Not too long ago I saw a post on Facebook asking how to describe
a character without a “standing in the front of the mirror” type scene, which
any decent writer knows is a big time no-no. But it isn’t always all that easy,
especially if you have only one POV. How would the POV character describe
himself to the reader without standing in front of a mirror to do an assessment?
That isn’t easy to even to answer.
I have one story I’ve written were the reader learns the
hero has red hair because he complains about how his whole family (whole
community actually) has red hair and how boring it is. In the same story, the
reader learns about the main character’s size because some other characters
point out the size difference between him and another fellow his age, and he
reflects on why he is understandably larger. The only other description given
of him is the way he dresses, and that was in form of describing the dress code
of his people to an outsider. (They’re aliens.)
At no point do I have this character standing in front of a
mirror.
In another story of mine (an unfinished one), I show the
reader the POV character’s appearance by having other characters react to it.
Of course, the whole thing is in his POV, so he does inwardly react to their
reaction, thereby the reader learns why people do have such a reaction, but my
main character isn’t standing in front of a mirror describing himself either.
Generally, I find it easier to have at least two POV
characters, so each of them can “assess” the other in their eyes when they
first meet. Simple and easy, but then sometimes you need more, because there
are always things a character isn’t going to take note of. Or maybe doesn’t
need to.
I have a scene in yet another story of mine where the hero
describes what he assesses to be a young boy climbing out of the passenger seat of
his tow truck, which his employee had just returned to his garage. In that
short paragraph, the reader learns about the description of this new character
in the hero’s life, including said characters size, though not her gender.
Which brings me to another post I read this week about pronouns
(and frankly I find this incomprehensible) but apparently it is now politically
correct to use the plural pronoun “they” to describe an individual who prefers to remain androgynous. I even noticed an
author using this incongruous pronoun to keep the sex of a character unknown to
the reader.
And it makes me wonder if schools are even teaching grammar
anymore at all. He, She, and It are all singular, They is plural. Personally, I
would never want to be referred to as in it, but “they”?
And instead of keeping the reader in dark about a character’s
gender don’t refer to that person as “they”! Keep the POV character in the dark
too, or at least confused as to gender, which I’ve said I’ve done, but frankly,
if I ever read something where an individual is referred by the pronoun “they”
I’d probably stop reading the book. I might even consider it a wall banger.
Such writing would certainly draw me out of the story, which we all know is a
bed thing.
Yeah, I know I’m old fashioned, but I can’t be alone in
this. Can I?
Happy writing everyone. J
