Well, now just to make it interesting and keep people interested (yah right) I guess I'd better actually talk about the topic of this blog.
I'll start it out with a simple subject and one that people often wonder about when it comes to OCs in fanfiction. The simple question: is Beth based on me?
Naturally, the answer is less simple.
When I was younger and first started the stories, I was like "NO! Definitely not!" I mean, isn't it obvious that she isn't me? I don't wear glasses! And I'm not a genius! And I'm not really super-skinny! And now years later it's like... boy I was naive. *lol*
The long and short of it is that, I believe, anyone who creates a character is at least in part writing themselves. Even if the character represents a part of them who is the opposite of what the author stands for, in order to write a convincing character they must get inside their heads... they must write a person, and in order to do that you can only really draw on your own experiences and thoughts. Henny is as much me as Beth is, in some ways (and as such I'm surprisingly fond of her; I am the only person in the world who is ^_^), but when it comes to protagonists, especially in fanfiction, they are nearly always at least partly the author. It's not a hard-and-fast rule but it's a pretty strong one.
None of which is to say that Beth is based on me, or that all OCs are just avatars of the authors writing them, or anything like that. It's different; this is influence. No characters can escape the influence of their writers. Making up "ways" in which the OC is different from the creator is just denial. So as I got older I grew to sort of embrace the elements of myself that I share with Beth; there are a lot. We both talk a little too much, we both question how we appear to others far too often, and we both wear our emotions on our sleeves.
There are major differences too, of course. Many of the ways in which Beth behaves are not patterns I follow, but they're patterns that I try to understand. Beth puts up with more than I do, for reasons that - as cliche as this sounds - I'm only just now coming to understand, myself. The funny thing is that when I first started writing the Webfoot Chronicles in 1994, I spent all this time denying how much of myself was in this character yet at the same time when something happened I knew how she'd react. I didn't have to think about the hows and whys, I just wrote it, because obviously that's how she would react. It's how I would react, or sometimes, how I would LIKE to react; therefore it's how it goes. Now, even as I've accepted Beth as a part of me and me as a part of her, I take more time to think: never mind what I would do. How will Beth actually respond to this?
I am glad I've waited this long to write "All About Elizabeth", and I'm also glad I'm doing it now, at the same time that I'm starting to heavily revise the first few stories. I have a backstory to look at, patterns coming to light and I'm going "this has been here all along?" And at the same time I can go back and just slightly emphasize one or two things in the early stuff that is explained - or at least pointed to - in AAE. It's cheating in a way to go back 13 years later and "restart" the beginnings... but at the same time I feel like it's the right time.
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4 comments:
Hey! How do I "subscribe" or whatever to your blog on here? This is Amanda, btw. ;)
I haven't used my journal on here in forEVER!
Very cool blog, I look forward to more of Beth's adventures (and misadventures?) ^_^
I should elaborate a bit, I liked the
way you explained how you feel about Beth and writing about her. I feel the same way about my own characters,
from Hagusa and Slew to the more bizarre ones. They all came from my head, even when they have small influences elsewhere.
"The long and short of it is that, I believe, anyone who creates a character is at least in part writing themselves. Even if the character represents a part of them who is the opposite of what the author stands for, in order to write a convincing character they must get inside their heads... they must write a person, and in order to do that you can only really draw on your own experiences and thoughts."
I think that this is very wise and true. Maybe it isn't necessarily true of all authors, but I certainly know it's true of me, and when I go down my roster of Original Characters I have to look them each in the eye and acknowledge we are kin.
[Also, I know the post I am responding to is nearly two years old, but it's new to me and I may comment on a few more of these older posts as the occasion strikes me while I am read through this blog.]
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