Character Dysfunction

Life is not easy for a character in a book. Take me, for example. Marty Pitchford. My ‘creator’ wants me to be some kind of magnificent character readers will fall in love with. Mr. Big-Time-Author decided to make me a wuss in the beginning of the book just so I could grow some, you know? How do you think that makes me feel?

Yeah, I bet you wouldn’t like it any more than I did. Characters have to grow. I get it. They have to move through their allotted storylines and show some progress, some change, that significantly changes their lives. I’m tellin’ ya, this is pure hell. I’ve been stuck in wuss mode in this book for a while, then I go to borderline perv, and then I go through an number of other changes.

I suppose I have it better in this one than other characters. Take Franco. Poor sap  gets nabbed and roughed up, AND, he’s afraid of dogs. Nonetheless, Franco takes the fall as a mean character because his creator decided this was his fate. Sometimes I think we should sue for some kind of self-creating rights.

Ok, ok, so my creator allowed me to ‘go with the flow’ in my growth. I suppose as authors go, he is kind to his characters and allows us to make our own mistakes and take the story places he would never go. Like all the sex stuff in my life. My author would not necessarily go there normally, but he let me do the walkin’, talkin’ and, well, you know what.

My big beef, though, is that he takes credit for it. Asshole! Who does he think he is? He lets me run amuck and give him a decent character who gets into all kinds of shit, then he goes and claims he “wrote it”. Isn’t that something I can sue for? Shouldn’t I claim some sort of character plagiarism or something? What right does he have to take all the credit for me living my life out on the page? That’s what really sucks. I get myself into all those messes, allow people to call me a wuss in the beginning, deal with a wife that is nothing short of a slut, come out of it a changed man and HE gets all the credit.

I’m going to form the Character’s Writing Guild and we’re gonna sue the pants of all you yahoo’s who think their the cat’s bark when it comes to writing. Everyone knows character driven stories are the best. We do all the heavy lifting. We should be able to demand higher compensation. Hell, we don’t get any compensation. How’s that for one big, fat ripoff?

Well, I’m gonna change all that. Wait and see. In the meantime, check out my performance in The Method Writers, due out in November 2011. You won’t be disappointed. I promise.