Setting Exercise 2 - Creating a Character Through Setting

Individuals are what they buy, own, eat, wear, collect, read, and create; and they are what they do for a living. Details can indicate the circumstances of a character – success or lack of success, social status, habits, emotions, personality, intelligence, character, and outlook on life.

Create a setting for three of the following “absentee dwellers” and furnish a place with his or her character – you create the character through observation of the setting. The place can be any kind of locale – a house, a specific room in a house, outdoor grounds, an office, a cell, even a bed. The description must incorporate enough characteristic things so that the reader can visualize the absentee dweller accurately. Try to avoid stereotypes.

• An unsuccessful painter
• A former movie star who still thinks she’s famous
• A high school senior about to flunk out
• A cocktail waitress down on her luck
• A blind person
• A paraplegic
• A member of a lunatic fringe group
• A foster child
• A fugitive from the law
• A social climber
• A paranoid person
• A supermarket checkout woman who just won the state lottery