Writerly Q&A thingy

[huinare]

In order to 'help' me 'get productive stuff done,' perhaps my mind would prefer to revolve around more interesting stuff in the background (eh, wheelrider?).  Therefore, I'm reposting dwimordene_2011's inversion of the character meme thing that was going around:

Ask me about a character I've written. Instead of looking for an essential core that I constantly refer to when I depict that character, I'll tell you how my thinking about/depicting/using him or her has changed over time.

If I'm responsible (*chortle*), I won't actually answer prompts for this for a few days, but in any case it will be fun brain-fodder.

Comments

[keiliss.livejournal.com]

Radagast (because procrastination is a Good Thing)

[huinare.livejournal.com]

I was thinking about this a bit while I was procrastinating, though only after finals and a bit of Hobbit film frenzy am I finally getting round to answering these.

My first conception of Radagast was of a rather simple, good-hearted, somewhat annoying fellow who is fairly oblivious to social graces. This probably stands to reason, given I was writing him as a Maia in Valinor before I ever wrote wizard Radagast, and from Curumo's viewpoint.

Happily, characters always show you they have more to them when you spend some time with them and get into their heads. It's not really that my Radagast lost any of those traits, but that he gained others. It turns out he can get very angry where affronts to living things are concerned, can even appear frightening in such moments, provides viewpoints that none of the other wizards possibly could have, and still manages to appear mild and harmless when not doing these things.

[nelyo-russandol.livejournal.com]

Sauron. Who else?

[huinare.livejournal.com]

Oh this is a can of worms! =D

One thing that changed drastically in my dealings with Sauron is simply his place in my writing/in my brain/and soforth. He was initially an incidental character when I began a continually-under-editing story from Curumo's viewpoint in 2007; I thought, well, both were Maiar of Aulë and some point, it stands to reason that Sauron would make a couple appearances. Mairon seemed so interesting to write about though, that he kept sneaking back into the plot, to the point where he was one of the driving forces of the story instead of a minor character. He recently got edited into the opening scene, since it seemed thematically appropriate now. Plus he's basically axial to all my shorter pre-Third-Age works, exerting a strong influence on pretty much everything, even though I never actually write from his p.o.v.

As to how my conception of the character has changed, he was originally something of a braggart. Yet I absolutely cannot conceive of Mairon as a braggart now; arrogant and brimming over with his own sense of self-importance, yes, but not a braggart. It's simply beneath him, because he knows he's the best and he knows that everyone knows that...and they know that he knows that they know that...you get the idea. He's also turned out to be one of those people who is annoyingly good at everything; if he's got faults, I suppose they're that he's a sociopath, and a sadist, and very much an elitist. He considers intelligence the primary indicator of worth and has no qualms about harming those he considers stupid, whereas he'll hesitate to hurt people he perceives as on or near his level.

[nelyo-russandol.livejournal.com]

It's simply beneath him, because he knows he's the best and he knows that everyone knows that...and they know that he knows that they know that...you get the idea.

Absolutely. He can't even consider the possibility of not being the best, it would be like rain falling upwards. I'm so with you on this one. His failings are not with his capability, but with his attitude towards others, inferior in his mind, and therefore their lives are of little worth.

You say it much better than I can: "He considers intelligence the primary indicator of worth and has no qualms about harming those he considers stupid, whereas he'll hesitate to hurt people he perceives as on or near his level." The best example being Celebrimbor. He probably disliked the whole affair because he respected him, which was uncommon. But he wanted the rings more. rare.

Thank you for sharing these.

[huinare.livejournal.com]

His failings are not with his capability, but with his attitude towards others...

Yes!

My Mairon also has this unspoken attitude of, "Well, if you'd just listen to ME and if we all did it MY way, we'd all be better off," which is sometimes well-intentioned but, as he doesn't realize, totally alienating.

[nelyo-russandol.livejournal.com]

Wholly democratic, LOL. That's why world domination is his favourite pasttime.

