Barriers to Writing Realistic Fiction: Part 1
Sexuality and Goals
Since a lot of what inspires me to write on these subjects is involved with fandom and fictional writing, I thought that I might have a little series on the barriers that people come up against when trying to write fictional characters... having sex. It would seem, at first glance, that it would be a simple thing! After all, in the real world, a lot of people have sex on a daily basis, even people that the majority might not find attractive or interesting.
However, when approaching fictional characters, it seems like a lot of writers (particularly fan writers) wind up stuck quite quickly on how to make their characters ‘sexual’ without discarding every other aspect of their personalities.
So today I would like to talk about one of those aspects of personality specifically: the goals and driving forces that influence the character. When one takes a glance into the world of a fictional character, one of the first things to be laid out is usually the character’s goal in life. For some, it might be to be the best card player/fighter/racer to walk the earth (or applicable planet). For others, it might be to protect or care for an important person, to become strong enough to bring about some social change, to be a leader, to build or create something.
These priorities go a long way toward making the character who they are. Perhaps their dedication to this goal causes them to risk their lives, to betray someone else, to make choices that affect everyone and everything around them. Perhaps the goal changes somewhere int he middle of the novel/series/movie, and the character has to find new reasons to live, new things to strive for. Perhaps the goal leads them into utter ruin and destruction. However it goes, playing the character without that driving goal would change everything about them, wouldn’t it?
This is where a lot of fan writers make one of two choices: either ignore everything that the character strives for to create a story centered around romantic or sexual exploits, creating a sort of vacuum in which that goal can’t exist or take all of the sexual choices away from the character by putting them into a non-consensual sexual situation. This isn’t to say that stories that use these plots are a bad thing, but after looking through thousands of pieces of fiction that use them, I’ve wondered: Do fans really think this is the only way to write a focused character?
The problem with this view, to me, is the idea that sex and sexuality are big huge mystical things that must take over your entire life, if they exist at all. That there is no middle ground between asexuality and hyper-sexuality, that a person is either “above these things” or “consumed by them.”
And yet, if you stop and look around you in public at any given time during your daily life, you are probably spotting a myriad of people who (when you aren’t looking, hopefully!) are having sex. For example, the business owner who created a living from the ground up, the teacher who cares about his student’s well-being, the military officer who makes important decisions about the lives of soldiers, the academic who spends hours with her nose in a book. Many of these people, whose lives are dedicated to specific goals, have at some point had sex, and might even be in romantic relationships as we speak!
Perhaps the teacher goes home at night and collapses into his partner’s arms to talk about the day, venting about the issues his students are facing. Or perhaps, for him, his sexual life is more casual: a night out here and there, or a masturbatory session in the shower while fantasizing about the principal with the pretty blue eyes. Either way, taking such actions doesn’t mean that he cares any less about his students, his career goals, or the material that he’s teaching. It just means that he’s not a 2D image, he’s a person.
You might say: But wait! How can things that apply to ordinary people possibly apply to my ninja pirate space captain magician king?
This is when you have to stop and think: is your character really only defined by that one trait? Doesn't he or she have friends, family, other interests, a history, a culture, a social environment? Even if all of those things that you love about the character were originally created in a vacuum - here's looking at you, test tube babies - the character probably isn't now living in one, which means that he or she is being influenced, every moment, by a variety of environmental factors.
Having sex (or choosing not to have it by way of conscious decision rather than default) is just part of what makes a person who they are, just like being a ninja pirate space captain magician king is. If we can wrap our heads around this, it goes a long way toward creating stories that highlight the character rather than flattening them, I think!
Since a lot of what inspires me to write on these subjects is involved with fandom and fictional writing, I thought that I might have a little series on the barriers that people come up against when trying to write fictional characters... having sex. It would seem, at first glance, that it would be a simple thing! After all, in the real world, a lot of people have sex on a daily basis, even people that the majority might not find attractive or interesting.
However, when approaching fictional characters, it seems like a lot of writers (particularly fan writers) wind up stuck quite quickly on how to make their characters ‘sexual’ without discarding every other aspect of their personalities.
So today I would like to talk about one of those aspects of personality specifically: the goals and driving forces that influence the character. When one takes a glance into the world of a fictional character, one of the first things to be laid out is usually the character’s goal in life. For some, it might be to be the best card player/fighter/racer to walk the earth (or applicable planet). For others, it might be to protect or care for an important person, to become strong enough to bring about some social change, to be a leader, to build or create something.
These priorities go a long way toward making the character who they are. Perhaps their dedication to this goal causes them to risk their lives, to betray someone else, to make choices that affect everyone and everything around them. Perhaps the goal changes somewhere int he middle of the novel/series/movie, and the character has to find new reasons to live, new things to strive for. Perhaps the goal leads them into utter ruin and destruction. However it goes, playing the character without that driving goal would change everything about them, wouldn’t it?
This is where a lot of fan writers make one of two choices: either ignore everything that the character strives for to create a story centered around romantic or sexual exploits, creating a sort of vacuum in which that goal can’t exist or take all of the sexual choices away from the character by putting them into a non-consensual sexual situation. This isn’t to say that stories that use these plots are a bad thing, but after looking through thousands of pieces of fiction that use them, I’ve wondered: Do fans really think this is the only way to write a focused character?
The problem with this view, to me, is the idea that sex and sexuality are big huge mystical things that must take over your entire life, if they exist at all. That there is no middle ground between asexuality and hyper-sexuality, that a person is either “above these things” or “consumed by them.”
And yet, if you stop and look around you in public at any given time during your daily life, you are probably spotting a myriad of people who (when you aren’t looking, hopefully!) are having sex. For example, the business owner who created a living from the ground up, the teacher who cares about his student’s well-being, the military officer who makes important decisions about the lives of soldiers, the academic who spends hours with her nose in a book. Many of these people, whose lives are dedicated to specific goals, have at some point had sex, and might even be in romantic relationships as we speak!
Perhaps the teacher goes home at night and collapses into his partner’s arms to talk about the day, venting about the issues his students are facing. Or perhaps, for him, his sexual life is more casual: a night out here and there, or a masturbatory session in the shower while fantasizing about the principal with the pretty blue eyes. Either way, taking such actions doesn’t mean that he cares any less about his students, his career goals, or the material that he’s teaching. It just means that he’s not a 2D image, he’s a person.
You might say: But wait! How can things that apply to ordinary people possibly apply to my ninja pirate space captain magician king?
This is when you have to stop and think: is your character really only defined by that one trait? Doesn't he or she have friends, family, other interests, a history, a culture, a social environment? Even if all of those things that you love about the character were originally created in a vacuum - here's looking at you, test tube babies - the character probably isn't now living in one, which means that he or she is being influenced, every moment, by a variety of environmental factors.
Having sex (or choosing not to have it by way of conscious decision rather than default) is just part of what makes a person who they are, just like being a ninja pirate space captain magician king is. If we can wrap our heads around this, it goes a long way toward creating stories that highlight the character rather than flattening them, I think!