So, I tried this, and wrote to the first suggestion I got!
Write about a teacher.
Okay, first, a real teacher. Or a series of them. I don’t remember much about my school teachers, but certain moments stick out. Mr. Lynd, who taught Global Studies, Really Liked Japan. A lot. My 5th grade Social Studies teacher Really Liked Hawaii. A lot. It led to a certain amount of tuning them out, which means I know about the slippers thing for Japan and ah, pineapples for Hawaii. And that’s about it.
Actually, it was really hard to engage in history/world studies classes, and I don’t know why. I’m fascinated by those subjects now – why wasn’t I back then? Then again, I’ve always learned history best when looked at through a lens of fiction…
Real teachers were a long time ago for me. The fictional ones are a bit more recent, but some of them have traits borrowed from various real teachers.
Instructor Pelnyen, in Edally Academy, reminds me a bit of teachers I’ve had who thought I wasn’t living up to my potential. If I took some time to get into Kaatzie’s head, he’d be a lot more like my high school Physics teacher.
Kairos, in Addergoole Year 9, will end up being like my Social Problems professor, Darwin Davis. And as for the rest of them in Addergoole – To be honest, other than Mike, Reid, and Luke, I’m still working on developing personalities for them 6 years later. Pelletier and Valerian suffer the most from this, but many of the others are very thin indeed.
Somehow, the first time I was writing Addergoole, they seemed very secondary to the whole school experience. *cough* I wonder what that says about my IRL teachers?
This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/914499.html. You can comment here or there.
Funny, because I think a lot of your readers focused heavily on the administration, and it never quite worked. In a certain way, making weighty immortal/old characters is harder than weighty young characters, because there’s a lot of detail to plot and it’s tempting to make them basically the same person at 20 that they are at 200, even though people change more than that, really.
Yeah, people change from 20 to 30 to 40 O-o. Much less to 200. I think to really do them properly, I’d have to draw an arc of words, showing them progressing through life.
*nod* When I’m really doing immortal characters properly, I do a timeline with five year spacing. So, 55-60, first grandchild, personality changes, major events. 60-65, first grandchild died, personality changes, major events.
I could do that for all of them! It might be fun. I mean, Mike & Luke & ‘Gene’s first kids really colored all of them, of course.
Also, yeah, I noticed readers focusing on the administration. But they were so Peanuts-adult-wanh-wanh to my life in school that it colored everything.
*nod* All three of the protagonists have their reasons to not connect to the administration, but it would be cool if some of the side characters were administration-positive, like student council, teacher’s pet kind of thing.
I could def. do that. Especially as a few members of the 5th Cohort are going to be, ah, replaced, anyway.
One thing I’d like to know is if the teachers are single or dating or if they currently have kids at home – there’s this sense that they only exist in relationship to the students and maybe affairs, but adults generally have adult relationships. I know some of the teachers have affairs, but maybe they had their reasons for avoiding emotional entanglements during their stay at the school?
Hrrm. Well, Mike is in love with Luca, and is fairly stupid about it, but I could easily write home scenes of the rest of them.
A random snippet of my headcanon: She stared at the contract in front of her, and at the Grigori woman across the table. Regine looked back at her calmly. “You want me to sign this? It’s Keeping in all but name. Can’t move, can’t leave without permission, agree to follow your orders in everything relating to the school, agree to follow your orders on reasonable personal matters, agree to contribute genetically to the project….” Regine’s expression did not change. “I know I said I was interested, but this is too much. There will be need to be changes to the contract.” “I have promised that all teachers will be treated equally,” Regine said coolly. “Before you decide to reject employment, consider the alternative.” A halfbreed fae loose in the world was not a safe thing to be. You had to keep your head down, stay out of the way of the bigoted Children of the Law and the torture-mad Nedetakaei. She had her own contacts among the seers, and she wanted more than anything to establish a place where halfbreeds would be the norm, not the exception, where her people were celebrated…. She pushed the contract back across the table. “I don’t give anyone I’m not sleeping with that much power over me. I’m sorry, sa’Lady of the Lake.” “I am reliably informed you will die if you don’t sign the contract.” “Are you reliably informed I will survive if I do sign it?” Regine was silent for a time. “There is a chance,” Regine said. “It is more than anyone else can offer you.” She stared at the contract for a time, and watched her thoughts for signs of mental tampering. Selfishly, horribly, she wished there was mental tampering. It would make this decision easier. But Regine had always known what she’d decide. That was what was so annoying about mind readers.
…Im sure it says something silly about my head that my first thought was, well, then sleep with her; problem solved [but i suspect it would be out of character for Regine]
I am not sure sleeping with her would solve any of the problems at all?
i was joking, but what the unidentified woman said was she would never agree to these terms with someone she was not sleeping with.. 🙂
Ah! Sorry, missed that part on re-read <.< Regine… Hunh. Regine's sexuality is Is This Useful?
Ooof. I love it, and it fits. Ooof.
I honestly don’t know what that halfbreed fae lady decides! She didn’t tell me much about herself.
She doesn’t fit Ginger or Valerian or Pelletier, but she could be Kairos. I don’t know much about Kairos.
User addergoole referenced to your post from A Vision to Purchase, a story of Addergoole’s history. saying: […] Set ~1890, in response to a conversation […]