Although we're now well into Spring (or so we
hope...), back in January when the weather was still bitterly cold and nobody was sure if we'd see the other side, we set you the first WEBook writing challenge of 2016!
In order to distract ourselves from the cold and the seemingly endless darkness, we set you a whimsical challenge that harked back to times of
your youthful innocence (ha ha). We asked you to
breathe life in to things that were devoid of soul; to animate the inanimate.
We asked you to look below the surface of what you see before you, and show us
something else hidden there.
Is your water bottle really content with you consuming
it's innards?
Does your highlighter see its work as enlightening, or a real drag?
Each entrant to the January Challenge gave life to objects from various corners of our daily lives. We saw bickering clothing
and manipulative smart phones, exasperated laptops and gangland kitchen
utensils. Each entry was brilliant and unique and really helped to divert away from
the dull skies of January (thank youuuuu).
***
Whether you find this disassociation from the humanity
of character something that is a help or a hinderance to your writing is
entirely dependent upon your personal skill set. However,
you can always use this type of writing challenge to explore character
development in a more academic, or (if you don't like that word) structured
way. So, let's strip it back to basics and look at how to develop a character
from scratch.
The first, and most important thing that every
character needs to have, regardless of whether they're good, bad, male, female,
fat, thin, old or young, is a goal.
Every person, object or creature must have a purpose
for being. Whether we're talking about the water bottle, whose purpose it is to
store water, or the heroine, who strives to save her village from bandits, or
the man who simply wants to get a good turkey sandwich, every
character needs a goal.
Identify what is standing in the way of
your character's goal (the challenge), and what are they going to do - or not do - about
it (the action)?
It's at this point that you can start exploring the
personality of your character based on their reaction to this central situation. Let's
take our man in need of his turkey sandwich. For weeks he's been dedicating his
lunch-hour to testing out different sandwich shops, hoping to rediscover that
one perfect turkey sandwich he ate on his first day in the city.
So, now we've got three basic character traits that
have been revealed organically. This is opposed to an author superimposing a
variety of traits onto their character, which may or may not work out to be
complementary later on down the line.
Relying on organic development is endlessly beneficial
when creating a believable character portrait for your reader. You can use this
approach to develop any number of peculiarities and quirks for your character.
Because you're the
author you can of course circumvent this by manipulating the story to suit your needs, but it's
usually best to start with a triad of three main traits that you can build upon
and diversify from there. People change, and so can characters.
Once you've got this solid foundation, you can start
to have a bit more fun with your character. Give them some hair (or not),
choose what colour their eyes are and describe what the sun feels like on their
face. It's useful to write down your three main character traits on a piece of
paper and keep referring back to it as you write. Add on any new traits that
are revealed in your character as your story develops, and keep reinforcing
these as time goes on.
Before you know it, you'll have a solid, believable
character who fits perfectly in your story. Whether your character is a man in
search of a turkey sandwich, or a bottle wincing with pain each time its
innards are drained by a thirsty human, is up to you...
The winner of our January Challenge: Below the Surface
was Josafat with their creepy tale of the murderous scissors, Scissors of Mercy.
This story left us wondering if it was the scissors who drove the action or their mistress. Wonderfully characterised, the scissors were brought to life in a luxurious flurry of comedic sexualisation and bloodlust.
Josafat was kind enough to have a chat with us about
their entry. Read on below for the full interview.
WEbook: The object you selected to
personify in your winning entry, the scissors, are represented in a way that
highlights their ability to create and destroy. This theme of creation and
destruction runs neatly through you piece and we see this presented in a number
of ways. For example, the pajamas that the woman and the scissors have both
created and destroyed, the relationship between husband and wife that was once
created and (we assume) the husband has destroyed.
These oppositions create an interesting
structure within the story – were you actively trying to balance the story like
this, or was it something that came naturally?
As writing progressed, the destructive
aspect emerged; it had been hidden both from me and from the scissors
until the seamstress' atypical actions began to reveal a crisis. After that
point, when the scissors knew something was different, the destructive aspect
became as important as the creative aspect, and I consciously wove this into
the story's crisis.
