How to make
a convincing male character? How to make a convincing female character? The
answer in both cases is the same: make a convincing character. Don’t try to
make a male or female character. First make a character, then decide on the
gender.
There are
several layers for making a character. First, give them a purpose. A reason for
being in your story, a reason for carrying it. What is the story about? What
will they have to face? What qualities, what abilities, what characteristics do
they need for that? Then, give them a back story which will fit with their
character. What sort of life would they have led? Then look at the society they
live in. What kind of limitations does society put on them? Finally, decide
which gender would suit them most. Gender is not biological or genetic sex,
keep that in mind, too. Gender is a social construct, the way a society splits
abilities and characteristics between ‘male,’ ‘female,’ and ‘neither or both.’
Let me give
you an example. Jane/Jack Carter was created for a series of novellas (even
though I still have to publish the second one, but it is written). Her back
story is that she is one daughter of seven in a middle-class household of a
Victorian age. She is sterile and couldn’t find a husband because of that (the most
important job for a wife is to give her husband an heir, something she couldn’t
do). Her parents expected her to take up work, as a governess or a lady’s
companion. Jane/Jack refused to do that kind of work. She cut her hair, dressed
as a man, and came to London to work as a clerk. But she would have needed some
kind of recommendation for that, so instead she became a penny-a-liner, a
freelancing journalist. At the beginning of the first story, “Vengeful Spirit,”
all of this has happened already. Jane lives as Jack Carter in London, writes
articles under both names, and just makes enough not to starve or completely
drop into poverty. She knows she needs a better job. So when she finds a
personal ad of a man looking for a secretary who is adventurous and ready to
travel, she decides to apply. And despite the fact that her future employer
sees through her disguise, he hires her. I do not show her transformation from
Jane to Jack, because it’s not necessary for the story. She has learned to
behave like a man, to be a man in every social aspect of her life, except for
one (she is not a lesbian and takes up a sexual relationship with her
employer). Jane/Jack, who defied expectations and rather led her own life
instead of conforming to society, has the necessary balls (not literally, of
course) to become Lucas Swenson’s secretary and assistant. She has the courage,
she has the scepticism, and she has the patience sometimes needed. Society has
forced her to adopt a male alias and she has grown used to it. The changes in
her life come from the identity of her new employer, who is not human, but
Loki, the Norse god, again exiled from Asgard for a while. Jane/Jack, who
thinks very practical and doesn’t believe in the supernatural, has to face the
fact that, in her world, the supernatural exists, in the form of the god Loki,
in the form of a Sidhe called ‘Miss Underhill,’ in the form of the vampire
Elisabeth Bathory, and in many other forms.
Jane is a
woman, because this is essential for her back story. I could have created a
young man who has come to London and has ended up as a penny-a-liner, too, but
the back story is stronger with a woman here: Jane has to fight much harder
than a man would have to, because she has to fight her upbringing as a woman as
well.
On the
other hand, I have written a host of stories (both published and unpublished)
with Loki as the main character, showing him in a variety of roles from really
close to the Marvel universe (The Loki Files) over stories in between Marvel
and Myth to stories clearly inspired by the Norse god. And while Loki might
actually be the ‘wife’ in a political marriage, he is always male by definition
(although Loki is a Frost Giant and those are both male and female at the same
time). I have written Yaoi for a while, working almost exclusively with male
characters. The point is always to start with the story and purpose and then to
decide how to write the character.
Jane
Browne/Jane Doe started out as a female character, because I wanted a parody of
the espionage genre with a female agent who was as badass as the men. But she
developed into a different person. She has many ‘male’ abilities and
characteristics, but that doesn’t make her a man. It makes her a highly-trained
agent with specialities which are often considered ‘male.’ It makes her a very
reliable and loyal right hand to a criminal mastermind who raised her for that
position. In both cases Steven (as her mentor and as her boss) saw her
potential and worked with it - not because she was a woman or despite of it,
but because she had what it needed to become the agent or the right hand. Her
abilities, her likes, her dislikes, her back story, all make her a real
character. A person who is as real as they get within the pages of a novel.
Stay away
from stereotypes. No matter whether it’s the buxom blonde who doesn’t have much
of a brain or whether it’s the ruggedly good-looking man who is secretly
caring, but openly daring, they have no place in the world of a story. Your
characters can be blond and a little on the stupid side, but that shouldn’t be
all which defines them. Your characters can be ruggedly good-looking and daring
with a soft and caring side, but they should have more to offer than that.
Make sure
that they do. Make sure you feel the characters, you understand them. Make sure
they whisper ‘that’s not my way’ into your ear when you decide on a scene which
shouldn’t play out like you planned it, because the characters would never act
like this. Because then you have full-fledged characters, characters which can
carry their story.
Full-fledged, breathing
characters with a real soul - don’t accept substitutes.
