In an interesting exercise today, I think it'd be fun for us all to think about who influenced the characters we write about, be it someone else in our genre, an actor, a friend, or even just ourselves. It proves rather fun as we think about it more. I myself am going to examine two of my characters in here.... Styx (Blazer) Styx (preferred alias Blazer) is one of the major characters in my series. In a short synopsis, he is an unnamed species of divine creature, greater then a human, but less then a God Child (the ultimate race of life in my series) and is cousin to my major character. Blazer has a lot of me in him, in the idea that he is a very stuck up, and often goofy acting individual, although this is a mask to hide his inner misery. While I, myself, do not consider myself full of misery, I do put on a facade of acting goofy and often like an idiot, just for the fun of it. Blazer is also like me in the respect that he is in a constant state of blaming himself for things that are not truly his fault, and is eternally sorry, even after being forgiven. To be coupled with this, Blazer is also, like me, heavily devout, even though he does not act like it, and is a strong believer that all humans are created equal, another dominant quality of mine. Blazer, as I recently have noticed, is also very like my friend Thayne. In a strong beginning respect, I suppose, Blazer and Thayne are both homosexuals, though in both cases you'd never really think so until they've told you themselves. Rather like Thayne as well, Blazer is defined as a homosexual because he is only sexually attracted to men, also true in Thayne's case, though Thayne has been with his girlfriend for years, his insistent argument being, "Hey, I'm in love with a person, not a vagina." Blazer too had a girlfriend once, but sadly, unlike Thayne, Blazer gave up, though it is made clear he did (and does) love her. I suppose Blazer just couldn't handle living a lie anymore, perhaps he wasn't as strong as Thayne in this way. Any way we look at it, he decided it couldn't work anymore. Thayne and Blazer are also similar in the way of having incredibly destructive relationships with their fathers, but that's a different story. As stated in my part, Blazer is still devout, as is Thayne. I suppose there is also a little of my girlfriend in Blazer too, for many of the same reasons above (as she is a bisexual who generally prefers females). Talia Talia was Blazer's girlfriend for several years, and during that time, fell in love with him. Though Talia initially despised him for his lineage, she grew to drop her hatred, and inevitably wanted to be with him. More then anything else, I think my girlfriend, Meredith, inspired Talia. This seen in the mental journey Talia goes through before accepting a respect for Blazer, and gradually a love for him. Mere and Talia had their own early prejudices (Mere was somewhat prejudiced of men, in relationships at least, and Blazer's father was an enemy of Talia's during a war within my story). Later however, respect turned to friendship in both scenarios, and finally, friendship turned to love. Like Mere, Talia is just what I in vision in the perfect lover (yes, I'm sucking up to my girlfriend here), she is strong when Blazer needs her to be, she is at his side every second he needs her, and she just lives to make him happy, and he does the same back. To me, what I feel out of Talia, as well as Mere, is that they just want to be able to live on love alone, and even when their partners come up short, the two never lose faith....
I am writing a beauty and the beast remake. Zuriel is the "beast" in the form of a beautiful, immortal prince from medieval times who is living in the victorian era. he is prideful and elegant, self sacrificial and brooding. he is alot, i've discovered, like my fiance. This was not my original intent. He just kinda popped out that way. He's like my fiance's darker twin or something. And his looks were inspired by Vega from Capcom's Streetfighter. Strange inspiration source, but hey, whatever works. Celine is the sweet, graceful but naive beauty who is kidnapped, more or less, by Zuriel. I set out to make a character very different from myself, or at least partially, but I have discovered that Celine is like a reflection of what I wish I could be. She is like a better version of how other describe me. I'm often described as sweet and innocent but wise and such, but she is graceful where I am clumsy and dutiful where I am selfish and so on and so forth.
My character, Hadad, ended up coming out strong and stoic. He was originally meant to be easy going, but as I delved into his past I found out more than I would have expected. Hadad is a young man in his early 20's. He was born and raised on a small, undiscovered island; Sendoa. He's tall, dark and built -- in a lean way. He works as a Royal Guard for the islands Queen, Karesinda. He keeps most of his emotions bottle inside because he is terrified to lose control. As a teenager, in order to save his family from his tyrant of a father, he went overboard and ended up killing him. No one blames him for this, but he carries the weight on his shoulders, and is afraid of releasing that monster again. I find that he's coming out more and more like a character in one of my favourite series, The Fall of Ile-Rien by Marth Wells. I can't remember his name off the top of my head for some reason, but his overall posture and take on life is somewhat the same. Wary of creating a burden for others. I'm' decently proud of him, and quickly falling in love with him.
