Kind of late here, but I just wanted to say I've been reading the comments on this post with interest, and agreeing with most everything everyone has said. Out of curiosity I tried googling for something like "how to write likable characters," and unsurprisingly the lists of advice were mostly extremely cliche and useless, but there was one page that mentioned something similar to what china_shop says about making characters recognize their flaws, and I that bit stood out to me as something I particularly agreed with. There's just something about self-awareness that I find compelling, and I like seeing characters think about their choices (even if they end up making the worse choice or have already made it), or acknowledge their faults (even if they can't change them, or try to and fail), including both protagonists and antagonists.
Granted, I'm coming at this from a perspective of, like, most of my favorite novels are very philosophical, which is certainly not everyone's cup of tea. But I think for me, having characters experience some kind of cognitive dissonance about their beliefs or thoughts or actions, whether they choose to confront the problem or have secret angst about it or just sweep it under a rug, is one of the ways I try to make them more interesting. I also think I generally aim for interesting rather than likable, even in protagonists, I guess on the theory that "interesting" is something I feel like I have (slightly) more control over?
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2023-04-12 07:21 am (UTC)Granted, I'm coming at this from a perspective of, like, most of my favorite novels are very philosophical, which is certainly not everyone's cup of tea. But I think for me, having characters experience some kind of cognitive dissonance about their beliefs or thoughts or actions, whether they choose to confront the problem or have secret angst about it or just sweep it under a rug, is one of the ways I try to make them more interesting. I also think I generally aim for interesting rather than likable, even in protagonists, I guess on the theory that "interesting" is something I feel like I have (slightly) more control over?