A SLIGHTLY DIFFERENT APPROACH TO DEVELOPING CHARACTERS - PART I
A Slightly Different Approach to Developing Characters - Part I
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A SLIGHTLY DIFFERENT APPROACH TO DEVELOPING CHARACTERS - PART I
Nearly all craft classes for writers teach, in one way or another, that people (and therefore our characters) are the products of genetics, environment, and experience. These three factors are keys to identifying character goals, motivations, and conflicts. While human beings are influenced by external events and the resulting attitudes and technology throughout their lives, the formative years between the ages of five and fifteen are significant in establishing individual values, beliefs, expectations, and self-image. Naturally, people continue to change, but these formative years set the stage.
Years ago, in a former life, I ran onto this approach to character development in a class to given to government employees who dealt with the public. The purpose was to help them better understand the needs and attitudes of the people they were trying to serve, with the intent of providing better service. It was a great class and, believe it or not, made a difference. Years later, after I began to write fiction, it occurred to me that looking at the events that occurred during a character’s formative years could give insight to their core values and expectations. This has to be used in conjunction with the more traditional approaches, but it can provide writers with another tool for developing vivid and realistic characters.
How you use this information depends on what genre you are writing. Regardless, it provides some insight into character, and it’s just plain interesting.
PEOPLE BORN BETWEEN 1910 & 1919 WOULD BE FROM 91 TO 100 YEARS OLD IN 2010
This age group may not be important to authors who don’t write historicals, but you might end up with a character this old. People in this age group would have been influenced in the formative years by the following events.
1910 - 1920 The Mexican Revolution
1910 – 1919 Top popular songs: Alexander's Ragtime Band (1911), My Melancholy Baby (1912),On Moonlight Bay (1912, St. Louis Blues (1914), Over There (1917), Rock‑a‑Bye Your Baby(1918), Swanee (1919)
1914 - 1918 World War I
1915 Release of one of first movies-The Birth of a Nation
1916 President Woodrow Wilson makes "The Star‑Spangled Banner" the national anthem.
1917 - 1921 The Russian Revolution
1918 Armistice in Europe
PEOPLE BORN BETWEEN 1920 AND 1929 WOULD BE FROM 81 TO 90 YEARS OLD IN 2010
This age group would have been influenced in the formative years by the following events:
1920 ‑ 1929 Top popular songs: Whispering (1920), Ain't We Got Fun? (1921), April Showers (1921), Someone to Watch Over Me (1926), My Blue Heaven (1927), Ol' Man River (1927), I Can't Give You Anything But Love (1928), Star Dust (1929), Ain't Misbehavin’ (1929)
What they grew up hearing and reading about:
1920 - Bubonic Plague in India
1920 - First Commercial Radio Broadcast Aired
1920 - League of Nations Established
1920 - Prohibition Begins in the U.S.
1920 - Women Granted the Right to Vote in U.S.
1920 - Ida Rosenthal invented bra cup sizes
1921 - Treaty of Versailles
1922 - Jazz musician Duke Ellington organized his band
1922 - Soviet States form USSR
1922 - Tomb of King Tut Discovered
1922 - The Reader's Digest Published
1922 – Mussolini’s march on Rome
1923 - Hearing Aid invented
1923 - Charleston Dance Becomes Popular
1923 - Teapot Dome Scandal
1923 - Time Magazine Founded
1924 - First Olympic Winter Games
1924 - J. Edgar Hoover Appointed FBI Director
1924 - V.I. Lenin Dies
1924 - Hitler writes Mien Kampf
1924 - Liquid rocket fuel invented
1925 - Flapper Dresses in Style
1926 - ATalkie movies invented
1926 - A.A. Milne Publishes Winnie‑the‑Pooh
1926 - Houdini Dies After Being Punched
1926 - A woman swims the English Channel
1926 – R.H.Goddard invents liquid‑fueled rockets.
1927 - PEZ candy and bubble gum introduced
1927 - The quartz crystal watch, Technicolor, a complete electronic
TV system, and the iron lung invented
1927 - Babe Ruth sets the Home‑Run Record
1927 - The First Talking Movie, The Jazz Singer
1927 - Lindbergh Flies Solo Across the Atlantic
1927 - Erik Rotheim patents an aerosol can
1928 - First differential analyzing computer invented
1928 - Jacob Schick patented the electric shaver.
