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Character Building


Terra

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Ha! I'm not talking about going through some God awful events that will make you a stronger person on the other side of the tragedy, but in developing the characters in your stories.

As many of you know, the children's stories I'm writing are basically about a fictitious character that lived my childhood, experienced my adventures, mishaps and learning experiences. In order for children to relate to it all, the emotions and thought processes have to be true to life.

Anyone who remembers their childhood knows that it all wasn't peaches and cream, and that they were not the perfect child all of the time and did some things that they're not proud of. Those parts need to be included too so that children can relate.

Heck, we can say that of our lives at any point really.

What I wanted to do was get a few experiences down that aren't the proudest moments of my character, but I got stuck at just how I wanted to bring those out. So I decided to describe my character the way her worst enemy would to someone who didn't really know her.

Haha! It worked, I revealed some of my character's flaws and can now include them in a couple of experiences and adventures.

So I thought this exercise could really help in fiction stories too while developing your characters. If you need to develop a quirk with them or a secret dark side or what they are like once they pull their public "mask" off, go ahead and describe your main characters from a worst enemy's perspective. Maybe you could start out with...

I know what Tom's all about. The thing no one seems to realize about Tom is...

Or maybe ...

Jessica is so freakin' ridiculous. Just let me give you a few examples. When I walked into the ladies room, she was actually...

Or something of the like. Just get into your dissing mode and fire away. It's really fun and interesting what you can build into a character that way.

Hope this can help someone else as much as it helped me.

 

Terra

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This gave me something to think about Terra.

While I do something similar when describing a "bad" character in a book, I used your post to think about the book I'm writing about me.

When describing a character in my books, a bad one, I use people out of my past that I didn't care for.  I become their worst enemy, so to speak, when building them.  It's a little harder to do that to yourself, especially as an adult character.  LOL.. ouch. 

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Haha!

Perhaps I should have added a prerequisite is that you have to be able to laugh at yourself before you decide to diss up the dirt on yourself, lol!

I never take myself too seriously though because for me anyway, it adds up to contention and drama and stress and I hate those things. And I have never thought I was perfect. I know myself too well, lol! 

I guess this would be a good time to quote Socrates, "Know thyself" LOL! ;)

 

Terra

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  • 1 month later...

Character building has risen as a hotly debated issue in schools. Presently when I specify schools, I don't imply that it is constrained to them, rather this structures a basic part in marriage guiding, sports settings and work settings also. Basically, it can be properly said that it has ended up being a hotly debated issue in this day and age.

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14 minutes ago, Nancyrice said:

Character building has risen as a hotly debated issue in schools. Presently when I specify schools, I don't imply that it is constrained to them, rather this structures a basic part in marriage guiding, sports settings and work settings also. Basically, it can be properly said that it has ended up being a hotly debated issue in this day and age.

Hi Nancy, welcome to the forum. 

I don't mean any disrespect, but did you read the OP? Or the rest of the thread?

The first thing it clarifies is that the topic is in regards developing characters in your novels or story books.  This is the writer's subforum. ;)

 

Terra

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