# Getting away from 1Dimensional People



## SlushPuppy (Jun 9, 2008)

I am paranoid about my characters being one dimensional. Are there any good 'self check' methods to make sure a character is not? Or in the very least a good definitive line between a good character (maryjanes aside) and a 1D character? 

I'd hate to write my entire story only for people to go "hey, wow, those characters sucked". 

I understand growth is important, but there's got to be more to it than that.

So any info/feedback would be appreciated.


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## dietrc70 (Jun 9, 2008)

I usually focus on moral/theological issues in my stories, so just speaking from that perspective here are a few of my "checks."

Are my protagonists/antagonists ALWAYS in the right/wrong?
Do my protagonists/antagonists always come out on top (or lose) in moral, intellectual, or physical conflicts?

Situations where a character does the wrong thing for the right reason (or vice versa) can be very interesting and offer a lot of opportunities for character development.


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## Clothoverlord (Jun 10, 2008)

In real life people are contridictory, so it's not a bad way of making characters feel "real."

Rough examples, like a hard ass military minded man who is merciless and takes no prisoners, and yet has a very tender attitude toward his family, or a person who wanders around helping the poor yet feels disdain or even murderous contempt for those he happens to disagree with on certain issues.

It adds a degree of flaw that makes it inherently difficult to sum up a character in one sentence.

Thinking about it, that in and of itself works pretty well too; make it so you can't just describe them with one sentence.


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## Le_DÃ©mon_Sans_Visage (Jun 10, 2008)

I think it helps to know your characters as if they were real people. I've always enjoyed those lists of questions that you write an answer to 'in character' - what's in your fridge right now, what is the last book you read, what would you do if a cashier shortchanged you, what is your idea of a perfect vacation. That sort of thing. If I feel like I can answer the questions honestly and consistently as the character, then I have someone I can write about who's more than just a chess piece for my plot.

Two caveats. For one, a character in a story is truly two dimensional in the sense a real human being is. There just isn't enough space in a novel or a short story to adaquately explore all a person is capable of. The trick is to make the characters APPEAR to be two-dimensional. And if you say, have your bloodthirsty cannibalistic assassin be a sucker for kitty cats to show he's not all bad, in order for this not to be ridiculous you should make sure you've not only got a damn good explination for WHY there's this seeming contradiction in his character, you should have him express it in a manner that's consistant with the rest of his character. A normal person who loves kitty cats, for example, might have pet cats, donate money to the SPCA and maybe wear the occasional Garfield shirt. The insane murderer character might express his affection for cats by going around shooting dogs, or, if he kills someone who owns a cat, he might be considerate enough to have the victim skinned and stuffed so the cat can still sit on their late owner's lap. That sort of thing. 

Also, not all the characters in the story SHOULD be two-dimensional. Because of those space limitations, you can't give us a detailed backstory for every person. Sometimes the pizza boy only shows up to deliver a pizza, and if you're interested enough in the pizza boy's backstory to make him an interesting and complex character, maybe he should be the main character instead of who you're writing about! 

The one I always think of is a novel I once read which spent two pages describing in detail how a family had adopted and cared for and loved their mule, which had bogged down on the trail and had to be abandoned. I know the author was trying to express how much the mule meant to them, but having to sit there and read all that, which contributed exactly nothing to moving the plot forward and was never referred to again, took me totally out of the book. It's one of those cases where the author would have been right to tell, not show.


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## Stratelier (Jun 10, 2008)

Aren't we missing a dimension somewhere?  Or did I miscount...


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## Le_DÃ©mon_Sans_Visage (Jun 10, 2008)

Stratadrake said:


> Aren't we missing a dimension somewhere?  Or did I miscount...



Maybe the OP has been reading _Flatland_.


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## TakeWalker (Jun 10, 2008)

Le_DÃ©mon_Sans_Visage said:


> The insane murderer character might express his affection for cats by going around shooting dogs, or, if he kills someone who owns a cat, he might be considerate enough to have the victim skinned and stuffed so the cat can still sit on their late owner's lap.



This is perhaps the greatest idea I've ever read. Make it reality, gogogo!

And I do believe you're trying to push for three-dimensional characters here, not just two-dimensional. The one-dimensional types are the worst, all thin and unable to stand up.


