Writing children...

[pmmg]

How do you?

Go!

 

[Naruzeldamaster]

I write them based on what little experience I have with actual children.
Sometimes they have more 'smarts' because the plot requires them to.
Otherwise I write them the way I've seen the (Good executed) ones get written.

I'm struggling to write a character in hound and fox right now because I want her (She's like 10 and most of the characters are grown ups) to have that 'silly brat' energy without being obnoxious.

 

[Prince of Spires]

Same as grown-ups, but I make the font smaller to indicate they're small people...

In all seriousness, I think children are hard to get right for the simple reason that it very much depends on the age of the children. An 8 year old will react very differently from a 10 or a 12 year old. Boy vs girl matters, both from a maturity angle, but also simply how they react to things.

I think to write believable children you need to know even more who you're writing than when writing adults.

 

[Mad Swede]

When I write children I base them on how my own children and my nieces and nephews were at whatever age I need to write the character at. The challenge is that most readers have children (or child relatives) of their own and so have their own ideas about what children are like. It isn't an easy balance.

 

[xena]

I base it on experiences I recall having or experiences I have with my nieces and nephews. That tends to give me a good ground work to go from

 

[Naruzeldamaster]

Same as grown-ups, but I make the font smaller to indicate they're small people...

Jokes aside you should actually do this sometime if you're writing a comedy story, it'd be funny.

In all seriousness, I think children are hard to get right for the simple reason that it very much depends on the age of the children. An 8 year old will react very differently from a 10 or a 12 year old. Boy vs girl matters, both from a maturity angle, but also simply how they react to things.

I think to write believable children you need to know even more who you're writing than when writing adults.

I think I'm struggling to write proper children (13 and under) because my 'social battery' can't take being around them.
I have mild experience dealing with different types, but overall, my social battery (I hope that makes sense) can NOT handle them.
I typically have nothing 'against' children, especially well behaved ones, it's just my brain can't handle being around em.

I've been trying to write Nana (The child in question) as 'a child, but one I'd be able to be around for extended periods' which, may not be perfect.
She's a little more 'street wise' than most actual kids her age, but otherwise her reactions are as child like as I can muster.

 

[pmmg]

Yes...children could be broken down into age groups. For the most part, I think their thinking processes, and vocabularies, and even social understandings would be somewhat underdeveloped. And more so depending on age.

But...the precociousness, and word misuse and mispronunciation, and simple rosey way they view things very often feels forces, or less than genuine.

I ask this question, cause I wrote my child character ugly, meaning, I plan to go back and fix it later and add more of the childlike nature and less of the adult one. But...the world is rough, and its easy to become jaded. So, I wonder how much growing up too fast is too fast.

I also wonder at races that have different life spans. If a race is known to age quicker, does the sped up process make up for the lake of world knowledge that would come with years spend on it. Could an Orc, who might become a mature adult at 12, have the perspective of an 18 yr old, and gain it at a quicker rate? Or does it serve to keep them kind of lower scale of mind.

I have more children coming up, but I feel I have not captured the right feel for them yet. They really don't have time to be children, but one cannot escape that some phases must be passed through.

Sadly, life it too busy ATM to really formulate thoughts on it. I'll just see what others can offer.

 

[skip.knox]

That's a bit like asking, how do you write men, how do you write women, how do you write old people. Heck, how do you write people.

In the first place, you write them so they are believable *to you*. You are the First Editor. If a character sound off to you, then you have some revision to do.

Also in the first place (there's no second place), are you writing a human? This is a fantasy forum, after all. Are we to make all orc children like all human children like all elf children?

For that matter, are we to make all human children like all human children? Why not treat them as individuals who are who they are because of their setting and history and their own story?

I suppose if I were writing a story set in modern times and culture, and it was going to be a YA story aimed squarely at the teen audience, then I suppose I'd have to be more concerned. I suppose I'd read a clutch of books that answered to that description (Percy Jackson and his ilk). Happily, I write pixies and sprites and humans and ogres and dwarves and elves, and they've all been grown-ups except for one.

 

[FifthView]

I mean.... many adults have perspectives that are not much different than a child's perspective. Hyper-focus, a frequent lack of circumspection, impulsivity, mood swings tied to achievement of immediate desires ... or failures.

