Self-insert Characters and Wish Fulfillment Plots
...and why I love them.
Self-Inserts
The self-insert character is exactly what it sounds like; rather than creating a brand new fictional person, the author very simply imagines themselves in a fictional situation and writes from that perspective.
Within the writing community there is often disdain for the self-insert character. It is juvenile, basic, unimaginative.
But if a writer writes themselves, and you don’t know them personally, how could you tell? And if a writer invents a character, isn’t it still, by necessity, birthed from themself? Isn’t a more “creative” character just a caricature or an extrapolation of one of the writer’s own qualities, and therefore a reflection of themself warped by a different lens?
Character creation is a whole skill in itself. Neil Gaiman suggests giving each character a “funny hat” to make it easy for the reader to tell the differences between them. When I was in high school, every character sheet I referenced insisted that the character should have some kind of visible scar with an interesting backstory.
Nowadays, I prefer Holly Lisle’s method of character creation.
1. What she has experienced
2. What she THINKS she’s learned from this
3. Actions she’s taken based on what she THINKS she knows
4. The TRUTH behind what she thinks she knows
Even that is not a one-size fits all character creation method, and often I don’t put that much thought at all into my characters, or I loosely base them off of someone I know and then tweak them in significant or insignificant ways, or any number of things.
My point is, Character Creation is a whole skill in itself, and it is not necessary yet for the Beginner Writer. The Beginner Writer, remember, should first be focused on writing a complete story with a Beginning, Middle, and End.
The self-insert character is a shortcut. What better way to write a fully rounded character than by using yourself? There’s no-one else you know better! And, if you’re honest with yourself (which you must be, to be a good writer), by writing a self-insert character you will have someone with both qualities and flaws, someone who is consistent in their reactions to situations and in the way they speak.
The self-insert character is a shortcut, and that is okay. If we’re being honest about it, you can change their hair color or their gender and nobody will even notice the difference. And if we’re being really honest about it, all good, creative, authentic characters are self-inserts because authenticity is the key to great writing.
Wish Fulfillment Plots
Wish Fulfillment plots are perhaps even more self-explanatory than the self-insert character. A few examples of this are Twilight, or any harem story ever. And like the self-insert character, it is disdained by the writing community as a whole. It is far more respectable to have a deeper, darker, more creative plot than that.
But for the Beginner Writer, again, the goal is a complete story, and it is easier to write a story that is fun to write, and a simple way to make a story fun to write is to give it a wish fulfillment plot. Create a world you would like to live in, and go play.
Which, when you think about it that way, is advice given to Intermediate Writers as well. If you want people to enjoy your story, it must be a story you enjoy. If you want people to want to live in the world you create, it must be a world you enjoy living in.
I have less to say about this topic because a lot of it feels the same as the self-insert characters, and also because in general it feels self-evident. All of these complaints fall away when you focus back on the goal: tell a complete story. Shortcuts are okay, having fun is really ok, and if you’re enjoying what you’re writing then you increase the chances of a reader enjoying it as well.
Write with joy.
