EXERCISE: Revealing Characters

[mbarker.livejournal.com]

original posting: Tue, 15 Oct 2002 22:25:00 -0400

(from the past...)

REVEALING CHARACTERS

No, this isn't a column on erotic writing, flashers in the park, or even intellectual or religious breakthroughs.

However, I do think these exercises can help you develop the art of revealing characters through actions and objects.  The first one focuses on a character overcoming obstacles -- the very simple roadblocks we all encounter trying to go from here to there.  The second puts a character in the odd situation of coming home and finding that everyone there remembers them as being a very different person.  The third looks at a character through the contents of a box.

Oh, in case you're having trouble getting the first line of a story, I've tossed one in.  Feel free to use it -- but once you've started the story, I do expect you to finish it, okay?

All right?  Get your keyboards, pads and pencils, or whatever ready, and let's see whether we can't get those characters out in plain sight...

Exercise 1.  In The Way

[I am gleefully ignoring the Quarterly report that is due, the idiot who thinks our development group has unlimited resources, and all the other minor distractions...]

1.  Pick a character.  This character, like so many of us, is over here (pick your place!).  Due to the machinations of the author (that's you!), they want to be over there (you decide again!).  They are going over there to meet--a minor character, a romantic conquest, a sinister antagonist, sterling protagonist, or ??? --someone anyway.

2.  Roll the die.  First roll, pick odd or even.  Second, pick a number.  (or you could just pick a number from one to twelve, but that would be too simple...)

   ODD
   1.  sadness  2. distress  3.  relief  4.  joy   5.  hate  6. love

   EVEN
   1.  fear  2. anticipation 3.  anger  4.  guilt   5.  gratitude  6. pride

(other lists of emotions can be found in thesauri, etc.)

3.  So, your character is going from here to there to meet another character toward whom they feel your chosen emotion.  Stop now and think about why they feel this emotion.  Did the other character shoot their dawg, and so they are angry, seeking revenge?  Just what happened that inspired our character to look forward with joy-colored glasses to meeting the fellow with the sweaty underwear?

4.  Now, the current mania is to do a camera cut and *poof!* we are there.  But let's give your character (and your reader) time to really go from here to there.  Your character is going to take a walk, skateboard, bike, drive something, ride the bus, catch the trolley... and along the way...

5.  Roll the die one more time.  Pick a number (one to six).  Got it?

1. a foreign tourist asks for help and directions
2. there is a detour
3. mechanical breakdown...flat tire, dead brakes, you decide
4. a passing stranger screams and collapses
5. major natural trouble--storm, tornado, earthquake, you decide
6. a street person really gets in the way asking for change

6.  That's it!  Your character goes through this little scene, this play, of starting out from over here (with a certain emotional cast, intent on the other person) and heading over there where they expect to meet the significant other.  Along the way, there's a small obstacle...

Write it up.  If possible, don't tell us what the emotion is -- SHOW it to us, in the way they react to the obstacle.  Who knows, dealing with this interruption may teach them something about the situation they were headed for -- or at least change the way they look at it.

[Bonus for the over-achievers out there:  Go ahead and put a few more obstacles along the way.  Raise the stakes and make it harder and harder for your character to get there.  Do they put their head down and get stubborn, or just give up and go with the flow?  (That's the flash flood running through the arroyo cutting across their path!)]

Exercise 2.  Who is that masked man?

First, pick a character from a story you have written or are working on.

Got him or her clearly in your mental eye?

Ok!  Now, your character just went to their hometown (or somewhere else that they expected they would be recognized).  No problem - but the person that everyone remembers and presents to your character is COMPLETELY different from what they remember and think.

Questions:  What's wrong?  Are the townspeople right or is your character right?  How does the character react to this?

YOUR CHALLENGE:  Figure that out and write up the scene.  Make sure that the conflict in memories is clearly brought out through actions and dialogue. Have your character (and the reader) work out the problem, react to it, and eventually resolve it.

Exercise 3.  That Old Box...

Yo!  Are you ready to roll out some words?

Okay, let's try this.  It's based on one of them thar country songs that I heard while we were rolling down a real highway (Route 60, in the Apache Reservation, near Salt River Canyon, if you want to be precise.  Talk about beautiful country!)

1.  Pick two (or more) characters.  Work out their relationship(s) up to this time.  (relatives are fairly easy, others can be good too.)

2.  Pick one of the characters to die.   Suddenly or peacefully, young or old, the ways and means are up to you.

3.  The other character(s) finds (gets by mail, stumbles over in a field, take your pick) a box that belonged to the recently deceased.

4.  Your turn!  Write up the scene... Finding/getting the box. Realizing what it is.  Opening it.  What's inside--and how does this "collection" change the character's beliefs and attitudes toward the deceased?

Unpacking a box--make us see, hear, smell, feel the contents of the box, and the emotional shakeup as the character(s) discover that the deceased really was...

Well, that's up to you!

One-sentence starting power?  How about...

"I'll get over there right away," she said, and hung up the phone.

