![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Feb. 22nd, 2010 04:09 pmI'm trying to distract myself from telling you about I can't talk about. For a change, some of these things are good (no novels new-signed, but still good), but just not quite announcement-ready. I need a distraction. Any will do.
People are useful to think about. Three personality types are dominating my day. They're all ambitious and, I suspect, are going to be round me for a while.
The first is a person of privilege whose world spins round them in perfect motion. They don't realise their privilege and they're parsimonious in sharing the fruits of privilege. When small things go wrong it's a horror. When big things go wrong their perfect world spirals in closely to help them. They probably think they suffer.
The second is also privileged, but is aware of this and what it has given them. They're not threatened by the thought of sharing their universe and they're generous with the fruits of their privilege, but they keep an eye open for what will work best for them. I like to think of this kind of person as a child of grace, because they really don't have to share and they have no deep basis for empathy, yet they manage both. Because of their self-awareness, the world doesn't spiral in to protect them when things go wrong. It doesn't need to: they're perfectly capable of protecting themselves. If I end up writing someone like this into a novel, I think I might give them a deep hurt that can lash people, otherwise they might look a bit Mary-Sue. I rather suspect a lot of us would like the benefit of privilege without the mindset, so a destructive underbelly would keep things real.
The third is also privileged (I've been thinking about privilege recently, and how so many novels exploit its assumptions without factoring it in intentionally) but privilege has turned them passive. Life has, perhaps, been too easy. They can do anything that's thrown at them, but haven't sufficiently developed their hungers and needs. I wonder what would give this person hunger and need? I wonder what would tranform them into someone less accepting? Their background and privilege would make them accepted almost everywhere, but not very promotable. In a team, they're the person who would automatically be recruited to back person #1. They seem to share #1's values, after all, but are not a threat to #1's centrality in the universe.
I don't know what I want to do with these people, yet. I know where I want to do it, but that's part of what I'm distracting you from. Focus on the character types, people!
What I need now is working names. If you know a character #2 and her name is Eadgyth, please feel free to volunteeer that name and embarrass your friend. I can't guarantee it will stick, but it will be an improvement on my current nomenclature which is 1,2,3...
People are useful to think about. Three personality types are dominating my day. They're all ambitious and, I suspect, are going to be round me for a while.
The first is a person of privilege whose world spins round them in perfect motion. They don't realise their privilege and they're parsimonious in sharing the fruits of privilege. When small things go wrong it's a horror. When big things go wrong their perfect world spirals in closely to help them. They probably think they suffer.
The second is also privileged, but is aware of this and what it has given them. They're not threatened by the thought of sharing their universe and they're generous with the fruits of their privilege, but they keep an eye open for what will work best for them. I like to think of this kind of person as a child of grace, because they really don't have to share and they have no deep basis for empathy, yet they manage both. Because of their self-awareness, the world doesn't spiral in to protect them when things go wrong. It doesn't need to: they're perfectly capable of protecting themselves. If I end up writing someone like this into a novel, I think I might give them a deep hurt that can lash people, otherwise they might look a bit Mary-Sue. I rather suspect a lot of us would like the benefit of privilege without the mindset, so a destructive underbelly would keep things real.
The third is also privileged (I've been thinking about privilege recently, and how so many novels exploit its assumptions without factoring it in intentionally) but privilege has turned them passive. Life has, perhaps, been too easy. They can do anything that's thrown at them, but haven't sufficiently developed their hungers and needs. I wonder what would give this person hunger and need? I wonder what would tranform them into someone less accepting? Their background and privilege would make them accepted almost everywhere, but not very promotable. In a team, they're the person who would automatically be recruited to back person #1. They seem to share #1's values, after all, but are not a threat to #1's centrality in the universe.
I don't know what I want to do with these people, yet. I know where I want to do it, but that's part of what I'm distracting you from. Focus on the character types, people!
What I need now is working names. If you know a character #2 and her name is Eadgyth, please feel free to volunteeer that name and embarrass your friend. I can't guarantee it will stick, but it will be an improvement on my current nomenclature which is 1,2,3...