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## SlushPuppy (Jun 10, 2008)

dietrc70 said:


> I usually focus on moral/theological issues in my stories, so just speaking from that perspective here are a few of my "checks."
> 
> Are my protagonists/antagonists ALWAYS in the right/wrong?
> Do my protagonists/antagonists always come out on top (or lose) in moral, intellectual, or physical conflicts?
> ...



Yeah, I think since my story is still in the very beginning I haven't had a chance to elaborate on that thing yet. But the main char's 'hero' is about to make the flop of his life, all in the idea of 'saving' her 

I had always lumped the constantly right/wrong thing in with being maryjanes.  Those durn perfect characters


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## SlushPuppy (Jun 10, 2008)

Clothoverlord said:


> or a person who wanders around helping the poor yet feels disdain or even murderous contempt for those he happens to disagree with on certain issues.



Ha! Sounds a little like myself  I'll have to think on the contradictions in respect to my characters.



Le_DÃ©mon_Sans_Visage said:


> I think it helps to know your characters as if they were real people. I've always enjoyed those lists of questions that you write an answer to 'in character' - what's in your fridge right now, what is the last book you read, what would you do if a cashier shortchanged you, what is your idea of a perfect vacation. That sort of thing. If I feel like I can answer the questions honestly and consistently as the character, then I have someone I can write about who's more than just a chess piece for my plot.



That's an awesome idea  I will have to take time to do that soon.



> Also, not all the characters in the story SHOULD be two-dimensional. Because of those space limitations, you can't give us a detailed backstory for every person. Sometimes the pizza boy only shows up to deliver a pizza, and if you're interested enough in the pizza boy's backstory to make him an interesting and complex character, maybe he should be the main character instead of who you're writing about!
> 
> The one I always think of is a novel I once read which spent two pages describing in detail how a family had adopted and cared for and loved their mule, which had bogged down on the trail and had to be abandoned. I know the author was trying to express how much the mule meant to them, but having to sit there and read all that, which contributed exactly nothing to moving the plot forward and was never referred to again, took me totally out of the book. It's one of those cases where the author would have been right to tell, not show.



Indeed. Although I think I may have done the complete opposite! I wrenched my main away from her best friend without really letting people see how close they were. But since she doesn't attach quickly or easily to anyone maybe it will come to be seen as the story moves.



Le_DÃ©mon_Sans_Visage said:


> Maybe the OP has been reading _Flatland_.



I haven't. I just figured since a good character was 2-dimensional, then a bad one is 1 dimensional.


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## Stratelier (Jun 11, 2008)

> I just figured since a good character was 2-dimensional, then a bad one is 1 dimensional.


Technically, a good character appears _three_-dimensional, while a bad one is two.


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## Roose Hurro (Jun 11, 2008)

A good character is three-dimensional... poor characters are two-dimensional... and the horribly bad characters are one-dimensional.........

I find that a good character displays many things that add to their "reality"... one of the things I try to develop in my own characters are habits.  You know, common gestures they make, how they are in the morning when they first wake up (I have a character who quite frequently forgets to put on pants), what they like for breakfast, those little things real people do as they go about their day, without realizing.  Also, I've had characters do things in reaction to emotional stresses or memories.  I had a character in a tavern scene leave his companions, go out in the rain (I think it was raining at the time), and slash up a tree with his claws, as a way to relieve an upwelling of old grief that came out due to present events in the RP.  Got some very good comments on the emotional impact of that scene... its "realness".  In a main character, yes, you want as much detail put in the character as you can, but it needs to be consistent with that character's background and personality.  Something the reader can believe that character would do, or how they'd react to a given situation.  You don't want some happy-go-lucky character suddenly breaking down into tears, unless you've set up and already presented a reason for that emotional breakdown (say, this character had a brother/sister/parent who died, years ago, and their happy-go-lucky personality has been their way of coping with the loss, all this time).

Well, I could probably add more, but I'll leave you with this, for now.........


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## SlushPuppy (Jun 11, 2008)

Oh! Whups ^___^


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## Stratelier (Jun 12, 2008)

Here's an easy way to remember it:

Good, believable characters are called three-dimensional because it _feels as if they could jump out of the page into reality_ at any moment.

