Examine your story, either in your head, in outline, or in draft form. What is it that most interests you? Where are you spending the most time and effort? Are you constantly researching or inventing more details about the setting? Is it the detailed unraveling of the mystery that fascinates you? Do you constantly find yourself exploring a character? Or is it the actual events that you care about most? Your story will work best when you use the structure demanded by the factor that you care most about.

  If you love the mystery, structure the tale as an idea story — begin with the question and devote the bulk of your story time to answering it. If you care most about the milieu, let the reader know it from the start by beginning with a character’s arrival in the new world (how long does it take Alice to get down the rabbit hole or through the looking glass into Wonderland?) or by concentrating on the details of the place and culture; then spend the bulk of your time discovering the wonders and curiosities of the milieu. If you care most about a character, begin with his or her dilemma and spend the bulk of your time on the effort toward change. If you care most about the events, begin at the point where the characters become involved with the world’s sickness, and spend the bulk of your time in the story on their efforts to restore balance.

  The techniques and structures of the other story factors are always available to you for subplots or complications, but keep them in a relatively subordinate position. In The Lord of the Rings, there are several event stories going on within the overall milieu story — Aragorn, the out-of-place king, coming to take his rightful throne; Denethor, the steward who reached for power beyond his ability to control, threatening the safety of the kingdom and the life of his son until Gandalf finally succeeds in stopping him; Frodo, Samwise, and Gollum, the three hobbit ring bearers, in their twisted, braided paths to the cracks of doom where, by casting in the ring, they will be able to put an end to the evil, destructive power of Sauron.

  Yet when all these story lines are resolved, the reader is not disappointed to find that the story goes on. Tolkien begins a completely new story line, the Scouring of the Shire, which is related to the other stories but is barely hinted at until the hobbits actually come home.

  Even then the tale is not done — Tolkien still has to show us Frodo sailing west, along with the elves who can no longer live in Middle Earth, at least not in their former glory. Was this the resolution of a question raised at the beginning of the book? No. Nor was it the resolution of a character dilemma — Frodo was quite content when the story began. And Frodo’s and the elves’ presence in Middle Earth was not, when the story began, a disequilibrium that needed to be resolved.

  So why are we still reading? Because The Lord of the Rings is a milieu story. The author establishes from the beginning that he is going to spend large amounts of time simply exploring the world of Middle Earth. We are going to have detailed accounts of birthday parties, village life, customs and habits of the people; we will visit with Tom Bombadil, who has almost nothing to do with the story, but has everything to do with the underlying mythos of Middle Earth; we linger with the Ents, we pass through the Mines of Moria, we visit with the Riders of Rohan, travel with the legendary dead; and while Tolkien weaves all these places and peoples into a story that is generally interesting, sometimes creating characters we care about, there is no story line or character that becomes our sole reason for reading. It is the world itself that Tolkien cared most about, and so the audience for the story is going to be those readers who also come to love the world of Middle Earth. So it is no accident that the story does not end until we see, clearly, that Middle Earth has ceased to exist as it was — we are entering a new age, and the milieu we were exploring is now closed.

  All the MICE factors are present in The Lord of the Rings, but it is the milieu structure that predominates, as it should. It would be absurd to criticize The Lord of the Rings for not having plot unity and integrity, because it is not an event story. Likewise, it would be absurd to criticize the book for its stereotyped one-to-a-race characters or for the many characters about whom we learn little more than what they do in the story and why they do it, because this is not a character story. In fact, we should probably praise Tolkien for having done such a good job of working creditable story lines and the occasional identifiable character into a story that was, after all, about Something Else.

  I’m dwelling on these structural matters at some length because this is a book on characterization, and for us writers to characterize well, we must characterize appropriately.

  Character stories really came into their own at the beginning of the twentieth century, and both the novelty and the extraordinary brilliance of some of the writers who worked with this story structure have led many critics and teachers to believe that only this kind of story can be “good.” This may be a true judgment for many individuals — that is, the only kind of story they enjoy is the character story — but it is not true in the abstract, for the other kinds of stories have long traditions, with many examples of brilliance along the way.

  However, character stories have been so dominant that they have forced storytellers in the other traditions to pay more attention to characterization. Even though a story may follow the idea, milieu, or event structure, many readers expect a deeper level of characterization. The story is not about a transformation of character, but the readers still expect to get to know the characters; and even when they don’t expect it, they are willing to allow the author to devote a certain amount of attention to character without regarding it as a digression. This is the fashion of our time, and you can’t disregard it.

  But it’s a mistake to think that deep, detailed characterization is an absolute virtue in storytelling. You have to look at your own reason for telling a story. If it’s the puzzle — the idea — that attracts you, then that will probably be the factor in your story that you handle best; your natural audience will consist of readers who also care most about the idea. A certain amount of attention to characterization may help broaden your audience and increase your readers’ pleasure in the story, but if you go into characterization as an unpleasant chore, something you must do in order to be a “good writer,” chances are your characterization will be mechanical and ineffective, and instead of broadening your audience, it will interfere with your story. If you don’t care about or believe in a character’s deepest drives and troubled past, neither will your readers.