Words and more words, please?
sprinkle lightly with punctuation
and smooth with humor.
Can I get that to go?  In a pocketbook?

Write!

EXERCISE: Speeding into Memories

[mbarker.livejournal.com]

Original posting: Sun, 13 Oct 2002 00:21:14 -0400

another old column...  feel free to play along!

Speeding into Memories

As we move into summer, I thought I'd give you a little speedwriting exercise and one focusing on remembering for those slow days out on the beach (or wherever you may be relaxing).

Eggtimers and writing?

I realize that most of the time, we like to consider carefully, give ourselves plenty of time, and otherwise move slowly when writing.  (something like a tortoise?)

BUT--today we're going to practice speedwriting!

A ten minute exercise!  Anyone can squeeze in ten minutes, right?

Get yourself a three minute timer.  Eggtimers, a friend, perhaps even that funny timer on your watch that you've never used.

Oh, and don't forget the die (the singular of dice, like nye is the singular of nice:-)

A.  Roll twice, picking a first and last name.

1.  Arlene  2.  Gina   3.  Laura   4.  Boris  5.  Felix  6.  Isaac

1.  Smith  2.  Johnson  3.  Williams  4.  Jones  5.  Brown  6.  Miller

Write for three minutes about this person.  Where did they grow up? What kind of family?  What kind of work do they do now?  Write!

1...2...3...4...5...6...7...8...9......

BUZZZZZZZZZZZ!

Time's up.

Settle down.  Put that description aside, take a sip of your water (coffee, tea, or...your choice).

Ready?  Okay.

B.  Roll twice, picking a first and last name.

1.  Lee  2.  Noah  3.  Ralph  4.  Vicki  5.  Portia  6.  Muriel

1.  Davis  2.  Anderson  3.  Wilson  4.  Thompson  5.  Moore  6.  Taylor

And, once again, write for three minutes.  Where did this person come from, and where are they going?  What kind of face do they see when they look in the mirror?  Who are they?

1..2..3..4..5..6..7..8..9....

RINGGGGG!

Time's up, please put down your keyboards and other input devices.

Breath, breath, stretch.  You may want to print the descriptions or at least review the two pieces you've written.

C.  Okay, now take these two people and bang them together!

In three minutes, write a scene where they meet.  What do they say to each other?  What kind of conflict might occur just from their backgrounds?  What kind of "bond" or "crucible" where they have to deal with each other might occur?  Write!

1.2.3.4.5.6.7.8.9...

BONG.  BONG.  BONG.

They said it couldn't be done.  But here you are, running those little fingers right over the finish line, with the crowd cheering, the tape snapping across your chest, the coach throwing a towel over your sweating wrists.

Relax.  You may want to set this aside and later come back to it.  If you want to continue the scene now, go ahead, but do plan to revise and strengthen the piece you've written, looking for spots where (in the heat of the exercise!) you may have told rather than shown the reader, senses that didn't get touched, and other details to polish.

So, champ, what's next?  Another 10 minute exercise?   (imagine doing three scenes in a half-hour after lunch :-)  A bit slower pace?  Some thoughtful revision of the quick draft you've just written?

Windsprints for the mental fingers--alternate with some endurance runs, a little weightlifting, and in no time at all, you'll be pushing words with the best.

Once In Every Childhood...

A quick, simple exercise that you can take as far as you like.  Although I've written it for a story, you could also use it for poetic fodder.  Enjoy, and keep those fingers moving...

1.  Pick your emotion.

flip a coin.  and roll a die (okay, pick a number from one to six...)

heads?  your list is:

   1.  sadness  2. distress  3.  relief  4.  joy  5.  hate  6. love

tails?  your list is:

   1.  fear  2. anticipation 3. anger  4. guilt  5.  gratitude  6. pride

2.  Remember.  Remember.  Rememb...is that record skipping again?

Sometime when you were a child, you experienced this emotion. Remember that time.  Roll back the years, let those wrinkles smooth away, and put yourself in those days of yore, with the laughing friends making you cry even harder over...or maybe the terror when you drove the neighbor's new gocart and the pedal stuck so you couldn't slow down...or what about the anger you felt when you saw that someone else was in your favorite seat on the bus?

3.  Write it up.  You can push the details around, maybe make the air from the drunk's mouth stink even worse than you really remember, or have Freddie's braces have these enormous spikes that tore into your lip...but make us feel the emotion.  Make us jump in our seats, lean into the spin, call out her name as our favorite dog runs into the traffic and the truck hits...

4.  Now.  Take that same emotion and scene, but rewrite it so that your protagonist (or even the antagonist, doesn't matter) is experiencing it with perhaps slightly different (adult type) surroundings.  Instead of the gocart whizzing around the vacant lot, maybe it's a militarized dunebuggy sliding around Las Vegas?  Or what if the daughter of the police chief darts into traffic and is crushed?

Write about what you know?  You certainly know how you felt...don't you?  Just remember.  Stare into the little whirling bits on the screen and remember...

Then write about it!