Characters are predominantly defined by the decisions they make. The story-telling community tends to agree with this statement. It would follow that more interesting decisions make for more interesting characters. The major implication here is that an interesting character does not exist in a vacuum- the ability to create complex characters rests with the ability to create complex dilemmas.

Cake or Death

The biggest problem with many films is that the dilemmas are decidedly one sided and easy to approach. It is a waste of screen time to show a character making an easy decision. Say we put ten characters into a room, all with various character traits, religious backgrounds, political inclinations and personal histories and gave them a dilemma.  The most revealing and interesting dilemma would be one in which all ten characters would choose differently- so the viewer would learn the various differences. The least revealing dilemma would be one in which all ten would choose the identical path; like “Live or Die”. Comedian Eddie Izzard has a great take on the concept:

We can think of it like questions one would ask a prospective date. If we are trying to learn about them, why ask “Cake or Death?” (other than to be coy). As filmmakers, we only have the length of the movie to connect our audience to our characters, don’t waste time with easy dilemmas. So how does one go about making complex dilemmas? Here is a method:
Good vs. Good

The fastest way to create a flaccid dilemma is by making one choice “good” and another choice “evil.” It’s “Cake or Death” all over again. Instead, try putting values in conflict. For instance, it is hard to argue HONESTY is undesirable (It’s good!). Similarly, who wouldn’t want KINDNESS (Also good, but different). Once we place these values in conflict, we can start to think of complex dilemmas. Some small examples:

HONESTY vs. KINDNESS

Your best friend, a passionate musician, is gathering signatures for a petition to allow students to practice instruments in your college dorm. You do not enjoy the music your friend plays. She asks you to sign the petition…

The man who has replaced you at your dream job is at the center of media and press coverage for his success. You know the man (though qualified) lied on a part of his resume- you also know he has a family to support. A reporter asks about his resume, do you tell the truth?

Your daughter enters a talent competition and was decidedly outperformed. In a moment of sheer awe, you cast your vote for a child who does spectacular human beatboxing. Your daughter returns from the competition downtrodden with loss. She looks up and asks you if you voted for her…

Thoughtful people will disagree on the answers to these dilemmas. Your own answer will tell you if you value kindness or honesty more. Such decisions are more revealing of character: In what contexts will the character be independent or cooperative? curious or comfortable? free or secure? practical or imaginative? social or diligent? Value conflicts come in an unending palette.

You can probably improve upon my examples, feel free to do so.

Happy reading,

-Tom

I just finished reading a book called Story by Robert McKee. It was quite an insightful book (though I have many criticisms of it which I will go into later). In the following passage, McKee describes the creation of an original character:

Like Dr. Frankenstien, we build characters out of parts found. A writer takes the analytical mind of his sister and peices it together with the comic wit of his friend, adds to that the cunning cruelty of a cat and the blind persistence of King Lear. We borrow bits and peices of humanity, raw chunks of imagination and observation wherever they’re found, assemble them into dimensions of contrafiction, then round them into creatures we call characters. (McKee, 386)

The way I described originality as integration of existing ideas (in an earlier post) is analogous to how McKee describes character creation as the integration of ideas in existing characters.

The implication of integrative thinking is twofold. It means that we can research and observe to create “original” products. However, it also means that our products are only as strong as the wealth of ideas at our disposal. We cannot hope to be “original” (in the integrative sense) if we do not explore, study and read a wide breadth of material. And I don’t just mean other forms of art, I mean all sorts of disciplines.

But how do we find time to study all sorts of disciplines? I read another book recently that was a collection of essays from the philosopher Lord Isaiah Berlin called The Power of Ideas. In an essay on general education, Berlin writes about studying in a way to maximize breadth without completely sacrificing depth and specialization. He writes that instead of simply trying to absorb material from other disciplines (like making a chemist memorize poetry, or making an artist list out famous physicists) we should focus on the methodologies of different disciplines.

Simply put, we should at the least know how various disciplines go about answering questions- and what questions they are most interested in answering. Economics, for example, is largely a question of allocation- they assume that resources are scarce and try to figure out the best way to distribute them fairly. Capitalism is born from the pursuit of this question. Capitalism also assumes that people generally make rational decision, and that more choice and more consumption is good. Psychologists and sociologists often have completely different assumption about human beings- that we are governed by irrational emotions, and that we are molded by society. Many political scientists assume humans are corrupted by power, hence a major question in political science is how to best distribute power.

