Billy Joel's song "The Stranger" talks about the different faces we all wear. I've read several articles that talk about discovering parts of your psyche in your stories and characters when you write fiction. Today I was shocked to find that my most recent writing has quite unintentionally revealed two of the faces I wear.
The first face I recognized was easy because it is the face I hoped others saw when I worked with them in my IT career. One of the characters in my book begins almost exclusively as this face. He changes through the book in ways that move him closer to the person I actually am.
The other was much more terrifying because it is the face of the person I wish I was when I was growing up. That is a face I have tried to keep hidden for a long time, even when I was growing up. Now the character is out there on full display. The truly terrifying part of this for me is that I feel this character's voice needs to be a little stronger. I need to let the reader deeper inside this character to take the book from being a really good to being outstanding. The reader needs to know and understand the inner pains and challenges that face him as he tries to be the best he can without losing himselve in the expectations of others.
As someone who spent years loathing himself it is wonderful to really like this character. As someone who was not at all popular in his youth it is terrifying to expose the person in the form of a character I want others to love.
What a marvelous and yet terrifying revelation.
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