The Place For My Writers Notes

Originally posted April 11, 2007

Clothing for your character

Writer's Digest, September 2004, pages 18 and 19, by Nancy Kress talks about how the clothing that your character wears defines the character. Nancy provides three different interpretations or perceptions of the clothing that you as a writer need to pay attention to.

First, you need to think about how the reader responds to the character's clothing. Nancy provides examples of how a blue silk dress with different accessories implies different things. "Ann wore a blue silk dress with a nail-studded choker and combat boots." gives a different impression from "Melissa wore a blue silk dress with pearls and black flats." Clothing, especially in combinations, suggests economic status, regional affiliations, other affiliations, personality traits, and even current emotional states. What is going on with someone who is wearing a bathrobe or underwear on the street?

Second, you need to think about that character's perception of the clothes. When the character gives his or her reaction to the clothing, this can help direct the reader's attention and interpretation. Especially where clothing is involved in emotional choice, think about what choices in outfitting are available to the character. If the clothing that the character chooses has some reason behind it, tell the reader about it. Finally, giving brief descriptions of the character's emotions -- how they feel about the clothes -- can give us some real insights.

Third, you need to think about what opinion other characters have about the clothing. Be careful, this can easily involve a sudden momentary shift of point of view, which is dangerous, but you can also just have the other character say something or do something to show us what they think of the clothing. If you're going to do this, make sure that the characters and the outfits and the opinions actually tell us something significant.

Nancy concludes, "Clothing, then, is much more than mere covering. It's personality, it's status, it's economics, it's a language all its own. Use it to say something about your characters. Readers will hear you."

Interesting. When I read this, I started thinking about some short stories that I've read recently. In most of them, I'm not even sure what the characters are wearing. On the other hand, some stories seem to have lavish descriptions of the clothing.

I did like Nancy's three points. What does the reader think about it? What does the character think about it? And what do other characters think about it? These can actually be applied to many different facets of a story. The action that a character takes. A speech by some character. Or even the overall plot.

Something to think about. Just what is your character wearing, and does it make a difference?

tink (in the interests of full disclosure, when I wrote this, I was wearing a blue flannel shirt, grey sweatpants, and black socks. Sitting at the computer at home, that's enough. Oh, yes, I was wearing underwear, but we don't need to go into detail about that.)