Poor characters are called two-dimensional because _they're as flat as the page they're printed on_.  Paper-thin.  They can only be viewed from the same perspective they're portrayed, if you tried to look at them from another angle you'd just see more of the same.


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## Roose Hurro (Jun 12, 2008)

Stratadrake said:


> Here's an easy way to remember it:
> 
> Good, believable characters are called three-dimensional because it _feels as if they could jump out of the page into reality_ at any moment.
> 
> Poor characters are called two-dimensional because _they're as flat as the page they're printed on_.  Paper-thin.  They can only be viewed from the same perspective they're portrayed, if you tried to look at them from another angle you'd just see more of the same.



So you can imagine how bad a main character would have to be, to be graded one-dimensional....


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## makmakmob (Jun 12, 2008)

Well, they can only exist on one plain of movement. That's gotta suck.


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## Stratelier (Jun 12, 2008)

Right, but if they don't exist in the other two, then they can't even be seen in the first place because there's no width or depth to make them visible.  In other words, they exist only as an abstraction.


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## makmakmob (Jun 14, 2008)

In my experience (which is not great) Being shit at stuff makes characters more believable. I don't want to read about Mr.Succeeds at everything; I want to laugh at Mr.phail because I'm better than him, while most serious characters should be a mix of good skills and bad skills. Just a guess really.


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## M. LeRenard (Jun 25, 2008)

I should think a 1D character would actually be pretty interesting.  Someone who has absolutely no capability to think differently than he already does, no room for change of any kind....  You could have fun with a character like that.  Someone like Pangloss, from Candide, almost.
In any case, I like the whole flaws and hypocrisy and personal tics and stuff, but I think it's a bit more complicated than that.  Those are good guidelines, of course, but creating a believable character is as difficult as making a whole new person from scratch.  I know a lot of respectable authors have written that writing their characters is almost a form of acting; in other words, they have to get inside the brain of the person they're writing, pretend to be that person, and often times they'll get so involved they'll find themselves acting like their characters in everyday situations outside of the typewriter room.  The best way to write believable characters is to become them while you're writing, I think.  Voluntary multiple personality disorder.
But of course you have to have a clear picture in your head of what this fellow is like in order to be able to do that, and that's where the list of questions and the like that people have mentioned comes in handy.  Once you get this fellow down in your mind, you'll know just what he'll do in any given situation without having to stretch.  And if you find yourself stretching to make a plot point or something work, stop immediately and revise, because you're no longer writing a believable character.  You can't take short-cuts, I'm afraid; your character is solid, so it's obviously the plot that needs work.  I've found myself doing this in my own novel, where I'd write a passage that reveals some heretofore hidden side of my MC so that such and such event later on would make sense, but in the end I always go back and rewrite those sections, because I can only tell myself, "There's no way he would ever act like this."
So, I guess... get to know your characters like you know your best friends, and then exchange minds with them while you write, is my advice.  If that helps.


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## makmakmob (Jun 28, 2008)

Maybe it would be worth setting up a new thread for those character questions? Could breathe a little life back into here maybe... I dunno...


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## M. LeRenard (Jun 28, 2008)

I could write another essay type deal.  Character creation merits some more discussion, I think.  Which reminds me... I wrote two others that never got moved here.  I think I'll repost those, too.

Edit: oh, right.  I already wrote one about characters.  It didn't get much attention, I guess.  Anywho, reposted those original two I wrote.  Maybe one will spark a debate or something.


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## ScottyDM (Sep 23, 2008)

Part of the fundamentals of character creation is, what is the character's motivation?

I had a villain that I was struggling with. In step 3 of Randy Ingermanson's snowflake method of planning (or analyzing) a novel, he has you create a brief seven-part outline of each of your characters.
The character's name
A one-sentence summary of the character's storyline
The character's motivation (what does he/she want abstractly?)
The character's goal (what does he/she want concretely?)
The character's conflict (what prevents him/her from reaching this goal?)
The character's epiphany (what will he/she learn, how will he/she change?
A one-paragraph summary of the character's storyline
 I think it was in his MP3 lecture series where Randy says to write these outlines from that character's point-of-view.

The problem was, I didn't know my villain, didn't understand him. He was only "villain #2", but still important enough that I spend some time with him. When I wrote his seven-part outline I wrote it from my POV, not his, and I had stupid junk. For example under epiphany I wrote something like, "It hurts like h*** to have your wrist broken." :roll: A sure recipe for a flat, uninteresting character.