It is hard for me to say. I'm sure many of my characters are inspired by people, actors, and other characters subconsciously. I know the MC is my romance novel I will be starting soon is heavily based on my ex-girlfriend, who is now my best friend.
Hm, my characters...I don't really know where they're inspired from, haha. I suppose, like architectus, most of them are inspired by other people, movies, etc - one of my novels has a character that started off very closely resembling Tyler Durden from Fight Club, a fact which I deftly tried to hide as I edited the book. I try not to make my characters resemble anyone I know personally, if at all avoidable. Just not how I roll.
My character doesn't strongly resemble anyone, at least, not intentionally. Looking back, I suppose I must admit there are aspects of Altair from Assassins Creed and Jason Bourne from the movies in there.
It's actually really hard to say what inspires/who inspires my characters. I know a little it of my own personality comes across in each and everyone of them, but I try to make sure that it's always a different little segment of me. I'd say my past relationships, current relationship, family and friends are probably also in my characters' dynamics with one another as well, but I don't really think about that when I'm writing. ~Lynn
I would say that I base my characters off of all types of people, and not just any one. If I'm writing a character to be loved I base it off of somebody or a type of person that I love, and if the character is to be hated then I base it off of somebody or certain character traits that are peeves to me.
My characters are based off of life long friends, my own struggle, my mentor and dear friend, and everything that matters to me. My stories are personal, because the struggles the characters face emotionally, are ones I have fought or am fighting.
Who inspired your characters? ...myself; my imagination; my dreams; those i've known, seen, heard of, or read about...
Not anyone, necessarily, when it comes to my MC at the time being. Sometimes, a character just seeps into your mind with no thought of who they will model. But, as for my other, supporting characters that are in my work, that would be mythological/biblical characters. Since my characters are going to be angels and demons, I decided to base them off of real ones when it came to their history and such. But otherwise, I like working from the ground up, from scratch. If a character happens to resemble someone a lot, normally it's just my brain clicking the traits together without aforethought.
Reading about stock characters inspires a different spin on an old stereotype. There is a website I visit to do research, called TVTropes.
A lot of things. Though I don't intend to, I find my main character often has a great deal of myself in him. I've given up on fighting it. I often find other characters are based of people I've known, historical figures, or mythology.
My character inspirations are all over the board. Sometimes an actor inspires them. Sometimes they just pop into my head.
More or less, this is my character list. Most of the ones I have in my current project, are based on people in my life. Main Characters Owen Graham - Strong, eager to please. Late teens, brown hair and green eyes. He is based on my best friend/boyfriend of 1 year 7 months, but we've been best friends for years. I wanted to write something where he was involved. Marie Jackson - Nice, caring. Loves Owen and everything about him. Shoulder-length dark brown hair, blue eyes. Marie is based off of me, even though in her description, she looks nothing like me. Besides, I couldn't write about James with adding Leah to it. James just isn't James without Leah. Haha. Mark Mason - Seems like the perfect boyfriend until he beats the crap out of Marie, almost kills her, for some reason I haven't figured out yet. Shaggy black hair, green eyes. Mark is also based off of a figure in my life, as is the situation. Background Characters Charlie Reyes - Owen's best friend, helps them escape. Ethan Givens - Mark's spy. Gets information from Owen by acting like a friend, then betraying him.
Different sides of my own nature have inspired Marc Dases and his younger brother, Dante, the latter being my favourite character of my book by quite some distance. Marc is the introspective, self-critical part of me that exists in everyday life, whereas Dante is the rash, impulsive part of me that surfaces in certain situations. Rachel Stead is inspired by one of my best friends. She's much less self-critical than Marc is, and a much stronger person for it. Hummd is purely my imagination running wild - shown in the name, if nothing else. He's very much a 'what if I was like that?' character, being a reckless womaniser, gambler, drinker and one of the most capable swordsmen in the land. He's also fiercely loyal.
