Characters in turmoil.
I set out to know who put her in the spot, who put her in front of the gun. That was you, angel.
-Brendan, from Brick
To borrow the phrase, you have to put your characters in front of the gun. Situations have to get dicey. You gotta shake things up. If you don’t, if you let your characters sit in their boring self-complacency, you should ask yourself, what’s the point? Why am I writing?
Sometimes you write to explore a deep-seated darkness. Some secret buried so deep in a character’s soul that she could break at any moment. Some darkness she may not even realize is there. It’s like giving a character a dozen past lives, and in each one she did something or experienced something that only burdens her more and more.
Until she’s in a turmoil that surrounds her.
I know that sounds harsh. But, when you’re writing that character and her situations, you should make it harsher. You should make her bleed. Let her fall down. Let her make a mistake.
Or maybe you take this route: Your character is basically good; or, at least not as dark as I painted her above. This time, the darkness comes from outside of her. Things happen to her that force her to deal; force her to examine issues she’d rather not; force her to dig deep and become stronger. (For a prime example, watch Veronica Mars.)
Or, you could do both: darkness flows out, darkness flows in. Of course, getting too heavy isn’t always good.
Yet, characters need some darkness that pushes them. They need their perfect worlds shattered into pieces so tiny they may not be able to pick them all up. They need to be blindsided with turmoil, with sadness, with pain, with…
Because after you’ve put them through hell, they will emerge on the other side, and they will emerge having found truth.
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That is so true about characters. Sometimes it is nice to read the mistakes they make and how they resolve the issues. Your stories are so in-depth and I think that you have valid points. I think that it is cool that you like what you are talking about so much that you feel comfortable expressing yourself in the way that you do. I cannot wait until next story.
You are talking about the basic idea of storytelling here…conflict. If there is no conflict and a character is just living their comfortable life then we are not interested. Yes conflict can come from inside or outside of the character. I am most impressed with portrayals of inner conflict. It is much harder to write I think, especially if you are writing it for a film or television show where the conflict will have to come through in visuals more even than words. When the conflict comes from both places there is a fear that it can be overwhelming and much too dark but it can add depth and make the story much richer. Thank you for sharing your thoughts on writing. It makes me think.