Monday, September 7, 2009
Characters Without Back-Story
At a recent party, under the influence of several hours of drinking, a friend remarked that he wasn't at a point where he felt he could begin writing a novel. "I get too bogged down in the characters' back-stories."
I thought about my own writing in which backstory is sometimes conspicuously absent. I didn't know why, but I was completely averse to spending pages detailing to the reader a character's personal history. Unless it was done very carefully, I usually stopped reading fiction that spent a great deal of time spelling out these details. They struck me as somehow irrelevant. But I couldn't explain why.
And then I came across a podcast on the subject of Karma. Suddenly back-story was put into a new context and my own aversion to including it in my writing was made clear: Back-story has an element of redundancy.
And then I came across a podcast on the subject of Karma. Suddenly back-story was put into a new context and my own aversion to including it in my writing was made clear: Back-story has an element of redundancy. The woman in the podcast explained the concept of Karma as that of cause and effect. She said, "When we meet an experience, we meet ourselves. What happens to us is a result of our past actions, our Karma." This meeting of ourselves in our present situations is why I feel that back-story is redundant. The back-story should be inherent in the character's present - in the event itself as well as the way in which the character responds to this event.
Boring or flat characters are not boring of flat because the reader hasn't been filled in on what profession their parent's held, what food they liked to eat or if they were teased by bullies as a child. They're boring or flat because these details haven't manifested themselves in the actions of the present character or in dictating how this character responds to what's presented.
Those few words from the podcast on the subject of karma - that when we meet an experience, we meet ourselves - also details exactly what I love about traveling. Traveling is a constant re-meeting of ourselves due to our karma. 16-hour bus rides are either enjoyable or despicable based on a hundreds of different factors that took place long before that bus ride was even considered. But every single one of those factors will be present in the attitude of the person taking that bus ride, even if they sit in complete silence the whole time. We figure out who we are based on both where we find ourselves, and how we respond to where we find ourselves.
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