My point is, that there is a vast reservoir of ideas out there, and our creativity will be severely limited if we live only within the assumptions and methodologies of our own particular specialization.

-Tom

HERE is a link to purchase or preview the book.

I’ve worked on this book for a long time, and I’m particularly proud of it. One of the wonderful things about making a picture book is the ability to get a whole story out there with a manageable work load.

Some spreads:

-Tom

I read a fairly interesting book over break called “The Anatomy of Story” written by John Truby. Truby’s book is a guide to preparing and writing an effective story.

Truby defines a story at first in a simple superficial way: The one line definition of a story: “A speaker tells a listener what someone did to get what he wanted and why.”

So the first question we might ask is, why is understanding story important? Well, I feel there is a tremendous reason that we should be interested in story (if we consider ourselves active citizens of the world):

Story is Argument:

Story can be viewed strictly as an argument. Every story can be viewed as some kind of argument (stories that try to avoid making an argument usually just make a very weak, confusing or insignificant arguments that no-one could disagree with- for ex: good is better than inexplicable evil) According to Truby, argument is typically articulated through the main character’s major flaw. So when arguing in story form, treat your main character as the guinea pig who succeeds based on your argument. For example, if you wish to say “cooperation is better than independence“, you might set up a situation in which your main character is a viciously independent person who must cooperate to succeed.

In the following sections I attempt to articulate some of the points Truby makes. Many of the concepts Truby describes are directly applicable to the lexicon used in critical thinking texts (such as “Asking the Right Questions”). I want to warn those of you who may decide to read the book that I am placing the terms into Truby’s mouth- he does not make the connections apparent in his book.

Building the Main Character:

Truby never explicitly uses the term “value conflict” but is essentially defining character and story in terms of, what I have learned to call: value conflicts. A value conflict results in two positive abstractions (values) being placed against each other, a common example is: Freedom vs. Security. The first piece of advice that Truby divulges is particularly interesting: He writes that many people try to start making their character by listing values and traits. For instance:

Protagonist “Jill”
1) Brave
2) Strong
3) Kind
4) Independent

Truby considers the above approach useless. His insight is very much in line with this idea of values: values mean almost nothing until they are placed up against other values. No one will say “bravery” is bad. But once we place it against “intelligence” we have a very nuanced and interesting argument forming. Perhaps a military general would prefer bravery over intelligence, but a researcher may prefer the opposite. The preferred value in a value conflict is called a value preference. What Truby suggests is the construction of a character web.

A character web is a chart of the possible characters in your story each compared and contrasted with the protagonist. In some sense, Truby asks us to create value conflicts while attributing the opposing values to other characters. So in this chart we might have our protagonist as “physically strong” while his friend (a secondary character) is “diplomatic”- by pairing up these characters we create the value conflict “physical strength over diplomacy”. Not only does this approach more clearly define your main character, but it also makes displaying these value conflicts in your story much easier. For instance, if we come to a part of the story where we wish to show that the protagonist holds the value preference “physical strength over diplomacy” we know that we must introduce the “diplomatic” character from our chart that holds the corresponding inverse value preference. Here is a mock character web:

1)Protagonist “Jill” and “Diplomatic Dave”
Physical Strength vs. Diplomacy

2)Protagonist “Jill” and “Clingy Clara”
Independence vs. Security

3)Protagonist “Jill” and “Asshole Andrew”
Kindness vs. Honesty

4)Protagonist “Jill” and “Cowardly Karly”
Bravery vs. Strategy

If you couldn’t tell, the fictitious author of the mock character web above obviously shares the value preferences of the main character… But the main character also needs to have a vital value preference (Or what we might call a Moral Principle) that would be considered a flaw by the story-teller. So if the Moral Argument (Truby’s term) in the story is based on a moral principle, such as: Cooperation over Independence, there might be a critical secondary character that would serve as the voice of this moral principle:

5)Protagonist “Jill” and “Friendly Fred”
Independence vs. Cooperation

This last value conflict represents what Truby calls the Weakness. I will attempt to explain weakness and other basic concepts of story in the next section.

