sistermagpie (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
sistermagpie) wrote2004-08-22 10:08 pm
sistermagpie) wrote2004-08-22 10:08 pm
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Magpie Mary Sue
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ljash!!!
I've been meaning to update for several days and just keep....what? Oh, getting distracted. I've been writing a lot elsewhere, though, and this weekend it really made me wonder about something.
Warning: this whole discussion could demonstrate a total lack of self-awareness on my part, but here we go.
I've been writing this thing, and there's this one secondary character I know is the one that's "me" for what that's worth. Not completely, obviously, but he's just the character who would be me. So I've been thinking about all the characters and trying to, like, get to know them by asking them questions interview style (which sounds unbearably poseur-ish when I write it down). So it was cool because when I got to this character I saw things about other characters that I didn't know based on how he saw them. Suddenly I was like, "Hey, J is a lot like my friend J and P is a little like S...” But the main thing was, this would be my Mary Sue, if you define Mary Sue as just by author insertion. And Mary Sues are so often characterized by having super powers and everyone loves them and they have a tragic past and they are absolutely beautiful. So often when somebody is identifying with that character, they become right. They take over the story.
Okay, so I'm not 14 and being in the fandom I naturally know not to give my Mary Sue/Gary Stu eyes like sapphires, raven black hair with violet highlights, porcelain skin and sculpted muscles that making him the sexiest ten-year-old on the playground. But still, when I was asking this character questions it was more embarrassing than anything. Going in I'd assumed that being me he'd be the most reasonable character, and he does seem that way. But the poor kid just seems to have been saddled with all of my issues. And it made me think aback on another character, the first thing I gave to my agent, and I didn't even really think of her as a Mary Sue, but she was obviously the "me" character in that piece and being perfect was not her problem. Her problem was she seemed to have these really annoying faults--at least to the agent. It was kind of funny, actually. The agent was just like, "What's wrong with her? Why does she keep doing this?" and I thought what she was doing was being this very reasonable human being. That was a little humiliating. So there we go...I think I'm making her right and she seems wrong.
Do people go one way or the other? Because really when I think of the few characters I've written where I would say they were more "me" than another character they seemed to have a real problem in becoming non-entities--that was the problem with that problem too, in a way. She kept seeing everybody else's pov. This character has a totally different set of issues, and I don't know how apparent they will be, since he's not a main character. It's just struck me that perhaps I just have a personality that produces a very different Mary Sue than the one commonly seen. Originally there was this girl character that I thought was more like me, and then I realized she needed to be the complete opposite. It's kind of sad, really. Woe to the character that is my Mary Sue!
ljash!!!I've been meaning to update for several days and just keep....what? Oh, getting distracted. I've been writing a lot elsewhere, though, and this weekend it really made me wonder about something.
Warning: this whole discussion could demonstrate a total lack of self-awareness on my part, but here we go.
I've been writing this thing, and there's this one secondary character I know is the one that's "me" for what that's worth. Not completely, obviously, but he's just the character who would be me. So I've been thinking about all the characters and trying to, like, get to know them by asking them questions interview style (which sounds unbearably poseur-ish when I write it down). So it was cool because when I got to this character I saw things about other characters that I didn't know based on how he saw them. Suddenly I was like, "Hey, J is a lot like my friend J and P is a little like S...” But the main thing was, this would be my Mary Sue, if you define Mary Sue as just by author insertion. And Mary Sues are so often characterized by having super powers and everyone loves them and they have a tragic past and they are absolutely beautiful. So often when somebody is identifying with that character, they become right. They take over the story.
Okay, so I'm not 14 and being in the fandom I naturally know not to give my Mary Sue/Gary Stu eyes like sapphires, raven black hair with violet highlights, porcelain skin and sculpted muscles that making him the sexiest ten-year-old on the playground. But still, when I was asking this character questions it was more embarrassing than anything. Going in I'd assumed that being me he'd be the most reasonable character, and he does seem that way. But the poor kid just seems to have been saddled with all of my issues. And it made me think aback on another character, the first thing I gave to my agent, and I didn't even really think of her as a Mary Sue, but she was obviously the "me" character in that piece and being perfect was not her problem. Her problem was she seemed to have these really annoying faults--at least to the agent. It was kind of funny, actually. The agent was just like, "What's wrong with her? Why does she keep doing this?" and I thought what she was doing was being this very reasonable human being. That was a little humiliating. So there we go...I think I'm making her right and she seems wrong.
Do people go one way or the other? Because really when I think of the few characters I've written where I would say they were more "me" than another character they seemed to have a real problem in becoming non-entities--that was the problem with that problem too, in a way. She kept seeing everybody else's pov. This character has a totally different set of issues, and I don't know how apparent they will be, since he's not a main character. It's just struck me that perhaps I just have a personality that produces a very different Mary Sue than the one commonly seen. Originally there was this girl character that I thought was more like me, and then I realized she needed to be the complete opposite. It's kind of sad, really. Woe to the character that is my Mary Sue!
no subject
I know this author who writes a het fic with a character that is an obvious insertion of her, who has an affair with Draco Malfoy. I know this sounds like the ultimate 14-year-old Mary Sue thing to write EVER, but the thing is, it's not exactly like it.
For starters, the character is not pretty. It's average-looking, brunette-ish thing, but nothing more than that. (unlike the author who's blond and very cute) Moreover, the character is deliberately flawed in many ways. So, by the way, is Malfoy. They both have an unhealthy fixation for one another in the "you're making me so angry and I LOVE it" way. They have lots of ups and downs in their relationship, which is really not even established (but it's clear that no one would like to stay with those two basket-cases for long ;)). I just wonder whether it's a new type of Mary Sue, Crazy Sue or something. :)
I personally think that those kinds of characters ARE real Mary Sues, much like the way JKR writes her Hermione. They're not always good looking, nor perfect. But yes, they are author insertion Mary Sues. So that's my cague answer, I think. :/
no subject
no subject
And I also agree about Hermione--I think part of the reason I always do like to think of Hermione as a bit of a Mary Sue is to point out how an author can have an author insertion that isn't a terrible character. And also it's just always so interesting to see what someone with imagination comes up with for their insertion chracter--like a girl who is blond and very cute having an alter ego who is plain and obnoxious, you know? There's always something so fabulous about somebody realizing, "Wait, that's you? How could that be you?"
In fact, I have a friend who has this joke about finding "Who's inside you?" It started when she was talking with some people about Elmo on Sesame Street, who's played by a large black man. So it's always funny to think about little pink Elmo having "inside him" this grown man. So they started asking people about the random types that were inside people--one person, for instance, had a sister who was a surgeon but inside her she swore was a heavy metal headbanger. My boss, we feel, has inside her a 14-year-old cool girl. Things like that.