Creating Fictional Characters—Part 3: Revealing Characters and Point of View
June 29, 2009 by Lillie
Table of contents for Creating Fictional Characters
In previous installments of this series, we’ve learned what characters are and discussed how to find and create them. Now, let’s talk about how to reveal characters in your story.
Although it may be tempting to describe your characters and tell the reader all about them when you first introduce them, that doesn’t work. After all, when you meet people, you don’t learn all about them right away. You usually notice their physical appearance first, and you probably learn a few facts about them—maybe their name, where they live, what they do for living, their marital/family status. Each time you meet them, you learn more. Reveal your characters the same gradual way.
You can reveal character in several ways:
- Through the eyes of another character: how the other character sees/describes the person, how they respond to him or her, what they say to and about them
- Through dialogue: what the character says and how they say it
- Through actions: what the person does, both large actions and small things like habits and patterns of behavior
- Through inner thoughts and flashbacks: what the person thinks about and remembers when they are faced with a particular situation or person
In revealing character, you must understand point of view (POV). Point of view is the eyes the reader sees through, the camera lens that captures the scene. In real life, we are limited by our POV, and so are our characters.
For example, imagine yourself at a large party. You are in the corner of the room talking with a small group of people. You can probably see other groups and individuals nearby, but you can’t see in the opposite corner of the large room or outside in the hall or in the kitchen.
If an argument breaks out, you might hear it if the people get loud enough to be heard over the sounds of the conversation around you. However, you probably can’t see who is arguing. Whether you know who is involved in the disagreement depends on how well you know them. You’ll recognize the voice of your spouse or best friend, but you won’t know who’s arguing if you just met the individuals in passing at the party.
For you to know everything that happened, someone will have to give you a blow-by-blow description. However, if you run across the room and get close enough to see and hear, you get it all firsthand.
Your characters are in the same situation. They can know only what they can see and hear and experience.
You can tell your story from several different POVs:
- First person (I)—the protagonist tells the story: I did this and thought that.
- Advantages: It is distinctive, natural, intense, and easy for the writer.
- Disadvantages: You are limited to what the narrator sees/knows—anything that happens off the stage of the protagonist must be revealed by another character or in some other way (such as reading something in a newspaper), and reading I for hundreds of pages can become boring.
- Third person singular (he/she)—the narrator tells the story from the viewpoint of a single character: He did this and thought that.
- Advantages: The same advantages apply to third person singular as first person except for immediacy.
- Disadvantage: Like first person, the action is limited to what the protagonist sees/knows.
- Third person multiple limited (multiple he/she)—the narrator tells the story through the eyes of several people: He did that and thought this. She did this and thought that.
- Advantage: This POV provides several perspectives and enables reader to feel the emotions of more than one character.
- Disadvantage: Avoiding head-hopping can be a challenge. In my description above, I “head-hopped,” meaning I jumped from one POV to another. In third person multiple limited POV, most experts advise you you should stay in the POV of one character for a complete scene. I admit I don’t always follow this advice, but however long you stay in one POV, you must keep from confusing the reader. It should be obvious when the reader is seeing the story through the eyes of a different character.
There are two points of view that are generally not recommended:
- Second person (you)—the narrator tells the story as if the reader is the character: You do this and you think that.
- Advantages: There are no real advantages to second person.
- Disadvantages: It is cumbersome and tedious, and the reader knows he or she isn’t the character.
- Omniscient (a god-like narrator)—the narrator can see everything everywhere and knows what every character is thinking: He did that and thought this. She did this and thought that. They did something else and thought other things.
- Advantage: There are no limits on the action or thoughts you can include in your story.
- Disadvantages: It can easily confuse the reader, and it keeps the reader from identifying with characters and feeling their emotions.
The most popular point of view in fiction is third person multiple limited. When you write in this POV, you can reveal your characters through their actions and dialogue no matter what character is the POV character at any given moment. You can also reveal character through the thoughts and emotions of the character who is the reader’s eyes at that time.
One of the most important steps in developing your characters and writing your story is to decide on your POV characters. Whose eyes will the reader see the action through? Whose emotions will the reader feel?
In the next installment, we’ll look at fleshing out characters with tags, traits, and relationships.
photo credit: Keyser_ Soze
You have given a very deep description on how an author should outline his or her character.Its very important to keep the readers intrigued to know the character as the story unfold itself. A good description of character can make your story or break the story. However writer should also keep in mind that how he want his character to appear in front of everyone. But yes a great insight is provided here to how to describe one’s character.
sachin,
As I said in the post, you wouldn’t describe your characters completely at once. You want to reveal the characters gradually throughout the story. However, the writer needs to know a lot about the character long before she reveals it to the reader.
