Survey: Hardest Character to write? by Arcadia

BLUE SUN ROOM

Survey: Hardest Character to write?

POSTED BY: ARCADIA
UPDATED: Saturday, January 13, 2007 06:21
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Saturday, January 13, 2007 6:21 AM

I think I have the hardest times with scenes between Mal and Inara. I can peg them separately, but when I put them in a scene together, it never sounds quite right to me... They are always between awkwardly tender and angrily snappy. I think I fail at snappy (though I'd appreciate y'alls opinions on the matter).

My rule of thumb with River is "the two metaphor rule." Take what you want River to say, turn it into a metaphor. Then make a metaphor for the metaphor. Somewhere in the midst of the exercise you'll find what you need. The other thing that helps me is her academic view of the world. When she sees pebbles on the ground, she will try to count them (see Serenity, deleted scenes). She wants to quantify things because that makes it more real to her. Don't be afraid to mix lucid and cryptic and remember that not everything she says is seeing the future. It's all there.

The thing that helps me most is finding the essence of a character's reaction to a situation. Once you have the general emotion behind a voice, it comes out a little easier.

One thing I do, when I can't quite find a character's voice, is wander into Blue Sun and read other people's fiction. Different authors have talent for different voices, and a little venture into reading can help one of those voices ring a little truer in your head and help you write it yourself. (That's a veiled thank you to all you other writers out there!)

I suppose I'm getting long-winded now, so I'll stop. Hope my ramblings have been helpful and informative...
-vb

"Just like handgrenades, you don't want to run into a horseshoe stake in the dark." -Gouda, FFF.net

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