These questions are intended to help you perceive characters imaginatively – to help uncover the mysteries of motivation, personality, and interaction.
Understanding the Central Person
- What seems to drive this person to action?
- What action tells us most about this person?
- What action affects your feelings about this person?
- What are some basic character traits of this person?
- What is the greatest weakness of this person?
- How does this person relate to other people?
- What is special or important about this person’s moral or religious life?
- How does this person change or mature?
- What personal insights enlighten this person?
Exploring the World of Characters
- What other characters draw your special attention?
- What do they tell us about the central figure?
- What special relationships are formed by these less central people?
- What groups of people are associated in your mind?
- Do some of these people or groups represent values or ideas beyond themselves?
- Which characters provoke distaste or disdain?
- Which character is most mysterious and hard to understand?
- Which character could most easily be left out of this world?
- Do any of these other people seem to grow, change, or gain new self-understanding?
- Does any character you don’t know well play an important role?
Imagining Characters in Our World
- What in our world would shock the central character most?
- What would make anyone know this character didn’t fit in our world?
- What serious matters could you talk about with this person?
- What important values would you disagree on?
- What would your parents think about this character?
- What social causes would this person support?
- What television programs would be most appealing to this character?
- What would be the political affiliation, if any, of this person?
- What religious dogma would be most appealing or disgusting to this character?