So last night, my sisters and I couldn't sleep. We were excited over a trip taking place in August and planning a party. However it was like two in the morning, one of my sisters has work today and we really did need to go to sleep inside of running around our beds in the dark dancing and singing hakuna matata (don't ask). So we finally settled down and dissolved into one of our very strange bedtime conversations.
It turned from cake to black paper stars to bowler hats to trying to find all the red things ever to how minds think. Like how do you think?
For me, it's me and then lots of other people, my characters, talking at once.
I'll use the metaphor here that I used with my sister: So sometimes my sister and I will be bored and annoy another sister by reading over her shoulder her conversation with this one friend that we all know. He's at one end of the conversation, while all three of us are over here. One sister is the one actually typing and deciding what to actually say. While me and my other sister was telling her what to say and just generally commenting. So the boy we're talking to is the person I'm talking to. I'm the sister that's typing, except I'm the one talking. While me and my sister are the characters living in my head, whispering and commenting and just . . . thinking.
Best example I can come up with.
And you're probably thinking how I handle having so many voices talking in my head at one time. Well, not all my characters do that. Most of my character from the novel I tried to complete in November (titled Twists of Thread), I made. I thought them up and *gasp* developed them! Now, you're probably thinking that what I do with all my characters, develop them, but . . .
I don't. My imagination doesn't work that way. My truly awesome characters, the ones that talk to me and have actual depth and personality, are the ones that made themselves. One day, I'll be sitting somewhere and a name, a picture, a feeling while spark something in my head and suddenly, a character will be born.
Amoria was the newest one. She was inspired by the crumpled leaf. So inspiring, I know. Still. Amoria, you were born from that crumpled leaf in the gutter last night, darling. First came a conversation between this mysterious presence and one of my existing main characters, Perci. And then Perci said her name and suddenly, I knew her name. From that conversation, I got a jist of her personality and stuff. From then on, she's just slipped herself into the story.
Those are the characters that live in my head. Most of them are from my current story, which I just loosely title 'The Virons'. All of the character in that story just run around freely in my head being . . . well, being teenagers. Two characters from Twists of Thread are like this, Tamara and Skye. And the two characters I've gotten from an untitled story idea are close, Annora and Cadan.
When I write, I'll be shaping the plot and everything, but the conversations and all that is basically letting my characters borrow my hands and . . . ROLEPLAY!
Sometimes they roleplay their pasts. With my main characters of the Virons, Max and Perci and the rest, they are actually telling their story. It's weird and had to explain.
So yeah. Anything I write here, anything I say, anything I talk about, it's all influenced by the people living in my head.
Of course, there are still a lot of people. The cast of the Virons is over sixty characters. Some are quieter and some are louder, some are gone for long periods and then pop in again randomly. Sometimes I feel like I'm going crazy, but in the long run it's nice to have all those people there. They help me through things and encourage me.
I was wondering how 'normal' people's minds think. Does everyone have people talking in their head? Certainly not, since my sister said she had no such thing. But still. Other writers, even. I always wondered what it's like to get a good character out of developing them. For me, you get no such thing. It's better to just let them run wild in my head.
How do you think?
For me, when I'm writing my novel, it feels like I'm going through deja-vu. Like my book all happened before to me and I know all of the characters pretty well. My characters don't talk to me, but I do feel a connection to them. They're good friends of mine :-)
ReplyDeleteOh my gosh, I thought I was the only one who experienced things like that. That's a lot like me. I have different people and voices speaking inside my head, though only really mainly two, unless I'm actually writing a story.
ReplyDeleteThere's one main person whom I've had as a companion for years and years. I won't talk about them much, since they're very sacred to me, and have never been talked about before.
The other is one who hasn't talked to me for about the last two or three years, but I'm feeling is slowly making a return.
Characters for me are born out of the setting and plot. To me, you don't create the characters, they already existed. They chose you to introduce them to the world. So when you write the stories you have to have a very fine balance of your writing, and what the character is telling you actually happened. My best stories come about when the character and I merge. I adapt a new personality, she adapts some of my traits. We become the same person, but two minds, though we think in unison. It makes it easier because then you know the character inside and out. You know their faults, their fears, their strengths and weaknesses, and suddenly the story isn't something that is foggy and springs out at you out of nowhere, but instead you can see the whole story, beginning, middle, and end.
Does that make sense at all, or am I just a basket case lunatic who spends too much time talking to myself?