Have you ever seen actors accept awards for their performances and wonder what made their performances stand out so much from the performances of their peers? Or read a story and wonder what it was that made a character seem so real and relatable to you? The answer to both questions usually lies in nuance. Beyond the broad brush strokes of who a character is supposed to be and how he or she is supposed to be portrayed, it is the details and minor tics of that performances that make a character seem more real and more human. These small behaviors and tics can often give away more information about the character than some of their major decisions and character traits. If you want to make your characters more real to the reader, you want to tap into these small actions.
I say that people are twitchy because it is a rare occasion when someone is standing perfectly still doing absolutely nothing. Even when people are doing something as menial as walking or having conversation, there are tics, facial expressions and body language that helps convey what is truly on their minds and how they feel about their current situation.
This is a key to avoiding having talking heads in a conversation, or even spending too much time in the inner thoughts of a character. You can break up all of that by showing even some small actions or movements. It could be a character folding their arms defiantly, or tapping their feet impatiently. It could be a character nervously picking at their facial hair or at a scar, or a character swaying back and forth as they speak. When a woman touches a man’s hand during a conversation, she is looking for a connection. A lot of people wave their arms and hands to emphasize what they are talking about, and they do it subconsciously without even knowing that they do it.
Facial expression gives a lot away without the character having to say of think anything, too. Study how the human face contorts with different emotions and thoughts. Eyes widen, narrow or dilate. Jaws drop, lips purse, brows furrow or raise, nostrils flare, ears perk. This adds to your story in that they are very visual cues to how a character is behaving that a reader can see in their mind’s eye.
The best moment to introduce these small behaviors is when a character has to react to something. You can give away a lot about what your characters think or feel about the new information you have presented with them without having to resort to them directly saying something, or without having to delve into their thought processes and spell out what they are thinking and how they feel. When fists clench, someone is readying for a fight, whether or not a punch is ever thrown.
This is also good for enhancing action, where there is a lot of stuff happening in your scene. If you want to show what a character is thinking without risking a stop in the action to process their inner thoughts, then show it through their body language and facial expression. Is your protagonist tired from chasing the bad guy through the streets? Then show them stopping to catch their breath, hunched over, clutching their thighs with both hands, panting heavily with their eyes squinted shut. It’s a very visual indicator of what state your character is in at the moment, and it says a lot more than trying to explain how tired they are.
You can even use these nuances to mislead. How often have you seen instances where somebody is saying one thing, but you can tell that they don’t mean what they say? Body language and facial tics can be a dead giveaway to when someone is being insincere, or when they are deliberately trying to mislead. Even when someone is trying to control their body language to mask their true feelings, you can often tell when they are acting.
You can define characters by their facial expression and body language. Maybe your heroine twirls her hair when she is nervous, or maybe your villain has a particular hand gesture he does with his index finger and thumb when he is trying to emphasize his point. This is a way you can give your characters added depth and make them recognizable.
Adding more subtle and nuanced behavior makes your characters more human and relatable. It also has the added benefit of helping add to your word count. So the next time you write, be sure to add some of these details to how your characters interact with their worlds.
