A lot of writers do character sketches. Some writers do interviews with their characters. Some even do whole biographies from birth to current novel time for character development.
One thing that I do consistently that sort of helps me figure out a character in the very beginning is to do a Myers-Brigg assessment of the character (check out my post Multiple Personalities). This helps me build a foundation.
For most of my novel projects, I’ve tried to do sketches and biographies, but I think now—especially with this current novel, I’m not going to do it anymore. For one thing, when my characters start to do something not in my sketch/bio, I get distracted. Should I go by the sketch/bio or what my character is now telling me? Do I go and change the sketch/bio? Ugh, it was just getting to be too much for me. Most of the time, almost everything about the character sketch/bio is obsolete and then I’ve felt that I’ve wasted time.
Author Brian Yanksy talks about creating characters in his post, Character Invention:
“I believe in creating a character in an organic way without any preconceived notions about what he/she might become as he/she evolves in a manuscript. I don’t want to know or think about his or her favorite color or ice cream. I want to be fluid and unencumbered by facts, trivial or otherwise, until they arrive in the natural order of invention. That is as the story evolves, the characters evolve.”
I’m thinking that after this novel, I may not do any more character sketches. I may make notes, but I don’t think I’m going to invest the time to create full fledged biographies. I’m a plot chick. The characters always come later. So for my next novel project, I’m going to try this approach and see what happens.
The thing is that that there are plenty of ways to develop a character. The key as a writer is to keep trying things and see what works.
I read Brian’s post earlier and was thinking about the same thing: is it worthwhile to do character sketches, writing prompts, etc? I think listing things such as likes and dislikes isn’t terribly valuable, though I do like exercises that help me get at a character’s backstory. I don’t do them often, but when I do they tend to help a lot. I agree, though, that characters tend to come to me through plot. I’m intrigued by the idea of using the Myers-Briggs test with character, though. I might have to give this a try at some point.
Yes, the Myers-Briggs helps me at least get an idea of the type of personality I may be molding into a character. Helps me keep them distinct at the base level. You should definitely try it!
But I don’t think I’m going to do any more in-depth bios/sketches. It takes too much time. I would rather work on the story organically and see where the characters take me.