Haunt your major characters for stronger storytelling

I'm swamped, don't know when the next post will go up. Meanwhile, VERY interesting article on the subject of editorial rejection by a Tor/Forge editor, Anna Genoese. Go here. Talk about a reality check. Now for ghosts...

When I was in Hollywood working at breaking into screenwriting, I took courses. One was Robert McKee's excellent workshop. Another was from a different screenwriting guru,  John Truby. McKee's was all about structure (as is his highly recommended book, Story). But Truby got into other aspects of storytelling, including characterization.

The idea from his course that has stuck with me and proved most useful is his notion that characters should have a "ghost." We're not talking about a haunt from Casper the Friendly Ghost, but a powerful, transformative event in a character's past that, whether consciously or not, affects his current behavior.

A now-clichéd example is childhood abuse suffered by a serial killer. How many times have you seen that? It's a true-to-life ghost but is almost a stock characteristic nowadays. Authors work to make their character's abuse more unique and horrific than competing killers, but it remains a standard serial-killer ingredient. It is used to motivate the behavior of other troubled characters, and rightfully so -- abuse is a powerful "ghost." I wonder if the pedophile Catholic priests revealed (and yet undiscovered) don't have abuse buried in their psyches.

A violent ghost such as abuse is a good motivator for an antagonist, but I look for other things to trouble my characters. I'm most concerned with finding ghosts for my protagonists. I seek to write about flawed characters, and for me a ghost is one of the best ways to create a weak spot in a character.

My character ghosts are usually deep-seated and not necessarily conscious. The primary requirement is that it -- the past event -- still influences behavior. I don't necessarily make my readers aware of the ghost, certainly not early on. But, to have credible motivation, aspects of the haunt need to be revealed along the way. If conquering the ghost is part of the character's final epiphany, then it will be revealed.

One of the things writing instruction tells us is that characters need to have a DESIRE. And it is the frustration of achieving said desire that creates conflict and tension, and thus powers the story. Dealing with a ghost is an excellent desire for motivating a character and causing tension.

Here's a tragic ghost for the primary protagonist in the novel some of you helped me with recently, We the Enemy. I don't think I'm giving away too much to reveal this, as his ghost first appears in a dream sequence in the introduction of the character. I tried to write it in such a way that the reader doesn't know for sure what the actual event is -- after all, dreams distort the reality they deal with.

My character, Jake, shot and killed his wife. He deeply loved his wife, and this event was so traumatic that, when the novel opens, he has no conscious memory of it. The reason he shot his wife was an unsuccessful attempt to save the life of his five-year-old daughter who his wife, in the grip of psychosis, kills. He knows the facts -- it was in the police report -- but he cannot recall what happened. It is, however, the content of a recurring nightmare.

More than that, this ghost has caused a kind of fugue in Jake -- his emotions have shut down entirely, this to prevent further emotional injury. If you don't love someone, they can't hurt you.

As you can anticipate, this ghost in Jake's past affects everything in his day-to-day life: his relationships with other people, especially women; how he reacts to small children; and how he lives his professional life. He is an ex CIA agent turned mercenary, able to kill without conscious remorse or hesitation. Note that I said "conscious," his ghost affects even his reaction to killing, and leaves him feeling sickened by the act.

Jake has an unconscious desire to break the thrall of his fugue and to conquer his ghost. But he can't do that consciously. When cracks begin to appear as a result of what happens to him in the course of the novel, he is eventually drawn to widening them and, finally, taking a gigantically risky route to conquering his ghost. When it is at last exorcised, his behavior changes, and that affects the climax of the story.

In my coming-of-age story, The Summer Boy, the sixteen-year-old hero is haunted by the death of his father. It is more conscious in this story, but still an event that affects his thinking and motivates behavior, especially during the climactic conflict.

In a period mystery novel, my hero is troubled by guilt for an affair he had with his twin brother's wife. Guilt is a terrific ghost. Another primary character in the novel is haunted by being "lost" in a poker game by her husband on her honeymoon, being raped, and then sold into sex slavery. As you would guess, this has a powerful effect on her behavior and motivations -- especially when she at last opens herself to love and then is rejected (as she perceives it) by the hero. His "rejection" is caused by his ghost and, between the two, the ghosts cause actions that lead to a tragic result. Without these ghosts, my characters would not have done the things that drive the action and lead to an exciting climax.

In my work in progress, the two main characters have their ghosts. One, a conscious one, is the death of a mate. For another, the ghost is a deep feeling of isolation from all other people caused by a singular childhood event when the effect of a psychic talent on "ordinary" people is revealed.

The primary things I start with when characterizing are the ghost and the character's name -- I can't really write for them unless I know the name, though I can plot in a general sense. After those two come physical characteristics, occupation, and other stuff, but name and ghost are primary.

I urge you to find a ghost for your most important "unhaunted" characters, even if you're already into your project. You may be surprised at how it can change your character's reaction to the events and barriers you've thrown into her path along the way.

For what it's worth,

RR

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© 2005 Ray Rhamey

Comments

[Tracy L. Chrestomathy]

>>My character, Jake, shot and killed his wife. He deeply loved his wife, and this event was so traumatic that, when the novel opens, he has no conscious memory of it. The reason he shot his wife was an unsuccessful attempt to save the life of his five-year-old daughter who his wife, in the grip of psychosis, kills. He knows the facts -- it was in the police report -- but he cannot recall what happened. It is, however, the content of a recurring nightmare.<<

I want to read this story, and I want to read it now. =(

You sure there's no way I can bribe you to e-mail me the manuscript? Kit-Kat Bars? Oreo cookies? Pizza? A trip to France? Free editing service?

*sighs*

Ah well. Hurry up and get it published!