The Professor's “How To” Writing Improvement Series

How to Write Like I Do”: Part 1 
Creating Your Characters
 By Mike AKA the Professor

 Since time first began to be recorded in oral tradition, the early storytellers had their cast of characters with which to tell their great tales of wondrous accomplishments. 



These characters, whether real or imagined each played a significant part in the story for the audience to find themselves being able to relate to in their everyday lives. Each one portrayed a role which the storytellers used to highlight someone or something like heroic actions, admirable traits, feats of strength, courage and /or displays of wisdom. 

These also were used to emphasize the seemingly insurmountable forces of Nature, various Wild Animals and Savage Beasts. How great an impact these tales had been evidenced in the results of their retelling in time to where when writing was invented these tales became inscribed for posterity.

 So this is how early mankind first became aware of such concepts as Religion, Philosophy Medicine, Music, Art and Danger! The many faces of evil, their enemies, degrees of villainy, treachery and acts of horrific terror inflicted by these So called Monsters of the day The art of storytelling, regardless of the genre, requires that you, the writer, create your own characters.

 Characters can come in all styles, types and venues depending on the genre you choose to write in. Having written in such diverse areas as Journalistic Articles, Opinion pieces, Philosophical discourses, Prose, Poetry, Fiction of all sorts like Romance, Western, Satirical, Comedic, Fantasy and Science Fiction, just to name a few, I have some knowledge to draw on. 

 The one true “Common Denominator” for any style of writing, is creating their believability, for your readers. Characters, no matter how fantastic they may appear, need to be “Believable” enough, for your audience. You need to be able to write so that what you envisioned in your imagination is what they see on the screen of theirs when they read your work.

 “How is that done?”, I hear you ask! The character that you are creating must be real first to you! The greater the details about each character you reveal, the more alive and personable they become. By illustrating these details to them as can be seen by you in your imagination, the better you can tell your reader about them.

 “So you become the character then? Like you are an Actor?” Some of you may ask! “Yes and No” is my reply! “What!!??” I will explain that this way. While You do take on the persona of each character as you create your story, scene by scene, you are then all the characters when you write. However if Acting is how you chose to see this work by comparison then you are also the director as well. 

“Why?” Because it is also you, as the author, whose job it is to assemble the cast of characters and guide them to make all the scenes work! “This is getting just too complicated! I mean “Why So many jobs! Are they really Necessary? I just want to write!” What do I say about that?

 My answer is “Yes!” “ Yes”, there are many jobs! “Yes”, You Do Need To Do Each and Every One of Them! Why?? Because Only Then, will You Be Writing the way a “Quality Author” should and does! The difference between a hack who pounds out illegible tripe and a recognized wordsmith is the pride that each takes in their craft and themselves. 

This section is about “How To” and “How to Write Like I Do” so this is how I do it! Sure you can cut corners, you can plagiarize, copy and imitate in hopes to get your name in print and be a “Writer” somewhere. But Here I am giving you my way to accomplish the Art of Writing.

 To learn “how to” create and be original. The choice is always yours and I will lose some of you, but those who decide to stay will be glad they did. If you have questions, comments and or opinions to share, please don't be shy! I don't mind intelligent discussion, nor am I dogmatic about my approach to writing! 

However be forewarned I don't allow profanity nor defaming of any sort on this site so if you do choose off colored remarks to stress your points they will not appear here, period! Thanks for reading and do join me for the rest of this new weekly series here on the Professor's Write Site

Originally Published on September 27th, 2011 
Revised and updated June 9th 2015