 Mystery: January 27, 2010 Issue [#3493] |
  Mystery
This week: Quirks and Personality Disorders Edited by: esprit  
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Voice can be referred to as the specific fingerprint of an author, as every author has a different writing style. In creative writing, students are often encouraged to experiment with different literary styles and techniques in order to help them better develop their "voice."
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Quirks and Personality Disorders
Still building your 3-D characters? Ready for the next step? You can take it all the way through to finish a character driven short story that could only happen in your imagination. Learn the elements one step at a time and then find the best way to blend them into great characters.
Odd habits grow memorable characters
quirk - Definition [kwûrk]
(n.) A peculiarity of behavior; an idiosyncrasy:
Quirks are those odd behavior habits that we all have. Quirks are personality based, not to be confused with traits or just plain oddities.
Quirks come from inside the character, from the personality. Remember Kojak, the bald detective with the tootsie-pop? I don't remember why he was compelled to use it, (perhaps a substitution for smoking?), but the reason was deeper than just a taste for sweets. It was more than a prop. The character was enhanced and remembered because of his quirk, so it worked.
Personality quirks are only truly identified after you know the character well enough to recognize his normal personality. The first stage is to get to know your character to get a sense of what type of personality he has. If you have used the exercise in It Takes a Village , you will know whether a character is outgoing or reserved, task-oriented or theory-oriented, logical or emotional, organized or messy. You will now have a better idea of the type of quirk he has and how it happened to come into being. It should fit in with the plot, helping to explain why he does what he does.
A few of the bad guys in this village may actually suffer from personality 'disorders', rather than simple quirks. Find out what causes disorders and become familiar with the outward signs and symptoms by researching a few psychology sites, they're easy to find--just Google 'personality disorders'. For simpler quirks read Dr. Phil, or watch his show. The writing goes much smoother if you have the cause and effect of your chosen quirks based on fact. Remember, fiction must be believable.
Write a few scenes with characters you've been creating from other exercises, but this time experiment with making them odd (or outright psycho). Let their quirks show in a few scenes until they feel natural, but beware of using more than one per character. One is enough when it comes to oddities, unless your character happens to need two to make it work the way you want it to.
Minor characters may not need as much profiling as major characters, but the more real they are, the better your story will be. Besides, who says they will remain minor? At some point, such as a future story, a minor character may be promoted to Main Character. I think it would be pretty handy to have a bevy of trained, ready-to-go characters, don't you?
Putting it All Together
You now know a few of your characters inside-out, and you've played with backgrounds and interaction. You know what makes them tick and what pushes their buttons. It's time to write a story. Choose a couple of your favorites who you know hate each other, along with a conflict that will bring out the worse in them--lock the gate and turn them loose. Instead of a plot with so-so characters, you'll have a character-rich story that only you could have written--straight from your creative subconscious mind.
This is part of a series of tips to help show how to blend ingredients to find your 3-D characters. I hope you have fun with it, but more importantly, I hope you find your creative side--the side that loves to write what it imagines
Thanks for reading,
** Image ID #1528029 Unavailable **
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Comments on "Invalid Entry"
By: drifter46
Comment: Names.
Gladys Pumphrey, a squat, round, apple cheeked woman. Mid 50's, Antique store owner.
Ethan Morris. Tall, thin, red wavy hair. Sunken cheeks and thin lips. Wears a waist coat, white ruffled shirt with cuffs that protrude from the coat's sleeves. He lives in a Victorian home in New England.
Unknown woman. Long flowing red hair, white knee length dress with a plunging neck line and short puffed sleeves. White peep toed pumps. A white gardenia is usually tucked neatly behind one ear. Location: A bar in New Orleans.
Names, locations and manner of dress are all important. Thanks for the reminder
Excellent examples of how the name helps describe the character, Jack. The short roundness of the letters in 'Pumphrey', and the sound naturally show a short round character. The tall, thin letters in 'Ethan' demand a tall, thin character to follow.
Clothing can also be used to rounding out a character as you've shown here. If Ethan happened to be a jeans and t-shirt man, the setting wouldn't fit.
By: DB Cooper
Comment: I changed my name twenty years ago so I AGREE 100% about names. Adolf Hitler was Schicklgrouper!
Thanks, D.B, 
By: StephBee 
Comment: Esprit, I agree - the character names of a story mean a lot. Thanks so much for making us think about them.
Steph, thank you!
By: NanoWriMo2018 Into the Earth 
Comment: I agree with you on names. thanks for your NL, esprit.
"Thanks, Robin. 
By: D.L. Fields
Comment: Helpful tools for finding if a name was used in a particular era: high school yearbooks, local and state historical societies, obituaries, newspapers from that time period.
These are great tips, thank you!
We always appreciate feedback, thanks!
Editors:
Kate - Writing & Reading 
Vivian 
Your guest host this week is esprit
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