Then I read a story in _Rolling Stone Magazine_ about a famous TV personality. It seems the TV fellow's a real stinkpot because he's essentially a 10-year-old boy in a man's body. That seemed like the perfect reason for the badness of my villain. I knew that in his heart-of-hearts he wasn't really a bad person, it's just that he keeps making horrible choices. Now I knew why. I could fill out that brief outline in a way that made sense, and I could start building a backstory for him.
*Name:* Lupe Socorro
*Summary:* Male human, 29, he used to be Pennyâ€™s lover and he's a former drug dealer, recently released from state prison.
*Motivation:* To be liked and acknowledged as someone worthwhile.
*Goal:* Get some kind of job so he can go straight and get a trade school education to get the job he really wants. By giving up drug dealing and getting a great job he hopes to impress Penny enough to win her back.
*Conflict:* With selfâ€”heâ€™s impatient, when he wants something he wants it now and if it takes too long he takes shortcuts to get it, and heâ€™s immature, lacking the ability to recognize that not everyone wants what he wants.
*Epiphany:* Early during his introduction in the novel he realizes his life sucks and he needs to change. Toward the end of his place in the novel he realizes that maybe Penny isnâ€™t the girl for him and he wants to try to straighten out his life as a personal goal.
*Storyline:* After high school he went traveling around Central America with a buddy (immediate gratification). Once their money was gone, and with only a high school diploma, he couldnâ€™t get a decent job, so he got sucked into dealing drugs (impatience). He met Penny, fell in love, got careless, and was arrested by the police. His story starts 17 months later when heâ€™s released from prison and returns to Ventura with big plans about going straight with the help of Penny. Heâ€™s convinced she still loves him as much as he loves her (self centered).
You might think I'm too nice to my villains, but you haven't seen Lupe's old drug boss.  His motivation is simple: money.

While plotting the novel, and since I'm a newbie at novels and not so hot with storytelling, I decided to take the radical step of writing plot outlines for several major characters--all done from their POV. Everybody's got a story to tell, right? I figured I wouldn't need to actually write many of these stories, but I decided to write Lupe's story in full. Partly because many of his scenes take place without the hero or heroine around--so I could directly use what I'd write.

I discovered something interesting--Lupe's and my hero's stories are remarkably similar. Shortly after I introduce each they have the same epiphany, "My life sucks and I want to change." Now my hero's far better equipped to change his life, but then I throw a lot more problems at him to overcome. Both fellows like the same girl (the conflict between them). And I've decided that, like my hero, Lupe finds redemption at the end of his story when he sort of stumbles into the opportunity, but it's his quick thinking that allows him to seize the moment. The thing is, neither hero nor heroine discover Lupe's redemption. After the police rearrest him he's out of their lives. Since it's a brief scene I thought I'd include Lupe's redemption in the novel.

Scotty


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## M. LeRenard (Sep 24, 2008)

You know.. I was thinking.  Everybody keeps saying that a believable character MUST have flaws.  I don't know if that's necessarily true.  Believable isn't a synonym for likable, after all; that's how it often rolls in fiction, but one doesn't always imply the other.  As such, I should think it would be possible to create a character who is ABSOLUTELY perfect, and is thus pretty well the most detested character in the entire work.  Granted, this kind of thing would work best in a humorous piece, but it is one exception to the rule everybody here seems to have with regard to characters having flaws.
I think what interesting characters boil down to is... is there something interesting about the character?  If you think about it, someone who just rides on divine fortune and universal goodwill is bound to be a pretty interesting character in a setting where such people aren't expected to exist (aka a realistic setting).  You'd probably run into problems if you made such a character integral to the plot, but I think kept as a side-attraction, he could actually give the setting and story more color.
What do you guys think?  Too much relativism?


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## wilce (Sep 24, 2008)

M. Le Renard said:


> You know.. I was thinking.  Everybody keeps saying that a believable character MUST have flaws.  I don't know if that's necessarily true.  Believable isn't a synonym for likable, after all; that's how it often rolls in fiction, but one doesn't always imply the other.  As such, I should think it would be possible to create a character who is ABSOLUTELY perfect, and is thus pretty well the most detested character in the entire work.



