Grist: Creating characters with personality

Register now to join us at 7pm GMT on Monday 11 March for the next Grist conversation.

Hi there,

In the next Grist conversation, we’ll be talking about how to construct characters with real personalities, and perhaps even personalities that clash. We’ll take a look at a few different frameworks that we can use to think about personality, from The Big Five personality traits to Myers Briggs and even astrology. 

As we’re not talking about real people, it doesn’t really matter when we believe in these frameworks – any tool that helps us to create believable, well-individuated characters is useful.

You don’t want all your characters to behave and sound the same, and sometimes it helps to have characters whose personalities clash. But what does that mean? And how do we create characters whose decisions and relationships are based on who they are, rather than the necessities of the plot? 

We’ll also take a look at exercises that can help us make our villains more villainous, without losing their humanity. Being a bit conflict-averse, I struggle to write believable antagonists, so I’m particularly looking forward to this part of the conversation.

The next Grist session will happen at 19:00 GMT on Monday 11 March on Zoom, and is open to my paying subscribers or anyone who fancies taking out a free 7 day trial to access the Zoom link at the bottom of this post! If you’d like to come along but aren’t in a position to subscribe, drop me a line by replying to this email and I’ll send you the registration link. 

Remember, Grist sessions aren’t recorded, so you can share your thoughts or experiences, or talk about your own work in progress, safe it the knowledge that it will go no further.