Does Anyone Else Have Discussions With Their Characters? From My Sidhelagh CreateSpace Blog

Or is it just me? 

I tell ya:  it's taken a bit of doing to get some of these characters to sit down and shut up for even just a minute.

Sometimes they're worse than kids. 

I'm just kidding here, although having assertive characters (a couple of them bordering on aggresive) does seem to get things moving when I'm stumped.  When I'm in doubt, I 'ask the characters', so to speak.  Somebody always has an answer.

Take Sidhelagh for example. 

The name is nothing more than a re-spelling of my own name (Shiela).  I chose it in case I had to burn my first-ever attempts at 'people-drawing' in my kitchen wood-burning cook stove.  I figured that would make it easier than trying to burn either a total stranger (or a member of my own family as those characters came along).  As it turns out I never did burn any, but I MIGHT have. 

Sidhelagh is stronger, tougher, gentler, smarter, prettier; she is MORE. 

Well, she's a fictional character, what do you expect? 

At any rate,  she and the other characters in They Are My Song dominate the progression of the book. 

Me being new at the whole book-writing thing, it was better that way, believe me.  I'm just a means through which they Speak and therefore THEY are responsible for whatever you don't like in the book.  Me, I get to be totally innocent.  Of course, to be fair, they are also responsible for anything you DO like.  I can deal with that.

I gave Sidhelagh her Voice on purpose, to provide a first-person account.

The others just seemed to jump onto her chariot and refused to be dislodged, which was also a fortunate development (in my opinion) as their Voices seem to be stronger than mine. 

Using family members for the basic personalities gave me at least something to go by as the characters came into being. 

Danann was the first to veer sharply into his own distinct self. 

He was the one who literally told me off in no uncertain terms.  Figuratively speaking, of course.  Danann - enigmatic Danann. 

Keep in mind that originally each of the characters had a specific font of their own; I thought it wonderful but others said no it isn't practical and some of those fonts might be hard for people to read ... anyway, Danann's font was called 'Mythology' at the 18 point size. 

I would sit at my keyboard and wait for inspiration.  Eventually one of the characters would pop up with something to say so I would enter their font, close my eyes, and 'free-thought' my way through it.  A time or two I got my fingers onto the wrong keys and had to spend considerable time and effort trying to 'translate' the resulting hieroglyphics.   Which is neither here nor there ...

Danann, very early on, had this to say: 

"I am Danann.

I am Sidhe.

I am of the Mother, of the One God.

I am Druid trained.

I am Christian trained.

They would call me Culdee

but I choose not that designation.

I am Warrior trained.

I am Artisan trained.

I am in need of no training as a man.

I am as I am.

I am WHO I am. 

I am NO OTHER.

I am a man and my woman is Sidhelagh.

We have a tumultuous peace with one another.

Seek peace with us and you will find it.

See tumult with us

and you will find that also.

Seek God with us and you will find the One God.

Seek to tell me who or what I am you you will

soon discover your error.

I am Danann and I speak.

For myself I speak. 

Listen well; perhaps you will learn." 

And me, I'm saying to myself as I read the above words:  Okay this is getting a mite strange here. 

But I paid attention. 

Something somewhere inside of me was insisting that these characters represented real people who HAD lived in that time and at that place.  1500 years is a long time.  I couldn't expect them to 'fit' immediately into my 'now'.  They had their OWN 'now'.  It would behoove me to take myself there as best I could. 

Anyway, the long of it having been said, the short of it is that these characters, from the Elder Mamm right on down to the younglings (who will 'write their own books if you please') have gone from some being tentative and/or somewhat formal to all becoming strongly individualistic - which all things considered is only to be expected. 

One lonely book will not tell their stories, so there will be eight. 

I'm listening in as Mamm of Dunnottar tells her story, and Alianora and Drustann are rather impatiently crowding forward in the wings.  Sass and her soldier aren't pushing yet; Caileen and Talorc are the most practical and wait calmly.  Aine and Kalann are busy and can't be bothered right now, thank goodness.  Merri, well Merri is biding her time, so to speak.  Since Sidhelagh and Danann are 'in atonement' they'll have to have each their own story to relate. 

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, the Younglings of Dunnottar are beginning to fidget during this Long Dark.  They want to tell THEIR stories. 

Thank goodness I have the privacy of my own home to work in; talking to myself might be considered more than 'a mite odd' were outsiders to listen in on some of our 'conversations'.

And now, now I shall close this massive missive of a post and go see what said characters are up to. 

The last I saw of them, they were all heading for bed after an evening of listening to part of Mamm's story.  By now it ought to be just about time for the next installment.