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Fictional Narrative Basics - Character
Unit Completion Date: End of Week 5
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There are other ways of thinking about character beyond these two, and the more tools we have available to us as we move into the critiquing and revision part of the class, the better prepared we will be to work with characterization. Feel free to post other suggestions for ways of thinking about characters and characterization in the "Character" section of the class craftbook.
Once you have your first draft done, there are a few manageable techniques for revising your stories to sharpen the focus of your characters. Pamela Painter has a wonderfully effective question she asks of stories workshopped in her classes, which is "Whose story is it?" The question forces the writer to articulate which of the characters in the story is the central character, the one to whom the climactic moment of the story is central.
This may seem like a ridiculously simple question for some stories, but can be a really devilish one for others. In most cases, writers know, or think they know who the central character of the story is as they are drafting. Often it turns out however that the defining moment of the story is more about the dreams and desires of another character, and it is important to recognize this and be able to hand the story over to that emergent character in redraft.
Re-examine your selected story from Best American and identify the central character, the climactic moment, and decide why this climactic moment affects the main character more than any other in the story. This will be an easy exercise for some of you. Others may find this surprisingly difficult. There is no need to formally respond to this exercise, but you may of course do so if you wish.
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