Characters: Original
Characters: Original
by CarolinaC
Picture this: You have a fantastic idea for a story. You know your fandom inside out. You're excited about trying to capture the voice of the canon characters. The blank screen or page awaits. Your fingers, trembling with anticipation, are poised to begin – but you aren't ready. Not yet. That plot you're thinking of? The one where Sherlock Holmes' younger half-sister solves the murder and marries Inspector Lestrade? Yeah, there's one problem with that. Sherlock Holmes never had a half-sister- you're going to have to make her up yourself, as an original character, an OC. And a badly written OC can get you into trouble, quickly (1) .
So, how do you write a compelling original character in fanfiction? The same way you write any other compelling character, of course. The only real difference is that you've got to pay a lot of attention to how your character fits into someone else's world. It isn't difficult to do, but if you mess it up, your readers will notice, even if its only a subconscious twinge. So, how do you ensure you've paid enough attention to the story world when creating your characters? Let's take it one step at a time . . .
1. Don't get me wrong; there are great OCs out there. Shakespeare wrote more than a few; the story in the Gesta Danorum that Shakespeare retold as Hamlet doesn't have a Horatio, let alone a Rosencantz or a Guildenstern. Virgil wrote OCs on an epic scale - In the Aeneid, he gave Aeneas a whole host of friends, enemies, and family members - even household gods - who never existed in the Illiad. Unfortunately, you and I aren't Shakespeare or Virgil.
Names:
With OCs, even the basics can be challenging. Think about names, for instance. Let's go back to our example above, where Sherlock Holmes has a younger half-sister. Say I've been watching a lot of anime lately, and have fallen in love with the name Sakura. "Sakura Holmes" sounds pretty good – so I'm done, right? Nope. Not even close.
Last I checked, Sherlock Holmes lives in London (1) and speaks English. The name Sakura, on the other hand, is very definitely Japanese. Sakura sounds out of place in a Victorian, English-speaking setting. We need to find a name that will be a better fit for the society. If our story is set in 1890, and the half-sister is 20, she must have been born in 1870. If I look up the most popular English girls' names in 1870, I find that the number one name for girls was Mary, and the number two name, Elizabeth (2). Mary's out, since there's already a Mary in canon, Watson's wife. That means our OC's name should be "Elizabeth Holmes," right? Again, no.
This character's older brothers are named "Sherlock" and "Mycroft". These are both unusual names and definitely not in the top 10 names for 1870. Elizabeth sounds too commonplace to fit in with the Holmes family! Both the Holmes' boys names are used as surnames (3), so a surname would work well. Think of one that makes a good girl's name (4), and run with it. A place name might also sound good - Fenchurch, maybe (5). Victorians felt there was a lot to learn from history; they're the people who gave 'mediaevalism' its name. So a name that makes a classical reference – "Tacita" – or a reference to the Middle Ages – "Heloise" - might work too. Does this mean that you should name your OC "Tacita Fenchurch Heloise Holmes"? Again, probably not. Unless you have a story-related reason to list middle names, leave them out. Pick your one favourite name, and stick with it.
Most of us are comfortable picking names for a real-life culture that uses a familiar language; if nothing else, you can Google popular names in the country or time period. Naming in fantasy societies can be more challenging. Once again, the key is to make sure you know the world you're using well enough to pick a name that will fit in. Don't name your Tolkien-inspired elf "Slothrat", or your Lovecraftian eldritch horror "Benevolentia". Getting the right name may require a little research. What if you don't have time to do much research? A quick-and-dirty solution is to recombine parts of different names in the source material and/or a related real life culture (6). For instance, to get a quick name for that Tolkien-inspired elf, think of two elves from the books/films. You could take the first part of "Elrond" and the second part of "Glorfindel" to come up with "Elfindel" - not the prettiest name, but at least it doesn't stand out like a sore thumb (7).
1. Well, actually, the last time I checked, Holmes had retired to Sussex to raise bees – but he spent most of his professional life in London.
3. According to ESPN, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle named his characters after some of his favourite cricketers -http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/content/story/82166.html
4. I once started a Sherlock Holmes fanfiction where the detective had a niece named Penrose.
5. What? It worked for Douglas Adams. Actually, because it worked so well for Douglas Adams, you probably shouldn't use it unless you're using it as a conscious reference. It's been taken, in a big and famous way.
6. This method, while effective, does have its pitfalls – this is how Puccini got "Benjamin Franklin Pinkerton", after all.
7. Serious Tolkien fans may want to note that I did not do enough research here to determine if that name actually follows the Sindarin rules for consonant mutation and assimilation. Quick-and-dirty, remember?
Appearance:
Once again, your character's appearance should fit the setting. If your character was born in a tree on the forest moon of Endor, he'd better resemble a bear. And not just any bear; in Return of the Jedi, ewoks are bipedal, approximately 1 m tall, and have fur in shades of brown, black, red, and white (1). So your ewok character shouldn't be lime green and as tall as a house. Similarly, if you're writing a Pride and Prejudice fanfic, avoid having Mr. Darcy's even-more-handsome twin brother fight in Wellington's Iberian campaign while wearing hipster glasses and a Beatle haircut (2).
Speaking of even-more-handsome twin brothers, remember that family members generally look at least a little alike (3). It's nice if this similarity is subtle – face shape, mannerisms – but just about any similarity will do. One thing to keep in mind: genetics. For instance, it is unlikely that two blue-eyed people will have a brown-eyed child (4). If you write a story where this happens, your readers will complain. Don't forget, some fictional worlds have their own genetic rules, and you've got to follow those, too. If every time a Baratheon marries a Lannister, the children have dark hair, you probably shouldn't use the word 'platinum' to describe the hair of your own Baratheon-Lannister character (5).
