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You can't do just "dumb." You can write a mentally impaired character, like Lenny in "Of Mice and Men," that does dumb things that cause complications out of an inability to understand. Stephen Kin...
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#5: Post edited
by
Amadeus
·
2020-02-15T17:22:34Z (over 4 years ago)
You can't do just "dumb." You can write a mentally impaired character, like Lenny in "Of Mice and Men," that does dumb things that cause complications out of an **inability** to understand. Stephen King has a mentally impaired character (Tom Cullen) in "The Stand" and turns that mental impairment into a strategic asset (the bad guy cannot read his mind).Otherwise, in an MC, any _consequential_ dumb mistakes are a deus ex machina, it is the author putting their thumb on the scale in order to force a plot point.Nobody cares if that "happens in real life." A novel is NOT real life, a novel is about humans facing adversity and doing their damnedest to overcome it. They can have some bad luck, that may BE the adversity (like getting cancer, being in a car accident, being held hostage in bank robbery).They can also **have been** dumb in the past, that can be the adversity (e.g. drove angry drunk and killed a child).They might guess wrong given multiple options, they might be misled, they might be betrayed or trust someone that lies to them.But they cannot be just dumb. Any reader that sees a dumb move that **has** plot consequences will not identify with the MC, that breaks their immersion, and that is a bad story.
- You can't do just "dumb." You can write a mentally impaired character, like Lenny in "Of Mice and Men," that does dumb things that cause complications out of an **inability** to understand. Stephen King has a mentally impaired character (Tom Cullen) in "The Stand" and turns that mental impairment into a strategic asset (the bad guy cannot read his mind).
- Otherwise, in an MC, any _consequential_ dumb mistakes are a deus ex machina, it is the author putting their thumb on the scale in order to force a plot point.
- Nobody cares if that "happens in real life." A novel is NOT real life, a novel is about humans facing adversity and doing their damnedest to overcome it. They can have some bad luck, that may BE the adversity (like getting cancer, being in a car accident, being held hostage in bank robbery).
- They can also **have been** dumb in the past, that can be the adversity (e.g. drove angry drunk and killed a child).
- They might guess wrong given multiple options, they might be misled, they might be betrayed or trust someone that lies to them.
- But they cannot be just dumb. Any reader that sees a dumb move that **has** plot consequences will not identify with the MC, that breaks their immersion, and that is a bad story.
#4: Attribution notice removed
by
System
·
2019-12-19T22:13:54Z (almost 5 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/47980 License name: CC BY-SA 4.0 License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/
#3: Attribution notice added
by
System
·
2019-12-08T12:57:18Z (almost 5 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/47980 License name: CC BY-SA 4.0 License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/
#2: Initial revision
You can't do just "dumb." You can write a mentally impaired character, like Lenny in "Of Mice and Men," that does dumb things that cause complications out of an **inability** to understand. Stephen King has a mentally impaired character (Tom Cullen) in "The Stand" and turns that mental impairment into a strategic asset (the bad guy cannot read his mind). Otherwise, in an MC, any _consequential_ dumb mistakes are a deus ex machina, it is the author putting their thumb on the scale in order to force a plot point. Nobody cares if that "happens in real life." A novel is NOT real life, a novel is about humans facing adversity and doing their damnedest to overcome it. They can have some bad luck, that may BE the adversity (like getting cancer, being in a car accident, being held hostage in bank robbery). They can also **have been** dumb in the past, that can be the adversity (e.g. drove angry drunk and killed a child). They might guess wrong given multiple options, they might be misled, they might be betrayed or trust someone that lies to them. But they cannot be just dumb. Any reader that sees a dumb move that **has** plot consequences will not identify with the MC, that breaks their immersion, and that is a bad story.
#1: Imported from external source
by
System
·
2019-09-12T21:03:58Z (about 5 years ago)
Original score: 9