This week: The Unlikely Protagonist Edited by: Storm Machine  
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"We have a lot of unlikely heroes now. It's not just the guy with the guns; it's the guy with the brains." ~Benedict Cumberbatch on playing Alan Turing in Imitation Game
"My dream is to try to reach as many kids and readers who might need an unlikely hero to connect to." ~Tim Federle |
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Life moves at intervals. This month I celebrated 15 years on WDC. It's hard to recognize that once, i hadn't known this place.
The move is over, injuries are healing, and I'm finding a way back into the world.
I still remember the meme where the people were waiting for the grandmother to take up the call so the young people could live in peace a little longer, not return broken and fatigued beyond words. That the spunky grandmother might be the best one to go out and save the world. She hurts every morning when she wakes up anyway, so she can absolutely do these things for the rest of the family.
I rarely see that point of view, and there are others, too. So many of our protagonists are teens. Maybe, like Dumbledore said once, it is a crime of the old to forget what it is like to be young. The old remember, and the young haven't lived to feel it yet.
Age is hardly the only barrier, and it is very difficult to write things you do not know in your own experience. Research helps, but it might not be enough. Occasionally, you need the protagonist to be something you can know so you can have a main supporting character who is other and then deciphered through that gaze.
Make a list of what you know. I know my brain works differently because of mental illness. My age, gender, race, occupation, economic status, physical location, and hobbies can detail out entire legions of characters that are never quite the same.
One of my problems is I always want to write the monsters, the creatures, and the things that are not quite human. Sometimes I see my readers struggling to understand a character's viewpoint that is too far from human.
What does it mean to be too far from human, anyway? If we delve deeply enough, patiently enough, cannot we understand anything? Maybe. Maybe not.
The more time you spend with these kinds of creatures as non-POV characters, the more they can be treated as the POV characters with practice.
I'm not telling you to go out and try to write an entire novel from an ant's viewpoint. We can leave that to animated movies that get to show what these things are as well as give you a different perspective.
You can try a scene with a protagonist like a ghost, an animal, or an alien. What does that change with how they interact with things or people around them? How about the differences in size or ability? Give yourself time to explore it. This isn't anything but an experiment, but it is fun to play with words. Good luck.
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This is my last newsletter for a while. Real life calls, and it is not on anyone's timing but its own. Thank you for reading and for hanging in there, and one day perhaps I'll be able to return.
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Action/Adventure: February 23, 2022 Issue [#11213]
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