Lucy Liu Quotes

Creating characters is like throwing together ingredients for a recipe. I take characteristics I like and dislike in real people I know, or know of, and use them to embellish and define characters.

I try to create characters that I am fascinated by on some level or intrigued by or can't stand.

What I'm really trying to do is create unique characters.

It's always fun to layer a character, to make the character a little bit more dynamic than it is on paper.

The thing with videogame characters is that they tend to be really undercooked, and people don't take the time to really flesh them out. They don't treat them with the respect that a writer writing characters in any other medium would treat their character.

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

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

I do write long, long character notes - family background, history, details of appearance - much more than will ever appear in the novel. I think this is what lifts a book from that early calculated, artificial stage.

Everyone likes a bit of variety. I'm sure none of my readers only want to read about anti-heroes or villainous protagonists any more than they only want to read about square-jawed heroes doing the right thing. I just write characters than entertain me and hope they'll be ones that other people want to read about, too.

You establish a technique on how to develop characters. Everyone does it their own way, and that's what makes it fun.

I always look for interesting, complex characters. You know, interesting, well-written material.

With an interesting character, there's always something to say.

I want to give my characters nuance.

Great novels have great characterization no matter what. But multiple points of view let me examine characters from entirely different perspectives, allowing me to learn more about everyone in the process.

I mean, can I really create a full, three-dimensional character? I don't know anymore. I'm certainly going to try.

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

When writing a novel a writer should create living people; people not characters. A character is a caricature.

Outside books, we avoid colorful characters.

What makes characters real are details, and if you're crafting a person from scratch, you're probably not going to pay as much attention to a question like, 'Does this person bite their nails?'

Look at the Coen brothers. All their minor characters are as interesting as their protagonists. If the smaller characters are well-written, the whole world of the film becomes enriched. It's not the size of the thing, but the detail.

I like to make definite choices and give my characters as many unique edges as possible.

You've got to leave the reader with more than just a name and a costume - they need to know who the character is, what they're like, what kind of attitude they have, what sort of role they play.

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.

When you're writing a book, with people in it as opposed to animals, it is no good having people who are ordinary, because they are not going to interest your readers at all. Every writer in the world has to use the characters that have something interesting about them, and this is even more true in children's books.

For every book that I write... I develop a history for each person and make sure they are well rounded and flawed. You have to know everything about them from their shoe size, to where they went to school, to what their first pet was, to what they like to eat, to what they want out of life.