So I think that that, in inflicting cruelty and pain on characters, the
impact on the writer shouldn't be ignored. When I'm writing from a
character's viewpoint, I'm seeing through their eyes, and feeling what
they
feel -- joy or laughter, or rage, grief, fear or despair. I suspect that
it's probably the same for most good writers. I've never >asked them,
but
I suspect that Mike Noakes is going through all the >anger and confusion
with Ranma and Akane in "Choices", and Nick >Leifker's probably been
right there in all the painful decisions >in "Clothes Make The..." or
"Iris".
I can say only this... when I wrote Bubblegum Collapse, I was driven to
write it. The images were so vivid in my head that they would not go away
until I put them to the page. What it did to me, though, to write that...
when it was done, I broke down and wept. I can't really describe what it
was that I did (in case someone might want still to read that story), but
when I write, I come to love my characters... and especially when it comes
to BGC, I love Nene... and to do what I did there pretty much wrecked me.
In all my writing there is suffering. It is our suffering that makes us
stronger, that makes us grow, that ultimately defines us. Because of this,
suffering is a powerful component in any story which means to develop the
characters, as all my work does. Is it easy on the writer? Heavens, no.
It's hell.
As for the person who was commenting on the pleasure that sometimes comes
with dark themes in stories... I find that plotting out the story does
provide something of a twisted pleasure... a kind of odd satisfaction with
oneself for conceiving such a thing... at the same time, though, when I sit
down to write it, when I am so wrapped up in the characters, the emotions
are those that they feel... and often painful.
"Life is pain. Anyone who tells you differently is selling something."
--Westley, "The Princess
Bride"
Well, that's my 2 copper pieces
--
Douglas A. "Stormwalker" Reeves <stormwalker@airmail.net>
Computer tech, anime fan, hopeless romantic, and sometime writer
Fanfiction Archive - http://web2.airmail.net/a0011387/fanfic/
"Sometimes the lost cause is the only cause worth fighting for."