Anonymous, on September 2, 2024 at 1:02 pm said:
If you could be so kind Betsy, share the key. Mine is stuck in the G D lock.
The key for me was this: editors who turned the book down said that my main character, Amy, didn’t change enough by the end of the book. There is an obsession today of having characters change (and that generally means for the better). It is my deeply held belief that people don’t change all that much. In fact, time reveals who they really are and often they get worse, harden, ossify. My editor said, Amy doesn’t have to change, but she has to learn. That turned the key for me. All the disappointment she experiences needs to impact her, but no she doesn’t get the guy, the job, the rainbows and unicorns. I want to find out who a character is layer by layer; that’s all. That’s enough for me.
Who is your favorite fictional character and why? OR, what did you do on your summer vacation?
Photo: France revisited
Filed under: Uncategorized |
Betsy Lerner 
I’m glad Anonymous asked about the key, because I was curious about that too. My favorite character: Olive Kitteridge, the realest of reals.
John C. Krieg
Concerning your key:
I agree that people really don’t change all that much. Those first five years are critical, and most of us remember very little about them. So, all those books talking about “the hero’s journey” and how they literally transform because of it are useless to be. If they were to say how the hero (or anti-hero) handles her/his challenges is what makes the story, I would find it more helpful.
Concerning your question:
Feliz Nasmyth in T.C. Boyle’s “Budding Prospects” (1984). He was a non-hero. Just an everyday smuck with a history of quitting at most everything he tries. But he knew who he was, and Boyle let his reader know that from the start: “No: I was a child of the middle class, nurtured on Tiger’s Milk and TV dinners and Aureomycin until I towered over my parents like some big-footed freak of another species, like a cuckoo raised by sparrows.” So, Boyle set the stage that nothing much was expected of Felix, and through his bungling incompetence Felix hilariously delivered on that promise.
Very interesting! Thanks for sharing this “key” and good luck getting your book out there to many readers.
Jane Ellis
Your editor is spot on. It made me think about my work, and did I conform to the “hero’s journey?” I’m happy to say, no, I don’t think so, but I do think my characters learned.
What did I do for summer vacation? Haaaaaa. What the hell is that? I DID get two puppies. Adorable little Yorkies, named Daphne and Chloe. We were going to the Blue Ridge Mtns mid-Sept, but no way at the moment – not with those two who are NOT yet house trained, or leash trained. 🙂
George Smiley. He’s an enigma wrapped in a riddle inside a mystery. Like me 😀
What did I do on my summer vacation? PT!
Your editor definitely slipped you the master key. And your view on characters not changing, but learning who they are, reminded me of the old quote: And the end of all our exploring / Will be to arrive where we started / And know the place for the first time.
The astute Jane Smiley advised new novelists, in my paraphrase, that while the unexamined life might not be worth living, it is certainly true that the un-lived life is not worth examining. I agree that protagonsts’ having learned something is as valuable as changing, if not more so. The classic Greek plays and Shakespeare show the narrative necessity of understanding. As an aside, the lack of the protagonist’s either changing or developing a new understanding is the primary reason that I found the film The Good One to be disappointing.– Stephen Sossaman
Well boys and girls I am the Anonymous with the stuck G D key. Betsy, the advice not only works for my character but for me as the writer. Again I have LEARNED FROM YOU. Thanks babe. Learning is good, very, very good.
My summer vacation? A week in the Poconos with kids and grandchildren. It was heaven and ….I will quit while I’m ahead because the rain and traffic to get there was hell. Your most devoted Anonymous, Carolynnwith2Ns
Hi! Hi! Hi!
Hi back-atcha !!!!
So excited to read your new book. Can’t wait!!
“Who is your favorite fictional character and why?”
Falstaff. As well him as any other (though I did espy him with Harriet, and they made a fine couple).
A few months ago, I saw Falstaff played by Ian McKellen.
Amazing.
Hi. Again, I wish you a bestseller! I’m not a keeper of characters in my head, and, certainly, the reason I might keep one or two, so here’s what I did this summer.
I wrote and revised and, deciding I may never earn a single penny for all my efforts, I got hired by a tutoring firm and am waiting to have my first student assigned.
But…I’m not giving up! I’m just following the other good piece of advice: don’t quit your day job. Though, I am not sorry I wrote full time and gave it my all for about a decade. I think if I hadn’t done that, I’d regret my choice even more. I have built a portfolio of novels, plays, and even a musical, to put forward when I am finally discovered. 💚
I didn’t comment because I was just nodding furiously when you posted this. But now George Saunders has posted about boiling water and I feel, frankly, blessed that the two of you in the space of a week have unlocked something for me about the elements I really struggle with in longer pieces. Thank you ! https://open.substack.com/pub/georgesaunders/p/boiling-water?r=3a0q&utm_medium=ios