DO YOU KNOW YOUR HERO?

Under what conditions does a person continue to be a person?

Under what conditions does he or she stop being a person?

As a young man, Hitler dreamed of being an artist.

There are private collections of his artwork kept all across the world by different individuals ...

for whatever reasons prompt such people to collect those paintings.

Do they look at those works of art, trying to picture the mind of the young man who put brush to canvas? To see if they can spot any indication of the monster he later became?

Rene Descares' maxim : I think therefore I am.

Does what we think determine the person who we are? Do our actions dictate that? Or is it a meld of the two?

A zombie. Could we call that a person? It is hunger with a mouth and two legs (usually).

Yet, haven't you met people consumed by the hunger for fame, wealth, social status to the extent that they will sacrifice their wives, their children, their health to obtain them.

Do they quality as a type of zombie, emotional hunger driven with little thought for others?

What tells you more about a person? The way his body works or how his mind works?

I would suggest that language is where our being lives. There is the language of words, but there is also the language of action.

I say "I love you" but I forget your birthday, I humiliate you in public, and slap you in private. The language of action is more persuasive than that of words.

Novels are the only medium that portray the mind well.

Only novels expose the secret life of a man's character. Do you know your hero/heroine well enough to portray his/her character with a few deft eye lifts or sighs or the finality of a signing of a divorce decree?

The best novels show a mind in conflict with itself, dark urges contesting over the feeble protests of decent ones. You, as a reader, will find the deepest connection with the character when his or her deepest thoughts are explored.

But they must resonate with truth -- the truth of what it means to be human. What are your character's deepest thoughts?

They will be about his worries, fears, and hopes.

If you can write a short , genuine-feeling paragraph of the worries, fears, and hopes of each of your characters, they will come across as real in your novel.

And those paragraphs will help give you a sense of self for each character -- and how each one of those characters interact, mesh, or strike sparks off the others in your novel.

How do you write a genuine summation of your character's worries, fears, and hopes?

Once in New York City, a rat was filmed caught in the middle of a busy street. It tried to dart from one side to the other, only to nearly be run over. Again and again, it frantically scrambled to the safety of the curb, only to miss death by millimeters.

Finally a whizzing tire caught the rat, sending it spinning and tumbling. It stayed in one spot cowering. A man with folded newspaper in hand ran from the sidewalk, scooped up the fearful rat, and tumbled it into the dark safety of the sewer grate.

The man smiled big, got on his bike, taking off. The camera crew called after him. "Why did you do that?"

He smiled embarrassed. "I've been scared like that, too."

If you can get your reader to think "I've felt like that, too," your character's worries, fears, and hopes will feel real to him and her.

Hope this helps your writing in some small way, Roland
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