Back Story and Motivation

NOTE: Some the exercises in this mini-workshop require going into public places. If this is not possible at this time, modify the exercises any way that suits your circumstances. Be safe.

Backstory

Backstory is the first step to getting into the minds and souls of your characters. It’s how you give your characters a past, memories and the experiences that led up to them being the people they are today. Backstory is also a great way to identify scenes and chapters in your novel. In fact, I started my first novel with no plot, no idea where the story was going, how it would start or how it would end. All I had were three characters, one woman and two men. All three were parts of people I’d known, with a trait from one person here and a gesture from another person there. I wrote backstory after backstory about each of them, an event at this time in their lives and an event at another time. These events turned into scenes and the scenes turned into chapters and together the scenes and chapters turned into the overall plot of the novel.

In effect, the characters wrote the novel by telling me about themselves.

Two Types of Backstory

There are two types of backstory. The first one gives a broad general picture of the character. I call this the historical backstory. The other focusses on a single event in the character’s life. I call this the turning point backstory. Let’s look at these a little closer.

Historical Backstory

This backstory is epic in proportion. It sweeps the character’s entire life or a large part of it. It could start in early childhood and work its way up to the present. It describes major events or changes in the character’s life without getting into much detail. It’s an overview. It goes something like this:

Alice was the youngest of six children, all of them girls. She was also the smallest and not exactly the brightest star in the sky. This made her the target of endless pranks and ridicule from her siblings. Given the year or two difference in the ages of the girls, Alice rarely experienced the feeling of new clothing, not even underclothing. This contributed great to the sense of shabbiness she projected. Everything she wore drooped with the wear and tear of five previous owners. She was ten when her mother bought Alice her first piece of new clothing, a blouse that she fell immediately in love with. It almost seemed to sparkle with newness as she gazed at herself in the mirror, admiring the white embroidery on the blue background, the short collar and puffy sleeves. Within the hour, her sisters were on her about the blouse, making jokes that it was too good for her, not really her kind of fashion statement, until the second youngest reached out, hooked her fingers in the buttoned collar and pulled down, ripping off the top two buttons and tearing a few inches into the fabric. Almost immediately after high school, Alice moved out of her parents' place, where three of the sisters were still living, and into her own apartment. It was tough financially, but she worked two part-time jobs while she took extension courses in business from an online university. It took almost five years to get her degree, but by then she was working in an office for a small IT company and already being groomed for management. And then she met Donovan.

Notice that there’s no delving into personal emotions in this backstory. We can infer that Alice was angry or heartbroken when the sister ripped her blouse, but we’re not given that degree of detail in the historical backstory. It’s just a retelling of the events, not the emotional content behind the events. It’s like a roadmap of the person’s life up to the present.

Departure Backstory

The departure point backstory gets right into the mind and soul of the character by focusing on those events that shape the character’s personality in the way they respond to the events, the character makes a decision. If faced with a dangerous situation, does she run, meet the situation head on, turn it around or ignore it. What goes on in her mind at this point is what’s important. If she runs, will she always run? Probably. If she faces up, will she always face up? Probably. Let’s take a look at one of these turning moments in Alice’s life―the ripping of the blouse:

Katie was the worst of the five. She was mean-spirited and ruthless, and it seemed that her greatest pleasure in life was tormenting Alice. She had that look in her eyes, that simmering spitefulness, and Alice knew that Katie was going to cause trouble. Don't cry. Whatever you do, don't cry. Katie walked right up to her as the other four watched, barely controlling their laughter.

Don't cry.

"Nice blouse," said Katie. "Too nice for you. Let's see if we can adjust it more to your style." She sneered as she reached out, grabbed the top of the collar and pulled down, tearing out two buttons and ripping into the fabric just above the third button.

Don't cry.

"There," said Katie, smiling maliciously. "Now it's more like you."

Alice stared into Katie's eyes, her own eyes simmering with hatred for her sister, but there were no tears.

Someday, I'm going to go far away from here and never have sisters in my life again.

Seeing the glowering hatred in Alice's eyes and the lack of tears, the smile dropped from Katie's lips and she backed away. "Loser," she said with a slight falter.

At this moment, Alice could give into tears and be the victim. Instead, she stands up to her sister, stares her in the eye and, even though the sister tears the blouse, she can't break Alice's spirit. Years later, Alice does exactly what she promised herself that day. If she had cried that day, would she have moved out? Maybe yes, maybe no, but she didn't cry. She was strong and remains strong. And then she meets Donovan…

When you write the departure point backstory try to get right into the person's mind, either as I did (showing their thoughts with italics) or using first person narration.

It's these moments that shape the person, making them ripe for dramatic scenes in your novel, scenes full of tension and conflict that will compel your readers to keep reading.

Build Your Own Library of People

Now it's time to start building your own personal library of characters that may or may not come in handy when you're short a character or two in one of your future novels. Even if you never use any of them, doing this exercise will help you to understand the elements that go into character creation and make it easier to build characters when you need them.

BTW, you should do these exercises with all your characters, main and minor, to get yourself on intimate terms with them to the extent that, hopefully, they start to write your novel for you.

EXERCISE (Part 1)

Pack your notebook and some pens (or laptop) and go to a mall food court, preferably when it's busy. It helps to buy a beverage and/or something light to eat so that you blend in.

Look around until you find someone who interests you and who you think will be around for the next ten or fifteen minutes. Keep looking around, glancing at your chosen person briefly, and make notes: size and body type, head shape, facial features, clothing and general appearance, hair and mannerisms. Write down what you see.

