Category Archives: Character Sketch

A WRITING BLOG About Playing Around with a Story Line in Different Literary Genres and Different Literary Categories

Writing Leap #34

Hi Writers,

Are you ever walking or talking or sitting on a train and your mind alights on a writing idea?  It hovers there, a sparrow touching down on a telephone line, apt to fly off at any moment.  Grab it! (Apologies and gratitude to the wonderful former U.S Poet Laureate Billy Collins whose metaphor this is.  I’m so sorry I can’t find the poem for an exact quote.)

But the essence of the poem is a part of my writing self.  Write down your impressions and reactions as they are happening.  Otherwise as Billy Collins implies the sparrow will probably fly away forever.  Gone, swoosh.

Later the spontaneity of the thought will have vanished.  Or you will be growling because you can’t remember any of it.  Just that it was great.

I carry a small journal and my cell phone to jot down ideas.  Later these small jottings can turn into vignettes.  Writing vignettes is great writing practice.  Just for the sake of writing them.  Writers write and edit.  As much as possible.

From The Book of Literary Terms by Lewis Turco.  “The vignette is a finely written literary sketch emphasizing character, situation or scene.”

So writers, tackle the vignette!  

The story line is:  What does chocolate evoke in you?  Fiction or Non-fiction.

Here’s mine.  A vignette inspired by the painting below and something I jotted down.  While eating a chocolate truffle as pictured above.   Let’s watch Becca.

     Oh, how Becca loved chocolate bars.  The extra dark velvet kind.  Thick and smooth in her mouth.  Just sweet enough. 

     “Afternoon Becca,”

     Becca nodded at the old lady, bundled up in three threadbare coats.  Her legs were wrapped in scarves and she was settled on a broken chair outside the door of Mr. Palkowski’s newspaper shop.     

     Becca pushed open the door to the shop.  The loud bell on the door made a jangly, jarring noise .  She jerked back.  She always did.

     “Hi there Becca.  What can I do for you today?” Mr. Palkowski said.

     “Um, not sure.  Just want to look, thank you,” she said.

     “Right,” he said, and turned his back to fuss with something behind the counter.

     Becca grabbed a small chocolate bar from a box on the shelf opposite the counter and slipped it in her pocket.

     “Bye Mr. Palkowski.  Nothing today.”

     There was no avoiding nodding again at the old lady outside. 

     “You take care now, Becca,” she said.

     Becca started to hurry home.

     “Wait,” the old lady called.  “Think about this.  What are you really hungry for?  It’s not chocolate dearie.”

     Becca kept walking.  That lady was crazy.

     Mr. Palkowski stepped outside his store.  He watched Becca turn the corner.

     “Well Minna.  That’s about the tenth time now.  I haven’t got the heart to say something to her, poor child.”

     “You want my opinion?” Minna said.  “You are doing her no favors letting her get away with stealing.  No favors at all.”

     “Hmmmmm,” he said and went back inside.

     When Becca reached her stoop she peeled the paper off the chocolate bar and ate the whole thing.  She made sure to put the wrappings in the trashcan in front of her building.  She wasn’t going to add to the garbage on the sidewalk.

     Becca really did know what she was hungry for.  She was hungry for her mama’s chocolate cookies.  Her mama used to make them for her a lot.  Mama didn’t make them now.  If she did, Becca thought, the cookie dough would be full of Mama’s tears. 

     Next afternoon after school Becca pushed open the  door to the news shop.  Jangle, jangle.  Her heart began to flutter in her chest.

     “Afternoon Becca,” Mr. Palkowski said.  “Ummmm, now look here.  I’ve been thinking.  I could use a little help around here, straightening up the stock and such.  Would your mother let you do that for about an hour after school?  I could pay you a little or you could take it out in merchandise.  Like chocolate bars.”

     Becca stared.  He knew.  He knew and he was still being nice to her.  She fought back tears and let herself hug him.

Here’s to vignettes and your jottings!  

LINKING THE ARTS

A Painting

Homeless

My inspiration for Minna

A Poem

  “Lines Lost Among Trees,” in Billy Collins collection, Picnic, Lightning

A Good Word

Jot     As in to write quickly in the moment

(to my email subscribers.  Click on the title THE CHARACTER SKETCH in the above box for full posts, links—-and color.)

