characters, muses, stuff

[branchandroot]

A recent post made me think.

Do my characters really *talk* to me? Do I hold actual conversations with them?

I mean, when I write it out in here, that's what it looks like. But in a lot of ways it feels like I'm translating what actually happens, which isn't verbalization at all.

On the other hand, there were a few times while writing "Glow" when I started to write some action, usually for Ed, and got a very definite veto. If I translate it into words it goes something like

Ed: Excuse me? I am not letting him carry me, what the hell are you thinking!?

It doesn't happen in words, though. That's just what I translate it to when I want other people to be able to hear it.

It's a lot more like echolocation, that process of asking myself questions until I get a solid "bounce", a firm contact, a "yes, that's it". Feelings, not words.

Only, it isn't asking myself, for this.

Storyspace, where all these characters stay, is an odd one. It's not part of my self, for all that it's inside my head. It's a shared space. I make it *out of* my self, and then use it to store copies of characters I like, which are, in effect, other people. Other people with whom I can utilize the protocals for internal communication. It makes the process of writing... curious. The plot comes out of my head, and then I bounce it off the shape of the characters and listen for how they react. And translate their reaction into dialogue. But to make that bounce work, I have to take the characters a little out of Storyspace, a little into my self. That's what gives me the channel of communication that carries the "yes I would do that/no I wouldn't do that" response. There has to be a constant feedback between my awareness of the plot and my awareness of the shapes of the characters, so I can hear when there's a break in congruity. A bad note.

I think maybe this is why I write so fast, when I write the stories down. Nonverbal communication, the internal kind, is extremely fast. I need to translate fast to keep up with it.

So I guess I'd have to say my characters don't really *talk* to me. But communication certainly happens when I rummage around in Storyspace.

Comments

[hikariblue.livejournal.com]

I've been curious about that, lately. Wondering how it is, more or less, that other people interact with these parts/pieces/names/voices. The metacognition of writing. How does it work with other people, and is it really all that dangerous, and are all writers a little bit crazy?

I've been worried that, when writing (fanfic or my original stories), I'm more of a puppeteer than a reporter (and I used to be much more of a reporter, for various reasons), and I worry that I'm not being 'true' to the characters. Because even in fiction, a lot of it is about truth, still. (Perhaps moreso than in nonfiction, maybe, because the truth you're relaying is so ... ephemeral, for lack of a better word.) But even then you have to ask yourself 'who' these characters are and 'where' they come from...

[joriel.livejournal.com]

Mine do that. Sometimes they even jump ship on a fic and replace themselves with someone else, which happened both in Snap and Snapdragon. I started out writing for completely different characters than the fics ended up being about. *Grumbles*

[luco-millian.livejournal.com]

That kind of communication is exactly why i stopped writing fanfics. I got to attached to characters...in some ways I'm told I became them for the time I was writing adn I dealt with everything they did too emotionally.

But it is interesting when you stop and think about how people go about writing, what inspires them, keeps them going and who talks to them in their heads.

Those things alone could have an entire library written about them...

...

And I probably made no sense but yeah I need my coffee.

[arete.livejournal.com]

You put into words exactly what seems to be happening with my original fic right now. Many story elements, beginning of the plot, but no overarching plot. Friends keep throwing plot ideas at me, I keep vetoing them because they just don't work, and I try to explain, and I usually go into immense detail because they keep asking 'Why?' the answers don't work. And the characters keep going 'Nope, that won't work'.

[marmalade-girl.livejournal.com]

I find that this is the very reason I have dry spells in my writing. The characters become very quiet in my mind, so for a time, I let them go and forget about them. They always come back, though, and let me know how they've changed in the meantime. It makes for a lot of revisions of unfinished work, because what seemed to be going well in one burst of writing is totally contracted by the characters later.

[scimitarsmile.livejournal.com]

Oh, hell. I had an entire response and the screen suddenly refreshed on my behalf... and it's all gone. Damn Microsoft. Shoot the damn programmers.

Anyway...I had a point.

