I’d Know That Voice Anywhere
By Katrina Kittle | September 5, 2014 |
photo by Mike Bailey-Gates
Please welcome Katrina Kittle to Writer Unboxed as a regular contributor. Katrina is the author of four novels for adults—Traveling Light, Two Truths and a Lie, The Kindness of Strangers, and The Blessings of the Animals— and one novel for tweens, Reasons to Be Happy. She has an MFA in Creative Writing and is an experienced teacher of creative writing as well as a manuscript consultant. You can learn more about Katrina in her bio box at the end of this post.
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No matter if you’re writing in first person or third, it’s vital for our characters to have distinctive voices. Your characters should sound like individual people. I know that in my own first drafts, my characters all end up sounding like each other, which essentially means they sound like me.
Let’s talk about what creates a voice, then look at published samples of distinctive voices, then, finally, go through some simple exercises that will help us create these individual voices in our own stories.
What Creates a Voice?
Vocabulary is the most obvious ingredient, as are expressions, idioms, and favorite curse words. Voice is also shaped by the character’s gender, age, education, occupation, geography (Where do they live? What country? Urban or rural?), time period, class, attitude, vocal patterns, their use of figurative language, and essentially every single thing they’ve ever experienced in their life! I’m not kidding—everything that makes up your character’s real life informs the way she sees the world, and therefore informs the way she speaks.
As you can see, voice, then, is deeply connected to characterization. It’s so difficult to isolate one aspect of our craft from the others because they’re all so braided together. Clear voice is aided by knowing your character inside and out.
Samples
I know for me, it helps to see concrete examples, rather than talking about it in the abstract. In the following short excerpts, note how unique each voice is from the others. You would never mistake any of these characters for each other. Oh, and I want to point out that I adored all three of these novels and encourage you to read them!
The first is from Things We Didn’t Say by Kristina Riggle (William Morrow, 2011):
Stupid Casey and her stupid questions. I hate how all these kids are making my drama into theirs to get attention. Like, if he totally disappeared for real, by next week they’d be on to the next thing, like that kid whose brother died of cancer and everyone was acting like their own brother died and then within a week it was all, whatever.”
In Riggle’s passage, the character is clearly young, a teenager—and we get that not only from what she says, but from how she says it. Her use of “all these” and “like” and “whatever” plant us clearly in contemporary times, and we get loads of attitude from her forthright “Stupid Casey and her stupid questions.”
Contrast that character with our speaker from Nayana Currimbhoy’s novel, Miss Timmons’ School for Girls (HarperCollins, 2011):
I, I am the night. I prefer people to see me first from behind. My hair is rain. It is thick and black and long, and it swings on my hips like music. My hair is my own private beat as I walk to school, to college, to family dinners, as I walk behind my mother, carrying her vegetables and fish.”
This speaker is also young—she references college and her mother—but is far more sophisticated than Riggle’s speaker. Her use of metaphors “I am the night,” “My hair is rain,” and “My hair is my own private beat” reveals her to be more poetic, and there is something far more deep and mysterious to her than the surface, in-your-face attitude of Riggle’s character. Neither character is “better” than the other—they are both perfect examples of powerful voice.
Our final sample is from The Doctor and the Divaby Adrienne McDonnell (Viking, 2010):
We are afraid that she has grown desperate. My sister’s husband has become obsessed. He has dragged her to physician after physician, put her through every procedure and humiliation so that she can have a child. He won’t relent.”
We can tell we’re “hearing” a more mature character here. There’s an even greater sophistication, even a formality, in the vocabulary. Much of the word choice probably clued you in that this is not a contemporary story. The choice of “grown desperate,” of “physician” over the more casual “doctor,” and the choices of “procedure,” “humiliation,” and “relent” speak to a level of propriety and etiquette not present in the other two excerpts. Instead of “We are afraid she had grown desperate” (note the choice not to use a contraction), Riggle’s character might have said, “We’re, like, all waiting for her major meltdown any second.”
Pay Attention to Figurative Language
One of the most useful tips in finessing your own character voices is to pay careful attention to your character’s use of figurative language. We are most individual when we make comparisons, but the figurative language has to fit your character’s life experience. I was once working with eighth-grade writer who, in her story set in ancient Egypt, used the phrase “cold as ice.” Not only was that a cliché, but I reminded her there was no ice in ancient Egypt. She went back and revised the line to “cold as the deepest waters of the Nile.”
Go through your own work and look for similes and metaphors. Highlight them and ask yourself if they are truly from your character’s life experience or from your own. Can you revise them to be truer to your character’s frame of reference?
