#Great Trinity Experiment: Trinity Students Fascinated by Fictional Writing

A student imagines characters for an exercise
 during the creative writing mini course.  
Photo by Robert Smith

By Robert Smith

Creating fictional characters, turns out, has a lot to do with understanding real people, as attendees of a Great Trinity Experiment course learned on Thursday.

The course, Building Believable Characters in Creative Writing, was designed and taught by two Trinity alum, William M. Razavi (’95) and Jack Bonner (’02).

Though many English and creative writing students, as well as a few alumni, were in attendance, the talk focused on more than just literature.

“Fictional characters, like real people, may often not know what they’re doing. And just like people, they are capable of lying,” said Razavi. “People behave differently in various social contexts. Be it with parents or with friends, for instance. Some are great at deciding which part of themselves to put forward, others not so much. That is where we create drama.”

Just like real people, fictional characters may not know what they’re doing in a situation. A very small interaction can reveal a lot; their flaws enable the audience to relate and empathize. The writers must first know themselves and be able to realize their own flaws. They must also know how others behave in order to observe that character in context, the speakers told about 30 people in the packed classroom.

To stimulate the imagination, students were tasked to visualize the feelings of inanimate objects. “Vanilla ice cream likes giving oral pleasure. It's sweet and pleases the tongue,” said junior Evan Kelly during this activity. Such comparisons make it easier to establish character traits.

Born in Tehran, Iran, Razavi has been a playwright, actor, and director in addition to being a Classical Studies professor at Trinity. Bonner is the chair of the English Department and a rock band instructor at Antonian College Preparatory High School in San Antonio.

Razavi had this advice for aspiring writers, “Just write. Write though the psychological processes we’ve got in our system. The more you write, the better your writing will become.”

Though many bright and eager Trinity students attended this session in order to get better at fictional writing, Bonner saw the future of fiction taking an alternative path.

“I see something like shorter stories, maybe using something like twitter,” he said. “There will be some great social media novel. It may not be a book as we know it but someone’s gonna use it for a sort of narrative purpose.”

Trinity sophomore Haley Smith had debated whether to come to this course or another Great Trinity Experiment course on drumming. “I write plays for fun; it’s like creating your own little fantasy world,” she said. “This course seemed like a good opportunity to improve my writing.”

Correction: Mr. William M. Razavi is a staff member in the Department of Classical Studies, not a professor as stated in the story.