Projecting Greatness

I think most folks want to be heroes.  Who hasn’t envisioned themselves saving the princess, hitting the winning homerun, or rescuing the orphans?  A streak or heroism runs through our veins, even if we may be cowards in real life.

Writers are no different, but we tend to put those fantasies on paper.  Moreover, we tend to project our desire for greatness onto our characters.  We’d like to be smarter, stronger, or more daring.  As I said previously, that doesn’t mean we’ll write perfect characters – who relates to a perfect character? – but we will project our desires to be noble onto those we write about.

Read any book, and you’re likely to see who the writer wants to be from how the main character acts.  Stephen King writes people who are self-sacrificing and introspective.  Tad Williams writes characters who are snarky but have a heart of gold.  It’s because we know these folks will be admired by the reader, and, secretly, we feel that admiration through those characters.  That’s how we’d like to be seen by the world at large.

Is that self-serving?  Sure…but who cares?  Few people bare their souls as much as writers.  What we write channels our innermost desires, but that doesn’t mean we’re the only ones with such desires, for our readers glom onto our characters because they secretly wish they had those traits too.