Modeling Characters on Real People

I don’t usually model my characters on real people. The protagonist’s mother in Desert Jewels had some of my mother’s personality, but the two women are more different than similar. However, I’m currently working on the second draft of a story about the sinking of the Andrea Doria, and the father is a lot like mine.

It can be dangerous to model characters on real people, and next week’s post will discuss those dangers. With Daddy, however, I have no concerns. He would probably be flattered and find the humor in my description of his quirks. Still, I might have asked for his permission if he were still alive. But you can’t libel the dead.

My novel starts with the protagonist’s father almost missing the boat to America because he is looking for a mailbox. As far as I know, Daddy never cut any of our trans-Atlantic crossings that close, but Mama and I had near heart attacks several times when he almost missed a train in Europe. Usually he was taking one last picture, although looking for a mailbox wouldn’t have been out of character.

On one occasion, Mama, my brothers and I, and the luggage were on the train but Daddy wasn’t. Mama thought about getting off but decided to wait for him at our destination (or maybe the border). It was a good thing she did, because the train had barely gotten under way when Daddy came strolling down the aisle totally unconcerned.

Back in those days, she couldn’t have gotten very far without him, anyway. We had a single, family passport between us, and every European country had its own border.¹ Since Daddy carried the passport, we could not have gone very far without him.

My protagonist’s father is also very careful with his money. He won’t pay for movies when library books are free. On the ship, however, where they are part of the fare, he jokes that he would be losing money if the children didn’t go to the movies. Again, that was very like Daddy.

Sometimes using personal experiences and a real person’s character quirks can add color to a story. As next week’s post reminds us, however, be careful how you use them.

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¹ The picture at the top of this post is our family passport photo from our trip to Scotland in 1961. I would not normally have sat on Daddy’s lap at that age, but it was probably done to get all five of us in one picture.