I’ve been getting a lot of good questions lately, and I really appreciate it. However, even though Gene’s question about editing and meddling came first, I’m going to save it for next week, on the grounds that it’s about the business end, and I’ve been talking a fair bit about that lately and feel it’s time to get back to some craft stuff. I will get to it, though!
Meanwhile, I’m going to go with Emily’s request for a post about characters and their motivations. That’s pretty open-ended, but motivation is one of those basic character things where there’s plenty enough to talk about without further direction.
People (and therefore characters) have reasons for everything they do. Sometimes, those reasons are simple and obvious (the clerk at the Walgreens counter rings up your purchase because that’s his job); other times, the reasons are complicated and unclear, with roots that reach far back into a person’s past. One way or another, though, there’s always a “because” in there somewhere – because she promised, because he likes working with his hands, because they enjoy a challenge, because he’s afraid of pain/spiders/dogs/the dark, because she had a bad experience when she was eight, because, because, because.
The reasons people do things can be simple – because it’s the only way to survive – or they can be complex – partly because she’s ambitious, but partly because she likes the challenge, and partly because she really does want to help. They can be external – because that squeaky door hinge is going to drive her crazy if she doesn’t oil it – or they can be internal – because he can’t stand the thought of being betrayed again. They can be a desire to get or achieve something – because he wants that position, that ship, that girl; because she wants to become the best magician ever – or they can be a desire to avoid something – because she doesn’t want to go to jail, because he doesn’t want to feel pain, because they don’t want the kingdom overrun. Motivations can be obvious – because the dragon is right there; run away! – or they can be obscure – because he reminds her of a second-cousin she hasn’t seen in thirty years and has never mentioned to her traveling companions.
It is, however, very important to remember that “because the plot says they have to” is not a motivation.
The plot is what the story looks like from the outside. The characters are inside the story; the plot may say they have to do X, but in order for that action to look and feel believable to readers, the characters have to have their own reasons for doing what they do. And those reasons have to be consistent with what the reader knows (or will learn) about the characters in the course of the book, or the reader very likely won’t believe in the character (and by extension, the plot).
Not all reasons have to be spelled out extensively, any more than every action the character takes has to be described in grim detail. Yes, George got up, showered and shaved, combed his hair, dressed, and had breakfast; 99.9% of the time, the author doesn’t need to mention that, much less go into detail about the position of the bed, the temperature of the shower, the type of soap, etc. About the same percentage of the time, the author doesn’t need to mention why George does these things – habit, fastidiousness, childhood training, etc. – because neither the actions nor the reason behind them is particularly important to the story, the character, or the reader.
Generally speaking, the spear-carriers and walk-ons, the grocery store bagger, cab driver, palace guard, maid, messenger, etc., who appear just long enough to bag the groceries, ferry the character from A to B, deliver the message – those characters don’t need motives for their actions beyond “it’s their job.” Even the charmingly chatty cab driver seldom needs more than “because he likes talking to people” as his reason for going on for a couple of pages.
The more important a character is to the story, the more carefully the writer needs to look at his/her motivation to make sure it holds up – that it’s believable emotionally and strong enough to explain why the character takes the actions he/she takes.
That doesn’t mean the motivation always has to be complicated and deep. “Because I don’t want the bad guys to kill me” is pretty simple and straightforward, for instance, and as long as the reader believes it, it can work well for everything from a straightforward action-adventure to a complex psychological thriller where nothing is quite what it seems and “the bad guys” keep changing from page to page. The reverse is also true – having a straightforward adventure plot doesn’t mean that the characters’ motives can’t be complex,
What motivation does have to be is plausible. That means the reader has to believe that this particular character would do whatever-it-is in this particular situation, for this particular reason. Not that “a girl” or “an alien” or “an Australian” or “a soldier” or “a redneck” or any other generic type or category of person would do this – what has to be believable is that Blytzmi, the Rigelian pipefitter who was raised in an isolated space colony, would do this for these reasons. Or that Indria, the runaway princess-turned-mercenary who’s spent three books now looking for revenge and who has no sense of humor whatever, would do it.
Because one of the other really important things to remember about motivation is that it is personal and individual. What works for one character won’t necessarily work for another, no matter how similar they are or seem to be. Also, people change over time, and so do their reasons for doing things…even if what they’re doing are the same things they’ve been doing for the last 200 pages. What started off as just a job may become a patriotic duty, or something done out of friendship rather than merely for money.
Finally, I want to add that as with many, many things in the writing process, figuring out the motivation of the characters is something that some writers do consciously, but other writers do intuitively. You may need to lay everything out clearly in your notes so that you can keep it obscure-but-consistent in your writing, or you may write by feel and only realize what your characters’ real reasons are when you get to the climax, or after. It really doesn’t matter, as long as the end product is a bunch of characters whom the readers will believe have their own individual reasons for whatever they’re doing…whether the readers ever actually find out what they are, or not.
I do it instinctively. My characters do what they do because it is what they would do, and I often don’t figure out all the motivational intricacies until much after the fact.
But readers, I’ve found, sometimes have trouble accepting actions they don’t understand, and making the central characters’ motivations a little clearer is one of my more commonly needed revisions.
