In this week’s Story Works Round Table, Alida, Kathryn, and Robert discuss character invention. We tackle where our characters come from, and how to fine-tune them to meet your stories needs.
VIDEO
AUDIO
SHOW NOTES
Where do your characters come from? What if you get stuck? How do you create a character when you don’t know what to write about? What about innovating characters? We discuss thinking about what your story needs, working backwards, and thinking who, what, and why in order to invent the best characters for your story.
What we talked about:
Where do our characters come from when you are starting at ground zero? (0:30)
What about if you get stuck? Or no ideas are coming? (3:25)
Start with what before who. (4:50)
Don’t just try to innovate, remember you must make the character real instead of conceptual. (8:35)
What does your story need? (9:22)
Work backwards. (13:05)
What about supporting characters? How do you choose how many to have? (13:50)
Do you have too many characters to juggle? (17:38)
Think, who, what, and why. (20:20)
LINKS
Things we mentioned:
True Grit by Charles Portis
Harry Potter by JK Rowling
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Doctor Who
Want more about these topics? Check out:
SWRT 17 Finding Your Protagonist
SWRT 34 Developing Your Supporting Characters
SWRT 007 Arcless Protagonists
SWRT 021 Distinct Characters