Finders Keepers by Stephen King has a great deal of commentary about the role of the author and how the characters in a novel turn out. Many of these seem to be done in the authorial voice, so that the reader has a sense they relate more to Mr. King's views than the views of the characters in the novel.
While I found the descriptions consistent with Mr. King's other works and observations, I also found it interesting to consider some of the issues he raises, and how they relate to other authors.
The first element I found interesting is the question of who controls the characters?
Finders Keepers justifies the in-book fictional character arc of Jimmy Gold by saying the authors don't control the characters. Authors get inspiration and the story takes them where the story needs to go, all the author does is to record.
This approach is consistent with that described in The Dark Tower series and elsewhere in Mr. King's writing. Whether it's inspiration coming from Gan, or a mean gunslinger threatening the author, the characters have a life of their own, and for the author to try to force them in another direction doesn't work for the story or the character.
Having created a world and its characters, there are some things those characters can and will do, and some they will not. The author can only move them so far before he feels them straining at their own reality. The interesting point in Finders Keepers (or perhaps The Dark Half?) is that sometimes the characters move in ways that may not have been originally anticipated by the author.
Perhaps this is caused less by a muse directing the author's hand, and more by the author's understanding of the character he or she has created. For the author, the character is fully real, four dimensional in the author's mind (three dimensions, plus time) and must organically react to certain events or even drive events in particular ways in the story or series. The author knows, with a bone deep understanding, not only how the character would look or behave in a given circumstance, but also how the reactions would change depending when in the story or series arc the character is confronted with the circumstance.
I get the sense that Michael Connelly would have this sensibility about Harry Bosch and his other characters. Harry acts in certain ways when he's a cop in Hollywood division, differently when he's a private detective, differently again when he's on the cold case squad and after he becomes a single dad. I think Mr. Connelly would talk about what Harry would or would not do as though he's a real person... and to him (and many readers) he is.
Other authors, for all their realism in developing fully formed, four dimensional characters, never cease to see them as constructs of paper to be moved and dealt with as they wish.
I'm reminded of George R.R. Martin asking how many children Scarlett O'Hara has. She has one in the movie version of Gone With the Wind but three in the novel. So which is correct? Mr. Martin proposes that a correct answer is none... Scarlett O'Hara is a fictional character.
I find Mr. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series fascinating, because he seems to hold that attitude throughout, while somehow managing to give real depth to his characters. Readers intuitively know what Jaime Lannister would do in a given situation, how he would react as though he is a real person. The same is true for most of Mr. Martin's characters, in that series and otherwise. And yet, he seems to feel no more attachment for them than he would for any other constructs of paper. If they get tortured in hideous ways, or killed, I don't get the sense it bothers Mr. Martin internally, since they're just fictional characters.
I get the sense that Karin Slaughter would share Mr. Martin's sensibility about Will Trent.
I don't say that's a bad thing, but it does make a different reading experience.
Messrs. King and Connelly and their spiritual colleagues would be loath to kill off their characters or put them in life altering scenarios. It would feel to them like they had killed a real person or put a real person in those circumstances, so it wouldn't happen without a lot of careful thought, and probably some sense in the book that it had been earned, or was a worthy experience somehow. That gives me as a reader a certain sense of assurance and comfort in reading their books. If they do kill a character or cause some life altering experience, I anticipate I'll get some kind of satisfying closure.
With Mr. Martin and Ms. Slaughter, I feel a greater sense of danger when I read their books, because I feel as though the floor could drop out from under any character at any time, and I don't know if things will be resolved in a meaningful way, or even if it will happen for a reason.
When I started writing this commentary, I was tempted to refer to Agatha Christie and her steps to kill off Hercule Poirot. In the end though, her decision in Curtain was not so much indicative of where she finds her inspiration and plot directions, but instead about the importance for an author to control the works in which a character appears. And in that regard, I suspect Mr. Martin, Mr. King, Mr. Connelly, Ms. Slaughter and Ms. Christie would all agree that the author ought to be entitled to control where their characters appear and how they are portrayed.
That may be a good segue into the question of what rights readers and fans have to direct the course of a work, which will be a topic for later this week.
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