I’ve been wondering something and this seems like a good time to ask. In The Far West, an expedition leader brings along a spare cargo carrier. May I ask why?
Readers, Michelle? *People* have difficulty accepting actions that they do not understand.
Being somewhat different, I have run across this all too often. Said people may even attack actions or views that they do not understand rather than bother to find out the why behind them.
Thank you! This is just the kind of thing I was looking for.
I’m revising my fantasy novel, and I realized recently that the heroine’s group of sidekicks all need better reasons for helping her than “because she’s the heroine” or “because the plot says so”. For one of them it’s fairly clear-cut – she asked him for help, and he’s the sort of guy who would respond immediately when someone needs him. (Also, as the book progresses he develops, let’s say, a more personal desire to help her…) It’s more complicated with the others, though, and this post provides some good things to keep in mind as I work out their reasons.
When you get really lively, you can give all the characters on the same side differing motives despite their common purpose, and draw out all the conflict potential in that.
For that matter, one could give characters on different sides the same motives and draw out conflict from that.
“We are trying to make the world a better place!”
With my first couple of books, I really struggled with this. I kept trying to force my characters to act out the plot, even when it didn’t make sense for their motivations. Hopefully I’ve gotten better with time – my novels don’t always go in the direction I’ve planned, but I’ve found I actually like it that way!
My own formulation of relating motivations to plots…
Motivated by => Type of plot => form of plot
desire for intimacy -> romance, buddy pairs, family dramas, coming-of-age stories, fiction about subcultures -> setting-based plot.
desire for status, esteem -> political thrillers, travelogues, satires, utopian / dystopian stories, fiction about subcultures -> setting-based plot.
desire for truth -> mysteries, puzzle stories, what-if scenarios -> idea-based plot.
desire for challenge, achievement -> adventure, exploration, capers -> idea-based plot.
desire for justice, morality -> revenge plots, disaster stories, war stories, crime & punishment -> event-based plot.
desire for influence -> comedies, satires, absurdist fiction, political allegories -> event-based plot
desire for empathy, emotional security -> character-based plot.
desire for expression of vision -> character-based plot.
@ spacechampion –
Maybe that’s a little too simple. It’s more fun when say, as in the one I’m writing right not, the desire for intimacy leads to an adventure/crime/political plot. Motivations lead to decisions, but decisions can have all sorts of effects. And, of course, if you have a romantic couple, one with a desire for intimacy, the other with a desire for challenge, and an antagonist with a desire for justice/status, how do you predict which one gets to direct the plot?
Cara, i certainly don’t mean it as a straitjacket, but I can’t see anything in particular about crime / adventure / politics that anything to do with intimacy. In the case above one option is to view it as a challenge-based plot with two subplots. I’d view the antagonist as making the first move and that would indicate the inciting incident that starts the plot off would be revolving around some injustice, but it is merely a subplot, with the protagonist beginning his/her journey by responding to it. It’d probably be an injustice regarding making an achievement. For example, the antagonist felt he was wronged in the outcome of a previous challenge, and thinks it would be justice if he steals victory from the protagonist, thinking the protagonist was the cause of that injustice. Perhaps the challenge requires a team of two, and the romantic couple was one team, but the protagonist is tempted to ditch his romantic partner for a better option more likely to succeed. His lack of confidence in his partner becomes a complication to their intimacy. As the plot goes on, the protagonist would decide the key to defeating the antagonist is to stick with his romantic partner, and in the climax she/he has a key ability that ensures victory for them both OR one of them out of love makes a key sacrifice so his/her partner is able to win — possibly winning something that ensures their future together, if not the immediate challenge itself. Either way, I might write it as an idea-based plot, so dealing with self-discovery and populating it with atmosphere and themes and subplots related to free-will, ability, self-acceptance, self-confidence, etc. with the politics and other things as subthemes / subplots. Of course, how you decide is that you just decide which kind of plot you feel like writing, since there are many ways to write it. If you did an entirely political-based thriller, motivated by desire for status, all the other motivations can come about in other ways as subplots and turning point and key moments that allow you to get to the end. But i think it should always be the protagonist’s motivation determining the type of plot, though the viewpoint character may not be the protagonist. If you wrote a different plot (not based around a challenge, but around the romance instead, or politics or crime) then your readers will come away thinking that someone else than who you think is the protagonist.
Above, when i said “I can’t see anything in particular about crime / adventure / politics that has anything to do with intimacy” i should have added that if you change the motivation to anything else and it doesn’t change the plot, then I have difficulty seeing that motivation leading to that plot.
spacechampion said: “i certainly don’t mean it as a straitjacket, but I can’t see anything in particular about crime / adventure / politics that anything to do with intimacy”
But a story doesn’t need you to see them as being connected in general, it just requires you to find a connection that works in the specific circumstances of that story.
If my hero wants to become intimate with the princess, then that’s politics.
If in the course of trying to get intimate with the princess, he discovers that someone has illegally cast a spell on her, and he can’t be intimate with her until he finds the perpetrators, then that’s crime.
And if he needs to breaks the spell himself, and that will involve engaging in hazardous activities, that’s adventure.