Schwartz, Sheila. The Dynamics of Character. Creative Writing in America.

Here Schwartz focuses on one craft aspect of creative writing: creating character. She says, "Where do characters come from in fiction? Do they come from exercises such as 'The Most Unforgettable Person I've Ever Known,' or 'The Person I Most Admire'? I believe that they do not, that there is no transference from abstract exercises such as these to the development of rounded multidimensional characters in a work of fiction. That is not the way I write, and that is not he way I teach my students to write" (123). I believe I know where she is going with this: that fictional characters are indeed fictional, and not just thinly veiled disguises of people we already know. Yet she does admit later in the chapter that her characters are probably somewhat based on people she's met, people with whom she's clashed or created a problem for her, to some extent. She focuses on the experience of those clashes instead of the people involved:

"Dorothea Brande, in her classic work on writing, Becoming a Writer, states:

'It is commonplace that every writer must turn to himself to find most of his material ... There is just one contribution which every one of us can make; we can give into the common pool of experience some comprehension of the world as it looks to each of us. There is one sense in which everyone is unique. No one else was born of your p arents, at jut that time of just that country's history; no one underwent just your experiences...'(footnote 1).

"In my opinion, all fictional writing stems from emotion; from the need and desire to communicate, fro mthe need and desire to exorcise old wounds, to redress old grievances, to bring clarity to unresolved events of the past. Once the writer has found a situation based on one of these needs, the development of hte character can begin. This philosophy is the core of the method that I employ, both as an author of fiction and a teacher of writing (123-124).

"(Schwarz's book) Growing Up Guilty is filled with these mementos. It is based on two major wounds that I have long since consigned to memory. Both of these wounds are what Joyce Carol Oates call 'that obscure but vulnerable, and, once lost, precious life that [the writer]lived before becoming a writer' (footnote 2) "(124).

I don't think Schwartz is actually describing characterization here; she's describing plot and theme. This is the major fault I find with this chapter; although I think she does a good job of describing how to come up with a theme for your work, but doesn't show how it necessarily pertains to creating characters.

"And now back to the summer of Growing Up Guilty. When I sat down each day to write, 26 years later (after her childhood camping experiences), I had not clear characters in mind. But as I worked, a character emerged, a wonderful woman named Millie: radical, poor, generous, intelligent, optimistic, and a little naive" (125).

These are characteristic traits, not stemming from dissonance, as might theme, and I'll bet Schwartz loosely based her character on herself or someone she knew. She claims to have no characters in mind as she wrote her work, but how did she come up with these traits?

I know that many of my characters share some traits with me to begin with, and them begin to have their own "personalities" as I realize more who they are. But my characters can often start as based on someone I know or knew: me, my husband, my friends, former co-workers, old boyfriends, etc. I once interviewed Jennifer Weiner, best-selling writer of women's lit books such as "Good in Bed," and she said the boyfriend in her first book was also at first loosely based on an ex, but then he realized himself more as the book progressed and she realized what he needed to do.

Schwartz later admits the same works for her: "...I was unhappy at camp and Helen was cruel to me and this is hte way the world looked to me at that time. This perception is expressed through Susan, the stubborn, feisty, honest, irreverent heroine of the book.

"Is Susan me? Well, yes and no." Exactly. So I don't think doing exercises such as "Who is the Most Interesting Person You Know?" is completely a waste of time, if only it gets students thinking about the blacks and whites of a person and realizes not to create steretypes or caricatures when characters are realized on the page. A character will be both good and bad, an empathic being with whom the reader can relate because they know people like them. And that's based on real people, to some extent.

Although this chapter tends to often wander away from characterization, I do like what Schwartz says about workshopping: "With teaching, as with my own writing, I have students begin with something they want to say, some thing that is uniquely theirs. For this purpose, free writing and journal writing are indispensable. At each class session, before I teach whatever lesson I have planned for the evening, we read one or more journal entries to each other. The amount read depends on the time and the number of students in the class. If class registration exceeds eight or ten students, I divide the class into small groups for the initial reading. While they work in small groups, I confer with individuals. Then, when the groups have finished, I ask for a few volunteers to read their work to the entire class. Volunteers must be willing to accept comments from class members outside of their own small group and from me as well. As they comment and listen, s tudents begin to gain insight into their own work" (131).

Exactly. I love the idea of workshopping, both in composition and creative writing classes, and think it works best in small communities of writers, where the students do not feel overwhelmed and also have more opportunity to share and have feedback on their own work. They also learn not to look to just me for the "right" answers about their writing but also to write for a community, creating writing that is understood and appreciated by a community rather than just an audience of one (me).