Villainy

[khiemtran]

Something else that's just dawned on me lately... I've got a real tendency to fill my stories with sympathetic characters. I've always thought of it as just a stylistic choice - reflecting the stories that I hear in my head and the ones that I like to read. Thinking about it a bit more, and about some of my favourite books (and especially the Chinese classics), I've realized that this isn't true. My favourite books are filled with unlikeable characters. I just don't seem to write them.

Thinking back over the various things I've written, I don't have any really well-developed minor villains. I've got Voldemorts, of course, but no Malfoys. In The Silver Bowl, for instance, most of the minor antagonists are nameless and even faceless - they're often just random extras drawn from the crowd. On the other hand, those scenes which have vivid antagonists and hate figures you can get your teeth into are, without exception, the most interesting. Yet another thing that I thought was "my" style turns out to be just a writing limitation.

I don't think the problem is that I can't write unsympathetic characters. It's more that I don't even think of writing them. This will change from now on. It's a lot easier to conjure up conflict when your best characters are on opposite sides of the fence.

Comments

Psychology of Military Incompetance

[zornhau.livejournal.com]

I used to have a similar problem because villainy is - for the most part - irrational, and I'm a fairly rational person. Two books - and a good dose of cubicle hell - helped me get inside the heads of the bad guys:

The Psychology of Military Incompetence: Most military incompetence shades over into downright evil as top brass shoot the messenger, lose half their command, then try to cover their tracks.

Games People Play: A little dated, but gets you into the heads of the Odd People Who Do Harm.

Oh, there's also a very good book by Dwight Swain, Mid 20th Century Pulp Master; "Creating characters: How to build story people".

Re: Psychology of Military Incompetance

[khiemtran.livejournal.com]

Actually, I already have the first one. It's a great read. Also a good source of quotes for office politics.

Re: Psychology of Military Incompetance

[brownnicky.livejournal.com]

Real life seems full of minor villains to me - hell, I'm probably a minor villain. People who can't actually see that there is anything wrong with putting their own needs first and to hell with anyone
else. I don't think villainy of that kind is necessarily irrational,
though it can be. In my case I'm not always sure that there is enough of a gap between my heroes and villains as they all act from
occasionally murky motives.