A certain naivete is more likely with less life experience; but even in this case, some adults fail to reflect on the past or learn from it, and some children are more introverted and self-analytical than those adults.

So much depends on the target audience.

Generally, I think the tight POV requires a more adult-like approach to writing children. Age them up a bit mentally and emotionally—maybe not too much.

I think that depicting a very young child being very child-like (define that hah) is better done from a more omniscient POV, looking down at the child. Whether this is an omniscient narrator or an adult POV character viewing that child doesn't make much of a difference, except one is more likely to be objective-ish and the other might be skewed, a subjective reflection of the adult's own mind and life experience.

 

[Naruzeldamaster]

That's a bit like asking, how do you write men, how do you write women, how do you write old people. Heck, how do you write people.

In the first place, you write them so they are believable *to you*. You are the First Editor. If a character sound off to you, then you have some revision to do.

I'm writing some 'teens' (15-19) in my RWBY story (fanfiction) and while their personalities aren't entirely believable, they're much more in line with the Canon characters of that age range. I think that's more important than making them believable for real teens that age. They are still written as people first regardless of age. But keeping to canon tone is also somewhat important to me.

Also in the first place (there's no second place), are you writing a human? This is a fantasy forum, after all. Are we to make all orc children like all human children like all elf children?

In Hound and Fox, the Kitsune's physical 'clock' just stops aging at some point, and it can happen at any age. It's largely dependent on their personality. Said personality can either mature over time or stop maturing entirely. Again, depends on the person in question. Their current queen stopped 'aging' at the age of like 14 or so. She has some 'quirks' of someone her physical age, but is otherwise as wizened as someone 5K + years old.

For that matter, are we to make all human children like all human children? Why not treat them as individuals who are who they are because of their setting and history and their own story?

I suppose if I were writing a story set in modern times and culture, and it was going to be a YA story aimed squarely at the teen audience, then I suppose I'd have to be more concerned. I suppose I'd read a clutch of books that answered to that description (Percy Jackson and his ilk). Happily, I write pixies and sprites and humans and ogres and dwarves and elves, and they've all been grown-ups except for one.

What about a story set in Modern Culture with a bit of fantasy thrown in?

 

[Penpilot]

My approach, which applies to how I approach most characters, is don't look at them as a child character. Look at them as a character who happens to be a child. Start with who they are as a character, what their likes and dislikes are. What motivates them? Etc. Then take that and filter it through the eyes of their experience, less so their age. Because despite chronological age, some kids have seen some serious crap, while some adults have live very sheltered lives.

 

[dantheman93]

Yes...children could be broken down into age groups. For the most part, I think their thinking processes, and vocabularies, and even social understandings would be somewhat underdeveloped. And more so depending on age.

But...the precociousness, and word misuse and mispronunciation, and simple rosey way they view things very often feels forces, or less than genuine.

I ask this question, cause I wrote my child character ugly, meaning, I plan to go back and fix it later and add more of the childlike nature and less of the adult one. But...the world is rough, and its easy to become jaded. So, I wonder how much growing up too fast is too fast.

I also wonder at races that have different life spans. If a race is known to age quicker, does the sped up process make up for the lake of world knowledge that would come with years spend on it. Could an Orc, who might become a mature adult at 12, have the perspective of an 18 yr old, and gain it at a quicker rate? Or does it serve to keep them kind of lower scale of mind.

I have more children coming up, but I feel I have not captured the right feel for them yet. They really don't have time to be children, but one cannot escape that some phases must be passed through.

Sadly, life it too busy ATM to really formulate thoughts on it. I'll just see what others can offer.

Super interesting. On the flip side, yeah, how literal do you need to go when you’re storytelling through different races of creatures. From a realistic lens, that would probably impact how they talk and act. I do kind of think it’s funny - I know this started asking about children, but sort of like you were saying, I think the same question can be asked for fantasy characters that are hundreds of years old. Like, I really don’t feel like this centuries year old ruler is going to have the same speech and motivations of this younger, teenager character, yet they often do which is funny to me. I’m like, I feel like one of you would have wayy different slang and speech patterns than this is letting on .