Writing outside of your perspective

[FalloutJack]

Well, I personally don't feel right writing from a perspective that I don't adequately understand. So far, I have managed to branch out from the white male range well enough to be considered of reasonable quality and not offensive. However, there are areas that I'm no good at, and won't write in that perspective until I get it.

 

[Gordon_4_v1legacy]

The only piece of advice I can give regarding artistic creation it is to meet people: coppers, crooks, deviants, straight arrows, heterosexuals, homosexuals, trainspotters, power lifters etc and hear their stories. We've all got one, even if each one won't be he Illiad. Perhaps the world doesn't need your voice, but maybe a bunch of confused and bored folks in North Carolina do.

 

[RikuoAmero]

I'm surprised that no-one here has mentioned the rather well known example of Memoirs of a Geisha, which is a book about the life of a (fictional) geisha in Kyoto, Japan, written from her perspective but the author being a man.

 

[Addendum_Forthcoming]

A part of being a writer is constructing a narrative and (most likely, though not always) a cogent world for which people belong. Writers ask prople about their characters. They ask multiple people. They build consensus with a shared reality of apprehension.

If you fail to build it, then a lot of people will gripe.

 

[Silence]

So, depending on who you write ... or in every case: Do it, don't be afraid of it. It can help you think about other perspectives. And give better stories.

But I would, in every case, ask someone from that background to either proofread it (sometimes there are super dumb, simple mistakes, like a deaf person hearing something), and change it accordingly.
If you don't have someone to proofread - publish it anyways, but accept the criticism, if someone reads it. Maybe change it after, or give a footnote.

But definitely write outside your perspective!

 

[sageoftruth]

Okay that really pissed me off, you want to write non white characters? Then write them like you write every other chracter, as opposed to what might think, black, muslims, women, LGBT and all those are not some "exotic" animals that we should appreciate like a fucking zoo, but human beings How will a black person act when a bad or good thing happens to him? The same as a "white male", women, gay or any human being alive on the world will act.

Basically this^ but way less angry. Also this:

My advice, provided you don't do it already, is to do a character writeup before you begin. This is where all your research into the person's cultural and societal differences should go. Use it to help you define the person's past, personality, likes, dislikes, personal strengths and weaknesses, relationships to other characters, how that person sees his or her place in the world, etc.

Once that is done, just write your story the same way you would normally, using your writeup as a guide to help you figure out how the person would behave in different situations. This helps to ensure that you continue to write the character as a person with depth rather than slipping into stereotype/archetype territory.

Also, feel free to update the character writeup whenever your writing uncovers new depths about your character.

I feel like a lot of writers get too caught up in the differences and forget to focus on the fact that we're all human (or intelligent extraterrestrial, anthropomorphic animal, whatever else you're writing about, etc). I'm working on a long piece where all four of my main characters are WAY outside my demographic (two homosexual males, one in his 50's one in his 20's; a 30-something STEM type guy who's self-employed; a 30-something woman of ambiguous sexuality).

One could argue that to really do this right I have to do some serious research into what it's like to be 30+ years older than I am, of the opposite sex and sexual...preference...

See how dumb that sounds? Don't bog yourself down with research for your CHARACTERS, just make your characters HUMAN. Normal quirks, natural reactions and organic dialogue overcome perceived boundaries of race, sex, etc.

If you want to research, use that for background and setting. Sageoftruth has the right idea in using research to help outline and shape a character through their past and what they know, but every time a writer talks about "doing research for a character" I fear the worst for that character becoming a bucket of factoids with no personality.

TL;DR version: use research for background stuff ONLY, get an idea where your characters come from, what they've seen and what they might know, but for the love of words just write them to be PEOPLE, don't worry about any accuracy other than "is this a HUMAN BEING I'm talking about?"

Looks like you're right. I guess I ended up over-emphasizing the extent one should rely on the writeup while writing the actual story. When using it myself, it was kind of hard to tell how big of a role it played. On the other hand, I seem to really enjoy making them for some reason.

At first I was a bit uneasy about the idea of slashing everything from the writeup except the character's past, but if you make the past more than just a brief summary, then I suppose it could cover every other aspect of the character's personality.

The only exception I can think of is the appearance of the character. In some fiction, the appearance won't be that important, but it can affect first impressions with other characters, and sometimes I just like to reference a character's eye-color or hair-color simply to make a sentence more colorful.

 

[Wrex Brogan]

What are your thoughts on someone writing in a voice totally removed from their own personal identity?

Heartily recommended and pretty much standard for having a good story, really. If the story or characters read like '50s Homosexual, but as told by white man', then someones gone fucked up somewhere.

How deep must the research go before a writer can arguably say it was in depth?[[footnote](Did George RR Martin speak with the current Little Person community as research or did he read extensively about how dwarfs were treated in Medieval society? I honestly do not know what he did in preparation for his books.)[/footnote]

Depends on what the research is for and why you're doing it. Generally speaking, have your characters act like... well, people. I'm gay, but I'm still human, and the 'human' part comes first. If the story has nothing to do with homosexuality and it's just a character trait, then just present it believably - and despite common belief, someone going flat out 'I'm gay' is a believable presentation. Maybe do some research on Stereotypes so you can avoid writing those by accident, since stereotypes are the best way to piss off the people you're trying to present when writing another perspective.

