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Character motivation
Lesson #5: "Hello, my name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father, prepare to die."
This is a great example of character motivation. As readers we understood Inigo's motivation, and all of his actions throughout the book were consistent with his underlying goals.
In simplest terms, character motivation is what drives your character's behavior. It's the underlying reason why when confronted with the exact same situation, two characters will behave in different ways. Why James will stop to pick up the hitchhiker, and why George will not.
As an author, your readers need to be able to connect with your characters. If your characters behave in bizarre ways, or they act in ways that are completely contrary to the motivations you've shown, then the readers won't be able to connect with them and they'll lose interest in your story.
One common mistake of beginning authors is to confuse author motivation (or plot reasons) with character reasons.
I once critiqued a western where the story opens with the hero meeting the heroine and immediately agreeing to undertake a long journey to escort her from the end of the rail line to her uncle's ranch.
"Why would he do his?" I asked.
"I need them to travel together so they can fall in love," the author replied.
This is a classic example of author motivation. Her plot required the two of them to spend time alone together so they could learn to rely upon each other and fall in love. The heroine had a reason for going on this journey but the hero did not. His actions were unbelievable, and thus we couldn't sympathize with him as a character.
One way to fix this would be to have the heroine offer to pay him to be her escort. This solves the motivation problem-- he's doing it for the money.
Since it was a romance, we could strengthen the motivation by making it multi-layered. At first glance, he's agreed to do this for the money. Later details will reveal that what the heroine thinks is a generous wage is actually a pittance compared to what he would normally make in the booming economy of a silver mining town. We then learn that he wants her to think that he's doing this for the money, but his real reason could be:
a) He has a grudge against her uncle and is using her to gain access to his stronghold
b) He admires the courage it took to leave behind her pampered life in the east, and knows that if he doesn't agree to escort her it's likely she'll hire someone who will harm her, and he can't live with that on his conscience.
Given a few minutes thought and I'm sure you can come up with a half-dozen other reasons why he would agree to go on the journey.
Keep in mind that characters may not understand why they do certain things. Denial is a wonderful thing, and just as we can lie to ourselves, our characters can also be lying to themselves. But as the author you don't have that luxury. You need to understand your characters, even when your characters don't understand themselves. Then, once you understand their motivations, you can ensure that their actions are consistent and believable.
Your characters' motivations may change over the course of the book, as their experiences shape them. The young knight who lightheartedly sets off on a quest may transform into a vengeful assassin after witnessing the slaughter of his comrades. As his motivations evolve, so too will his actions. Here, again, consistency is the key. A man seeking adventure will behave quite differently from one who is solely driven by thoughts of revenge.
I approach writing as a character driven exercise, so I spend a lot of time contemplating the 'W' questions: What do they want? What do they need? Who/what do they love? What do they fear? The better I know my characters, the easier it is for me to write, as each action evolves logically from the previous according to the nature of my characters and the situations they find themselves in.
As you write, remember to ask yourself "Why would he/she do this? What is in it for them?" If there's no reason for the characters to be doing something, then your readers have no reason to care, and they're not likely to keep on reading.
Coming up over the weekend,![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
jennifer_dunne is on deck with the next three mini-essays.
This is a great example of character motivation. As readers we understood Inigo's motivation, and all of his actions throughout the book were consistent with his underlying goals.
In simplest terms, character motivation is what drives your character's behavior. It's the underlying reason why when confronted with the exact same situation, two characters will behave in different ways. Why James will stop to pick up the hitchhiker, and why George will not.
As an author, your readers need to be able to connect with your characters. If your characters behave in bizarre ways, or they act in ways that are completely contrary to the motivations you've shown, then the readers won't be able to connect with them and they'll lose interest in your story.
One common mistake of beginning authors is to confuse author motivation (or plot reasons) with character reasons.
I once critiqued a western where the story opens with the hero meeting the heroine and immediately agreeing to undertake a long journey to escort her from the end of the rail line to her uncle's ranch.
"Why would he do his?" I asked.
"I need them to travel together so they can fall in love," the author replied.
This is a classic example of author motivation. Her plot required the two of them to spend time alone together so they could learn to rely upon each other and fall in love. The heroine had a reason for going on this journey but the hero did not. His actions were unbelievable, and thus we couldn't sympathize with him as a character.
One way to fix this would be to have the heroine offer to pay him to be her escort. This solves the motivation problem-- he's doing it for the money.
