by Ellen Buikema

 
A character's impact on the plot involves all their traits. It's important to understand how their background, personality, flaws, and strengths influence the plot and move the story forward.

This time, I’m covering how characters’ hobbies and interests affect the narrative.

Develop well-rounded characters

People in our world have hobbies and interests, as should our characters. Some enjoy the extreme end like bungee jumping, aerial silk gymnastics, surfing on boards upon the waves, or sails for land surfing on the desert floor. Others prefer more laid-back activities like gardening, reading, playing a musical instrument, going to the movies, or painting. Although, I have witnessed people painting via swing, and playing something akin to musical chairs on a piano bench, so maybe that’s something in between.

Gifting your character with hobbies like these gives insight into the kind of person that character is. To make them relatable and believable, consider hobbies/interests that mirror personality traits in your characters, making them behave the way they do.

Making a protagonist or antagonist overly endowed with skills, unless they are superheroes or supervillains, might make those characters unrealistic. Who wants a perfect person, for the good or for the bad? Not me. And readers likely agree. Show characters failing while attempting to try mastering a hobby. This shows they are just like anyone else. Becoming good at anything, including hobbies, takes time.

Create character relationships

Having a hobby can be a great way to meet new people. In a story, characters having mutual interests is an excellent way to introduce characters to each other or kindle relationships, friends and otherwise. The choice of hobby/interest can be important to the kind of relationship between characters.

Consider:

• Two people meeting at a contemporary arts museum. What that might say about who they are?
• People locking eyes from across the science lab. Are they interested in each other? Or preparing to cause mayhem?
• A small group of people getting ready to jump from an airplane with one member of the group frozen in fear. Who will help that frightened person out?

These are a few ways to bring like-minded characters together, and give the reader immediate insight into what these characters may be like.

Use of negative/antisocial hobbies

A hobby can be a problem if it has negative consequences. These hobbies are not just for antagonists. Any of the following can be used as problems protagonists must overcome to achieve their goals.

For example:

Emotional pain: Purposely causing stress in others.

• Playing characters against each other.
• Guilt tripping.
• Purposefully ignoring.

Extrinsic motivation: Characters participating in hobbies at which they excel for external rewards like:

• Money.
• Popularity.
• Praise.

Financial strain: Spending money on the hobby and therefore unable to afford basic needs.

• Shopping addiction.
• Drug addiction.
• Gambling addiction.

Illegal activities: Participating in illegal activities for the rush.

• Cybercrime.
• Antiquity theft.
• Smuggling.

Influence the setting

Hobbies happen somewhere. Hence the setting. Some hobbies can be set anywhere, anytime, like reading as it is portable.

Other hobbies dictate the setting, such as surfing where you find the characters in Hawaii, Fiji, or perhaps off the Australian coast. As writers, we can use hobbies as a reason to put characters in specific settings where we want a particular scene or story to take place.

Travel is a flexible interest that allows writers to introduce their characters to new people, places, and experiences. For instance, Jules Verne’s novel,  Around the World in Eighty Days, and J.R.R. Tolkien’s, The Hobbit.

Move the plot forward

Hobbies don’t necessarily need to move the plot forward—only mentioned in passing—but can be great tools to help the story along.

For example:

A hobby/interest may help determine how characters solve obstacles in their path. A swimming teacher may be able to help a person with deep fears—water and as well as her abusive husband. In teaching the woman to swim, she unwittingly helps the character escape an abusive marriage. The woman fakes her death. The abusive spouse assumes his wife, terrified of the water, had drown.

In this case a secondary character’s interest, love of the water, assists the protagonist’s interest in escaping her tormentor, which occurs in Nancy J. Price’s Sleeping with the Enemy.

J.K. Rowling included the hobby of card collecting, which Harry Potter and Ron Weasley do in the Harry Potter series. That hobby allowed her to add information to the stories as needed.

Harry along with friends Ron and Hermione Granger learn that an important item recently arrived at the school for safekeeping and there had been attempts to steal it. They discovered that the hidden object involved both Albus Dumbledore and Nicolas Flamel, both wizards.

Soon after the Christmas holidays end, friend Neville Longbottom gives Harry one of the Famous Wizards cards for his collection. It’s the Dumbledore card, which mentions his connection to Nicolas Flamel. Hermione researches Flamel, and determines that the Philosopher’s Stone is likely the item hidden at the school.

Harry and Ron’s card collecting hobby lets the characters make this intellectual leap.

Here are some helpful links for character hobbies:

One from Robin Piree 101+ Hobbies For Characters To Create Interesting Characters
Plus a PDF of Character Hobbies and Skills Brainstorming from Jill Williamson

Do you give your characters hobbies? What have you read that uses hobbies/interests to enhance the narrative?

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About Ellen

Author, speaker, and former teacher, Ellen L. Buikema has written non-fiction for parents, and The Adventures of Charlie Chameleon chapter book series with stories encouraging the development of empathy—sprinkling humor wherever possible. Her Works in Progress are The Hobo Code, YA historical fiction and The Crystal Key, MG Magical Realism/ Sci-Fi, a glaze of time travel.

Find her at https://ellenbuikema.com or on Amazon.

Image by Gipfelsturm69 from Pixabay