1928 - Penicillin discovered
1928 - First Mickey Mouse Cartoon
1928 - First Oxford English Dictionary Published
1928 - Sliced Bread Invented
1929 - The car radio and the yo-you invented
1929 - Byrd and Bennett Fly Over South Pole
1929 - First Academy Awards
1929 - New York Stock Market Crashes
1929 - St. Valentine's Day Massacre
1929 - Gandhi's Salt March
1929 - Pluto Discovered
1929 - Great Stock market crash/ Great Depression
PEOPLE BORN BETWEEN 1930 AND 1939 WOULD BE FROM 71 TO 80 YEARS OLD IN 2010
This age group would have been influenced in the formative years by the following events:
1930 - 1939 Talkie films first produced. Top films of decade
include:
Hell's Angels (1930), Frankenstein (1931),
King Kong (1933), Snow White and the Seven
Dwarfs (1937), Gone With The Wind (1939), The
Wizard of Oz (1939), The Woman in Red (1935),
San Francisco (1936), Lost Horizon (1937), Mr.
Smith Goes to Washington (1939).
1930 - 1939 New foods introduced: Birds Eye Frosted Foods,
Wonder Bread, Hostess Twinkies, Bisquick, Ritz
Crackers, Kit Kat Bar, Life Savers, Kix Cereal,
Lawry’s Seasoned Salt, Lay’s Potato Chips.
1930 - 1939 Top popular songs: I Got Rhythm (1930), Mood Indigo (1931),
Brother Can You Spare A Dime? (1932), Stormy Weather (1933),
Begin the Beguine (1935), I've Got You Under My Skin (1935),
Summertime (1935), They Can't Take That Away From Me
(1937), God Bless America (1938), Over the Rainbow (1939)
What they grew up hearing about:
1930 - Scotch tape patented by 3M engineer
1930 - Frozen food process patented by C.Birdseye.
1930 - The analog computer invented
1930 - Jet engine invented by F. Whittle and Hans von Ohain
1931 - Al Capone Imprisoned for Income Tax Evasion
1931 - Auguste Piccard Reaches Stratosphere
1931 - Empire State Building Completed
1931 - U.S. Officially Gets National Anthem
1931 - Harold Edgerton invented stop action photography.
1931 - Germans co-invent the electron microscope
1932 - Radio City Music Hall opens featuring Rockettes
1932 - Polaroid photography invented/ E.H. Land
1932 - Air Conditioning Invented
1932 - First woman flies solo across Atlantic/Amelia Earhardt
1932 - Lindbergh's Baby Kidnapped
1932 - Scientists Split the Atom
1932 - Zippo Lighters Introduced
1932 - Loch Ness Monster First Spotted
1932 - Prohibition Ends in the U.S.
1932 - Wiley Post Flies Around World in 8 ½ Days
1933 - Adolf Hitler Becomes Chancellor of Germany
1933 - FDR Launches New Deal
1932 - The zoom lens, light meter, and parking meter invented.
1932 - Karl Jansky invents the radio telescope
1933 - FM radio and stereo records invented
1933 - R.M. Hollingshead builds a prototype drive-in movie theater in his driveway
1934 - Chas.Darrow claims creation of Monopoly game.
1934 - Bonnie and Clyde Killed by Police
1934 - The cheeseburger introduced
1934 - The Dust Bowl
1934 - First tape recorder for broadcasting and first magnetic recording.
1935 - Wallace Carothers and DuPont Labs invent nylon
1935 - Alcoholics Anonymous founded
1935 - The first canned beer made.
1935 - Robert Watson‑Watt patented radar
1936 - Electric guitar debuts
1936 - Spanish Civil War
1936 - Hoover Dam completed
1936 - King Edward VIII abdicates
1936 - Nazi Olympics in Berlin
1936 - Samuel Colt patents the Colt revolver
1937 - Chester F. Carlson invents the photocopier
1937 - Amelia Earhart Vanishes
1937 - Golden Gate Bridge opened
1937 - The Hindenberg disaster
1937 - First jet engine built
1937 - Picasso paints “Guernica”
1938 - The ballpoint pen, Strobe light, and Teflon invented
1938 - The first working turboprop engine
1938 - Panic over War of the Worlds broadcast
1939 - First Commercial Flight over the Atlantic
1939 - Igor Sikorsky invents the first successful helicopter
1939 - The electron microscope invented
1939 - Germans occupy Czechoslovakia
1939 - World War II begins
1939 - Helicopter Invented
1939 - Leon Trotsky Assassinated
1939 - Nylon hose on the Market
1939 - Stone Age Cave Paintings Found in France
1939 - Pope Pius XI dies after being Pope for 17 years
Think about what kinds of values and attitudes would be likely for people who grew up without TV, frozen food (even refrigerators in some cases), computers, cell phones, and singing ‘Ole Man River. Next Monday, we’ll take a look at the decades between 1940 and 1960.
I’d love to hear what you have to say about this idea and if you find the approach helpful.
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