In light of my upcoming RWA OWL and last month’s RWA and RWNZ conference workshops, I thought it would be good to do a short blog on CHARACTERISATION THROUGH NARRATION.
What is CHARACTERISATION THROUGH NARRATION?
It’s the essence of crafting well-developed, 3-dimensional, believable characters.
When you write using CHARACTERISATION THROUGH NARRATION, you reveal your characters through your story, and allow your story to unfold through your characters’ POVs.
Sounds complex, right?
It’s really not that complicated once we take a closer look and begin to break the process down into bite-sized pieces.
1. CHARACTER MAP
The basis to any good story starts with the characters. The same goes for CHARACTERISATION THROUGH NARRATION.
The more developed your characters, the easier it is to incorporate CHARACTERISATION THROUGH NARRATION. To do this, we can devise a character map using the 6 elements of characterisation:
This doesn’t need to be a diagram. It can be bullet points, a table or spreadsheet, any format which works for you. What’s important is to capture as much information as you can. The more detail we incorporate into this map, the more 3-dimensional and believable our characters will be.
Once this is complete, we can move onto the next step . . .
2. GOAL, MOTIVATION, CONFLICT (GMC)
GMC is the lynchpin of strong, believable characterisation.
GMC gives our characters direction. It injects meaning into their every action, decision and reaction, providing purpose, as well as the foundation of a journey that becomes our very story.
Without strong, believable GMC, your story’s lead roles have no ‘drive’ and you are left high and dry with no story to tell.
In short, GMC can be broken down as follows:
- GOAL – what does your character want?
- MOTIVATION – why do they want it?
- CONFLICT – what internal (emotional) and external (physical) barriers are preventing them from getting it?
Once you’ve developed both internal (emotional) and external (physical) GMC for your central characters, you’re ready to take the next step towards CHARACTERISATION THROUGH NARRATION . . .
3. IDENTIFY CHARACTER TRAITS YOU CAN USE TO DEEPEN CHARACTERISATION
Some character traits can make more of an impact and reveal more about characterisation than others. By identifying these before you begin writing, you will write with an awareness that allows you to incorporate characterisation into your narration with more ease.
How can we identify these traits?
Here’s a few questions to ask yourself as you decide:
- UNIQUE: Does this trait represent the character in a fresh and unique way?
- STANDOUT: Will this trait make my character stand out amongst other similar characters?
- GMC: Which of my character’s traits are linked closely to their GMC? GMC-linked traits tend to generate more emotion and inject your narration with more ‘punch’.
Think about Harry Potter. His scar is unique, the reason he has it makes him stand out amongst other characters (Voldemort’s inability to harm him without feeling great pain) and his GMC is highly emotional (his parents died so he could live).
Think about how much stronger and memorable your characters could be if you inject the same amount of interest value into them.
4. APPLY THE 4 ELEMENTS OF NARRATION TO YOUR CHOSEN CHARACTER TRAITS
To really blend characterisation into our narration with any kind of continuity, we must first understand the elements of narration. What are they and what are their roles in storytelling?
1. DIALOGUE (includes internal monologue)
= a conversation, a verbal interaction with another character or thoughts within our central character’s head.
2. EXPOSITION
= a detailed explanation or account. This is often the ‘telling’ portion of our story.
3. ACTION
= doing something for a particular purpose (I love this definition. Purposeful action is meaningful action)
= All the important and exciting things that are happening in a situation. This is the fast-paced good stuff.
4. DESCRIPTION
= an account explaining what a person, object or event are or what they look like.
Once you understand the power of using these elements to drive your characterisation, your writing of characters will be rich and colourful, and your characters will be more believable than ever before.
If you’d like to explore CHARACTERISATION THROUGH NARRATION in more detail, make sure you sign up for my October OWL. Details and registration can be found here:
If you’d like to explore CHARACTERISATION THROUGH NARRATION in more detail, make sure you sign up for my October OWL. Details and registration can be found here:
https://www.trybooking.com/BACRP
And that’s all folks!
I hope I’ve given you food for thought on how to reveal your characters through the narration elements in your story. If you have any questions, make sure you post them in the comments beneath the blog and I’ll be sure to get back to you.
Firstly, thank you all for coming back this month. I really appreciate every one of you reading, commenting and sharing my posts.
Once again, I’m offering one lucky commenter a half hour skype session to discuss anything writing related. It could be your query, your synopsis or 300 words from your current work in progress. We could even discuss how you can incorporate CHARACTERISATION THROUGH NARRATION into your story. Yes, you heard right. We get to chat, face-to-face—or computer screen to computer screen—about whatever it is about your writing you’d like to discuss.
To enter the draw, please comment below and share the most surprising or useful thing you’ve learned since reading my Simply Writing blogs. Any ideas on what you’d like to see featured on future blogs will be gratefully received. Or perhaps you’d like to share how you’ll start to incorporate CHARACTERISATION THROUGH NARRATION into your current WIP.
Any and all comments welcome! I love reading your feedback and input each month ☺ and much as this blog isn’t set up for notifications, I always ALWAYS answer your comments. So make sure you pop back to check my replies ☺
If you’d like extra chances to win, share links to this blog on any or all social media sites. Tag me so I know you’ve shared, and the more shares, the more times I’ll place your name in the draw.
A name will be drawn in a week’s time, around Thursday 19th September and winners will be notified on the blog, so keep your eyes and ears peeled. Make sure you revisit the blog or watch my facebook posts to see when I’ve picked a winner ☺
Thanks so much to you all for stopping by. Have a fabulous month, and I’ll see you all again in October ☺
Michelle xx