Dynamic Characters- How to create personalities that keep readers captivated

by Nancy Kress

  Similarly, the forty-year-old man who in the past two years has worked as a salesclerk, handyman, busboy, truck driver, day laborer, telemarketer and petty thief—and none of them for more than four months at a stretch—has a different self-image. He sees the world as hostile (''Look what they did to me now!'') and himself as a fundamental loser. Is he? Maybe that's what your novel is about.

  On the other hand, a string of jobs is normal for a twenty-year-old still searching for his place in the world. Before he becomes a doctor, W. Somerset Maugham's Philip Carey (Of Human Bondage) tries out accountant, artist and floorwalker. He is confused about himself, his talents and his desires, and his confusion is beautifully dramatized by his wildly disparate jobs.

  GIVE HIM A JOB THAT TELLS US ABOUT HIS IMAGE OF THE WORLD

  This may come less from his choice of job than from his attitude toward its permutations. He's a cop: Is he the type who prefers to work with troubled kids or the type who prefers to break down doors and get rough with perps? She's a fashion designer: Does she fawn on rich customers, or enjoy adapting pretty clothes for the average female figure? He's an accountant—does he genuinely enjoy the work, or did he choose it because it's a secure job, with regular hours and no physical danger, in a frightening world? Show us.

  GIVE HIM A JOB THAT LETS US ASSESS HIS TALENTS

  This comes partly from how well he succeeds at different aspects of his profession. Is he organized? Clumsy? Hopeless with people? Persuasive? Punctual? Patient? Persistent? Show us, through how he handles work duties.

  GIVE HIM A JOB THAT FITS THE NOVEL'S SOCIAL CIRCUMSTANCES

  I recall a recent, let-it-be-nameless romance in which a woman was supposedly paying the rent on a New York penthouse apartment and supporting two kids on her salary as an art-gallery assistant. She also dressed superbly and sent a lot of roses. People familiar with art-gallery salaries and New York prices howled with derisive laughter. If you need your character to have lots of money and he hasn't inherited it, stolen it or married it, give him a job where he can earn it.

  The same goes for more intangible acquisitions. If your character has impressive political connections, either have her born into a political family (a la the Kennedys) or employ her in a place where logically she would meet a lot of high-ranking politicians. If your plot requires that she know a lot about the workings of the FBI, and you don't want her to work for the Bureau itself, then she might be a journalist on the Washington beat, or a cop who regularly attends law-enforcement programs at the FBI training center in Virginia, or a caterer with a contract at the Hoover building. Be inventive.

  GIVE HIM A JOB THAT YOU CAN WRITE ABOUT IN CREDIBLE DETAIL

  As in all aspects of writing, the details make the difference. Your character is going to spend eight hours a day at this job—a third of his life. It's very real to him. Therefore, you must make it real to us. You can't do that if you don't know anything about it. Personnel manager may be no more than a vague label to you—but to a person who is one, it's a very specific set of tasks, headaches, triumphs, hurdles and goals. We need to share them. Not all of them, and not necessarily in exhaustive depth, but convincingly enough that we will believe this character really invests time and energy in what you say he does.

  For instance, the reviews of Judy Blume's adult novel Smart Women almost universally pointed out that the teenage characters were much more successful than the adults. Blume, of course, has much more experience with creating youthful characters; she is one of the best-selling writers of young adult fiction in America. Nonetheless, I think the lack of realism in Smart Women's mature protagonist related directly to that protagonist's job.

  Margo Sampson is supposed to be an architect with a small Colorado firm, a position that demands a great deal of creative effort. Yet Margo is never shown thinking about her designs, sacrificing personal time to solve technical problems, handling job details, meeting with clients or encountering the frustrations inevitable to building anything. She has none of the professional highs, lows or absorption detailed in, for example, Tracy Kidder's wonderful nonfiction book about building, House. Instead, whenever Margo's job is mentioned, it's usually in connection with her love affairs: She had an affair with her boss; she keeps a list of her lovers in the top drawer of her desk; a design contract is determined by her boyfriend's ex-wife's jealousy.

