Writing About Characters

Fragrances are what I think I'll miss most when I'm dead. I know that's an illogical statement, especially for an agnostic. Nonetheless, it's true. How my own home smells is comforting, and I don't want to lose that. And birdsong. I love living where singing birds surround my house, even in the winter.

I've had similar senseless, but emotionally true, thoughts in the 18 months following a cancer diagnosis. Facing death, one's own mortality, usually affects a person, changing their character. The changes are individual, but I think they intensify someone's basic personality traits. I hear women tell how they've become fearless, brave and bold, after enduring breast cancer. Not me! I'm scared and angry and tallying what will be taken from me when I die. But that's me, basically a depressed and selfish person, now more than ever.

When developing a character who experiences near death or confronts a similar danger, consider the consequences that could result to his or her personality. If you're writing realistic fiction and have had such an experience yourself, you'll know exactly what I mean. Lacking personal familiarity, you may want to talk with other people who have faced the threat of death, especially those living under its pall. Ask how it changed their feelings and actions, and how is that different from they way they were.