If you're writing a character that's from a different culture or follows a real-world religion, make sure to research the necessary points. Shit like what are some practices they follow, how rigorously do they follow them (can vary based on character! Add that depth!), are there any restrictions/allowances, what are things that are respectful/disrespectful, how people from those cultures/religions act around people from different cultures/religions (again, this can vary greatly by character).

Basically, you gotta do enough research that the character seems real. The ultimate goal of writing from another perspective is for people from that perspective to go 'hey, yeah, this guy gets it!'.

[sub]I can't comment on George RR Martin, but while I haven't heard anything bad about his presentation with Tyrion (though that's largely because he's a dude first, dwarf second), he's apparently fucked up in regards to how to write women. Never read the books though, so take that from... well, any women who complain about it, really.[/sub]

When does the creator's personal heritage vanish from how you perceive your media?

When they don't fuck it up. Otherwise, if they do fuck it up, it's usually a good indicator of how they've fucked it up.

 

[hermes]

Of course you have to be prepared to write outside your own perspective. Every author does it, otherwise books would have only one main character. Good authors can do it seamlessly, bad authors can be cringe-worthy when outside their confort zone.

My advice to you is: do your research. That doesn't mean to bury yourself in books (although that doesn't hurt) but, when researching about people outside your confort zone, simply talk to people outside your confort zone. Talk to a cab driver, talk to the baker near your house, talk to your mailman, talk to the old lady in the bus...

 

[votemarvel]

It can be hard to do research at times outside of your box.

I wanted to include a trans character in my current book but boy is asking questions near impossible when nearly everything is taken as a personal attack.

The thing is I wanted a wide perspective, a collaboration of views from the community but it wasn't worth the effort. I'm currently reading 'Whipping Girl: A Transsexual Woman on Sexism and the Scapegoating of Femininity' by Julia Serano but I'm left with the feeling that the character isn't going to be as fleshed out as she could have been.

So if you have the time, just sit and listen as mentioned above. Sometimes actively trying to research something can come back and bite you.

As to detail you need to be careful on what you include and don't. There is another book I'm currently reading 'A New World: Chaos' by John O'Brien and he goes into excruciating detail about everything. It takes him half a page to write his main character, a former special forces pilot, kicking down a door. I'm honestly shocked by the reviews that say how fast paced this book is. I'm told the series gets better (it's now on book 10) but boy is it a struggle to get through this one.

 

[Zen Bard]

As a budding writer myself (with a grand total of two stories sold), I'm realizing that a good author is first and foremost an actor.

If you want to write convincing dialogue as opposed to just lines, you have to get inside your character's head. And that's regardless of whether that character is an idealized Mary Sue version of yourself or your complete antithesis.

I recently wrote a short story where the protagonist is a witty white woman because I felt she'd make a better hero than a swarthy loudmouthed Indian dude such as myself. So I based her on my wife.

Throughout the writing process I asked "How would she react to certain situations?" "What would she say?". I even peppered the character's dialogue with some of my wife's more colorful expressions.

The key, I discovered, was not to write "as a woman", but to write as a specific personality. It was actually my wife's inquisitiveness, sarcasm and attention to detail that I thought would fit well with the story. So I was more interested in capturing her voice than her gender.

That should be the main objective whether you write as a different race, age, gender or species.

 

[votemarvel]

To be honest Zen Bard it sounds there as if you've just written your wife into the story, rather than creating a new character.

It's easier in that situation to find the voice of the character you are writing because she already exists in your life.

Do you think you would have been able to capture the voice of a sullen black woman, beaten down by her life so much she questions nothing, quite as well as a white woman who mirrors your wife.

Are your previous two stories published anywhere? I'd like to read them because I actually really like the advice you've given.

 

[Fox12]

What are your thoughts on someone writing in a voice totally removed from their own personal identity?

How deep must the research go before a writer can arguably say it was in depth?[[footnote](Did George RR Martin speak with the current Little Person community as research or did he read extensively about how dwarfs were treated in Medieval society? I honestly do not know what he did in preparation for his books.)[/footnote]

When does the creator's personal heritage vanish from how you perceive your media?

I enjoy writing people who are different from me. Not necesarily just people with a different sexual orientation, race, or gender, but also people with radically different beliefs then me. I think it's interesting to write someone whose essentially my opposite, and to try and explore why they believe what they do. I don't want to write straw men.

I think the trick is to remember that you're not writing some alien. You're writing a person. And, at their core, everyone is driven by the same things. They need to eat, they need to drink, and they need shelter. Everyone wants to be loved, and to love others. If I'm writing a gay character, and the person he's in love with dies, is that really any different from what a straight character feels? You just have to be willing to put yourself in their shoes. Figure out what your character wants and the rest will take care of itself.

https://youtu.be/b3Guf-T3U1U?t=12m37s

 

[CaitSeith]

What are your thoughts on someone writing in a voice totally removed from their own personal identity?

My thoughts: it depends. Is it to inform or to entertain? What's the goal of doing it?

How deep must the research go before a writer can arguably say it was in depth?

When it surpasses the readers' perception.

When does the creator's personal heritage vanish from how you perceive your media?

Completely? When it delves into the territory outside my own knowledge.

Note aside, I kinda hope the effort of not being called for doesn't get in the way of a good story (it isn't like in "Stranger than fiction" where *SPOILERS* writing the best story meant killing a real person).

And sometimes, you may get called for by people that are just playing the PC police, while the readers who like it the most are the ones belonging to the group you are trying to depict (see Speedy Gonzales [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speedy_Gonzales#Concern_about_stereotypes] for an example).