Finally, don't forget that human characters can only have actual human hair, eye, and skin colours. Please, no eyes the colour of ripe tangerines and hair the colour of starlight. For goodness' sake, I don't even know what the colour of starlight is – not all stars are the same colour. This sort of colouration doesn't make your character unique; it just confuses your reader.
1. http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Ewok
2. Unless you're writing a time-travel fic. But we'll talk about breaking the rules later. And even then, Napoleon would probably laugh at hipster glasses. Just sayin'.
3. This can be great for foreshadowing if you're planning to later reveal that the OC is a secret child or sibling of a canon character.
4. It is, however, possible. Eye colour in humans is controlled by more than one gene, so it isn't as simple as you're taught in elementary school. If you're confused as to how, there's a great explanation (with pictures!) online here:http://genetics.thetech.org/how-blue-eyed-parents-can-have-brown-eyed-children
5. A Song of Ice and Fire / Game of Thrones: Colour-coded for your convenience! For the record, that weird little genetic quirk drives me crazy. It doesn't make much sense to me. Unless of course, the people of Westeros are not actually human . . . which would explain a lot, now that I think about it.
Outlook and Personality
Although a great deal of personality is innate, a person's basic character is also moulded by experience. And a lot of those experiences come from culture. That isn't to say that your characters always must follow cultural expectations – but if they break away, they'd better have a good reason.
For example, imagine you're writing a Star Trek story, and you have a Vulcan OC. As Mr. Spock would tell you, Vulcans prize logic and self-control (1). So you probably shouldn't write a scene where your Vulcan OC calls the ship's captain a 'terran buffoon', then bursts into tears over a hot fudge sundae on the holodeck. Unless, of course, this outburst is the first symptom of Bendii syndrome (2), and your story is a commentary on how we deal with dementia.
Make sure your character knows only things that are actually possible to know within the context of the story. Sherlock Holmes' sister shouldn't know in advance the outcome of the Second Boer War. Similarly, a muggle character in a Harry Potter fanfiction shouldn't know all about Hogwarts before he's met his first witch or wizard. The books make it clear that people with magical abilities work very, very hard to keep their world secret, so your muggle OC shouldn't be aware of them at the start of the story.
Finally, make sure your character has opinions and prejudiced suited to the society they live in: Klingons should value honour; Tolkien dwarves should value gold. Your character can probably get away with one weird, counter-cultural opinion, especially if you explain it well, but probably not a raft of them.
1. Essentially, they're a bunch of pointy-eared space Stoics.
2. A debilitating disease of elderly Vulcans that leads to a loss of emotional control. Not as much fun as the 'medical problem' I'm sure you all thought I was going to mention, Pon Farr. I mean, we all remember when Spock went crazy and threw that soup at Nurse Chapel, right?
When to Break the Rules
I know what you're thinking – those are a lot of rules, and that's a lot of stuff to keep in mind, plus, that doesn't work for the story I want to tell. Well, okay. Go ahead. Break the rules. Just make sure you can justify why you're breaking the rule within the context of the story.
Say you're dying to name Sherlock's half-sister "Sakura Holmes". Now, why would an English girl born about 1870 have a Japanese name? Perhaps she is of Japanese extraction; in this case, her father could be the very-English Mr. Holmes, and her mother from Japan. You'll have to come up with some backstory to explain how the two met, but with a little imagination and some research, you can definitely supply enough details to make it plausible to the reader.
As mentioned above, you can often get away with breaking one rule, especially if you justify it properly. But if you break rule after rule, eventually, your OC won't fit in with the canon characters and their world. Readers don't like that. So be careful.
A Note of Caution: Avoiding Mary Sue
The original Mary Sue was the protagonist of a short Star Trek fanfiction (1) published in and amateur fanzine in the early '70s. In that tale, Mary Sue was a 15 year old lieutenant who was good at everything, loved by everyone, and saved the Enterprise before dying artistically.
Generally, Mary Sue is an idealized author-insert character. She isn't always a girl (her male equivalent is sometimes called "Gary Stu" or "Larry Stu" or "Marty Stu"), but she is always very good looking. She often has an exotic hair or eye colour, and a flowery name. She is good at everything – she can do Tae Kwon Do, cook a turkey dinner, win the Nobel prize for literature, and tame the wild swamp beast, all before breakfast. Those who know her, love her, regardless of their sex. Those who don't know her, love her from afar, ditto. Well, unless they're evil – but even the bad guy usually has a sneaking admiration for Mary Sue. Worst of all, she has no real flaws and doesn't grow as a character during the course of the story.
Oh, her author thinks Mary Sue has flaws. She's clumsy – but her clumsiness has no impact on the story. She's stubborn – but who can blame her? She knows everything and therefore is right all the time. Or, most commonly, Mary Sue's flaw is that she's just so awesome that other people just don't understand her. It's lonely being that great (2).
If you're afraid your character is a Mary Sue, go through your story and reread it. Make sure that your OC seems like a plausible, realistic person, a person with uncertainties, fears, and flaws. If your OC has these characteristics, you're okay. You've avoided the dread Mary Sue.
1. Which you can read in all its Sue-ish glory here:http://web.archive.org/web/20100830041159/http://www.fortunecity.com/rivendell/dark/1000/marysue.htm
2. I have really and truly seen this idea being used in stories, and it is not a pretty thing.
So, there you have it. Go out there and write an OC that would make Shakespeare and Virgil proud!
Do you like to write or read about original characters?
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