The pajamas are a physical example of
that creation and destruction. However, I had not realized that the
relationship between husband and wife was the abstraction that echoed that
destruction, at least not consciously, but it makes sense that the
relationship, having been forged of love (usually a creative force) was
destroyed through the husband's annihilation.
In fetishizing the object within the
strain of personification, the scissors take on a personality of their own –
did you find it difficult to develop a personality for an inanimate object?
What method did you use to approach the development of its personality as an
object rather than a human character?
Josafat: Choosing the scissors as the
object of the story facilitated my process mainly by the fact that scissors
have "eyes" yet cannot see. From that point on it was easy to let the
personality emerge by playing with the basic usage of scissors: once sticks
one's fingers in its eyes! That, and the scissors' inherent blindness, which I
solved by seeing through the seamstress' eyes, were the raw material upon which
to build the character. The fact that scissors, in a seamstress' hands, are a tool of creation, made them automatically partakers in the creative process. Furthermore, the fact that they cut and could be used to hurt made it logical for the next stage to destroy with the same blades that would otherwise make beauty.
These limitations are what made it
crucial to make the scissors an object of magic and sensual creation when
manipulated by the seamstress.
WEbook: You’ve set yourself up for a
continuation of this story with the scissors' new mistress, do you think we’ll
get to hear more about the murderous scissors?
Josafat: Funnily enough, as I wrote that
last paragraph, the images of what would happen next naturally flowed through
my mind. The appeal of the scissors' newfound "hobby" of killing
definitely played into the way I wrote the paragraph.
In this story the scissors, from my
point of view as the author, were blameless until they embraced the killing and
realized they would do it again. Interestingly enough, a friend of mine who
read the story said she would be ready to read the subsequent series, so it is
likely that the adventure will continue, hopefully with some form of redemption
for the scissors at some point.
WEbook: Who is the true killer in your
mind? The scissors and their jealousy or the woman holding them and her desire
for revenge?
Josafat: This question touches a
crucial point about the story writing that reflects my inability,
even as the author, to decipher what is really hidden in the few lines that
tell of the scissors' apparent predisposition to kill the husband given the
mentioned jealousy before the crime occurred.
So my first answer would be that the
woman is the true killer, but there is something about this that still leaves
me to think that there is more in the relationship between the woman and her
tool that could say otherwise.
Josafat: I must say Sprayoncrayon.
His writing shows a wittiness and creativity that appeal to my reading senses.
I have loved his submissions to the monthly contests as well as some of his
other work and I believe he is always one of my top contenders.
Josafat: I have a piece titled Coventry
Carol actively in work. Interestingly enough, this piece was meant to
be part of the Christmas 2015 monthly challenge, but it grew much longer than I
could fit in 850 words so I am now writing it as its own thing.
The piece, as the challenged called, is
a Christmas story about a girl named Carol. Carol is a mystery. She always
wears black and shows unexpected racial tolerance in a small community where
racism is alive and dictates the dynamics of the small population. The story is
told by another girl, Camille, who is enraptured by Carol's uniqueness and
wants to become her friend. Fate brings them together as events both beyond and
within their control unfold around them.
Josafat: I will always love Anne Rice,
with her vampires and witches. I have read and re-read her different series
many summers. I am enchanted by her philosophy of the supernatural and, were I
to become a vampire, I would want to be one of hers.
Other books on my top list are Girl with
a Pearl Earring—which appeals to my artist persona, the Hyperion series—one of
my favorite sci-fi series, and The Sword of Truth Series, by
Terry Goodkind.
Josafat: To step outside of the
ordinary, to oppose the commonplace and juxtapose ideas that would seem to
clash at first. In other words, to let some of the randomness within their own
minds come forth, to weave concepts and images with each other, and find
associations that may seem impossible at first.
Also, to just write and write and write,
letting the flow come forth and then not be afraid to cut away the extra,
that which is not needed to gain focus in a short story.
In summary, take a large batch of the
best scented flowers and mix them together to then extract the 850-word pure
essence that will "wow" the reader.
WEbook: Thanks for taking the time to talk to us Josafat! Congratulations again on your win, and we look forwards to seeing many more of your entries over the coming months.
- 03:51
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