lack of skill to describe effectively what you need to describe. In other words, there should be no 'wrong first impressions' in fiction, only those your writing has elicited. Everything about the fictional character, the way they think, speak, dress, look, move, what they do, what grabs their attention, should have a purpose to convey to the reader something either about the story or the character. And this is where you can continue describing a character as well as reinforce the description. For example, your character has a broad nose, straight black hair and thin lips. She is five foot six and has medium but nicely shaped breasts and skinny legs. She isn't overtly fond of her appearance but she is meticulous about her health, in fact she is a martial arts instructor at her local gym, so she eats healthy food in moderation and exercises regularly. Now next time we see her, she might be getting dolled up to go on a prowl looking for a hot date (ok, I'm just paraphrasing 1Q 84 which I'm reading at the moment, but you get my point). What sort of dress is she wearing? What's her style? As a reader I really want to know, in fact, I need to know so I'm expecting you to keep painting her picture for me, in general terms, but in increasing and relevant detail, untilI feel like I would recognise her on the street. If I was to paint her, and another reader was to do the same, our pictures would be different - this is where our imagination comes in - but we have something to go on, some clue. Readers will get their own impressions, of course, but they will form those based on your words, and this is where you are in complete control. To deprive your reader of an essential aspect of the character - their physical being - will sell any story (and character) short. Go overboard, start detailing it like you would to a police sketch artist, and you ruin the fine gossamer fabric of it all, so there's an art to it, definitely. The only way I can see disaster playing out is if you aptly describe your character, and the individual reader has some issue with people who look or talk or move a certain way. However, it's not your job as a writer to pander to, or anticipate, individual reader's complexes and prejudices, your job is to tell your story. Is your character a short, petite blonde, thirty-five going on seventeen, professional kick-boxer in the ring? An ageing ballerina with drumstick thighs and tattered pointe shoes, teaching a dance class on the periphery somewhere? Is the girl playing a violin on the street corner young? Are her nails clean? Is she dressed for the weather or is she wearing a thin summer dress and an oversized suit jacket that's seen much better days before it was fished out of the bargain bin in her local 'Salvation Army' outlet? You can't not describe your characters in detail, you don't need to pontificate about it, but something relevant is absolutely essential, imo.
I don't give much clues as to what "race" any of my characters are, it risks alienating the reader that had another idea. Also I don't think adding "he is asian/middle eastern/white/black/italian looking" in some way usually adds much, but if someone thinks otherwise go ahead maybe its the right thing for your story.
You said "colour." You're not from the US. Why does that matter? I find myself wondering if there's a difference on this issue between different countries with different histories of bigotry and racism. In the US, there's long been a very strong push toward being "color blind", which suggests that being aware of someone's color would naturally make you dislike them--at least if that color is different from your own. When the idea switched to "diversity" the main associated word for a while still tended to be "tolerance", which implies that your natural feeling about someone different from you is assumed to be negative, and that you have to suppress that negative feeling and be "tolerant." That wasn't said out loud, but it seems implied in the word. Only quite recently, I think, has the phrasing switched to "celebrating diversity," a mindset where you acknowledge differences and you see them as a good thing. So, if you're raised in either a color-blind or tolerance mindset, I can see that you might feel that anything that suggests that a character is different from a given reader's mental "standard person" would be something that would turn the reader against the character. And if you give the reader the opportunity to dislike the character on those grounds, you might feel like an accomplice to the reader's bigotry. You were always taught that a good person ignored those things; there's not a lot of modeling, in the US, of talking about differences rather than ignoring them. But the very fact that we have all these messy, complicated feelings about differences, the very fact that we assume that those differences will make us feel differently about a character, means that those differences ARE relevant to many stories. Unless your story is in a world where everyone is the same, or a world where bigotry based on differences doesn't exist, differences are moderately likely to matter to the story. (Side note: I think that the traditional US focus on the individual, and focus away from group identity, also ties into this--there's little discomfort about divorcing a person from a possible group identity, if group identity is not valued.) (Side note II: "Color blind" also suggested that at some time, we thought that bigotry was always all about skin color, and perhaps that's part of why skin color, as opposed to cultural or national identity or other differences, is particularly uncomfortable to deal with.)