In this case, does their perfection not become a flaw in itself?


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## ScottyDM (Sep 24, 2008)

Buckaroo Banzai, the title character of the movie _The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension_ was pretty perfect, except for some very minor issues. As Wikipedia says of the character:





> A renaissance man, the character is a top neurosurgeon, particle physicist, race car driver, rock star and comic book hero, and probably the last hope of the human race....
> 
> Hikita raised young Buckaroo, using the entire world as his classroom, and the boy grew up to be, among other things, an extraordinarily skilled neurosurgeon....
> 
> Dissatisfied with a life devoted exclusively to medicine, Buckaroo Banzai perfected a wide range of skills. He designed and drove high-powered automobiles. He studied bujutsu and particle physics. His skill with a sixgun was reputed to eclipse that of Wyatt Earp. He spoke a dozen languages and wrote songs in all of them. His band, the Hong Kong Cavaliers, was one of the most popular, hard-rocking bar bands in east New Jersey, though its members (bearing names like Rawhide, Reno, the Swede, Perfect Tommy, Big Norse, and Pecos Bill) were not professional musicians at all, but rather cartographers and botanists, linguists and propellant engineers, an entomologist and an epidemiologist. All of them experts in their fields of endeavor, they were drawn to Buckaroo.


The movie was a box office bomb and the studio went bankrupt. Only later did it become a cult classic. It _is_ humor, which is why it works at all. Personally, I loved it.

Scotty


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## ScottyDM (Sep 24, 2008)

M. Le Renard said:


> You know.. I was thinking.  Everybody keeps saying that a believable character MUST have flaws.  I don't know if that's necessarily true.  Believable isn't a synonym for likable, after all; that's how it often rolls in fiction, but one doesn't always imply the other.


I was thinking too. In one of my stories I've been working very hard to create thoroughly _unlikeable_ characters. In fact, one of them is so disgusted with the other than during the story he seriously considers dropping the other down an abandoned well. They are brothers and the reason he doesn't kill his little brother is that he promised Mom on her deathbed that he'd look after the runty pervert.

I give these misfits a noble cause to fight for, but due to their personalities and approach to life, they are the villains. The Heroine believes in their cause too, but that doesn't stop her from doing everything in her power to destroy them. There's something refreshing about writing a story containing characters whom you hope the readers will come to hate with a passion.

Scotty


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## Stratelier (Sep 24, 2008)

Renard definitely has a point, it's not the "flaws" that strictly define a believable, realistic character, it's the sense that there's _more to the character than what they present of themselves on the page_ which makes a character believable.

Since nobody IRL is perfect, having some kind of personal flaw or weakness goes a long way towards making them believable, but it's not strictly required.

Fan fiction as example... it's not difficult to find mundane examples where a character's stated flaw(s) are what _make_ them non-believable.

And on a side note, I am simultaneously amused and annoyed every time I see somebody using the phrase "two-dimensional" as if it's a _compliment_.


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## TakeWalker (Sep 24, 2008)

But the thing to point out about Renard's counterexample is that it requires a lot of talent to be able to break the rules in such a way as to be entertaining. Novice writers still need to learn the basics, and get their characterizations down before they even think about doing something like that.


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## ScottyDM (Oct 5, 2008)

TakeWalker said:


> But the thing to point out about Renard's counterexample is that it requires a lot of talent to be able to break the rules in such a way as to be entertaining. Novice writers still need to learn the basics, and get their characterizations down before they even think about doing something like that.


Excellent point.

I've pretty much given up on posting stuff to the NaNoWriMo message boards except for the regional board for my area. The problem is I have no clue as to the seriousness of the thread starter.

For example someone might write: "This year for NaNo I thought I'd write my novel in second-person future-tense. Any tips?"

Is this the post of a clueless newbie who hasn't even dabbled in fan-fics yet? Is the poster a pro with a couple-dozen professionally published novels who truly wants to challenge themselves? Or just a troll? And if you do respond then all the clueless newbies and trolls come out of the woodwork to tell you that second-person future-tense is a perfectly valid way to write fiction and they/their friend/some pro writes like that all the time.

Ain't worth it.

Other than to remind people they gotta learn to ride a bike before they can win the Tour de France.

Scotty


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