The Things That Define Us
By Kathleen McCleary | February 8, 2023 |
Like most of us, I have my quirks. I can’t sleep at night unless all the closet doors are closed in my bedroom. I hate elevators and will walk up many flights of stairs to avoid them. Condiments—especially mayonnaise—send shivers down my spine. If there is Motown music playing anywhere, I am dancing. Even in the grocery store.
We all have our peculiarities; the habits and superstitions and likes and dislikes and fears and fondnesses that make us unique. So too, with the characters we create. Quirks are one of the most essential aspects of creating characters who feel real and relatable. From Don Quixote to Dickens’ Mr. Micawber to Phoebe Buffay of “Friends” fame, fictional characters are memorable because of their unique foibles. In some cases, a character’s quirks are a key aspect of plot. In fleshing out your fully realized characters, consider:
Are your character’s quirks an essential part of your story? In the South Korean TV series “Extraordinary Attorney Woo,” the title character, Woo Young-woo, is an autistic rookie lawyer hired by a major law firm in Seoul. She’s socially awkward and blunt, definitely odd, obsessed with whales, and avoids eye contact. Yet she’s smart and emotionally intelligent and has a photographic memory. The things that make her different also make her very good at what she does. Her quirks are not a side aspect to her character, they actually drive the plot.
Why does your character have this idiosyncrasy? Did something happen in your character’s backstory that led to the development of their particular fear or habit? I have a friend whose brother had a pet bird when she was little, and one time the bird flew out of its cage and onto her head, where it got tangled in her hair. She’s still terrified of birds 50 years later. If it’s a quirk that holds them back, will something happen that enables them to either overcome or accept that peculiarity? How does this quirk affect the way other people view them and how they perceive themselves? What does this quirk reveal? One of my daughters twirls her hair with one finger when she’s anxious. If I was writing her into a novel, I’d show her twirling her hair around and around her finger every time she’s in a situation that unsettles her.
Does your character use their eccentricities purposefully? Sometimes, people are aware of their own quirks, and use them to charm or unnerve others. In the BBC mystery series “Vera,” Detective Chief Inspector Vera Stanhope ambles around in an ill-fitting overcoat, calling everyone, from her co-workers to suspected murderers, “love” or “pet.” Using terms of endearment to address someone you suspect may have killed someone else by whacking them in the head with a poker seems odd at first. Yet when it comes out of Vera’s mouth, that term of endearment can feel like a knife held to the throat. “You weren’t really at home that night, were you, pet?” she might say.
Don’t overdo it. It’s a fine line between a quirk that helps define a character and a quirk that makes a character annoying (just as in real life).
How important are quirks to your characters? How do you decide what quirks to give the people you create?
Kathleen McCleary is the author of three novels—House and Home, A Simple Thing, and Leaving Haven—and has worked as a bookseller, bartender, and barista (all great jobs for gathering material for fiction). A Simple Thing (HarperCollins 2012) was nominated for the Library of Virginia Literary Awards. She was a journalist for many years before turning to fiction, and her work has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Good Housekeeping, Ladies Home Journal, and USA Weekend, as well as HGTV.com, where she was a regular columnist. She taught writing as an adjunct professor at American University in Washington, D.C., and teaches creative writing to kids ages 8-18 as an instructor with Writopia Labs, a non-profit. She also offers college essay coaching (https://thenobleapp.com), because she believes that life is stressful enough and telling stories of any kind should be exciting and fun. When she’s not writing or coaching writing, she looks for any excuse to get out into the woods or mountains or onto a lake. She lives in northern Virginia with her husband and two daughters and Jinx the cat.
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Kathleen, I always enjoy your thoughtful posts. This is a great way of making characters come alive! Thanks for the wonderful reminder.
Hi, Heather. Thanks for the comment. It means a lot, coming from an author who knows how to create characters that leap off the page.
As a teen, my character studies began at basement parties. The pot smokers liked rock ‘n roll and lounged on couches, and talked pretty much non-stop. The MoTown crowd liked beer and the dance floor, and hardly talked at all — but did a lot of laughing. The contrast between the two groups, usually mixed in the confines of very small, dark venues, has always stuck with me. You could study contrasting eccentricities up close and personal in very confining circumstances — and nobody even knew.
I remember those basement parties well—I even grew up in shadow of Motown in the Detroit suburbs. Sounds like you’ve been a good observer of character your whole life, Jim. It must serve you very well in your writing. Thanks for the comment.
My protagonist interacts with an inordinate number of guards, and I try to give them at least one quirk each so that they don’t blur together. Generally I’ll invent small backstories too, not that these generally make it into the novel proper. We have:
– Guard who tries to guess which god in disguise each guest might be
– Guard who is so fed up with the guy above
– Guard who smells like garlic and dung because a witch told him it was a love potion, but really she was trying to spare any woman who might encounter him
– Guy whose sister has a baby coming, is trying to think of baby names
And so on. Far more interesting for me, the writer! And probably for readers, too.
I love the idea of giving small backstories and quirky characteristics to even some of the minor players in your story. I love the guy who smells like garlic and dung because the witch is trying to spare other women from having an encounter with him. Clever! Thanks so much for sharing these details.
Great post, Kathleen. I might even go so far as to say characters with quirks are the most memorable. Introducing natural quirks makes a character dimensional, relatable, and fun.
Thanks for sharing your insight!
Hugs
Dee
Thank you, Dee! I agree that the characters I remember most (and often love the most) are those like Vera with their eccentricities. I so appreciate your comment. Best of luck with your writing!
Love this!! And am going to write a post for my blog about quirks. Yes, each character should have one. The main doc in my fictional hospital is a loving control freak; my MC tries to “mother” her patients & can’t seem to ever take off her stethoscope; Zoey RN has a policeman father & she applies his tenants to her nursing! Aunt Rib is the keeper of all secrets, struggling between control and giving in, finally telling the secrets that she knows can save my MC.
Hi, Beth! Glad you liked this and I’ll look forward to reading your blog post. It sounds like your fictional hospital is full of unique personalities, which makes for a great story. Hope your writing is going well, and thanks for the comment.
Love this reminder, and your examples. Thank you!
Thank you, Kristan. So glad you found the column helpful. Cheers!
Quirks are a useful shorthand for characters’ personalities, but I would warn newbies to tread carefully. Kathleen said you shouldn’t overdo it because it can make a character annoying, and that’s true, but I would add that a quirk that pops up every time the character appears–jangling keys, cleaning and lighting a pipe, straightening strangers’ photographs–can call so much attention to itself that the character disappears.
You make an excellent point, Michael. Thank you. It’s true that if a quirk becomes the proverbial one-note song, it can actually detract from the feeling that a character is fully realized. Like most things in writing, moderation is key. I appreciate the insight.
Another great example of a character defined by his quirks is the TV series detective Monk. OCD leaves him a hypochondriac germophobe, but also intensely aware of details out of place, letting him spot clues and suss out red herrings the others miss. It also makes him a sympathetic, somewhat comic figure.
Such a great post! I love the idea of character idiosyncrasies or quirks, rather than always using mannerisms (hands, breathing, etc.) as a way to illustrate mood or reaction. It would be far more interesting to create a trait to humanize the character, or make them more memorable. Vera’s way of disarming suspects reminds me of Colombo, but with her own unique style. You love watching people underestimate her.