Bird by Bird Journal - Wk 13

“But no matter what, you are probably going to have to let bad things happen to some of the characters you love or you won’t have much of a story.” (43)
Yes, yes, yes! I can't agree more with this. I've been trying to brainstorm some interesting ideas for a drama, and there really isn't a way to do it without someone getting the short end of the stick in one way or another. 

“Another way to familiarize yourself with your characters is to base them partly on someone you know, a model from real life or a composite—your Uncle Edgar, but with the nervous tics and the odd smell of this guy you observed for ten minutes in line at the post office.” (47)

God, there's so much truth to this that it almost hurts. Every single character I've ever conceived has been based on someone I know, or some combination of people I know. In my opinion, a great way to do it is by taking unique elements from people you know and mix them together to form something else entirely. Also, a little exercise I like to do for characterization is: once I've established the main traits, I go through one of those questionnaires that are aimed to learn more about people, and answer as if I'm the character. This can really help you get inside your characters' heads! :) All in all, I think Lamott is saying that you should know your characters like you know some of the people in your life--their traits, beliefs, mannerisms, all of it. 

When it comes to plot? In my opinion, the plot shouldn't move the characters, but rather the characters should move the plot. The plot should be a continual result of what characters do. One of my biggest pet peeves in writing is when something happens for plot convenience, or to force a plot--it's not organic. I know I mention Breaking Bad/Better Call Saul a lot in my responses, but those are two very good examples of letting your characters drive the plot. Game of Thrones also achieves this (well, for the first half, anyway).

For dialogue: it should be unique to each character. No two characters should sound the same. They should all have their own "voice". Also check to make sure that any dialogue flows well, i.e. it sounds like something that would actually be said in its context. It's also okay to be a bit dramatic. I personally think Game of Thrones' early dialogue is perfect dialogue: it's clever, witty, a bit dramatic, and unique in such a way that you can't help but fall in love with it.

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