The Ballerina & the Surgeon
Here’s an exercise that can help you do that, as well as helping you to incorporate your character’s occupation. Imagine that two people—a ballerina and a surgeon—are looking out over a wide open field watching storm clouds gather. Write a sentence—just one sentence—for each of them, as they describe the impending storm to a third character who was not present.
A sample sentence might be: “The lightning sliced through the darkness like a scalpel and the clouds pulsed across the black sky.” We know the surgeon wrote that, right? The ballerina might say, “Lightning leapt across the sky above us in a grand jete, in perfect time with the timpani beat of the thunder.”
Okay, it seems so obvious, right? But we often fail to do it with our own characters. And the reminder is that the surgeon is not likely to say “the clouds pirouetted across the sky,” but if she does, then that is something very distinctive about this character and speaks to her frame of reference.
So pay attention to your character’s occupation and the specific tools and jargon that come with it. Make use of that, particularly when the character is using figurative language.
Go to the Source
Another useful tool is to have people as similar to your character as possible read passages and offer feedback. One of my point of view characters in The Kindness of Strangers is a 17-year-old boy who plays hockey. I asked three young men I had taught in middle school who were currently high school seniors, all three hockey players and excellent writers, to read Nate’s chapters. Of course, they helped me get my hockey images right, but all three also circled the word “blouse” in one passage where Nate describes his girlfriend’s clothing. They all pointed out that they would simply say “shirt.” A nitpicky detail, sure, but it matters, and made Nate’s voice more authentic.
Write Monologues
Not only are we most individual when we’re making comparisons, we’re pretty darn individual when we’re angry, so let your character rant about a pet peeve, or, say, some terrible customer service or being stuck in traffic. These monologues don’t need to end up in your work in progress, but they will help you capture voice and that effect will certainly end up in your work. Be sure to read these monologues aloud—that can help you nail a voice faster than anything…and also alerts you to anything that sounds “false.”
All good vibes to you as you go about creating characters who make readers say, “I’d know that voice anywhere.”
Have some tips you’d like to share about creating Voice? The floor is yours.
Katrina Kittle is the author of four novels for adults—Traveling Light, Two Truths and a Lie, The Kindness of Strangers, and The Blessings of the Animals— and one novel for tweens, Reasons to Be Happy. The Kindness of Strangers was the winner of the 2006 Great Lakes Book Award for Fiction. Katrina has an MFA in Creative Writing from Spalding University in Louisville and teaches creative writing workshops from the third grade to universities to retirement communities. She also teaches creative writing regularly for Word’s Worth Writing Connections (https://www.wordsworthdayton.com/ ) in the Dayton-Cincinnati area and to students across the country through OnLiten (https://onliten.com/workshops.htm#KKchar) Through Write Sisters Consulting (https://www.writesistersconsulting.com/, she offers manuscript consultations. Katrina has always loved the telling of stories in any medium, and because of her extensive background in dance and theatre, she is a firm believer in both honoring an apprenticeship and caring about craft. She lives in Dayton, OH with her odd cat Joey (he has anxiety issues, sucks on blankets, and is in love with a spatula) and her out-of-control garden; has a thing for goats, gardening, and going barefoot; and is totally addicted to coffee, dark chocolate, pedicures, and movies. If you’re on Facebook, she’d love for you to “like” her author page (https://www.facebook.com/KatrinaKittleAuthor). Learn more at www.katrinakittle.com
This is something that took me a long time to understand. I often need to find an example of the character I’m writing. Usually one with a very unique voice. I like actors like Sam Elliot, who can give me a distinct voice. I’ll assign the voice to a character and listen to Sam in my head before I write the scene. I’ve discovered that my characters cannot sound like normal people. Normal people all sound the same in writing (though not in real life). In order to pick up the nuances on paper, I have to find the extreme voices.
Ron, that’s a great idea! And you’re right: we go for the extreme in order to find the nuances. It’s all about whatever works, and then revision, revision, revision! :-)
Welcome to WU and a great first post! I look forward to reading more. Some characters pop into my head with a distinctive voice — and all I have to do is listen. But others need a bit more prodding. I have them write letters to each other, or to me, and I discover that how they speak to their friend is different than how they’d speak to a parent or an acquaintance. It also helps me see the web of relationships, how fickle or steadfast.
Thank you, Vijaya! I love the idea of having the characters write letters to each other or to you–that’s the idea behind the monologues I mention. And you make an excellent point–we all have very different voices depending on who we’re speaking to. And I love your phrase, “the web of relationships.” Absolutely!
