Hello Everyone,
This week's topic is one many authors will be able to identify with. Imagine you’ve just received your content edit from your editor or notes from your agent and she/he has told you that your protagonist must be taller, darker, have different eye color… Okay you could handle that. How about a name change? Okay, you can handle that. How about if he/she says your African-American protagonist needs to be white? How about if he/she says to change the culture of the protagonist?
Yep, it happens. How would you handle it? I’m an author and an editor, thus have been on both sides of this issue. I’m interested to hear your thoughts.
Much Joy, Peace, and Love
Deatri
Sunday, July 17, 2005
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7 comments:
I figured I’d be the first to comment. As an editor, I have had to ask writers to change a character’s culture. Sometimes it is because the version of the culture the author has given does not feel authentic or is so stereotypical that the character becomes a caricature. If that was what the writer was reaching for fine, but if not, then the culture needs to be changed. Other times the publishing company is trying to appeal to a certain base. For example I know a writer who was asked to change his black female vampire heroine to white so she’d appeal to more readers. I also know a writer who was asked to turn a white character to black. There are other reasons, but I don’t want to turn this into an article.
When I was asked to change my character’s culture, I asked why? I listened, with an open mind, and I also explained why I wanted this person to be from this culture. The editor and I discussed the issue, and we came to a decision. Same went for when I was asked to change how a character looks.
If you are ever asked to make a change that you do not understand or agree with, ask your editor why they made this suggestion? Try not to be defensive (I know this is virtually impossible). If you still do not agree with the change, explain why you wish to keep it as is. Once the both of you know where the other is coming from, you can discuss the issue until a decision is made. In the end, remember that it is your manuscript, so you should follow your heart. Also remember that the editor is an objective eye and will see things that you are too close to realize and/or admit.
Much Joy, Peace, and Love
Deatri
The editor would have to give me a really good reason for changing the race. That's such a touchy issue that we, AAs, immediately take offense and consider it rejection of us as a race. Now to the story. What market is the story written toward? I've had suggestions to change my genre to inspirational and another to change the name of my Protagonist to an AA name. My answer to both was this is MI story. I am willing to take the chance of offending some and inspiring others. I think all writers understand that option. If not, they need to take a close look at the issue. I call it flying without a parachute.
Deatri:
MY response to your question about changing race and color of character would be first to ask whether it would change the point of the story. If the point is universal, then I would say no problem. HOwever, if changing the race also conflicted with the character's cultural background and would affect the story line, I would have a problem with it. The same with color, it would depend on how the character identified with their own color (which then would impact the character's responses and self-image) and how others in the story line would view and react to the character's color (i.e. a black man in the south is not going to have the same interaction in the south as he would if he were in Kenya and the same goes for putting a white man in that situation. You make that man a woman -- and you have a whole different set of dynamics altogether) But, there are some circumstances that are universal and the setting can be open and the person can be anyone. Bottom line, it depends on the focus of your story and how it would be affected by the change. Case in point--Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. I always envisioned Ford Prefect as being white when I read the book but in the movie he was black--didn't change the storyline since he was an alien to begin with and it really didn't matter what color he was as it did not affect his character's role.
Leann
I've been asked and haven't done so, which is probably why I'm still trying to get published! LOL
The writer has a reason why his/her characters are from a particular culture. I'm upset that the higher ups that be cannot be more creative in trying to get a book MARKETED and instead choose to destroy a writer's work (and even if the book is good, it still, in a way, is destroyed because it's not the real vision of the book) in order to get the book to sell.
There's a whole culture behind a character being black or white or Asian. To change a character means that the whole story has to be reexamined. Characters are different anyway in looks, in how they live, in who they interact with. To change a "color", to me, would be to change the entire existence.
As a person who has been told I don't write "black" enough and that my characters don't seem realistic because and could I write "more black" or make my characters "white," this issue is a very sticky one for me.
If it is important to be published by any means necessary, then writers should do whatever it takes to get published, I guess.
It really depends on which story they wanted me to change. I'm flexible unless it has to do with my serial books which places character inside other books. IT would hurt the other books storylines. http://SylviaHubbard.com
I guess it would depend on the nature of the change. If the person (character) identifies better with that particular culture, I would change it. Especially if the current culture throws the story off.
For me to drastically change any of my characters, the editor has got to come to me with some very good reasons and be able to back them up. I'm usually shaky about changing my character's names, so I know changing the race would be very difficult for me. I put alot of thought into naming my characters and deciding what they will look like, how they will walk, and how they will talk. I think that's what writers may like most about the writing process, besides completing a body of work, you get to create your own world; and you get to do so exactly as you see fit. :-)
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