  So, if you choose not to devote much time to characterization in a particular story, this won’t necessarily mean you “failed” or “wrote badly.” It may mean that you understand yourself and your story.

  And because you chose to tell one story in which characterization played a lesser role doesn’t mean you “can’t characterize.” A good understanding of characterization includes knowing when it’s appropriate to concentrate on character — and when it isn’t.

  CHAPTER SIX

  THE HIERARCHY

  Not all characters are created equal.

  In earlier chapters we’ve talked about major and minor characters, without defining the terms. You must know — and let your readers know — which characters are most important to the story, so they’ll know which are worth following and caring about, and which will quickly disappear.

  It’s hard to measure the exact importance of a character — importance doesn’t come in quarts or by the inch. But there are three general levels of importance, and the distinctions can be useful.

  1. WALK-ONS AND PLACEHOLDERS. You won’t develop these characters at all; they’re just people in the background, meant to lend realism or perform a simple function and then disappear, forgotten.

  2. MINOR CHARACTERS. These characters may make a difference in the plot, but we aren’t supposed to get emotionally involved with them, either negatively or positively. We don’t expect them to keep showing up in the story. Their desires and actions might cause a twist in the story, but play no role in shaping its ongoing flow. In fact, a rule of thumb is that a minor character does one or two things in the story and then disappears.

  3. MAJOR CHARACTERS. This group includes the people we care about; we love them or hate them, fear them or hope they succeed. They show up again and again in the story. The story is, to one degree or another, about them, and we expect to find out what happens to them by the end. Their desires and actions drive the story forward and carry it through all its twists and turns.

  Remember, though, that there is no wall dividing one level from the others. In your story, Pete and Nora may be the main characters, but their friends Morry and Dolores and Pete’s boss Edgar and Nora’s brother Shawn are also fairly major, and we expect to know more about them; and then there’s Pete’s secretary and the doorman, who both do some pretty important things in the story, though we aren’t aware of deep personal dilemmas in their lives; and we certainly will remember the weird taxi driver and the Indian cop and…

  So where is the dividing line between major an d minor? There isn’t one. But we know that Pete and Nora are the most important; Morry, Dolores, Edgar, and Shawn are somewhat important; Pete’s secretary and the doorman are somewhat important but still pretty minor; and the weird taxi driver and the Indian cop are definitely minor but certainly not mere walk-ons. The different levels shade into each other. And as you master the techniques appropriate to each level, you’ll be able to create each character at exactly the level of importance the story requires.

  WALK-ONS AND PLACEHOLDERS

  Unless your story takes place in a hermitage or a desert island, your main characters are surrounded by many people who are utterly unimportant in the story. They are background; they are part of the milieu. Here are a few samples that show what I mean.

  Nora accidentally gave the cabby a twenty for a five-dollar ride and then was too shy to ask for change. Within a minute a skycap had the rest of her money.

  Pete checked at the desk for his messages. There weren’t any, but the bellman did have a package for him.

  People started honking their horns before Nora even knew there was a traffic jam.

  Apparently some suspicious neighbor had called the cops. The uniform who arrested him wasn’t interested in Pete’s explanations, and he soon found himself at the precinct headquarters.

  Notice how many people we’ve “met” in these few sentences. A cabby, a skycap, a hotel desk clerk, a bellman, horn-honkers in a traffic jam, a suspicious neighbor, a uniformed police officer. Every single one of these people is designed to fulfill a brief role in the story and then vanish completely out of sight.

  Part of the Scenery

  How do you make people vanish? Any stage director knows the trick. You have a crowd of people on stage, most of them walk-ons. They have to be there because otherwise the setting wouldn’t be realistic — but you don’t want them to distract the audience’s attention. In effect, you want them to be like scenery. They really aren’t characters at all — they’re movable pieces of milieu.

  So you dress them in drab or similar clothing, and make your main characters’ costumes contrast sharply with the crowd. If possible, you make the walk-ons hold absolutely still; if they have to move, you make them move as smoothly and gently as possible. You do not allow them to make noise except when you want general crowd noises. You make them keep their attention riveted either on their own quiet task or on the main action of the scene. You turn them so they’re facing generally upstage. You never let any one walk-on stay on stage for very long, or the audience starts expecting him to do something.

  The surest way for a walk-on to get himself fired from a play is to become “creative” — to start fidgeting or doing some clever bit of stage business that distracts attention from the main action of the scene. Unless, of course, this is one of those rare occasions when the walk-on’s new business is brilliantly funny — in which case, you might even pay him more and elevate the part.

  You have the same options in fiction. If a character who isn’t supposed to matter starts getting out of hand, distracting from the main thread of the story, you either cut her out entirely or you figure out why you as a writer were so interested in her that you’ve spent more time on her than you meant to and revise the story to make her matter more.

