How to detach yourself from a character you're going to kill?
So, in a WW2-ish story featuring a co-ed military, I have a female soldier who is very kind and caring. I'm setting her up to be a mascot and somewhat of the postergirl. Trouble is, she dies further down the story to kind of remind the player that this is a war game, not a war-themed visual novel, and to send the unit into the endgame. Problem is, I don't want to kill her because I've been suckered by her charm! So, for those who slay their characters you enjoy, how do you detach from a character you've grown attached to?
Some background: I planned to have her die by sniper fire, and have her death sort of motivate the platoon to go for an all out assault on the final destination/mission.
If you want to show people it's a war game, maybe you play out combat situations, roll dice to see who gets shot and who …
5y ago
I think this may be a matter of opinion; different psychologies will answer differently. Personally, my characters feel …
5y ago
Don't detach yourself emotionally from the character. Rather, experience the character's death as a major part of their …
5y ago
You don't detach yourself from the character. On the contrary - you let yourself feel the pain of her death, experience …
5y ago
You don't. To put it in more words: the audience has to get attached to make the death relevant. You want her death to …
5y ago
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You don't detach yourself from the character. On the contrary - you let yourself feel the pain of her death, experience the loss, and you pour all of that onto the page.
When a character dies, it should matter. It should be a punch in the gut for your audience. That can only be achieved if you care about the character. If you don't care, if you've detached yourself, how do you expect the audience to care?
When I write a character's death scene, I try to evoke with the words on the page the same kind of pain I feel at the death of this character I've grown attached to. Then I spend a couple of hours in a zombie state. Then I let other characters grieve, in ways that make sense for them. It's not about me processing my grief - they've lost someone they knew, it should affect them, right? Then, the world move on, I'm writing the next in-story thing.
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If you want to show people it's a war game, maybe you play out combat situations, roll dice to see who gets shot and who lives and dies based on the situation and whose number comes up.
Literature and especially war and action fiction have had more than their share of contrived forced deaths the authors thought were good thematic ideas, but instead were mainly transparent contrived dramatically-times sacrifices. If I don't see another of those, in the rest of my days, I'll still have seen too many.
This post was sourced from https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/45535. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
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Don't detach yourself emotionally from the character. Rather, experience the character's death as a major part of their arc.
This is not a real person who is gone once dead; this is a fictional character, and their entire arc is what makes them who they are. Make the specifics of the death contribute towards making the character even greater, and love the character for their entire contribution to your story, including through her death.
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I think this may be a matter of opinion; different psychologies will answer differently.
Personally, my characters feel real to me; but I remind myself of a few things. I go back over what I wrote for her, reminding myself that I invented her, all she really consists of is these words on paper. It is like sketching a person, then burning the sketch. In reality, I kill ALL the characters, sooner or later, when I stop writing about them. They will have their last words, even if I write a series.
What I would like to do for her is give her a meaningful death; I am not just killing her to get her out of the way. Her death will motivate the characters that love her, even if on the surface it looks like a pointless death, it will mean something in how the future of her friends turn out.
You have already said she is kind and caring -- Is she brave enough to knowingly sacrifice herself for her friends? If somebody must die, does she love them enough to make it herself? I think, for the other characters, realizing somebody loved you that much is a powerful emotion that can motivate them to risks and sacrifice they would not have made without her "going first".
Personally I don't kill "good side" characters with stray bullets or other such random events or accidents; if they die, they die fighting. I pay a lot of attention (and often rewrites) to deaths so they will be meaningful and impact the story. And even if the death is meaningless, it can still have an impact upon the characters left behind to grieve and perhaps avenge her. if it doesn't -- You probably did not need this character in the first place.
Second, if I have become attached, that is a good thing. It means you didn't write a cardboard character to kill and forget, just to make a point. Hopefully the reader is also attached, so her death will be meaningful to them.
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You don't.
To put it in more words: the audience has to get attached to make the death relevant. You want her death to be a wake-up call, a touch of realism and a reminder of what war is.
Sure, there is no guarantee that your audience will like the same characters that you like. But if you realize that you've grown fond of that female soldier, if you find her charming, chances are that her character works well.
So, you don't need to detach. A detachment strategy would make you think less of that character, show less of her, and focus less on her emotions or her dialogue.
Sure, it's somewhat sad that you have to give her the killing blow. But ultimately, characters live and die in the stories they're written in. The only right thing you can do is portray her at best of your ability.
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