@jazzabel I do not deny that a character's physical trait can be the effect of an important cause (e.g. überfitness is caused by the character's efforts to take care of herself, and the reader should know about those efforts because they are evidence of who she is and they might affect how she interacts with the story) or the cause of an important effect (e.g. Sherlock's gypsy beggar disguise causing John not to recognize him). I was referring to traits that accomplish neither. Those are the traits I forget when I read. This is actually the kind of setting I prefer to write about. There are so many sources of conflict for a plot that are so much more interesting than bigotry based on differences. Maybe that kind of setting is a fantasy world. Who knows. Who cares. I love fantasy.
My guess is that in those cases you've just read badly done descriptions. I've read many of them too; in one eye and out the other. But when a character is truly described well, I form a very coherent image in my mind and remember it for years after finishing the book. That kind of masterful description (usually based on action, emotions etc. instead of passive lists of characteristics) is what I aim at (still suck at it, but I'm a lot less crap than I used to be) and what I like the most when reading novels written by others. And I totally agree with @jazzabel (this is starting to become a pattern ) that looks really do affect a person's experience of their life in a significant way. Imagine two otherwise identical people, but with different looks: one is female, beautiful, tall, slender but athletic, and dressed in revealing outfits. The other is male, ugly, short, seriously overweight and out of shape, and dresses in ugly, loose clothes, like slacks and a hoodie. I just don't buy it that their life experiences wouldn't be significantly different because of how they look even if otherwise their likes and dislikes, personalities etc. were exactly the same. According to my cumbersome logic, that means that description, like everything else, just has to be done well.
@daemon : I agree with what @T.Trian said I think you raise an issue of bad descriptions, and those are quite common too. So I agree, bad descriptions aren't necessary at all. @ChickenFreak : Thank you for explaining, I found it really fascinating! I'm aware of the racism and associated issues in America, from all I heard but not much first hand, but I imagine most of the world outside the US associates your country with both existence of racism as well as determination to root it out. In the UK and Australia, places I have experience with, racism is as rife as anywhere else, but it isn't mainstream and it's frowned upon, esp. in Aus where people get a bit too fond of political correctness. Brits, especially older generation, tend to be suspicious of people who are 'foreign', it's an island mentality that applies to everyone, regardless of race and culture. The whitewash is the same as in your media, and we also have 'ghettos', they are called 'council estates' (how civilised...) but they are for the poor of all races, and really, on that child level, racism is much less common, at least in big cities. There are ethnic communities within cities, but they aren't ghettos in a classical sense, they are as prosperous as any neighbourhood (except for insanely rich ones, and council estates, which are two extremes). sI guess class division is the primary discriminator in the UK, while race is in the US and perhaps Australia, which has a bit of both. They also have a large Asian immigrant population ('They're takin' 'ur jobs!' type thing), so racially pure neighbourhood gangs sometimes pose a problem (in the nineties in Melbourne we had strong Vietnamese gangs fighting with the skinheads, that sort of thing). But viewing the issue in 'colour blind' terms isn't encouraged because it's not deemed particularly effective in achieving multicultural society. In Australia they are really big on celebrating and embracing differences, I hear Canada is quite similar. UK is mainly involved in class problems, racism is still present in many forms but there's no 'colour blindness' here either. People tend to be proud of their roots and culture, whatever it may be. I guess it depends on where the story is set. Got to stay true to the local customs and issues.
This is a really interesting difference between say Australia and the US. We are both countries built on immigration with a widely diverse population. But in Australia we don't have this strong mindset of becoming Australian in terms of leaving the old culture behind when you migrate here. Most of my friends are migrants and the imported culture is handed down from one generation to the next and slowly diluted. There is not this strong intention to become Australian beyond simply having the right to live here permanently. In fact it's usually quite a strong point to retain ones own original passport. So we do have enclaves of different cultures here and it's seen as positive to enable people to maintain a cultural link with their country of origin as long as doing so doesn't break the laws of this country. Personally I think it is what gives this country a very interesting flavour and you will find towns here that have a distinctly German, Italian, Greek or whatever bent about them depending upon their history.
All good writers? I'd have to disagree with that, since a) you can't show that all of them do and b) what you consider a good writer I may not. Of the two examples you gave, I could easily have skipped them and been none the worse in my reading. The first was full of cliches (except for that last sentence, which told less of his physical appearance and more of his movements and was quite nicely done), and the second was just another blonde cute girl. What did either really add to the story?