  Most of the time, though, you want your walk-ons to disappear. You want them to fade back and be part of the scenery, part of the milieu. How do you do it in fiction?

  Stereotypes

  We talked about stereotypes in chapter 1, and I told you then that sometimes stereotyping would be exactly the tool of characterization you need.

  This is the time.

  A stereotype is a character who is a typical member of a group. He does exactly what the readers expect him to do. Therefore they take no notice of him — he disappears into the background.

  As ordinary human beings, we may not like a particular stereotype if we happen to be the member of a group we think is viewed unfairly. But as writers, writing to our own community, we can’t help but be aware of and use our community stereotypes in order to make placeholding characters behave exactly according to expectations.

  If we think that a particular stereotype is unfair to the group it supposedly explains, then we’re free to deliberately violate the stereotype. But the moment we do that, we have made the character strange, which will make him attract the readers’ attention. He will no longer simply disappear — he isn’t a walk-on anymore. He has stepped forward out of the milieu and joined the story.

  MINOR CHARACTERS

  There’s nothing wrong with a background character violating stereotype and attracting attention — as long as you realize that he isn’t part of the background anymore. The readers will notice him, and they’ll expect his strangeness to amount to something.

  The audience still isn’t supposed to care much about him; he isn’t expected to play a continuing role in the story. He might be momentarily involved in the action, but then he’ll disappear. Still, his individuality will set a mood, add humor, make the milieu more interesting or complete. The way to make such characters instantly memorable without leading the audience to expect them to do more is to make them eccentric, exaggerated, or obsessive.

  Eccentricity

  Remember the movie Beverly Hills Cop? There were hundreds of placeholders in that film — thugs who shot at cops, cops who got shot at, people milling around in the hotel lobby, people at the hotel desk. They all acted exactly as you would expect them to act. They vanished. Unless you personally knew an actor who played one of the walk-ons, you don’t remember any of them.

  But I’ll bet that as you walked out of the theater, you remembered Bronson Pinchot. Not by name, of course, not then. He was the desk attendant in the art gallery. You know, the one with the effeminate manner and the weird foreign accent. He had absolutely nothing to do with the story — if he had been a mere placeholder, you would never have noticed anything was missing. So why do you remember him?

  It wasn’t that he had a foreign accent. In southern California, a Spanish accent would merely have stereotyped him; he would have disappeared.

  It wasn’t his effeminacy. The audience would merely see him as a stereotypical homosexual. Again, he would disappear.

  But the effeminacy and the accent were combined — the “foreigner” stereotype and the “effete homosexual” stereotype are rarely used together, and so the audience was surprised. What’s more important, though, is that the accent was an eccentric one, completely unexpected. Pinchot based his accent on the speech of an Israeli he once knew; the accent was so rare that almost no one in the audience recognized it. It was a genuinely novel way to speak. He was not just a foreigner, he was a strange and effeminate foreigner. Furthermore, Pinchot’s reactions to Eddie Murphy — the hint of annoyance, superiority, snottiness in his tone — made him even more eccentric. Eccentric enough to stick in our minds.

  How memorable was he? From that bit part, he went directly into the TV series Perfect Strangers. Which goes to show that you can still parlay a bit part into a career.

  And yet in Beverly Hills Cop, though we remembered him, we never expected his character to be important in the story. He existed only for a few laughs and to make Eddie Murphy’s Detroit-cop character feel even more alien in L.A. Pinchot managed to steal the scene — to get his promotion from walk-on — without distorting the story. He was funny, but he made no great difference in the way the story went. He simply amused us for a moment.

  Since he was a minor character, that was exactly what he needed to be. Likewise, in your stories you need to realize that your minor characters should not be deeply and carefully characterized. Like flashbulbs, they need to shine once, brightly, and then get tossed away.

  Exaggeration

  Another way to make a minor character flash: You take a normal human trait and make it just a little — or sometimes a lot — more extreme, like the character Sweet-Face in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Butch and the Kid are in a whorehouse; the Pinkerton detectives ride up on the street below. There we see a pudgy-faced character who looks like the soul of innocence and believability. Butch tells Sundance a brief story about him — that with Sweet-Face covering for them, they’re safe because everybody believes him. His innocent look is an exaggeration, but sure enough, when Sweet-Face points out of town, as if to say “they went thataway,” the Pinkertons take off in that direction.

  A few moments later, the Pinkertons ride back, confront Sweet-Face again; Sweet-Face panics and points straight toward the room where Butch and the Kid are watching. His panic and betrayal are as exaggerateed as his innocence was before. He sticks in the memory, and yet we never expected him to be important again in the plot.

  Obsessiveness

  Let’s go back to the example I gave before, of Nora’s cabby, the one she paid a twenty for a five-dollar ride. The stereotypical reaction — “Hey, thanks, lady” — is so ordinary we can omit it entirely. But what if the cabdriver is obsessive?