Two Creative Ways to Express Character Traits from Writer's Digest University

Writer's Digest University
June 15, 2010

Two Creative Ways to Express Character Traits
Beyond the basics of good writing lie the more creative elements – skills that elevate the craft of writing to the art of writing. Take your creative writing to the next level – no matter what type of writing you do. Learn techniques to add depth, texture, and emotion to your writing. You will also gain the knowledge of how to engage all of a reader's senses, ways to set the mood, put characters in motion, and more!

Inside Excerpt from Session One:

External & Internal Character Traits
Most writers use some form of character chart as a way to get to know their characters better. Basically, you're looking for something that's a cross between a police profile and personal interview (of course, if you're writing nonfiction, you can use the chart to keep track of the actual traits you've made note of). Tip: Keep completed character charts handy while you're writing; with these charts posted on your bulletin board or on your computer desktop, you can instantly find the detail(s) you need.

Remember that great characters are a complex mixture of both sympathetic and unsympathetic traits. Villains like Hannibal Lecter in Thomas Harris's The Silence of the Lambs are compelling because, along with their repellant, horrifying habits, there is also a glimmer—however faint—of something good (or at least understandable). Lecter's intelligence, artistic ability, and parental affection for Agent Starling make us care about him on some involuntary level, no matter how much we also loathe him.

Not only should your bad guys not be all bad, your good guys can't be all good either. Philip Marlow in Raymond Chandler's mysteries is an alcoholic loner who passes the time between cases playing chess with himself. Cervantes' Don Quixote is no less a hero for being a little crazy. They are knights in slightly tarnished armor. Yet, these very character flaws provide the obstacles that must be overcome in order for them to be heroic.

So take some time to create traits that will make your fictional characters complex and memorable. And if you're dealing with a real-life "character," be sure to dig below the surface to find the inevitable contradictions.

Internal traits are about emotion and motivation: What does the character want? Why does she or he want it? What does the character love/hate/fear? Why? These traits are revealed through the character's reactions to events and other characters, their actions in the story, and their biases or opinions about the world at large.

Whenever possible, try to link an internal trait with an external "marker": a character who is shy (internal trait) may blush when approached by a stranger (external marker); a character who is claustrophobic (internal trait) may avoid elevators (external marker).

Workshop: Creativity & Expression

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Start Date: Thursday June 24th

Instructor: Gloria Kempton

Workshop Length: 8 Weeks

Price: $250.00 Now only $225.00!
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Using Anecdotes To Flavor Your Articles [or Your Fiction Writing--NS]
An anecdote is a little story that writers use to enrich their articles. Anecdotes flavor articles by adding a human quality to them, by giving inside information about small things that actually happened to people, and often by giving insights into human frailties, characteristics, and qualities that could not be shown as vividly any other way.

Read the Full Article to Learn How to Maximize Anecdotes

This article was excerpted from the Focus on the Nonfiction Magazine Article workshop. The next class starts on June 17th with Rita Robinson