Since it was a romance, we could strengthen the motivation by making it multi-layered. At first glance, he's agreed to do this for the money. Later details will reveal that what the heroine thinks is a generous wage is actually a pittance compared to what he would normally make in the booming economy of a silver mining town. We then learn that he wants her to think that he's doing this for the money, but his real reason could be:
a) He has a grudge against her uncle and is using her to gain access to his stronghold
b) He admires the courage it took to leave behind her pampered life in the east, and knows that if he doesn't agree to escort her it's likely she'll hire someone who will harm her, and he can't live with that on his conscience.
Given a few minutes thought and I'm sure you can come up with a half-dozen other reasons why he would agree to go on the journey.
Keep in mind that characters may not understand why they do certain things. Denial is a wonderful thing, and just as we can lie to ourselves, our characters can also be lying to themselves. But as the author you don't have that luxury. You need to understand your characters, even when your characters don't understand themselves. Then, once you understand their motivations, you can ensure that their actions are consistent and believable.
Your characters' motivations may change over the course of the book, as their experiences shape them. The young knight who lightheartedly sets off on a quest may transform into a vengeful assassin after witnessing the slaughter of his comrades. As his motivations evolve, so too will his actions. Here, again, consistency is the key. A man seeking adventure will behave quite differently from one who is solely driven by thoughts of revenge.
I approach writing as a character driven exercise, so I spend a lot of time contemplating the 'W' questions: What do they want? What do they need? Who/what do they love? What do they fear? The better I know my characters, the easier it is for me to write, as each action evolves logically from the previous according to the nature of my characters and the situations they find themselves in.
As you write, remember to ask yourself "Why would he/she do this? What is in it for them?" If there's no reason for the characters to be doing something, then your readers have no reason to care, and they're not likely to keep on reading.
Coming up over the weekend,
jennifer_dunne is on deck with the next three mini-essays.
no subject
When the reader guesses wrong about what a character will do, they are intrigued and want to explore the newly revealed depths of the character. However, if it turns out the character does NOT have depths, and they were wrong because the character behaved -- well -- out of character, then they don't want to waste any more time getting to know the character, because what's the point?
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Skillful authors do this by setting up and then confounding the reader expectations, revealing layer after layer of depth.
A great film example is The Replacement Killers. John Lee (Chow Yun-Fat) was first shown as a cold and calculating assassin. Then, when he refused to kill his next target the viewer was both surprised and intrigued, wondering what had prompted this sudden attack of conscience. As the story unfolds we learn that John's motivation was the need to protect his family at all costs. He's willing to sacrifice his own life to keep them safe, but when it comes to sacrificing a true innocent he hesitates, and this conflict drives the movie.
A wonderfully complex character and a great movie.
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Hmmmm.... maybe I'm missing something. I just don't see the rewatchability factor. If I had to watch a movie about an assassin, I'd much rather watch Bestseller, with Brian Dennehy(sp?) and James Woods.
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Not that I'm picking on you, or anything....
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Years ago, I was really *struggling* with the idea of character motivation, and I was bemoaning it to a friend, who listened to me for a while, and then said, "Hello! My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die!"
And it all became so very clear to me. Motivation is *simple*. *Consequences* may be complicated, but motivation is *simple*. It was one of the most meaningful moments in my learning curve as a writer, period. I am delighted to see other people land on exactly the same phrase as their demonstration point. *beam*
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And yes, I still believe it was a crime against a National Scenic Treasure when they made Chow Yun-Fat shave his head for Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.
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I ran into this in Tainted Trail. Ukiah and Max are hired to find a girl, but she's a friend of theirs and they've already stated they'd take the job for free if they had to. Motivation enough I thought.
In Chapter Eight the two discovered where she was located, that the bad guys from book one was behind the kidnapping, and that chances were, she was dead. I planned them to charge into the stronghold of the bad guys and find her, miracle upon miracle, still alive and well.
Max started to pack to go home.
I had other characters try to talk him out of it, reminding him of his motivation!!!!
And he snarled "they kicked our butts on our home turf, we don't have a hope in hell in this place...besides...she's most likely dead.
Ah, yes, he was so right. One of the few times I've had a character crawl out of the book and point out major plot problems to me. After lots of head scratching, I inserted someone -- way back on page one -- who WOULD climb into the depths of hell to kill the bad guys -- but all Ukiah and Max had to do was stay out of his way.
That allowed me to come up with new motivations for Ukiah and Max and determine a new ending to the book.
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For example, I had my main character in my current book searching the city psychically for something in particular and found herself in her "romantic interest's" room. She scanned it looking for what was missing, not expecting to see anything (I wasn't expecting her to see something), but then she walked over to the desk and found a drawing of herself done by the man. It totally changed her perspective of the situation (she thought he despised her and the drawn picture of herself made her realize that perhaps she was wrong). It changed the course of the book after that, and has consequences in the next book as well.