Forget Questionnaires — Here Are 3 Things That Really Bring Your Characters to Life
Because they know who they are.
I have been working on a book project for some time, but I suddenly got stuck at some point. There was this one character who just sucked the whole existence out of my story every time he appeared. I couldn’t make him fit into the scene for the life of me, but I still kept forcing him into my story, which often resulted in a mass exodus of my creative brain cells. I honestly was about to ditch him and move ahead, but he somehow contributed to the overall plot, so I had to keep him. Besides, I was already too attached to him, no matter how much he felt like a cardboard cutout. So I had to find a way to bring him to life.
I started with some of those famous character questionnaires. You know, the general things you write down about your characters like age, birthday, hair color, physique, and stuff. Some others go into more detail, but mostly they’re a brief overview of who your character is and what he or she looks like. While consulting a considerable amount (not to say a boatload) of questionnaires, I realized something: I hate them. Wholeheartedly.
Answering all these almost identical questionnaires with the same information about my character did not help me render my defective character’s authenticity. After some unsuccessful character-crafting attempts with questionnaires, I had to take another approach. I asked myself: What does it really take to make this character more human? And I realized that not appearance makes him human. It makes him only realistic. But is he real? My character’s DNA must consist of more than just blond hair, sapphire blue eyes, and his everyday plain black clothing. He has a mindset. He has emotions, flaws, strengths. He has motivations, history, personality. And these are the exact 3 things that helped me create a multi-dimensional character.
Motivation
We humans don’t always know what we want and why we truly want it. There is often a subconscious reason why we want something. We sometimes also confuse it with what we truly need. The discrepancy between desire versus need is a great way to not only explore your character but also discover what lives in their subconscious. Fear for example is a great way to develop your character. It may contribute to making decisions, which lead to great plots. If your character is motivated by love, you can develop a love story full of happiness, and potential tragedy. Your character’s main goal is probably the whole reason you’re writing this book. The one singular thing your character dearly desires is very powerful. Once you’ve figured out what it is, dig deeper and discover the reason behind it. But remember that a strong story goal should not be easy to obtain. It requires your character to transform their mindset and behavior to achieve it.
History
We are all products of our pasts, and characters are, too. Even if you are not considering explicitly exploiting their childhood memories in your main story, they still influence your character’s thinking and behavior in the present. Mapping out a historical timeline of your character’s life is the basis of personal history. It helps to understand your character from a psychological standpoint. Record all significant milestones: birthdays, deaths, first kiss, moving away from home, having a child, new jobs, relationships. Especially relationships should not be underestimated. They are fundamental to human existence. Pay attention to family and friends dynamics. Whether they’re helpful or harmful, they do influence more than you realize. We’ve all run into people that we just do not get along with. Your character has, too.
Personality
Behavior is a very interesting thing. It’s influenced by many factors, like history, environment, beliefs, and much more. When we know what to expect, we know what to do — this sequence of cause-and-effect helps us navigate in life, and it also helps to create great characters. By exploring a character’s deepest layers and understanding them, we will learn how they will behave. Imagine your character in everyday situations. What do everyday emotions and reactions look like for them? Explore through various traits how they steer your character’s personality. Traits reveal a moral code, impact how your character interacts with others, how they view the world, how they achieve goals. Give them a mix of relatable features, along with flaws. Don’t forget to give them also some mystery. Treat your characters like a person your readers are meeting for the first time, and allow them to develop throughout the story. Think also about what your character sounds like. Consider pitch, tone, vocabulary, slang. Their voice is going to make them stand apart from all others. This is how they communicate. This is the external reflection of their thoughts.
Bear in mind: It is of course not always necessary to craft multiple facets to characters’ personalities. If there are one or two characters who are rather simplistic, it may not be necessarily a bad thing. As long as there’s a reason for it and you’re using one-dimensional characters correctly, especially by combining them with rounded characters, they may be a good literary device to keep the narrative moving. But if you really want to write real and good characters who are authentic and genuine, who live, feel, express, and act like real people, you have to know them deep into their core self. Don’t get me wrong: I do have some lists myself containing basic questions regarding facts like physical appearance, background, and personality. But I’ll also often fill up half a notebook per character about their beliefs, secrets, and relationships. I refer to these notes constantly throughout the actual writing process, not only for inspiration but also for fact-checking and development-tracking.
Pro-tip: When everything fails, let your characters just talk. I mean it. Ask them about something that annoys them, ask them about something that makes them happy. Ask them to complain, ask them to laugh, to cry, to scream. Ask them if they even want to be in this novel. Your character will always tell you a story. Don’t worry about the nonsense you might be getting out of this, you can revise it later or not even include it in your novel at all. But getting your characters to talk and listening to them is gold.
