Writing Compelling Characters

Today, Elana Johnson, Alex Cavanaugh and Jen Daiker are doing the Great Blogging Experiment!
Here is the idea: many bloggers will be blogging today about the same topic: writing compelling characters. We can go to all of their blogs (listed in the link above) and see how different each post is from the others. Yes, we all blog, but we are still unique (I hope)! So, here is mine.

WHAT MAKES A CHARACTER COMPELLING: 5 points I've learned from my favorite character

First, let me take a moment to think of some of the most compelling characters I know. Catherine Earnshaw, in Wuthering Heights. All the Walsh women in Marian Keyes's novels. Elizabeth Bennet, in Pride and Prejudice. Everyone's familiar with them, right? I know, they are awesome. But there is one, probably one of my favorite characters ever, one I've come to research and admire a lot, and who I think you don't know. A Brazilian character by a great Brazilian writer, Roberto Drummond. Her name is Hilda Furacão (Hilda Hurricane, in English).

Let me back up a little and tell you about this novel and this author. Roberto Drummond was a man born in 1939 in a small town called Ferros (the same where my dad was born). As a teenager, he moved to the state capital, Belo Horizonte (my hometown and current place of residence). His most relevant traits: journalist, writer, sports columnist, communist and passionate about the soccer team Clube Atlético Mineiro (the team I´m also passionate about). Wonderful man, right? His most famous novel is Hilda Hurricane, published in 1991 and turned into a 32-episode TV series in 1998.

So, what is so wonderful about it? The novel is strongly based in true events. The narrator is Roberto Drummond himself, and he tells many true tales of Belo Horizonte in the 1960's. The main character, Hilda Furacão, is a mix of several realities and a great deal of fiction. First, to the real person. I've done a lot of research about the topic, and several sources have told me that Hilda Furacão indeed existed, but Drummond died without confirming it. Rumor has it that Hilda Furacão was a prostitute that became somwehat known in the bohemian circles of Belo Horizonte. Why did she grab Drummond's attention? Because a soccer player in his beloved Clube Atlético Mineiro fell in love with her and married her. That triggered Drummond's creativity, and he wrote a novel that mistified this woman as well as revealed a lot about Brazil in the pre-dictatorship years (the novel ends on the day after the revolution that led to 20 years of military dictatorship in Brazil).

Now, on to the character. In Drummond's novel, Hilda is a sweet girl from a nice family, who is known for her beauty in Belo Horizonte's traditional high society. On her wedding day, however, she feels like she's been living a lie and dumps her groom at the altar. She takes a cab and ends up in the bohemian zone, in a hotel populated by hookers. That is how she becomes the most famous prostitute in Belo Horizonte, Hilda "Hurricane". At the same time, Drummond's best friend, Malthus, is a young man raised to be a saint, who goes to Belo Horizonte with the intention of becoming a priest. Malthus gets involved in a movement led by traditional high society women against Hilda and the bohemian zone, and decides to "exorcise" the demon out of Hurricane. That fight, of course, quickly turns into an explosive love/hate situation. Hilda is strong and yet fragile, one of those women who hide behind the image of a rock, but is actually full of insecurities. She's stubborn and proud, but she still shows her weakness by chasing "The Saint" from time to time. She has so many flaws, and yet you root for her every step of the way.

In the TV series, Malthus tries to exorcise Hilda


Now, why is that character so compelling? First, she is unexpected. A rich, sweet girl who willingly becomes a prostitute, and a prostitute who becomes a local celebrity and falls in love with a priest. Talk about a wow factor!

So, tip number 1: plot is definitely important when trying to make a character compelling. The story you create for your MC is key to how engaging he or she will be. If nothing interesting happens, it's pretty hard for you to showcase all the strength of this amazing person you created.

That said, having the most bizarre things happen to a person doesn't guarantee a compelling character. On the contrary, it can actually work against them. Sometimes there's so much going on your reader doesn't even have a second to focus on the person in between all that action.

Which brings us to point number 2: build a personality. Your reader needs to get to know your character. Did you notice how I described Hilda Furacão? Her strength, the contrast between the image she puts out there and what's going on inside her, her flaws and weaknesses, her reasons for making the decisions she makes. That's what makes her remarkable. She doesn't just have things happen TO her. She does things, she reacts to things, she changes the course of the story. Her layers are slowly revealed and you fall in love with her.

But note that those layers have contradictions and complications. You don't fall in love with Hilda because she is just so perfect, you fall in love with her because she is not. Which brings me to point 3: no one is perfect. Perfect characters are just not interesting. We thrive on the flaws, the dualities, the internal battles. Perfect is boring. And boring is definitely not compelling.

Actually, no one who has just one definitive trait is insteresting. Hilda has some intense moments and some light ones. She makes jokes and has hilarious scenes with her prostitute friends; she gets angry and fights with the Saint; she gets blue and depressed. And that is point 4: mix it up. Even if you're writing a tragedy, you need at least one funny scene to lighten the mood. And your comedy can't be all jokes, you need something deep behind your hilarious character. One-note characters are not compelling. Complex ones are (but not too complex, please).

Finally, my passion for Hilda Furacão comes from some of the things she says. You can't have a character blurt out a fantastic pearl of wisdom on every page, but a few lines from our favorite characters always stick with us. Which brings me to point 5: a few lines can make all the difference. In Hilda's case, it's lines like "living to avoid someone is the same thing as living for that someone" or "you love humanity, but you're unable to love a person, one who walks, who smells and who does everything wrong."

But even though I'm finding these characteristics by analyzing Hilda Hurricane, they are not specific to her. Liz Bennet has them, and so do Cathy Earnshaw and Heathcliff (how can someone possibly not get goosebumps at Heathcliff's speech after Cathy's death?). If you take a time to think about your favorite characters, you'll see that all of them have all of this somehow. That's what makes them compelling. If you do find those traits in your favorite characters, go ahead and share them. Let me know how (or if) this applies to those fictional people you just can't forget.

*Going through the posts for the Great Blogging Experiment (which really is so great!) I found a post that mentions getting to know your character and interviewing them which I really think is a great idea. I've done it and divided my interview with my character in two posts in this blog, and I felt it helped me a lot. If you like the idea, check out my interview with my MC here and here.