  But, you might ask, so what? This is a book about relationships, not about building. Why does it matter if Margo is not very convincing as an architect?

  It matters because it makes Margo less convincing. In the real

  world, a job is many things to a person: means of support, proof of worth, daily challenge, path to social betterment, confirmation of worldview, source of exhaustion and pride and delight and frustration and, sometimes, incredible anger. Anything that real to your character must also be made real to us. Otherwise, this person lacks a major dimension. He seems less than fully there.

  GETTING IT RIGHT

  The easiest way to portray a job realistically is to give your character work you've done yourself. William Styron worked as a manuscript reader; so did his character Stingo in Sophie's Choice. P.D. James, mystery writer, was an administrator in the British justice system. John Steinbeck, like so many of his characters, had experience as a day laborer. Robin Cook, author of medical thrillers, is a doctor. Scott Turow, like Rusty in Presumed Innocent and Sandy in The Burden of Proof, is a lawyer. Employing your character where you yourself have worked means you know the territory. You can—and should—include details that deepen verisimilitude: the field's individual jargon, the duties, stress points, standard procedures, hazards, equipment, perks, career paths, pecking order, even insider jokes. In addition to deepening credibility, such details are often interesting to readers who have never worked in that job.

  But your character can work in fields you have not. If you don't know what your protagonist's job feels like from the inside, find out. Talk to people in that line of work. Most people are flattered to be asked about their professions, and a good talker can tell you more personal details than any published source. Ask for the frustrations, glitches, problems.

  For jobs that are at least partially on public display, observe carefully. How does the waitress address her boss? What tools does the locksmith use while changing your locks? What obstacles beset the taxi driver? How do the construction workers building the high-rise across from your office seem to structure their day?

  Read trade periodicals, magazine interviews, memoirs. You can learn a lot from the more personal aspects of these sources. Study the ''Letters'' column. Read biographies for interesting views of jobs that celebrities held before they became famous. Playwright Moss Hart's autobiography Act One, for instance, contains unparalleled descriptions of the horrors and rewards and routines of being a summer-camp director.

  This is your chance. If you always wanted to know what it would be like to be a costumer in a wax museum, sewing for effigies of Lizzie Borden and Lord Nelson and Elvis Presley, give that job to a character. Then you'll have a reason for researching costuming. How hard is it to dress wax? How authentic does the underwear have to be? Are the wax dummies anatomically correct? How do you dust a wax Count Dracula? The research books will even be tax deductible.

  THE RIGHT JOB WILL SUGGEST MANY PLOT POSSIBILITIES

  Once your character is gainfully employed, you have a strong tool for powering your plot in whatever direction you wish it to go.

  How does this work? Suppose that the protagonist of your mystery novel is not a detective but a small-town vet. She visits a lot of farms, and a lot of smaller animals come to her clinic; she comes to know nearly everyone in town. She has scientific training. She gets called out on emergencies in the middle of the night. All these circumstances lend themselves to seeing things she shouldn't, to discovering facts that others want hidden, to making deductions from animal-related clues that others might miss. Look hard at the specifics of her job, and they will suggest all kinds of p
lot developments.

  Or take another exotic example: that wax museum costumer (I'm fond of this job). What does a costumer do? Research into authentic period costumes, including acquiring actual old buttons, fabric, shawls, dresses. This could send her poking around attics, warehouses, estate sales. Perhaps she's a real wheeler-dealer who tries to always get there early to make a presale deal with whomever it takes to sell her those buttons once worn by Princess Charlotte, or that Revolutionary War uniform from somebody's great-great-great-great-great grandfather. But what else does she find while poking around? And who knows she's doing it?

  Many interesting possibilities!

  Even if your character works in a conventional office, his job can provide plot developments. Ted Kramer, for instance, the protagonist of Avery Corman's Kramer Versus Kramer, sells advertising space in magazines. The novel isn't about his job; it's about divorce and parenthood. Still, Corman makes good use of the volatility of advertising to add tension to Ted's situation. The sole support of his young son Billy, Ted loses his job during a company merger. He searches hard and finds another. During the custody hearing he's laid off a second time, greatly imperiling his case. Corman shows us Ted's heroic efforts to find another job within twenty-four hours.

