This post was written by Sarah Carron, a new writer I've worked with who has completed a middle grade fantasy novel.
Developing Character - with Chris Riddell
When I booked the “Developing Character” workshop from the comfort of my own home, I was assuming that we would be studying this from a writing point of view. However, once I got to the SCBWI conference I realised that the workshop was being hosted by Chris Riddell, the established children’s book illustrator who is also responsible for those political cartoons in the Observer. He is now writing his own novels, based around a new character, a young girl, called Ottoline.
This workshop was a fascinating insight into the world and mind of an illustrator. He happily showed us through his sketchbooks of amazing characters. This is where it all begins. His ideas, and his characters start off in his private sketchbooks. This is where he developed the character of Ottoline with various drawings of her in eccentric clothes and seeing her in different situations.
I was completely inspired by this talk, but after the break, the plan was “to draw”. Being a writer rather than an illustrator, I fled and went to the workshop on Teenage fiction instead. But I spent that next hour wishing I had returned to the illustrator’s world, and filled in pages of my notebook sketching my own characters.
I have just finished the first draft of my first novel. The next stage is building up characters and injecting more emotion into the dialogue – thanks to this workshop, I have started this by drawing pictures of my characters and making notes on their personality. I think I better go out and buy a sketchbook.