The Seven Basic Steps to Story Structure:

On the cover of Truby’s book reads: “The Anatomy of Story, 22 steps to becoming a master story-teller.” Inside, however, Truby writes that the number “22″ is fairly arbitrary and is only a framework he created as a rough guideline. Truby claims that the 22 steps can be stripped down to seven rudimentary steps fairly integral to story-telling. I describe them in the following paragraphs:

1) Weakness and Need

The “weakness” is the major moral flaw present in the main character- it is the illustration of a poorly chosen central value preference. Truby argues that the weakness runs under the surface of a story (much like a value preference in any argument) and is not revealed until the protagonist discovers the flaw herself. Truby stresses that the weakness should be one that effects how the main character treats herself and others. He writes that in many stories, the main character merely has a psychological weakness that only effects how the protagonist treats herself. However, this distinction is not as necessary with the idea of the weakness being a Moral Principle- which inherently is a basis for how one interacts with the world.

The “need” is what Truby characterizes as the “lesson” of the story. It is the prescription that results from the outcome of the main character overcoming her weakness. The “need” would be phrased as such: Protagonist must overcome said weakness to live a more moral life.

In terms of values, the “need” would simply be the inverse of the allegedly flawed Moral Principle that the main character holds. So the “need” might now be phrased: Protagonist must discover that she holds a flawed moral principle [ex: Independence over Cooperation] and change it [to Cooperation over Independence] in order to live a more moral life.

For instance*:

In the film Dogville, the main character’s weakness is her total submission to the value preference: Collective Responsibility over Individual Responsibility. She needs to release her firm grip on this value preference so that she can hold others accountable for their actions- thereby living a more moral life (according to the filmmaker).

In A Christmas Carol, Scrooge’s weakness could be his commitment to the value preference: Thrift over Emotional Well-being. Scrooge needs to loosen his pockets so that he can learn the wonders of friendship.

In the short story The Lottery, the main-character’s weakness is that she goes along with the value preference: Tradition over Individual Freedom. The protagonist needs to change her mind (but unfortunately the town-folks’ mind, as well) in order to escape the consequences of the town’s tradition.

2) Desire

Desire is the superficial goal the character wants to achieve. Truby makes an interesting distinction between desire and need. Desire is the what the main character wants on the surface- what the audience thinks the story is about (when in actuality the story is about the Moral Principle within the main character’s need).

For instance:

In Dogville the main character’s desire is to escape the mafia and the police.

In A Christmas Carol, the main character’s desire is to escape his ghosts.

In The Lottery, the main character’s desire is to escape death by stoning.

3) Opponent

The opponent in a story is the character competing with the protagonist. The opponent should be the character (or group of characters) best suited to constantly and relentlessly attack the protagonist’s weakness; done in such a way that the protagonist must overcome their weakness or fail. Truby uses the term opponent because he sees a large mistake in most stories as making this character a “villain” (-a character that looks evil, and does “evil” things). Truby argues that in a good story, the villain is not evil, he/she just opposes the main character. Truby also makes a very important insight: The opponent should not simply wish to stop the protagonist, the opponent should have desires that cross the protagonist’s; and Truby argues that ideally the opponent would be competing for the same thing as the protagonist. The opponent should also be human- and by this Truby means, the opponent has to be able to learn.

Much like a written argument, making a story in which the opponent is pure evil is setting up a straw-man. A good story, like a good article, will illuminate the opposition in the most positive way- otherwise no-one will identify the moral argument because they will not be able to understand the opponent.

For example:

In Dogville, the opponent is the protagonist‘s lover. He appeals to the main-character’s value preference so that she considers him a victim of society.

In A Christmas Carol, the opponents are himself in the past, present, and future. The ghosts personify Scrooge’s inspection of his deep seeded value preference.

In The Lottery, the opponent is the town leader, representing the whole of the town-folk. The stringently obeyed tradition of the town bodes ill for the main character and causes her to question the value preference that put her in the situation.

4) Plan

Truby writes that the protagonist should establish some semblance of a plan or strategy to attain the desired goal. Otherwise, the audience does not know why the character does what he/she is doing. The audience should never be utterly in the dark about the central character’s decisions, it prevents them from understanding the main-character’s value preferences.

I feel drawn to making an analogy with paper-writing: Like a table of contents in a book, or an explanation at the beginning of a paper that tells the reader what will be covered, a map must be available to the audience of a story (not of the plot- in which mystery facilitates drama- but of the main character’s thought process).