Do this until you run out of observations or your person begins to notice you and starts clutching their eating utensils in a threatening way. Time to fictionalize.

NOTE: You don't have to do the remaining three parts in the mall. You can do them later in another setting if you want.

EXERCISE (Part 2)

Start making guesses about your person: birthdate, type of car, beliefs, favorite room, organized or disorganized, business person or unemployed, bully or victim. Write down whatever comes into your mind. Write quickly with as little thought as possible. This should be fun, not work.

EXERCISE (PART 3)

Write a one page historical backstory on your person. This will be something general along the lines of "Jim was bullied around a lot when he was a kid. His sister beat him up. His brother beat him up. His father beat him for getting into fights with his brother and sister. His mother slapped him for causing his father to beat him. Teachers flicked chalk at his head. This went on for months, for years. One day, the school's biggest bully, Bertha Butt, came after him in the school yard and humiliated him. This followed him throughout the rest of this schooling. After graduation, he moved into a bigger city, somewhere he could be anonymous, blend in with the crowd and not be noticed...." Historical back stories cover a range of weeks, months or years and put everything into context.

Ask yourself: What kind of life did this person lead that led him or her to the mall tonight so that I could steal their identity? What kind of background made this person what he or she is today?

EXERCISE (PART 4)

Read over the historical backstory of your character and give it some thought. Now, write a departure point backstory in which you concentrate on one specific incident in the character's life that became a turning point. For instance, Bertha Butt comes up to Jim and he stands his ground and fights back even at the risk of being thoroughly trounced. But a stand has been made and Jim will never give in without a fight again. Or he runs...and spends the rest of his life running from all the Bertha Butts in his life.

Entire lives are influenced by something that happens in just a moment or two. Write about that moment or two. Remember, this is very specific. You're writing about something that happens in a timeframe of no more than a minute or so. It's that flash of realization or that instant in which things change for the character for the better or the worse.

LIFETIME ACTIVITY

You can do these character studies anywhere and at any time. Restaurants and food courts are prime places because you know the person you're studying is going to be around for a while. Emergency clinics and airports are also good places, especially for capturing people showing emotion. The key is to do it discretely. Don't stare at people. Don't let your gaze linger. Sweeping glances will work nicely.

Doing these activities will make it easier for you to create characters from scratch and to fictionalize characters based on real people. The more you do them, the better you'll do them, and they'll help you to gain an understanding of people that you may not have had before.

But, to really understand people, to get into the pits of your characters' souls, you need to understand what drives them, what makes them tick. You need to understand their motivation.

Motivation

Nothing defines a character more than motivation. It’s the force that drives right to the core of our being and keeps us going each day.

Each of us might have hundreds of things that motivate us. Think about some of the most common ones. For instance, hunger is a great motivator to eat while, at the same time, taste is a further motivation to eat. Fear is a motivator to keep us alive in dangerous circumstances; if you fear high speeds, you’re less likely to drive fast and cause a speed-related accident. Fear of getting a speeding ticket will accomplish the same.

While we all have minor motivations (generally, the ones we need to function as human beings), most of us tend to have one or more major motivations, like getting a college degree, becoming a doctor or accountant, winning a race, going to the Bahamas for a couple of weeks every winter, winning a medal, finding a lost parent. The number of motivations are infinite and their assortment in each of us is one of the key characteristics that defines us.

Most motivations are good (especially the basic ones that keep us functioning), but some motivations can be bad, or, they can be realized through evil means. Killing can be a key motivator for a serial killer. But in some cases, the killing may be satisfying another motivation like having power over others, or fulfilling some perverse religious calling.

When you’re creating a believable character, you can’t just look at the surface motivation; you have to get to the underlying motivation to really understand the character. Most people want a lot of money, but the reasons they want the money may be as divergent at the people themselves. Some may want it to do good for others; some may want it to have control over their lives; some might just want to escape nine to five hell. You have to look under the surface to really see how your characters tick.

Here’re some examples of surface motivation:

• Military (promotion, duty)
• Students (learning, job prospects, socialization)
• Business (raise in pay, promotion, bonuses, status)
• Parents (wanting the best for their children, pleasing their own parents)
• Athletes (medals, winning, popularity, glory)
• Politicians (public service, power, ego)
• Terrorist (religious belief, hatred)

Here’re some examples of underlying motivation:

The athlete was mostly ignored by one or more parents who favored another sibling. Winning a gold medal could be a way to gain their approval and make the parent(s) love him or her more than the sibling. Approval and acceptance are the real motivators; winning is the means to get them.

What drives the executive to want more pay and promotion? What happened in this person’s youth to channel him or her into business? Did he or she feel a lack of control over their lives in youth that they gain in adulthood by becoming a manager and thereby gaining control over their lives?

REFLECTION

What might be some other underlying motivations in the list above?

EXERCISE 1

Pick a situation in which an individual is extremely motivated to the extent that they forsake family and friends to embark on a career or activity deemed by those who don’t know the person intimately to be successful. Decide on what will be the surface motivation. For the next 10 minutes, write mindlessly about what the underlying motivation(s) are by asking questions such as: “What motivates this person to be successful?” “What would cause someone to give up family and friends to devote themselves so completely to this career/endeavor?”

EXERCISE 2

With each of your characters, write down their motivations. Then, ask what underlying motivator(s) may cause them to want whatever it is they want (or don’t want). Always look under the surface.