@shadowwalker : As I suspected, we have quite different tastes in literature. I am only stating my opinion, and it is quite clear, since there are no absolutes in life, that I was using a figure of speech. I consider myself very well read, in a variety of different genres, and this is my opinion based on that. Yes, all three examples added to the story. Significantly so. No, there are no 'cliches' in the first example at all, this is what a guy looked like. People wear clothes, have noses and chins, legs and arms. Their hair is usually one of only four colours. I am not sure what kind of originality you are seeking in physical descriptions. Second example testifies to emerging emotions, and it was necessary because it described the character aptly too. Third is an example example of a very short yet relevant description. However, if these 'turn your stomach' for some reason, then I agree to disagree.
@shadowwalker : Yes, both were very relevant. I was using a figure of speech as my second 'most' indicates. But most of all, I am just amused to see with what ease you dismissed a writer who is in a queue for Nobel Prize in literature, as a 'cliche'. I guess I'll just leave it at that. I have no more convincing argument for someone who's already made up their mind
So I'm automatically supposed to be in awe of a maybe Nobel Prize winner? Does that mean I'm supposed to love every singer who's won a Grammy? Every movie that won an Oscar? Please... Not to mention that I did not "dismiss" the writer - I did not see any point in the writer's description of the character. What they looked like did not give me any insight into their emotions, what they were like as people. Did the fact the girl have brown eyes influence her actions or emotions? Did the fact the guy had the cliche "steel rod" back change how he reacted to people, how he phrases things? Other than trying to force the reader see the character the way the writer did, what purpose was filled by these descriptions?
Can I shoehorn in a question about describing a main character (story in 1st person)? I don't typically do a ton of it, honestly. However, if it's important to me to have the reader know my character is biracial, should I just mention it straightaway? It didn't really fit in either chapter 1 or 2, but I thought having someone else, who she's just introducing herself to, comment on her vague ethnic looks would do it, so that she could correct him. I guess I could also edit chapter 1 to add physical description of the parents, so that the reader hasn't already developed a mental picture by the time I mention oh yeah she's half black. Thoughts? This thread raised the questions for me, ha.
@shadowwalker : Not at all, I don't care who you 'like', nor am I telling you what to do, I am disagreeing with your notion that physical description is 'unnecessary'. What information or emotional reaction can anyone reasonably expect from a sample paragraph from the middle of the book they never read? If you think this is a cliche I honestly can't wait for your book to come out, so we can all learn how to do it better than Murakami.
You put the samples up. If they didn't produce the desired effect, is that my fault? You honestly don't think "steel rod" back, "bushy eyebrows", etc are not cliches? Then perhaps you need to expand your reading. As to comparing my book to Murakami, I have no problem with that. Some people will like it, others will not - I'm not in competition with anyone. You apparently think Murakami is some kind of god of the written word - I'm not impressed by the sample you put up. If you want to infer that that makes me some kind of literary neanderthal, well, so be it. I could make my own inferences, but...
You have many different options, I don't think one method is better than another, as long as it's written well and reader can relate. First person is more difficult, but you can see what your story needs and even insert a small flashback to a grandparent, or food she ate as a child, anything that will give a clue about mixed ethnicity, without resorting to mirror or other people describing her to her face.
They serve their purpose. They help the reader visualize the character. So what if other writers have used the same phrases to help readers visualize their characters?
The 'so what' is the idea that somehow this was extraordinary writing, or gave an excellent example of description - and from a Nobel prize nominee, no less! I found it mundane and would have skimmed over it, just like I would any other writer's.
I just read a post on The Hathor Legacy, on "the value of humanisation". And it made me think of this thread. I don't konw if I can enter a link, but you can find it by Googling hathor value humanization There's a link to a video that includes a girl talking to the cast of Orphan Black, telling them that she watched the show with her mother, and that the character Cosima, a gay woman, allowed her mother to see the humanity that she couldn't see in her own gay daughter, and that that shared experience is allowing her to rebuild a relationship with her mother. (That's not precisely how she put it; I'm giving my impression.) We know that being gay, or black, or female, or non-Christian, or old, or a bazillion other other differences from the "standard human", doesn't make you less of a person. But there are people out there who are being told, every hour of every day, that they are less. We can say to them that of course you're human, of course you're represented by the generic human being in my story. But if they don't see humans like them in books and in movies and on TV, then they're deprived of a huge opportunity to see models and messages to counter what they're being taught about themselves.