  In addition, how much Ted earns directly affects such plot incidents as hiring a housekeeper to take care of Billy, affording lawyers, even dating the second time around.

  Do your character's job duties, industry conditions, work stresses or salary level suggest any incidents for your novel? If not, perhaps the character needs a career change.

  SUMMARY: BE A FULL-SERVICE EMPLOYMENT AGENCY

  • Find your character a job that characterizes his personality, class and talents.

  • Further characterize him by his attitude toward his work.

  • Choose jobs you know a lot about—or can learn about.

  • Include enough realistic details about the job to make it seem as real as your protagonist does.

  • Use the character's job to suggest plot complications and/or resolutions.

  In Karen Joy Fowler's wonderful novel Sarah Canary, the protagonist never speaks. Not a word. Not for 290 pages. And Fowler succeeds in characterizing her anyway.

  Most of us, fortunately, do not have to labor under such a burden. We have a powerful tool to let readers know who our characters are. We have dialogue. ''How forcible are right words!'' says Job (6:25), and so they are.

  However, not all dialogue is created equal. Mediocre dialogue can do more harm than good: by boring your reader, by misleading him, by offending him or by convincing him that none of these characters has a single spark of genuine life. (If you write really terrible dialogue, he may think the same thing about the author.)

  So how do you write good dialogue? And after you have, how do you give it to the reader: in large unbroken chunks, or intercut with descriptions of gestures, voices, surroundings? And what about dialect—does it help or hurt?

  Dialogue is a complex subject. This isn't surprising when you consider how many areas of the human brain are activated by speech: frontal lobe, temporal parietal region, hippocampus, vagus nerve and, sometimes, the deep emotional centers in the limbic. Such complexity means that no rules will hold true 100 percent of the time. Still, guidelines exist. Good dialogue characterizes, sounds natural and flows well. Simple guidelines—until you start looking closely at each one.

  MARK MY WORDS:

  LETTING CHARACTERS REVEAL THEMSELVES

  The basics first. Good dialogue is unsurpassed at telling us who your character is, both intellectually and emotionally. Which of the following excerpts give you a better picture of Thomas Wells?

  Thomas Wells was a bitter man, an angry man, a bigot. He disliked anyone different from himself, and said so often. Nor did he care who heard him.

  ''Whole lot of 'em ought to be sent back where they come from,'' Wells said loudly in the Grain 'n Feed. ''Jews, Spics, niggers—just send 'em all back! Dirty bastards!'' Slowly, Saul Goldstein turned his head toward Wells.

  The second version presents Wells more strongly, because it's more direct. Instead of the author labeling Wells a bigot, the character's words pin the label on himself.

  Here is Muriel Spark's marvelous character, school teacher Jean Brodie (The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie), addressing her eleven-year-old pupils and revealing more about herself than she has any idea of:

  ''I have spent most of my holidays in Italy once more, and a week in London, and I have brought back a great many pictures which we can pin on the wall. Here is a Cimabue. Here is a larger formation of Mussolini's fascisti, it is a better view of them than last year's picture. They are doing splendid things as I shall tell you later. I went with my friends for an audience with the Pope. My friends kissed his ring but I thought it proper only to bend over it. I wore a long black gown with a lace mantilla and looked magnificent. In London my friends who are well-to-do—their small girl has two nurses, or nannies as they say in England— took me to visit A.A. Milne. In the hall was hung a reproduction of Boticelli's Primavera, which means the birth of Spring. I wore my silk dress with the large red poppies which is just right for my coloring. . . .''

  Name-dropper, elitist, self-absorbed, more than a little silly . . . Jean Brodie's character is clearly revealed through her dialogue.

  But, you may say, these two examples aren't typical. Thomas Wells and Jean Brodie are both extreme people, talking with unusual lack of inhibition. My characters are more ordinary, talking about more ordinary things. Can their dialogue still reveal individual personality?

