[Literary Society] Novel Growth Plan Season 2: How to Shape Characters

Note: This post is compiled from the internet.\NO.1\ First, you need to understand the purpose of creating this novel character. To create a deeply memorable character, the most important thing is to be like: \the four classic Chinese novels we are familiar with—their success lies in making their characters integrated into our lives. A kindergarten child may not know Luo Guanzhong, Shi Nai'an, Wu Cheng'en, or Cao Xueqin, and may not even know Romance of the Three Kingdoms or Dream of the Red Chamber, but they will know Sun Wukong defeating the White Bone Demon three times, or Wu Song fighting the tiger. This is the success of a novel. Therefore, when writing a novel, always remember the importance of the characters.\ Second, when depicting characters, use psychological descriptions sparingly. If you use them, don't write too much or too deeply, as this can make the character seem thin. Use other aspects of description to reflect the character's psychology (such as events, conflicts, background, etc.), which will increase the dimensionality of the character.\ Third, do not deliberately give the protagonist a fake name, and do not frequently use compound surnames, as lesser skill can actually hinder character creation.\ The specific writing will depend on the requirements of your novel, and you must pay attention to the focus points.||\NO.2\1. Find prototypes from your surroundings and integrate the people around you into your novel.\2. Before writing the novel, first conceive the personality and hobbies of the character, and mentally sketch out the character, achieving “a well-prepared plan.” Treat the character as a living person with flesh and blood…\3. At the beginning, you can write more freely; once you feel the character is basically formed, start detailing them. Sometimes the author will feel that the character comes to life on its own and does not require the author to describe them.\4. Read more novels and study how others develop characters. Reading enough novels will help you develop a certain “writing sense.”\5. Character traits can be reflected through language, psychology, actions, and expressions, including introducing their background, all of which can effectively portray the character.\6. At the beginner stage, you can first write characters with simpler, more direct personalities, which are easier to shape. After writing for a long time, you can try more complex, dual-natured characters.\7. After finishing, try to objectively examine the characters you have created and find mistakes for yourself.||\NO.3\In literary works, novels can depict characters from multiple angles and in a comprehensive manner. Through various artistic means, they can portray characters through portraits, psychological descriptions, dialogue, actions, and environmental descriptions. Novels can show external forms such as appearance, expressions, speech, behavior, and clothing, as well as internal activities like thoughts and emotions. They can also fully present the interplay between characters and their environment, thereby shaping rich and successful character images.\1. Novels depict characters through aspects such as appearance, behavior, language, psychology, and details.\(1) Portrait description refers to using precise, vivid, and expressive language to depict the characteristics of a character's physical appearance, such as appearance, clothing, posture, expression, and demeanor. Successful portrait descriptions not only make characters vividly appear before readers but also convey their identity, status, experiences, and circumstances, thus revealing their personality traits.\The following analyzes the features, methods, and ethnic characteristics of portrait descriptions.\1. The key to portrait description is to convey spirit through form, achieving both form and spirit. For example, in Cao Xueqin's "Dream of the Red Chamber," Lin Daiyu's portrait is described as:\Two arched brows seem to frown yet not, a pair of eyes seem joyous yet not fully so. Her cheeks possess a natural blush, her frail body exudes delicate charm. Tears sparkle faintly, she breathes softly. In quiet moments, she seems like a tender flower reflecting in water; in movement, like a weak willow swayed by the wind. She possesses one more sense than big, and her illness is a beauty like Xi Shi.\This description reveals Lin Daiyu's lonely, melancholy, profound, and somber temperament, as well as her sensitive and sentimental character, while also portraying her as a delicate and sickly beautiful woman.\2. Portrait descriptions should focus on a character's prominent features. It is important to depict a person's traits with extreme economy; it is best to draw their eyes, because drawing the entire hair, even in precise detail, is meaningless. The eyes are the window to the soul; depicting the eyes can reflect a character's inner world and reveal personality traits. For instance, the depiction of Xianglin Sao in "Blessings" is extremely successful. The author reflects her psychological changes through her eyes, illustrates the process of her being victimized, and exposes Xianglin Sao's tragic fate under the oppression of feudal rituals.\3. Common methods of portrait description.\In summary, the techniques used by novelists at home and abroad for portrait description generally fall into three forms.This refers to overall depiction, partial depiction, and the cloud-supporting-the-moon style of depiction. The so-called overall depiction is the writer's comprehensive introduction of the character. It is not limited to capturing a single glance or a single feature, but describes the character as a whole, including clothing, hands and feet, expressions, and so on. For example, Lu Xun's depiction of 'Tofu Beauty' Yang Ersao in "Hometown" highlights her prominent cheekbones, thin lips, and age around fifty; she did not tie her skirt, and her feet were spread like a compass. The so-called partial depiction refers to the writer's focused portrayal of the character's most distinctive parts, similar to a close-up shot in a movie, which best reflects the character's traits. For example, Lao She's depiction of the old girl Hu Niu in "Rickshaw Boy." The so-called cloud-supporting-the-moon style of portrait depiction is when the writer does not directly portray the character, but expresses them indirectly through someone else's narration, comments, or actions. This method not only saves effort but can sometimes be even more effective than direct depiction.