Just make sure to never reveal everything at once. Readers won’t really bond with the character this way. Let it grow on them.
Noclegi,
That’s what I mean when I wrote the paragraph ending: “Reveal your characters the same gradual way.”
This 3 part series had been a great read, it has been incredibly helpful. Even though I review childrens books and not adult,I still think about writing adult fiction one day!
Karlynn,
I’m glad you’re finding the series helpful. There are five more installments to go so hope you learn a lot more.
I’m a bit of a ‘method actor’ when I’m creating characters. I’ll step into their world for a day or so and try to behave, react and speak just like my character. Really helps me get under their skin to see how they’d behave in a variety of situations.
David,
That’s a great idea. The fifth installment talks about ways to get to know your character. It’s already drafted, but I’m going to edit it and suggest this as well, giving you credit. Thanks.
I totally like the method of revealing a character through the eyes of another character because it gives you a sense and feel of how someone perceives them, as you would. It especially helps for how they interact in conversation.
C,
That’s like the way we learn about other people through our own perceptions, so it’s very effective.
Very good advice, Lillie.
Another reason to have a character describe or reveal another character is because you can’t trust the character to give you a true picture of him(or her)self.
And bits and pieces here and there are better than a huge dump.
Thanks, Lillie.
Helen
Straight From Hel
.-= Helen Ginger´s last blog ..What? Me Lie? =-.
Thanks, Helen. That’s a good point about the reliability of the description from another character.
Thank your for this good advice, Lillie.
I am building a script right now and this article give me more ideas about behaviors and characters. It will really help me finish the script.
.-= Yuuko´s last blog ..Sola =-.
Yuuko,
I’m glad this is helpful to you. Good luck with the script you are writing.
Very well described Lillie,
What I learnt from seeing many movies is that the author or director in this case tries to present a character initially exactly opposite to what the character actually is. For example if he is introducing say a hero, he tries to present him as a kind of villain (or something that gives -ve impression on him).
Gradually, when the actual time comes to know about that person, it will be a complete surprise to the audience.
Of course this kind of introduction doesn’t work in all situations.
.-= Sriraj´s last blog ..www or no-www in a website URL? =-.
Sriraj,
There are certain genres that the technique you mention can work very well, especially any kind of suspense. I like books where you don’t know whether someone is a good guy or a bad guy, and you’re kept guessing for a big part of the book.
Head-hopping is definitely one fault I have when using third person multiple limited POV. I always have to go back and look out for that mistake, or sometimes I’ll catch it as I am writing.
I just can’t read a story with second person POV. It’s very annoying, actually. Once I read one novel with this POV, and I kept replacing the “you” with “I.”
I enjoyed reading all 3 blog posts related to characterization. Great advice! Looking forward to the next installment.
.-= Dawn Colclasure´s last blog ..Ah, summer vacation =-.
Dawn,
I have a problem with head-hopping, too. It’s something I work on.
Glad you’re finding the series helpful.
[...] Characters Are Story PeopleCreating Fictional Characters—Part 2: Finding and Creating CharactersCreating Fictional Characters—Part 3: Revealing Characters and Point of ViewCreating Fictional Characters—Part 4: Fleshing Out Characters with Tags, Traits, and [...]
I am writing a novel right now and its written in the heroine’s point of view. As the plot progresses, there is a scene in which the heroine faints and the hero tends to her. I want put that in the hero’s point of view.
The novel has just been started, so I have a doubt whether I should right in both people’s point of view or should I just stick with the heroine’s.
Kindly advise.
Anu,
Most books have more than point of view (POV) character. So it’s perfectly fine to have the scene you describe from the hero’s POV. In fact, the only way to describe the fainting scene in the heroine’s POV would be for her to be talking about with someone else later because she wouldn’t know what happened while she was unconscious.
The only caveat is that if you write this scene in the hero’s POV, you have other scenes throughout the book in his POV as well. You can have the heroine’s POV more of the time, but I think it would be jarring to have the whole story in one POV and have just one scene in a different POV.
Really intersting thank you. I will definately be following the rest of the series. I really like the way you write and the way you’ve broken down the steps to writing effectively.
Thanks, Jane.
Jane,
I’m glad the series is helpful to you.
I am doing my story in a step by step right now Lillie and I am so happy that it is easier fro me now.Thanks that I got a lot of tips from you…have a great day!!
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Glad I can help, celine. Good luck!