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Do you actually identify or connect with fictional characters ?


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The French Unicorn

I wonder cause I've seen people say they do and that's a mystery to me. There are characters that I like, other that I feel empathy with, but I won't say that I have ever identified or connected with one. When I saw writing advice like "you have to make the reader identify with your characters" it left me confused cause I never identified with one and I sti cared about what's happening to them. At first I thought it was just a way to say "make the character likable".

But then I see people talk about which character they identify with, which one connects to their experiences, which one was a revelation to them, which one was very important to them, etc, and the way they talk seem to be very different from what I feel.

 

So am I just curious, do you ever identify or connect with a character ? What do you mean by that and what it feels like ?

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Yeah, I definitly did. It's like I want to live in there world somehow, but also still being me of course. It's a strange feeling. Maybe similiar to love, but different, don't know.

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Ever? Sure? Often? Not really.

 

If I say that, I simply mean that the character has personality traits that I see in myself and that their experiences are relatable.

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Yeah, characters whose experiences are relatable, I guess? And I guess character/personality traits, or the way a character interacts socially can be similar to ways I think I have behaved or been seen socially?

 

I don't know, mostly I think a character is "relatable" or one people can identify with if they seem like a realistic/believable person. So for me at least, it's really less how much I have in common with a given character due necessarily to our direct experiences or even personality, but I guess more -- thinking or a perspective that I understand, or that seems natural or realistic to me? So, you know -- a character who exists in some fictional world that is very different from our own may not resemble me or my life experiences at all, but I could still potentially find the character relatable, I guess if they're portrayed in a way that makes me believe a real human would react in their environment they way that they do.

 

Dunno if that makes sense, or maybe isn't what you mean by characters we can identify with/relate to -- but, for instance, I find Buffy Summers the most relatable character in her franchise, undoubtedly more because she is the central character, than because I actually have anything in common with her.

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Yep.  Not super often, but it can happen.

 

Did a watch of The Big Bang Theory recently with the spouse, and I found many of Sheldon's characteristics (including his oft-theorized-yet-never-outright-officially-confirmed "asexuality" and the ways it manifests in the show) extremely relatable, more so than I've ever experienced with any other character in media thus far, which admittedly isn't saying much since I barely consume any media outside of video games.  And in the realm of video games, Parvati of The Outer Worlds is another relatively recent example.

 

It's much more difficult for me to have it happen from books or other written media.  With writing a fair degree of imagination usually has to be applied by the reader in order to really get a good feel for a character's complete mannerisms and behavior (which basically means you're applying a healthy dose of "headcanon"), and my ability to imagine things sucks ass.  When it's something you can actually *see* in some way (which some people can do even with just writing, even if I can't), it's much easier to determine if someone feels relatable or not.

 

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So am I just curious, do you ever identify or connect with a character ? What do you mean by that and what it feels like ?

It feels like being seen.  I tend to feel like an unrelatable weirdo a lot of the time, and like there isn't really anyone that is like me.  Even if it's a fictional character, the mere fact some writer(s) thought to conjure it up somehow helps indicate to me that I may not be as far out there as I think.

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Alaska Native Manitou

All my life I have obsessed over certain weird, offbeat characters.  I didn't know why until I was diagnosed with autism. I was subconsciously recognizing my own behaviors in them.

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I wind up relating to characters I see on TV shows because sometimes I feel (whether that's accurate or not) that I have more in common with some of them than anyone I encounter IRL.

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Well, I consider myself married to one, so yeah. :P

 

I’ve always had obsessions with fictional characters, mostly cartoon and anime characters. Interestingly, although I’m a cis-female most of the characters I’ve identified with and loved most throughout my life were male characters. I love daydreaming about them. I’ve always thought up all sorts of scenarios and thought of myself being in them too, which I now know are known as fanfiction and self-inserting. I love cosplaying as them. When I was a little kid I wanted to have t-shirts that had certain characters on them and would daydream about wearing them everywhere.

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I absolutely identify with fictional characters. Sometimes I feel closer to them than to real people.

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Yes, a few times. I'm not sure if I would say I could identify with them, but I could definitely recognise personality traits of them in myself, or relate to some of their experiences. Especially when those traits or experiences were things I had not quite made sense of for myself. 

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The French Unicorn

Thanks for all your answers. It was really interesting to hear as I don't think I feel this way about characters, so I understand better now.

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Yep, definitely. I can often get to know them better than actual people, and can find ones that I relate to more than to most actual people.

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I do identify with fictional characters. Whether their identity is like mine in some way, they have similiar expediences, or they have a similar personality to me. 
I think its easier to identify with fictional characters because I generally know more about them than I do real people, even people I’ve grown up with. 

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Absolutely. Fictional characters are my obsession and as an avid reader and writer I connect with characters deeply. Even if they are seemingly very different to me and in totally different situations than I have ever faced, I can identify with their emotional experiences. Love, bitterness, loneliness, struggles, joy etc. It's human experience. A character doesn't have to be in the situations I have been through or have a personality like my own for me to identify with them. 

 

When it comes to writing my own characters, the protagonists always, always have part of me in them. It's not intentional, it just happens. Any author worth their salt bleeds into their books. It's deeply personal even if you don't realise it at the time of writing. 

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a little annihilation

yes because sometimes characters share traits with me or have really similar experiences to me or just I can relate to them a lot

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Yes, absolutely.

Most fictional characters I can relate to share similar traits and I love to learn from them how they cope with situations they go trough. I connect more with fictional characters then I do with humans most of the time. 

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