My Top 4 Tips for Character Creation

Blimey, it’s been a long time since I’ve posted anything on here! Well, I shall use the far too often used and terribly clichéd reason that life kind of got in the way. There has been a bit of progress on my novel ‘Cara’s Journey’ but nowhere near as much as I would have liked. And I really should get around to writing part 2 of that short story ‘The Messenger’ I posted last year, given a couple of people seemed to like it.

Anyhow, in the meantime I thought I’d give some more (hopefully useful) tips, this time around creating characters for your written work. I have a loose process for this myself that may come in handy, so here you go; my top 5 tips for character creation.

1. Your Main Protagonist/Heroine/Hero/Alien/Horse/Creature (remove as appropriate)

So, you’ve come up with an idea for a novel/short story etc, but you’re not sure where to start. Well, I’d suggest your main character. Get the basics down first. Think about their age, gender, sexuality, political leanings, species (if relevant), education, childhood and personality. What motivates and drives them? What is their main goal in your narrative? Are they nervous, unsure of themselves and do they lack confidence? Or are they arrogant, overconfident and have a cocky swagger?

Obviously, the length of your narrative will affect character development; a novel will have much more scope than a short story, for example.

You may think this is a lot of effort to go to for a fictional character, but it’s a great way to create a more rounded ‘3d’ persona that will be more believable for your reader. What do you want the reader to feel about this character? Will the character inspire empathy and sympathy, or will the reader come to dislike them? Perhaps your main character will start out as ‘bad’ and then redeem themselves by the end of the narrative. Humans are not ‘black and white’, so any character that is 100% ‘good’ or ‘evil’ is probably going to come across as less believable to the reader.

If your character is a non-human then you have free range to create behavioural, personality and societal traits that could be very different to that of a human. However, in this case it’d be useful to create a baseline for how the species generally behaves so you can refer back to this when writing your character,

Remember, your main character is the central linchpin of your story; your fictional world hinges around them and their actions.  Their personality, beliefs, and upbringing will affect how they behave during your narrative. You could also use these techniques to help create the other characters in your narrative.

2. Study Human Behaviour Around You

Unless you’ve been living in a cave or under a rock (we shall ignore the Covid-19 lock down periods from 2020-2021), chances are you come into contact with a wide range of people in your day-to-day life. Real people are a great source of inspiration for building characters and personalities. Think about your relatives, your partner/spouse, your children (if you have any), your work colleagues, your friends etc. Heck even your pets and animals could be used as inspiration, as we tend to give them human characteristics and attributes.

Given the massive variety of humans out there, you’re bound to come into contact with someone who could spark an idea for a character. Got any artistic or creative people in your immediate or wider circle? Bound to be some gems in there. Any scientists? Anyone who has an unconventional lifestyle? I bet you know more interesting people than you think you do. Observe people whilst out and about and see how they behave (in a non pervy way of course). If you’re feeling confident, you could try striking up a conversation with someone random. (I see all you introverts at the back recoiling in horror. I know, I’m one too but most people don’t bite, I promise!)

3. Research Human Behaviour

If you’re more of a virtual researcher and less of a social butterfly, there are tons of resources online about human behaviour, what makes people tick, psychology etc. I’m really into doing personality tests and digging into what makes me tick and why I behave the way I do. One of my favourites that I’ve come across so far is based on the Myers Briggs personality typology.  You can do a free test on a website called 16personalties (https://www.16personalities.com/) which will generate a four-letter code that gives you your Myers Briggs personality type. You can also read about the other 15 personality types. All great stuff for helping with character creation. Some types are more logic driven, others are idealistic and more emotional. You could even try creating a character based around one of the 16 personalities.

4. Think About Your Favourite Fictional and Real-Life Characters

I’m assuming, if you are a fiction writer (or even non-fiction) that you have read many books. If not, what are you doing!? Go and read. I mean, I’ve heard you must be a voracious reader to be a great writer.

Anyway, you are bound to have fictional characters and people from real life that you admire and/or empathise with. Get out a notepad and have a think. Why do you admire these characters? If fictional, think about how they are written/portrayed and what draws you to them. Are there specific techniques the author/creator has used for the character that you could perhaps adapt? Could you take aspects of your favourite characters and incorporate these into your own creations? If it’s a real-life person, for example, someone championing a cause you are enthusiastic about, what is it that you admire about them?

It’d also be useful would be to think of fictional characters and real-life people that you dislike (and why), as these could be a good starting point for creating adversaries for your main character and their supporting cast.

Summary

So, there you have it, my top 4 tips for character creation; your main protagonist, studying and researching human behaviour, and thinking about your favourite fictional and real-life characters. I hope you found this useful! I’d love to hear about other people’s character creation processes. Feel free to comment below.