Writers don't know why readers love the dark guys
I like to read Sarah Monette's LJ and was reminded of something she'd said before, brought up again in her Q&A post today.
She notes that she's been surprised how much readers like Mildmay.
For some reason this reminded me of a very different character by a quite different author. I remember reading somewhere (book intro? essay?) that Marion Zimmer Bradley was enduringly surprised by reader response to her character Dyan Ardais. (I could have mangled the name spelling, it's been a long time since I read the Darkover books he's in.) Apparently she'd set out to create a pretty thoroughly unlikeable villain and yet many readers felt for him.
So I'm wondering about that, about how the writer and the reader respond to characters differently. I wonder what elements of character construction contribute to it, or if there are certain character types who are more prone to it. Mildmay's a protagonist in his story and Dyan an antagonist in the stories he appears in, so it's not a simple "identify with the villain" thing. I wonder too if it has to do with the richness of the world, the emotional values involved in the portrayal?
She notes that she's been surprised how much readers like Mildmay.
For some reason this reminded me of a very different character by a quite different author. I remember reading somewhere (book intro? essay?) that Marion Zimmer Bradley was enduringly surprised by reader response to her character Dyan Ardais. (I could have mangled the name spelling, it's been a long time since I read the Darkover books he's in.) Apparently she'd set out to create a pretty thoroughly unlikeable villain and yet many readers felt for him.
So I'm wondering about that, about how the writer and the reader respond to characters differently. I wonder what elements of character construction contribute to it, or if there are certain character types who are more prone to it. Mildmay's a protagonist in his story and Dyan an antagonist in the stories he appears in, so it's not a simple "identify with the villain" thing. I wonder too if it has to do with the richness of the world, the emotional values involved in the portrayal?