  Yes. It's true that in real life, much routine communication is generic: People in the same culture use essentially the same words to greet acquaintances, purchase a shirt, talk to their children (''What did you do in school today?'' ''Nothing.''). In fiction, however, even routine dialogue can be used to differentiate and individualize characters.

  Here are three different characters offering food to guests:

  ''It's not only pot roast,'' Ezra said. . . . ''There's something more. I mean, pot roast is really not the right name, it's more like . . . what you long for when you're sad and everyone's been wearing you down. See, there's this cook, this real country cook, and pot roast is the least of what she does. There's also pan-fried potatoes, black-eyed peas, beaten biscuits genuinely beaten on a stump with the back of an ax—''

  —Ezra Tull, in Anne Tyler's Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant

  ''I've brought you something to eat,'' said a voice; ''oppen t'door!''

  Complying eagerly, I beheld Hareton, laden with food enough to last me all day.

  ''Take it,'' he added, thrusting the tray into my hand.

  ''Stay one minute,'' I began.

  ''Nay,'' cried he, and retired, regardless of any prayers I could pour forth to detain him.

  —Hareton Earnshaw, in Emily BrontE's Wuthering Heights

  Katie came in with the tray. ''This may not be as refined as you're used to,'' she apologized, ''but it's what we have in the house.''

  —Katie Nolan, in Betty Smith's A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

  There's little chance of confusing any of these speakers with the others. Ezra's nurturing, Hareton's uneducated hostility and Katie's painful awareness of her own poverty come through in even these snippets of routine social interaction.

  You don't, of course, want to overdo this. Even the most dramatic and eccentric character occasionally just says, "What time is it?'' or ''Pass the salt.'' But, on the other hand, if whole sections of your protagonist's dialogue could be switched with whole sections of another main character's dialogue, you haven't done an effective job of using speech to individualize them. Go back and rewrite. Give each a diction, a rhythm, a slant on the world (the essence of characterization) of his or her own.

  An aside here: Dialogue is the one place in fiction where cliches can work well. If your character's thoughts and ideas are hackneyed and undigested, cliched speech will convey that. In that sense, dialo
gue is a horse of a different color. If your character never has an original thought in her pretty head, let her spout cliches till hell freezes over. Just be aware that she may sound dumb as a fence post.

  I DON'T LIKE YOUR TONE:

  MAKING DIALOGUE CARRY EVEN MORE WEIGHT

  By one expert estimate, 70 percent of communication is nonverbal. If Harry says to Sue, ''Can I see you tonight?'' almost three-quarters of his meaning will be conveyed by the tone of his voice, his inflections, his facial expression, his hand gestures, his body language, the degree of his attention.

  Perhaps he says, ''Can I see you tonight?'' in a weary tone of voice, while watching another woman cross the street, with the corners of his mouth turned down. or perhaps he says it intently, his eyes on Sue's face, his whole body yearning forward. Each sentence will convey entirely different meanings to Sue, despite identical words.

  In fiction, dialogue doesn't have the powerful support of these nonverbal clues. You can, of course, describe some of them: Harry's gestures, Sue's tone of voice. And you should. But you may also need to increase the emotional level of the words themselves, to compensate for the loss of nonverbal communication.

  For instance, suppose a character named Stan has just learned of another character's death. If you were a playwright, you could write Stan's line as ''Tom was a good man.'' The actor would supply the emotion with which the line should be said: resignation, irony, anger. But we fiction writers don't have John Malkovich or Meryl Streep to lend color to our prose. We have to do it ourselves. Therefore, you might heighten Stan's dialogue to ''Tom was a good man. Damn it, he was such a good man!'' The extra words, the mild profanity, the exclamation point—all make clear that Stan's emotion is anger that this good man is dead.

  You might also use both heightened dialogue and description of nonverbal cues:

  ''Tom was a good man,'' Stan said softly. He fumbled with a cigarette, lit it, dropped it on the carpet. And then, ''Damn it, he was such a good man!'' He looked out the window, dry-eyed, and the rug smoldered at his feet.