This is just something I was thinking about today. I've heard quite a few writers having the same worry - what if someone you know finds out you're actually writing about them? Well, I guess I have a success story, in a strange little way. Introducing my dad: Loud. Opinionated. Hard-nosed and will let you know it. No one else tries enough when he's around, no one else cares enough when he's around, no one else is smart enough or cunning enough or brave enough when he's around. Everyone else is beneath him, and that's all there is to it. Everything you own belongs to him. Music. Books. Clothes. Even food. But it's all for the 'greater good'. Because he's smart. He's tough. He's aggressive. He's a wise guy. He's going to be right, and he's going to win, and there is nothing in hell you can do about it. Picture that guy from Whiplash but with hair. (Incidentally, he hated that character for some reason I couldn't possibly comprehend). Not a guy who's great for understanding, always, support, or even kindness. That's my dad. All that being said, I respect him professionally enough to sometimes review my work. So as it happened, one of the pieces I'm working on has a very distinct character, let's call him Character X, who is... almost a direct lift from his personality. Down to the last detail. But this was months ago, and it was my very very first draft. Once we got past the initial heap of bare insults and unrequested commentary, which you can usually blithely ignore because of his borderline extremist reaction to everything he has an opinion on (his first words were 'this is @?/*', and not in a joking way), we got to Character X. He didn't recognise the character. The personality. At all. It was one of the strangest things I've ever experienced. And even better than that? Even better than the terrifying discovery of someone that unpredictable finding out that they've been scored down in history forever? He loved it. This is a guy who is never impressed. With anyone. Jesus himself could walk in, and my dad would scoff that he was doing a terrible job and didn't know what he was doing. This is a guy who believes that only he has the answers, that only he is smart enough to execute a plan. He told me it was one of the best written characters he'd ever seen (and thankfully, although strangely, not that he identified with him). And this is someone who flies off the handle if there's the barest suggestion that someone is better at something than him. I guess what I'm trying to say after that appalling character assassination is that, if you're going to write about someone, attempt do it so truthfully that even they can't see it. Because I think when people -- perhaps ourselves included -- are confronted with who we really are in fiction, we don't see it (or maybe refuse to?) because we don't interpret ourselves that way whatsoever. And I think that applies to other stories too. If you were most like an orc in personality (god forbid what someone would have to be like for that to happen), and you had to choose between identifying as an orc or Aragorn, which one would you choose? I think most people in that case (except in cases of severe low self-esteem) would tend to see themselves as an Aragorn-type figure, even if their true personality was staring right up at them from the page in the image of an orc.