I love this post, especially the idea of writing monologues in the voice of your character, and Vijaya, your suggestion of characters’ writing letters to one another is fantastic. I’m having trouble teasing out the voice of my novel’s protagonist, perhaps because she is not so extreme in personality, but I think these ideas will really help a lot. Thank you Katrina and all the wise comments!
-Dana
This is such an excellent post on voice. I wish I’d have read it way back 6 years ago when I started writing. I think for me it’s the figurative language and unique way each character views the world. Turning cliches around to fit the character’s own perception is a great way to establish it.
My best tip is to find books that grab you from page one and notice every detail of the narrator or character’s voice and keep those books on your desk as a reference. Read out loud from the daily, and voice will start to sink in.
Blouse? The boys were right. That’s not a word guys use, unless they’re tailors. The male vocabulary often is, well, let’s say less than elegant.
Wonderful advice on voice, and great to anchor it in the nature of a character. Welcome, Katrina.
Funny thing though, in the US Marines the men call their uniform shirts a blouse. Few people laugh at them for it for some reason…and none laugh twice.
Great post, Karina, and welcome to WU!
Ah, voice, what a topic.
I, myself, feel that voice is directly linked to knowing your character. Not just seeing them on the surface, but really KNOWING how they feel, think, move, react. Knowing their past, present, future, and how each has or will alter who they are.
I write pages upon pages of character profiles before I ever write word one of a manuscript. Few points ever reach the work itself, but how can I possibly hear my character’s voice if I don’t really KNOW my character in and out?
When writing, I’m not in search of MY voice. It’s discovering my CHARACTER’S voice that’s important.
Denise Willson
Author of A Keeper’s Truth, Meant 2 B, and GOT
Denise–
I second everything you say here. You are talking about empathy, imagination, being the character instead of writing about her, etc.
Yes! Getting inside their head!
Amen! I agree completely. When I talk about reference and the character’s world view and life experience, the only way to know those things is to know the character inside and out. I write soooo many pages of “finding the character” before I start writing scenes, too.
This is super helpful. I’m just starting a new novel and revising another, along with finding my own voice in creative nonfiction. I have the same problem of all of my characters sounding like me (or like my friends). It’s definitely something I need to work on.
Helpful tips and good reminders, whatever stage we’re at with the writing. I’ve especially found your last tip, the monologue, to be helpful in nailing down character voice. I once did this for every major and secondary character in a novel, midway through the process, and afterward wished I’d done it much sooner. It helped give depth to the story’s antagonists, especially.
Hi, Katrina:
Great post with wonderful insights. I often tell my students that voice is perhaps the most crucial element in writing — and the most slippery and elusive. You do a great job of laying out its core elements — and providing both great examples and useful exercises. I fully intend to steal them. :-)
(Two most important words in any writing life, courtesy of Oakley Hall: Steal wisely.)
In particular, I love your last insight, about pushing the character’s emotional state into anger or some other extreme. Weak voices often result from lackluster imagining of the character, and that’s often because we haven’t put them in scenes of risk, fear, rage, etc. Push a character to his limit, you’ll see him more clearly, and hopefully hear him more clearly as well.
In her poem “Death Comes to Me as a Little Girl,” Dorianne Laux personifies death as a child listening in on the living, and the girl says she likes it, “Especially when they fight, and when they sing.”
I think this all points to the crucial role of attitude in voice. Of all the elements you mention as dispositive of voice — class, gender, education, etc. — I think attitude is the key, since everything else seems to gel in attitude. And once again, when a character’s voice seems weak, I often advise clients and students to perform an “attitude adjustment,” crank up the angst, the spite, the righteous indignation. By some odd magic, the fog begins to lift.
Last, I remember a bit of advice from Sam Shepard, who said he always imagined his characters onstage as part of a jazz ensemble, and he tried to assign a unique timbre, tone and rhythm to each of them, so they stood out from each other. (But I’m big on musical metaphors.)
Thanks for the jump start to my day. Be swell.
David
Thanks, everyone. And, David Corbett, you just reminded me of how much I adore Sam Shepard! :-)
It’s funny what you said about ice in Egypt.
Made me think about an argument I had with a former agent who insisted that people would not understand my character’s use of the word ‘snowmachine’ instead of ‘snowmobile’ in my mss. The story is set in Alaska, my home since birth, and up here one of the ways to tell a person isn’t from here is if they say snowmobile, because we all say snowmachine. She insisted that readers would picture a snowmachine as that thing that makes fake snow on ski slopes (another odd concept for me, we had over 10ft of natural snow last year, why make fake snow?).
In the end I capitulated since the vast majority of the audience was not from Alaska, and wouldn’t you know it one of the first comments I got from a reader was “This guy needs to actually visit Alaska before writing a book about it, for one thing, its a snowmachine not a snowmobile!”
