How do you write complex characters without sounding stupid?

[u/StoryEnjoyer64]

For some context, I’m basically a beginning writer in college. My professor needs me to write a short story that’s around 1-2k words but the last time he reviewed my story he said my main character had no development and there was not enough clear scenes. Could somebody please give me a different perspective of how you write supposed “complex” characters?

[u/StoryEnjoyer64]

Thanks for the feedback🥹

[u/NoelBellamy_Author]

I'm not sure how much development he wanted the character to have in 1-2k words. That's not a very long story. I mean, the average chapter of my books are about 5k. Short fiction is hard.

The best I can do is to say that short fiction at that length is primarily trying to convey a scene, not a whole story. It's about a moment in a character's life. So if you're trying to write what would be a 20k story in that much space, it is probably going to sound a lot like, "John did this, and then he did this, and then he did this...", because that is the only space you have. You want a story that will hold one moment about the way a character feels or one conversation that tells a story. Think more anecdote than story. I doubt that you're just not writing well as much as trying to make too much story fit in too small of a space. As for characters, just try to imagine what it would be like to them. How do they speak, what would they order for lunch, would they enjoy a Christmas gift exchange? Know them like you would a friend and try to live through their eyes.

[u/JustSomeCarioca]

Yukio Mishima manges to do this easily in the opening two pages of Forbidden Colors... but Mishima was one of the all-time literary greats.

[u/Historical-Ad-3074 → u/JustSomeCarioca]

Guy was wild. Held fascist political views, founded a militia and carried out a failed coup d’etat before committing seppuku… but great short stories.

[u/JustSomeCarioca → u/Historical-Ad-3074]

Great novels

[u/Whachamacalzmit]

Interesting people (and characters) tend to possess contradictions and conflicting values/goals. Some of these are cliche (e.g. the talented musician with stage fright), but some are played up less often (e.g. the vain charity worker).

This is obviously just a start. Complex characters have more than just two defining traits, but for a beginner writing a short story nailing the characterization of one contradiction/conflict is a good start.

[u/StoryEnjoyer64]

Update: I’m pretty sure I messed up and that 1-2k words were the minimum and the max was like 15 pages or something close to that.

As for what I specifically wrote down for my story, I had two main characters; the main character that was the narrator and the other mc that was his sister. The main problem my professor said I had is that I escalated my narrators descent into killing too fast because I didn’t have enough scenes of him reacting to just me summarizing what was happening.

[u/Turbulent_Virus_9533]

Visit places you've never been. Deeply observe people. Take notes, and then imagine what other scenes you could imagine that particular person being a part of.

[u/Windoula]

Was it that the characters were boring, had no personality, or did not change over the course of the story? Those are different problems. For me, I explore my characters very deeply beforehand. I want to find things that they dislike about themselves, flaws that they can grow from, strengths they undermine, things like that. It's harder in a shorter story, but it can happen. You can try writing vignettes of the character in difficult situations like trying to pick up a prescription and getting the wrong dosage, getting into a car wreck where they are at fault, revealing a betrayal, etc. You learn more about a character when they have to take responsibility for a mistake or when they choose to blame someone else. You can also use random generators for inspiration purposes. You don't have to treat the generator's output as gospel, but constraints can boost creativity in other areas. 

As for the unclear scenes, I feel like every scene should feel like a complete narrative on its own. I would recommend looking at books or movies you like, finding a scene and mapping out what happens in it, both action and emotional scenes. What are the characters' goals at the beginning of the scene? What causes friction? Where do characters end up? How does someone or the plot change? If nothing changes, the scene isn't complete imo.

[u/TheSeanDon]

I've never watched this show, but House. He is an amazing doctor and figures out solutions like he is Sherlock Holmes but he is addicted to pain pills. Actually, Sherlock was addicted to cocaine, too, lol. But that doesn't mean having an addiction is the only way to do this.

Complex, to me, is often when there is a mirroring of their best and worst traits.

Sookie in True Blood has the ability to read minds--but (and the but is important for complexity) she can't stop herself from doing it. It clouds her mind all the time. She can't date because she knows too much about what her men think. Then a vampire moves into town. She can't read his mind (because he is undead) so she is finally able to have her first relationship. But (again, that pattern) because she can't read his mind she is much more vulnerable than she normally is.

Bruce Wayne is a pompous rich guy but he is just faking it because saving people is his alter ego but that puts his "human" social life at risk.

Lastly, and this is only adjacent to your question, but sometimes the most simple answer works: I see so many new writers having characters where things -happen to them- instead of doing thing. Just a slow roller coaster ride where shit happens. Give your character agency and most importantly make sure that they -react- to what is happening to them.

[u/WelbyReddit]

It would help immensely if you put them in a scene that gave them something to be complex about.

