Mississauga Writers Group
June 2015
A Thing of Bits & Pieces
CHARACTER VOICE
Take care that not every character sounds like you. Everyone is unique. Each character must have
a voice. Don’t confuse this with the author’s voice, something developed over time – think of a writer
like Hemingway; whose stylistic voice is almost unmistakable, despite many imitators. I mean
character voice whereby each player in your novel or short story can be identified by what they say
and how they say it. Practice should get you to a point where you can write a page of back and forth
dialogue between a group of characters, without having to identify them by name.
It’s definitely not easy, but again, if you listen to a group, and group like the MWG, discussing
something, keep your eyes shut, and even though you know each person by their voice, you could
probably pick them out by their speech mannerisms. You should be able to do the same with your
novel’s characters.
A few words about regional and national accents. Every country has them and there’s a temptation
to try and identify a character by “writing” the way they speak. I’m going to stick to English
accents as they’re the only ones I’m qualified to have an opinion on. Welsh, Cockney, West Indian,
Scots and Irish, to name just a few. Do yourself a favour and don’t try to write the way a person
from those places speaks. It’s much better to simply say at the beginning when introducing the
character, that so-and-so had a Scots accent, and perhaps remind readers once in a while by
dropping in a word or two that typifies that accent. Unless you’re actually from that area and
writing exclusively for that audience, don’t bother: it’s too difficult to keep up, and the spell
checker/grammar checker goes nuts.
1ST OR 3RD PERSON
First person is basically autobiographical. This is a bit like the difference between drawing a
straight line: the shortest distance being from A & B. or using a Critical Path Analysis as in project
management, whereby the various operations run in tandem and come together as necessary,
weaving a tapestry culminating in the last scene.
In the first person, your character is on stage 100% of the time: it’s like firing an arrow. The third
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