Do you believe that characters developed by a writer reflects his / her personality?
re: Characters and Writer's Personality
Not necessarily, Harivansh Rai bacchan wrote a pig poem "madhushala" which was about wine lover and it is well known that he wasn't a drinker.
Then we have Sir Arthur Conan Doyle who had some detective power, his literary character Sherlock Holmes is best detective.
Re: Characters and Writer's Personality
How about Waris Shah? had he experienced love with utmost intensity that is reflected from his character Ranjha?
Re: Characters and Writer's Personality
Not necessarily, like Hamid mir is not a reluctant terrorist:), thought Dan Brown looks through Robert Lansdon I suppose:), Then premchand writes about common poor people may be because he financially struggled. In my opinion poets are more expressive with their feeling than writers:)
Re: Characters and Writer's Personality
Yes poets can say things in lesser words :)
There are examples where the characters of a novel proved to be writers themselves. There is a famous Pakistani writer Mumtaz Mufti, who wrote a novel 'Alipur ka aili' and it was said by the readers that the main character was the writer himself. The writer acknowledged it when he came up with the sequel of the novel 'Alakh Nagri'.
PS: Do you know Hamid Mir - The Anchor person of Geo News?
Re: Characters and Writer's Personality
I know him through that book, the author introduction had that he is a journalist thats it. It was the last fiction work that I read, the reading champion shifted to non-fiction genre and I followed:). I never saw any Pakistani channel:) or dramas. Now we can not say for sure but mostly certain aspect of character might be influenced by author's experience alone, like train to pakistan by Khushwant Singh. But I sincerly hope David morell is not as boring as his special force commando, the green beret, John J Rambo:D
Re: Characters and Writer's Personality
Ok Hamid Mir of Geo News is different than the Mohsin Hamid, the writer of the Reluctant Fundamentalist. I was surprised how you mixed him with Hamid Mir :)
May be not all the characters written by a writer reflect his personality, but writer do impose himself through characters. Charles Dickens, who led a difficult childhood created characters with same difficulties in his novels 'The Great Expectations' & 'Oliver Twist'
PS: What is the champion reading nowadays?
Re: Characters and Writer's Personality
Ok Hamid Mir of Geo News is different than the Mohsin Hamid, the writer of the Reluctant Fundamentalist. I was surprised how you mixed him with Hamid Mir :)
May be not all the characters written by a writer reflect his personality, but writer do impose himself through characters. Charles Dickens, who led a difficult childhood created characters with same difficulties in his novels 'The Great Expectations' & 'Oliver Twist'
PS: What is the champion reading nowadays?
Mohsin Hamid, precisely:), Names got me confused:)
Experience and some interview can make character, as David Morell does explain about character of Rambo and his experience, hence he had good idea about special forces. Dickens lived in difficult childhood so it is possible that some of his characters were inspired, than we have Jules verne, around the world in 80 days(my all time favourite) which has highly calculating character called Philius Fogg which is near impossible:)
Books that arrived yesterday were.
Operation Mincemeat: a true spy story, and she likes spy stories
Seal target Gernimo
Bose in Nazi Germany.
Re: Characters and Writer's Personality
Did the champion ever tried 'recipe books'? :D
Other side of the story is many writers pretend to show themselves larger than life in their works. May be they want to live their expectations in the charcters. Khushwant's Singh short stories where gori mems invite him is one of those examples. Here we have Mustansar Hussain Tarad, who considered himself as a greek god (in terms of beauty) and almost in all his travelogues a mem fell in love with him. :D
Re: Characters and Writer's Personality
Never saw her reading recipe books,though she can write a book on Pandit kitchen rules and regulation:D
Khuswant Singh, my grandfather call him Khushki(dandruff) is the only person with whom he has disagreement on every issue:D, Buddha is still tharki:D. is okay category writer not in the league of Sir Vidiya Naipaul, though I haven't read any of Sir Vidiya's fictional work:). Now Khalil Gibran's The prophet doesn't seem to be he himself:)
Re: Characters and Writer's Personality
Khushwant Singh is obsessed with sexual topics. All his characters in novel 'Delhi' seems Tharki :D
Re: Characters and Writer's Personality
But no one can have characters like Salman Rushdie, Changez chamchawala, Hanuman, Vallabh pujari, and Satan singing "my boots are japanese, my pant english, my hat is russian but my heart is indian:D" in Satanic Veses
Re: Characters and Writer's Personality
Salman Rushdie is not a writer.. he is just a tool in the hands of propaganda machinery :) The kind of characters he developed show that he is mentally disbalanced.