5) Battle

The ultimate conflict between the protagonist and the opponent. It decides who reaches his/her goal. The battle can be articulated in infinitely varying methods- from physical to psychological to whatever. The whole story builds up to this moment- it is at this moment that the main character must overcome her incorrectly held value-preference or fail.

6) Self-Revelation

The main character goes through a very difficult struggle during the battle, and as a result sees her weakness. Truby describes this process as “strip[ing] away the facade [she] has lived behind” and argues that the process of stripping her facade should be the most difficult obstacle the protagonist faces in the story. As a result of going through this self deconstruction the heroine gains new insight and reveals her insight by her actions leading to and from the moment of introspection.

Truby argues that in good stories the opponent has a self-revelation at the same time that the protagonist does. The opponent’s insight must be related and intertwined with the main character’s insight- both insights pointing the audience toward the moral argument behind the story.

Good examples of these types of stories are actually romantic comedies. While they often do not deal with subject matter that is very piercing- they do establish the opponent (the love interest) as a learning human. Often times, both the main character and the opponent must learn and change in order to treat each other morally.

7) New Equilibrium

At the end of the story, a state of normality is regained. The only major difference being that now the protagonist has either evolved or devolved as a result of changing a flawed value preference. If the protagonist cannot realize her flaw, or is unable to deal with her flaw, she falls and is defeated (allowing the audience to learn from her mistake instead). If the protagonist has her revelation in time, she “wins” and is able to find a way to live in a more ethically able way (the audience shares in her success and in her moral revelation).

There are a few interesting methods Truby describes as lubricants for the seven-step story process. I will attempt to describe a few of these methods in the next section.

* The examples I use are not exact, there is much more nuance and many exceptions and variations to stories that Truby goes into in his book. Many stories have multiple opponents and protagonists, changing desires, missing or multiple plans and battles. I am merely outlining a basic structure.

Other Interesting Elements of Story:

Symbols:

Truby explains symbols in a way that I found very insightful. Usually we think of symbols as the weird (seemingly unintentional) re-occurring objects that our 5th-grade english teachers placed an infuriating amount of importance on memorizing.

She is wearing white: It’s her virginity!

Look a Dove: Peace!

There is an “A” on her chest…

Truby describes the use of symbols in a way I found much more interesting: Symbols are any “thing” that the storyteller attaches to an emotion. It can be a color, a series of notes, an object, a character, a voice… anything the storyteller wants. Their utility is tremendous. Think of a storyteller employing a symbol like a pavlovian bell. The storyteller produces food and rings a bell. The audience salivates. Soon, the storyteller merely rings the bell, and the audience still spews forth bubbling saliva.

A good example is in the film Jaws, where the all-too familiar quickening notes- “baaah-dump…. baahh-dump” soon terrify the audience without the need for any shark to be visible.

In The Matrix, the virtual world is represented with green hues while the real world is desaturated blues. The audience soon only needs to see the hues on-screen to have the feeling they are no longer in the real world.

There are symbols that exist outside of stories that can be employed (like the “dove” or the color white) but these symbols are dangerous to use because they are ambiguous. Maybe a good analogy would be thinking of symbols like ambiguous words. You can attempt to use a word like “justice” or “spirituality” or “true love” in a paper, but you run the enormous risk of everyone having different concepts of these words. So to be a more effective writer, you might create another version of the word with a subscript (like “true love1“) that will serve as a symbol for the definition you outline at the beginning of your paper or story.

Story World:

An interesting insight Truby makes is that (much like the opponent should be the character best suited for taking advantage of the protagonist’s weakness) the environment should be specifically created to relentlessly put pressure on the main character’s weakness. This way, the character’s weakness (her flawed value preference) becomes the pivotal element in the story.

Drama:

Truby describes that a crucial element in the plot is the act of revealing new information. Truby argues that in order to build drama and interest, a story must reveal new information exponentially in frequency and in magnitude. So in a good story, Truby argues that every new bit of information is progressively more important and more frequently occurring- spiraling upward to the climax (battle) of the story.

I hope this post is helpful. PLEASE do not hesitate to ask for clarification or anything. I have tried to cram a lot into this post and I realize that it may not be very clear.

-Tom