Playing Around with a Story Line in Different Literary Genres

Hi there Writers and Readers,

Writing Leap #11   THE CHARACTER SKETCH 

The character sketch in writing is like the quick first strokes of a finished portrait in painting.  They both contain some quality that evokes the person inside.  But not their whole story.

Character sketches are like a moment caught in a snapshot.  We don’t tell the character’s history.  We provide little glimpses of who they are; a raised eyebrow, a guffaw in response to something.   We decide what we want the reader to feel about our character and single out the particulars that will evoke that feeling.

New Story Line

When We Discover Something that Sparkles

Play loose with the story line.  It can be a discovery of a person, a feeling, an ah-hah moment, a rare wildflower–anything that makes your imagination sizzle.

So how about showing your great aunt Nellie scolding you with a wooden spoon or your employer responding to your idea?  Or, stretch and try a fictionalized character sketch of yourself!  All could be discoveries that sparkle with truth.

Here’s mine.

Travis

    Travis noticed Julie the moment her head appeared at the top of the stairs to the barn loft where the fiddles were hot and the barn floor sighed with the rhythm of cowboy boots and sneakers stepping lively to the music.  He finished his beer and executed some wild fancy moves with two giggling little girls.

     He popped open another beer, his third, and glanced over at Julie.  She sure looked different from the girls around here.  Same jeans, but different.  His guess?  New York.

     “Hi.”

     “Hi,” Julie said.

     “How ’bout a beer, though you look like you’d rather champagne.”

     “Beer, thanks.”

     Travis led her to a corner table, tipped back his chair against the stud wall and at the same time tipped his hat back on his head.  He poured Julie her beer, slowly.

     “So what brings you to Colorado?” Travis said.

     “What makes you think I’m not from here?”  She grinned.  “New York.”

     Travis gave himself an “I nailed it” for that one.

     “I’m an artist,” she said.  “I’ve just accepted a teaching  job at the elementary school.”

     “An artist.  Well now.  Don’t know anything about art.”

     “So what do you do, or does your hat give you away?” Julie said.

     He took in that she leaned closer to him.  He wondered if she saw the gray in his short brown hair, his wind burned ruddy skin.  He knew he looked younger from a distance.

     “Well I’ve been moving cattle, raising and baling hay, branding and castrating cows since I was seven, if you’re asking me am I a cowboy.

     “Are you a horse whisperer?”

     “Hell no, I just do my job is all.  But tell you what.  Your seat looks to me like it would fit just fine in a saddle.  Let me give you  lesson.”  Travis leaned in too.

      “You’re assuming I know nothing about horses,” she said.

     Was she piqued?  Naw.  Flirting is what she’s doing.

     “Well I’m right, aren’t I?”  He grinned.

     Julie grinned back.

     Travis talked for hours about his favorite horse he had to put down, his lonely stints up in the moutains tending cattle and fighting coyotes, all the while taking in the expression on her face.  He was charming her all right.

     In the weeks that followed Travis convinced Julie to move in with him in his log cabin on the creek.  He was surprised and happy she really wanted to.

     But as time went on he didn’t get that Julie couldn’t let go of her first impressions of him.   Why did she keep at him to be the dancing, talkative Travis of that night at the barn dance?   He’d had five beers after all.  Didn’t she know by now that he’s not one for long conversations?  Her latest name for him was Mr. Taciturn.   Well, that’s just his nature.  Shouldn’t be tampering with one’s true nature.

***

Have fun with your character sketch!

 LINKING THE ARTS

Classic Character Sketches

Character Sketches from Dickens,  Illustrated by Harold Copping.  Introduction by Kate Perugini, Charles Dickens daughter.   (out of print)

Did you ever “see” fictional characters walking around?  I have seen chubby Mr. Pickwicks and scouling Wackford Squeers (the worst of the meanies) all over the place.  It always makes me laugh.

A Good Strong Word

unearth as in discovery

To unearth truth in one’s writing is like participating in an elusive, difficult archeological dig.  But does anything else about writing matter as much?  Jewels are uncovered and make our writing souls sparkle.

Character Sketch Drawing

Frederic Remington

It’s all about the beard, don’t you think?