Yes, Cliche Characters. A phrase I'm getting totally tired of hearing. I mean, cliche characters are just the people who are so over the top in real life, they stand out, right? What would Harry Potter be like without the Evil Wizard ( could also be Brought-Back-To-Life villain), the School Bully, the Chosen One, the Twins, I could go on and on.
I wrote a book about a high school shooting. Who are the people in your high school that stand out above the rest? The jocks, the cheerleaders, the gangsters, the brains? Yes. They are. The stand out because of who they are, because they are caricatures of themselves. What the hell is wrong with writing about people that stand out above the rest? Give them their own personality with a twist, and you have someone interesting to read about. Someone you probably know. Maybe even someone you are or once were. Characters to hate or connect with. I'd like someone to name me one book without a cliche character. And who gets to define them as cliche anyway? Is there a literary cliche character committee?
I'm venting here of course. I'm an amateur when it comes to writing novels. Do I need to read more about writing? Sure. Could I benefit from classes? Everyone can. (of course on a one income household it's hard to find the extra money to do that) But I believe in my talent, I believe I have stories to tell. I believe in myself and my cliche characters.
credit to http://risusiverse.wetpaint.com/ for list of cliche characters.
I'm done. Please feel free to chime in about this. I'd love to hear your thoughts.
Here's a poem for your reading pleasure (or displeasure, whatever :)
it pains
more than birth
or death
folds you in a box
in the dark
in the light
shining
shadowing
thrills
and
disheartens
it brings you to tears
it charms
it pleases
it makes and breaks
and reels and spins
it’s a top
a pendulum
a perpetual dance
to a beating drum in my ears
you want it to stop
but it’s vital
like air
and you know in the end
it can leave you
empty
or filled
and you say to yourself
it’s a risk
that’s worth taking.
Okay Song of the Week: The High Road by the Broken Bells
Movie of the Week: Avatar
Book of the Week: The Bum Magnet by K.L. Brady. I haven't read it, but looking forward to it
Quote of the Week: "We make up horrors to help us cope with the real ones." ~Stephen King
Hey Megan,
ReplyDeleteI'm with you on the cliche character issue. In reality, what HASN'T been done before? I remember reading somewhere that every book ever written can be traced back to like 12 plots. If that's true, then it stands to reason that there will be cliche characters and all of them will be done over and over again multiple times.
So keep on writing your cliche characters and rest assurred that the rest of us writers are doing the same dang thing! :)
Thanks for poppin' by Karla. I think it's really hard to write about high school with out the cliche characters. Those are the ones that stand out!
ReplyDeleteWell that depends. There are cliches and there are archetypes. While they might seem similar, a cliche has a more negative connotation. An archetype describes the tendency to use a specific type of character as a symbol in a story, and such types are repeated throughout various stories, movies, etc and have been for millennia. This isn't a wrong thing. It's human. However, when someone calls a character (or a choice of words) a "cliche," they are not criticizing the use of an archetype. They are criticizing the execution of an idea as being indistinguishable. Wooden. Flat. Unformed. Without a heart/soul, or any reflection of the creator's loving care. Take the show Heroes, for instance. Claire is a cheerleader (or was, anyway). But she is different from other cheerleaders, and we see that right off the bat. Through her unique personality, we are able to know her like we would anyone else and we come to sympathize with and care for her.
ReplyDeleteI would never say you couldn't feature jocks, cheerleaders, goths, etc in your story. Hell, that's what there IS in high school. But it takes a certain amount of finesse to keep them from looking like caricatures, because as we know, nothing is so simple as saying "oh, she's a cheerleader, so she must be blonde, popular, and say "omigod" a lot." Does that make sense?
I think Carrie is a great example of a story about high school kids who fit archetypes (jock, rebel, reject, etc), but they're so unique in the way they talk and the things they do that you aren't seeing the archetype. You're seeing THEM. The harder you have to look for an archetype in a story, the better that story is.