David Harbour Quotes

I always believed in my characters. I lived them.

To create characters, one must build background. And one of the tools we use is improvisation.

You have to start from a place of trying to create a character.

Characters are not created on paper or laptop alone.

I always try to make my characters people, and yet I always want to entertain.

Writers often say that characters begin to write themselves, and I never used to believe that. I always thought that was complete hogwash.

I'm a novelist, so I can't write about ideas unless they're attached to people.

I really think if you take away a character's obstacles then there's no comedy.

The writer of stories or of novels settles on men and imitates them; he exhausts the possibilities of his characters.

I suppose it's possible that a writer would have feeling for his characters, but I can't see how, because writing is such a meticulous, intricate, technical business. I wish I could say that I love my characters and that frequently they take over the book and run away with the plot and so on. But they don't exist.

When I wrote for TV, I was always thinking in terms of character and story. After fifteen years, it became hard-wired in me.

The great thing about writing is that you always put yourself in the shoes of the character. If you're doing it right, you can see into the heart of all your characters. Usually, when there's a writing problem, it's because you aren't doing that.

My first job is to write the characters as full and authentic people as well as I can.

It's hard to know whether certain characters come to life or not, they either come to have their own life or they don't. I've written many things in which the characters just remain inert.

I always say I write my own novels and the characters don't take control of me, but in fact, I look at the characters in the early stages and I think, 'What is he or she like,' and they slowly come together and they become the person they are.

I treat all my characters as if they were real, and I am scrupulous about the details of their lives.

It is a wonderful thing in the process of writing when such paper characters are first sketched, and, when one is doing good work, from a certain point in time they come alive and start contradicting the author as well.

In 'Me Before You,' the two characters popped into my head fully formed, which is really strange and unusual. Other books, I sit on them for two or three months. I have a whole routine: I buy a nice book; I hand-write all their characteristics. I put them through little tests just to see how they would react to things.

As a writer, I always think about who my prototype actors are, in my brain. It's helpful, as a writer, to think about that.

Characters are incredibly important, but I tend to build them around the plot during the outline stage. However, once I'm writing the manuscript, the characters I'm writing dictate how the plot unfolds.

When you create a show, and create characters, these people are like children to you.

All the great writers root their characters in true human behaviour.

I love making characters real and believable, through my own experience and choices.

What I look for in any character, good or bad, is whether I can hear him speak. If I can imagine him that clearly, then I can write about him.

When you've got good writing, you can kind of give up all the research, in a way, and start just following the emotional integrity of the journey of your character.