Saying stuff with the wrong voice can throw a person right out of the story.
“Saying stuff with the wrong voice can throw a person right out of the story.” Absolutely, Basil! That’s why “blouse” or “snowmobile” can seem like a picky detail, but iscrucial. And, thanks to you, I’ve learned something new today. I did not know that about snowmachines in Alaska.
Welcome to WU, Katrina. Thank you for writing such a practical post with examples. Most helpful.
Also? I loved the personal part of your bio. I have a furry companion with similar traits, though mine is of the canine persuasion.
Thanks, Jan! My cat, Joey, is quite the character. I’ve never had a normal cat in my life, but this one really takes the cake!
GREAT! Love the ballerina and surgeon analogy. Will be sharing this on FB.
“I’d Know That Voice Anywhere”
I saw the title and thought, okay- another post on voice. After reading it, I said, “Hell yeah, another post on Voice- DAMMIT.” Should I say, “I love your post” or would that be redundant?
Welcome Kat, oops, Katrina, way to make an entrance.
I don’t know if it’s a good tip or not, but I normally create my character’s voice in their profile (Speech pattern and Mannerism section). Everyone sounds the same in my first drafts. I add voice in my second or third drafts. It makes for a lot of editing, I know, but if I try to focus on voice in the beginning, I will never finish my first draft.
BK
I agree, Brian, in my first drafts I just let all the characters talk way too much–but it’s how I get to know them. Occasionally, a character’s voice will be “clear” and immediate from the start, but usually, I have to work at it! Thanks!
Great post! Glad to see you’ll be a regular here. :)
Katrina, this is a very interesting post about, arguably, the most critical aspect of fiction. Well done.
As a film fan with a musical bent, I work hard to infuse my fiction with appropriate pacing, rhythm and tone. This applies to each character’s voice, as well as the flow of the individual scene and overall story.
The text I type is an interpretation of the film version that’s in my head, even though it is not my intention to physically create a movie (Dear Coen Brothers: I wouldn’t turn my nose up at selling the film right$ … and a cameo role … and a trailer with a pizza oven.).
Although my first-person style is heavier on monologue and dialogue than description, every character is a fully defined composite crafted from my memory’s film files. This most certainly includes the pattern and sound of the character’s voice.
So out of curiousity, do you tend to write your character’s voices in the second draft?
I’m currently writing something where the main character has a distinctive voice, but after the first 20 pages or so, I’ve kind of lost it. I don’t want to go back and try to fix it and lose momentum, but I’m worried if I wait I might not be able to find it again. In your experience, does waiting until the second draft matter?
Anne, I honestly think every writer is different. I think you’re wise to push ahead and not lose momentum. I might do some of that monologue writing I mentioned in the blog as a “warm up” every day before I wrote, but otherwise, I’d be content to work on it later. For me, the first draft is all about discovery. There is always much work to be done, on voice and everything else, once I finish! All best wishes to you as you forge ahead!
Thanks, everyone! I’m really happy to be here. Happy writing to you all.
Thanks, Katrina, for tackling this subject and welcome to the sweet mosh pit of WU.
Unless I am misreading, the three examples of voice you use are all inner narrative of first person narrators. This gives the author a leg-up, enables using language as the character “thinks” it. Those passages serve as long monologues with no other character around to temper the narrator’s attitude, so they are a free canvas and very effective.
There is different skill necessary, I think, when writing in close third. (In omniscient, one has to be careful not to devolve into straight telling.) Though I may choose a first person narrator at some point, I love the challenge of conveying character in close third, but it means the dialogue has to be right on the pin, because that is the actual voice. And the transition to inner narrative must also be polished, so the reader never knows she’s reading. Or am I over-blowing it?
The way I think of close third is everything that shows up on the page is what the character sees, absorbs or reflects on through his prism of experience, but without commenting on it, except in pivotal moments that again show character. . . . How the soldiers huddle in the rain. . . The prickling of skin when the train whistle blows.
Granted, there is no substitute for knowing the character thoroughly, but if you have any insights and techniques that pertain specifically to this aspect of voice, I will be happy to learn more.
Hey Katrina,
Great post. Also, wanted to say hi. We were in a workshop together at the Indiana University Writers Conference about fifteen years ago.
Best
Keith Hood
Wonderful Katrina! I am so happy you are here and so proud you are representing Dayton, Ohio with your talent and passion!
My current voice check is to have someone pull out a few sentences of dialogue (without giveaway clues) and see if the voice is clear.
I look forward to your future posts!