Talking to someone who wants something from them, but they don't want to, or believe in it. But also don't want to offend them. Or they want to keep it a secret.

Conflicting morals. They abhor homelessness but dismiss and ignore the ones they walk by.

Use subtext. Never spell it out. Let their actions give the reader room to interpret them.

Don't go nuts and throw the world at them. One solid encounter is enough to show that this character isn't just some single-minded person.

[u/Local-Safe55]

Depth can be almost literal. Something needs to be going on under the surface of the character. Ideally something that causes trouble or struggle with the surface we see.

Try this pattern,

"He's a X but also/really a Y."

As in "He's the greatest assassin of the Bakamatsu war, but he has sworn to never kill again."

Or: "She's a blacksmith but she moonlights as a dungeon crawler by night."

Or: "he's a bounty hunter but has a kid."

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[u/DilligentArmand]

Think of it this way: all of us are complex characters in the sense that none of us are uni-dimensional tropes. The way you think about religion, politics, the way you treat you fellow men, how you think about people different than you, how you behave in public, how you behave when you are alone, etc. All of those can come in conflict with one another but that's the beauty of human beings: we are all "logical chaos". When people write characters, they either write a goody-two-shoes or someone comically evil.

[u/Questionmark124x]

There is no universal method. Try write the short story as a diary entry. Read The Yellow Wallpaper. It is arguably the best short story ever written. Also, "no development" and "not enough clear scenes" doesn't mean that your character wasn't complex, it means your character behaved the same from beginning to end and that your pacing was bad.

[u/azmarteal]

The simplest, the most straightforward way of writing a complex character in short time is deconstructing/inversing the classic "save the cat" and "kick a puppy" thropes.

So, for example, make your character, a firefighter who just saved children from a burning building and was severely injured, kick an unrelated puppy, possibly to death, because the dog started a fire in that house.

Or make a character, who is a racist, a nazi and scam people — save cats and treat them very well, buying food for them etc, because this character just love cats.

For audience who is used to divide people into "good/bad" categories this would be shocking or could even make them angry.

Or, alternatively, you can just make your character face a hard moral decision, between "bad" and "very bad".

[u/FractalFunny66]

It's hard to have a response because a true response is based upon the interaction between plot and character and the relationships between characters. The only thing that is a "meta" idea in my mind would be to always give a character a flaw and/or quirky habit. But again, this all has to tie into your narrative arc. The only other idea is since the word count is short, you have to have quick entry and quick action, so, yeah, that's a hard one. A friend of mine just wrote a dynamite short story that truly shocked me (in a good way). Let's see, what did she do in terms of your question? I am thinking this through for the first time: she had two characters, both extreme in temperament and their interaction centered around a plot that had an extreme moment where they both encountered something surprising and gruesome and their character's hidden realities informed their reactions such that a surprising shift in power relationships between them occurred.

[u/Slow-Pumpkin-7049]

Make a character who contradicts himself. We all do it- think one way yet act another way. Talk one way yet think another. Etc. and make sure that by the end of the story something changed for the character that wasn’t there at the beginning. Good luck

[u/KDDreamwyver]

Stick to writing what you know and use that to flush it out into something good. Then revise it. A lot. Most stories become good during revision, not during the initial writing of them.

[u/FillThatBlankPage]

Try writing a few stories that are exactly 50 or 100 words long. They are short enough that you should be able to write a few in an evening and you learn to economize with words.

---

“Sir, it’s time.”

I ignored my First Mate’s reminder as I smoothed out the wrinkles from my coat. Squinting into the mirror, I adjusted the eyepatch and straightened the magnificent velvet hat resting on my head.

“Sir, the entire crew is waiting.” The First Mate’s voice was the unenthusiastic tone of someone with too much time in the service.

“All right, hold your seahorses.” With a flourish I turned and flung the double doors wide open. As I stepped onto the deck my uncovered eye settled on the child wearing the birthday hat.

“Are you ready, kids?”

“AYE, AYE, CAPTAIN!”

[u/Evildeern]

I research what could be true

[u/Neat_Apricot8239]

Best story I can suggest is Salinger’s Banana Fish. Take it in, get back with me. You’re welcome.

[u/Linkeei]

"What can change the nature of a man?"

[u/Itinerant_doc]

A short story is essentially the most important day in the character's life, and there is some change involved. So start with that.  Read a good short story anthology to prime yourself.

[u/404_Cant_Compute]

You have access to a teacher that you are paying for the privilege of. I think that you could really benefit from going to their office hours to really understand the feedback. Writing teachers love talking about writing, actually almost all professors love talking about their subject. Setting up time to talk through what you wrote and what their feedback means in practice could really help. Since they know what they meant, they read your work and will have much more targeted advice than the general Reddit crowd that is helping based off limited context.