[huinare.livejournal.com]

We like to call it 'benevolent dictatorship.'

[wheelrider.livejournal.com]

Olorin!

[huinare.livejournal.com]

Hrm, it seems to me like my version of Olórin hasn't undergone as much change as some of my characters. Some of my older (Silm-era) writings of Olórin cast him as more emotional and less gutsy than my current dealings with Third Age Gandalf, but I'm not quite sure if that's my ideas changing or the character himself changing. Gandalf, after all, does undergo a lot of change in the source texts, from the Maia who never wanted to be sent to Middle-earth to the one who saves the day when the rest of his colleagues have forsaken their task. So, not the most satisfactory answer, but...I'm not entirely sure yet.. Things would probably come clearer to me if I ever write transition pieces between my pre-First-Age and Third Age writings.

ETA - oh wtf, NOW this shows up...it didn't before, and I made a whole new one, thinking it was lost forever. *sigh*

[wheelrider.livejournal.com]

That's cool, as I get to see your thinking evolve over a few minutes! It's funny how things change when you suddenly have to re-write something. Sometimes it's good.

I like how the Maia are not just generic do-gooders with super powers... they are subject to changes of mood and motivation just like humans. Or maybe not "just" like, but at least it happens.

Maybe you can write a piece on Gandalf reflecting on his own change, if it interests you.

[huinare.livejournal.com]

I was thinking I ought to delete one, but then I could sense a big philosophical debate with myself about which version was 'more true' coming on, so I was like 'Screw it, they'll both stay.'

Ah yeah, I love the Maiar. I've always personally found them the most intriguing Tolkienian race. When it comes down to it, my 'verse is kind of metaphysics-themed, owing a lot to the examination of ethereal consciousnesses responding to physical bodies.

[huinare.livejournal.com]

Argh, I had a reply, but LJ ate it as I tried to post.

Essentially, it was "I'm not yet quite sure" in more words. With Olórin, there seems to be a difference between how I began writing him as the Maia Olórin, and how I've written him as the wizard Gandalf in my more current stuff. While they're similar in a lot of ways (including a love of substances), the Maia version is more emotional and less gutsy. This is probably more due to the character himself changing after he's sent to M-e, than to my idea of him changing; I mean, he had to be all but forced to go to M-e, yet he was the only one of the wizards who ultimately followed through on his task. I think part of my confusion answering this one is that I wrote Olórin one way well over a year ago, and have written Gandalf slightly different for the past year, and have never written anything transitional between the two incarnations of him..

[lindahoyland.livejournal.com]

Wormtongue

[huinare.livejournal.com]

Gríma's a quite recent addition to the, er, happy cast of characters floating around in my head, so there's not been change so much as discovery of the character at this point.

Things that I've done with the character that seem to buck fandom's general conception of him is making him have dark blonde hair (he is a man of Rohan, after all, however unlike them he acts, and fanon seems determined that he has to have classic villainous stringy black hair); and making him have a bit more motive for his obsession with Éowyn than just sheer lust.

[lilith-lessfair.livejournal.com]

Draugluin

[huinare.livejournal.com]

Draugluin's first appearance in my headcanon was that of a rather vainglorious, savage, but ultimately somewhat cowardly wolf. I'd included werewolves in another work as a plot device, but then I found that my ideas about them wanted their own story, so I began writing about Draugluin.

My premise was basically that Draugluin is an Ainu who started out preferring a wolf shape, and ended up confined to it as part of an experiment by his superiors. When I started delving into his story, I ended up adding some canine aspects to his character; an eagerness to please and a sometimes self-sabatoging loyalty. I ended up writing him as somewhat of a humble fellow, too, so the early vainglorious portrayal of him had to undergo savage editing. Weirdly enough, Draugluin turns out to be one of the "nicer" characters I write about, although he hasn't lost a certain joy in violence under the right circumstances.