*thinks*

Characters have never talked to me. The story does, though; at the same time, the story is never really plot-driven. It's more of a "drop the character in this environment, and see what happens" - so I'm rarely at a loss as to what will happen next, unless I'm unable to get inside a character's head.

Thing is, I've never had the problem of being too inside a character's head, which is a good thing, considering some of the content I've tackled, and plan to tackle. I'm currently 28 chapters into a story that addresses the healing process for a victim of torture (in essence), and I have yet to write a chapter that didn't make at least four or five reviewers cry - if not more. Each time, I'm a little startled by their response, especially when it's one or two lines that prompted such a reaction. I didn't see it, although I will feel the twist in my gut reading someone else's story, I don't when it's my own. Hell, my own lemons don't do jack for me. I'm...detached, somehow. Not the right word. It's kind of like asking the keyboard how it feels about what's on the screen, I suppose. I only know, these words belong here, and these words do not. I change accordingly, but I can't guage the emotional reaction.

I've only had one character pushing to get out, and she was a joy to write, but that was mostly because there was a story that came with her. I think what I feel most often isn't related to characters, but stories. Sometimes I feel desperate, driven, and I lie in bed thinking, I should get up and write. The story is bugging me - GET IT OUT! Like I'm running out of time, if that makes sense. This would explain how, in the past six or seven months, I've produced a chapter roughly every day and a half...like I'm not even in control. Gadz, I probably sound like an addict, but it's an addict in reverse - instead of using the drug, I'm producing it.

I think maybe this is why I write so fast, when I write the stories down. Nonverbal communication, the internal kind, is extremely fast. I need to translate fast to keep up with it.

Yah. I think that's part of it. I tend to type fast, but it's a desperate kind of speed - like I'm screaming to the story to WAIT UP, I'm typing as fast as I can! Almost like taking down notes while life is going on around you, and when you're tracking that nonverbal, it does move faster than words. Lightening-fast. I suppose there are conversations going inside my head, balancing this line against that, these words against that, this plot twist against that, but because of the speed, I don't see it. Seamless? Opaque, perhaps. Odd, that it would be opaque to me.

What's strange is that when I slow down - as I have, at points, out of a sense that I should - I always trip. The metaphors are too clunky, the characterization too flat. When I speed up, I get these reviews back that laud the metaphor, the subtle use of this or reference to that, and I can only think: the what? Hunh? Are you reading the same story I wrote? Now I understand Tolkein's comment that if you want to read Gandalf the White appearing on the Plain as some sort of avenging angel, you can, but that's not what was in his head when writing - he was busying thinking, move this character here, and then this will happen...Yah, now I understand. The story just takes care of itself, if you can keep up.

*wrings fingers*

Sometimes I can't keep up, and I feel like I'll go mad.

[moumusu.livejournal.com]

Dude, I was totally wondering when you'd write something about this. ^^

Yes. Echolocation. It's JUST like that. This is why I don't write fanfic. I get unbelieveably uptight about the translating part. My goal is to make the writing invisible, so I cut out any of my own narration. Every single word has to be tested for my own feeling and oh. My. God. It kills me.

With drawing, I almost don't have to echolocate at all. I just do it some at the beginning, and then I get a fairly stable mental picture of what's happening. I already know how I want the eyes or that coat or this arm to look, so it's just a matter of making it match on both sides. I still have (sometimes outrageous) criteria for what I want, but no worries about putting in too much of my own feeling because I have to be clearly OUTSIDE whatever I'm drawing to see it.

Wow. It reminds me that I do enjoy drawing. ^^ Feels goooood.

[q-sama.livejournal.com]

Yep, yep, I can totally relate to this. On the other hand, the best way for me to actually WRITE the words comes after I take a long walk, literally talking aloud to myself.

I think there are a lot of writers who seem to "tap into" their characters - a scribe rather than a puppet master. Perhaps that's what may be going on. The story is being told, inside your head, and you're transcribing something that has all ready been created in your mind. :)