Getting Into Character: Seven Secrets a Novelist Can Learn From Actors

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cover Photos by WEN WEN and Alesandro14

Author Name Logo by DogEared Design

Author Photo by Angela Hunt

 

Getting Into Character, Edition 2
Copyright © 2015 Brandilyn Collins

All rights reserved

 

Challow Press

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Coeur d’Alene, ID 83814

 

 

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BOOKS BY

BRANDILYN COLLINS

 

Southern Contemporary

 

Bradleyville Series

 

Cast a Road Before Me

Color the Sidewalk for Me

Capture the Wind for Me

 

Dearing Family Series

 

That Dog Won’t Hunt

Pitchin’ a Fit

 

Suspense

 

Stand Alone Novels

 

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Dark Justice

Gone to Ground

Over the Edge

Deceit

Exposure

Dark Pursuit

 

Rayne Tour YA Series

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Always Watching

Last Breath

Final Touch

 

Kanner Lake Series

 

Violet Dawn

Coral Moon

Crimson Eve

Amber Morn

 

Hidden Faces Series

 

Brink of Death

Stain of Guilt

Dead of Night

Web of Lies

 

Chelsea Adams Series

 

Eyes of Elisha

Dread Champion

 

Non-Fiction

 

Getting Into Character:

Seven Secrets a Novelist Can Learn From Actors

 

 

 

Table of Contents

 

 

Introduction: Why Should A Novelist Care About Method Acting?

 

Secret #1: Personalizing

 

Secret #2: Action Objectives

 

Secret #3: Subtexting

 

Secret #4: Coloring Passions

 

Secret #5: Inner Rhythm

 

Secret #6: Restraint And Control

 

Secret #7: Emotion Memory

 

Appendix

 

Author’s Note

 

 

INTRODUCTION

Why Should a Novelist Care about Method Acting?

 

 

 

[The artist’s] job is not to present merely the external life of his character. He must fit his own human qualities to the life of this other person, and pour into it all of his own soul. The fundamental aim of our art is the creation of this inner life of a human spirit, and its expression in an artistic form.

—Constantin Stanislavsky, An Actor Prepares

 

 

The “Secrets” or characterization techniques in this book can open a whole new world of thinking for you as a novelist. I’ve adapted these techniques from the “System” or “Method” of acting attributed to the great Russian actor and director Constantin Stanislavsky (1863–1938).

When I started my career in fiction I automatically used these adaptations from Method Acting in my writing. I soon saw from reader feedback that the techniques were working. Readers would comment how they didn’t just
read
the scenes I wrote, they
felt
them. To this day that’s the highest praise I can receive from a reader.

But when I would mention these techniques to my colleagues, many of whom had been published far longer than I, they gave me blank looks. I came to realize that my understanding of Method Acting wasn’t standard knowledge to most novelists. Why should it be? My first major in college had been theater. Without those studies I wouldn’t have been aware of the various Method Acting concepts myself, much less having discovered how to tweak them for my own use as a novelist. I also began to realize the “Secrets” I’d come up with needed to be written to help other writers. Since then I’ve taught these Secrets countless times at writers conferences—and have seen how helpful they are to novelists, both aspiring and multi-published.

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