Characterisation
(See the Diary for course dates.)
Don't forget to check our Christmas Specials for big discounts
This one day course will be run by BerylKingston and Adrienned Dines. It will cover all aspects of character creation both as individual characters and as plot devices. Participants will spend the morning with one author and the afternoon with the other.
The price includes morning and afternoon tea plus a buffet lunch. The course will be held in elegant air conditioned conference rooms, with no more than 12 people in each group.
Overnight accommodation is availble at special rates for those who might want to stay longer.
Cost for the day: £125
(If a block booking is made for 4 or more people to attend this course there will be a discount of 20% bringing the cost down to £99 per person)
Contact us at Creative Writing Courses for details on how to book.
The course will follow the outline below:
BUILDING A CHARACTER
This workshop will be run by Beryl Kingston
There are many matters which need to be considered when creating a character. During the first part of this workshop we will be looking at the following:
- The age, sex, and class of your character at the start of the story
- His/her age and class at the end
- Historical events, local, national and/or international
- The crisis/crises the character will meet during the course of the story .
- The psychology of the character
- The character as a member of his society
- Tastes and Opinions of the character
- Language
Beryl will then be asking her groups to create a character as a group project while considering as many of the factors listed above as possible. In the second session you will be on your own, creating your own individual characters with the template as a guide and Beryl as a wandering advisor. We can promise you it will be a lot of fun!
CHARACTER AND CONFLICT
This workshop will be run by Adrienne Dines
"Conflict is the essence of drama. The engine of fiction is somebody wanting something and going out to get it.”
Sol Stein How to Grow a Novel
All novels and stories are driven by conflict. There will be conflicts between the characters' personalities, their desires, their ambitions and abilities and even within the characters themselves. The writer 's challenge is to incorporate that conflict into the plot so that it becomes the driving force.
- We'll start with the writer - what drives his/her writing and how does he/she like the conflicts to be resolved?
- Then we'll look at the different plots that a writer might use and see what type of conflict exists in each.
- Then we'll really get you working! We'll look at different types of adversity and consider dialogue as a source of conflict: how the sensuality of language can create/suggest conflict and how body language creates undercurrent.
- Lastly we'll look at tragic heroes and Prince Charmings and the internal conflict of the ghoulish onlooker who really ought not to enjoy this - but he does.
You will be worked so hard that you really ought not to enjoy it either .
But you will!