Do you see yourself in your characters?

[MeltingCORE]

Oh yes, most of my characters have pieces of myself and people I know reflected in them. I think that's pretty normal! My two main characters are kind of dueling sides of myself. One is the logical side who does care for people while the other has trouble expressing their emotions at times which can become pooling rage. (And yes, I'm ok! These two characters are more reflections of my younger self.)

Red Shift | Tapas

(Here they are together! This an art piece I did for ch.16)

[Pony_wearing_a_hat]

Oh, my god YES! all my characters are essentially aspects of myself expanded upon and exaggerated. In my novel right now, Eryn is my inner monologue personified, Rose acts exactly like I did when I was little, John is essentially of all my anxiety and worrying re-targeted and made human (Sorry John!) And Madge... well, I don't really know actually. She came to me in a dream, (yes, really) and I've heard that everyone in your dream is you so... Out of all of them she does share the most of my interests and idiosyncrasies, and she tends to go back and forth between who I am on my best and worst days.

[gabriellabalagna]

I purposely made my main character a guy (I'm female) to avoid writing a Mary Sue/self insert.

Still, in order to write likable characters, you have to have to make them relatable. So I just try to put different parts of myself into each character, and make sure they each have a different dominant personality.

[CursedBeasts]

I have 3 characters I kinda put the most of myself into:

Styrak, a canon character from SWTOR who doesn't have a lot of development (so i gave him some), on whom I project a lot of my personality and also my ASD. He's also Bestia's husband.

Heskal, also canon character from the same game, he gets my struggle with the concept of fate and destiny and choice.

And Rowan, an OC that I made for Skyrim. He's kinda, what I'd like to be as he is far kinder than I will ever be.

[Caro]

I think I put a lot of myself in certain characters but not really in any way that most people who know me would be able to recognize.

For me my characters tend to have shades of different attributes I have (usually completely exaggerated for effect) or have traits that I wish I had.

One of my sillier comics (and probably the best example of a reflection of myself in my work) sees a main character who is an art school graduate who stresses out about her inability to get work in her chosen field, has low self-esteem, and no friends. (Kind of me except that I never graduated from anywhere and I was actually working in my chosen field when I was getting paid to draw this particular comic but it reflected my feelings at an earlier time of my life).

And then after she wishes for her pet cat to hang out with her and act as her friend and the cat becomes anthropomorphized she’s somewhat disappointed when her former-cat-turned-cat-boy-roommate excels in all of the things she can’t without even trying because he’s unburdened by the constraints of human convention. He wears all her cute clothes and gets compliments whereas she gets ignored, he goes to one art class with her and he draws more convincingly without trying, he’s not afraid of talking to people or looking silly so he makes friends easily. This cat character was based on the things I wish I were able to do.

[AmeGINGA]

I personally think there is a bit of me in my main characters, even though they don't "think" like me, or act like either. I think it so impressive the authors who can create beings completely different of them, but despite everything that they succeed to transpose their message through them.

[Prometheus]

I think it's common to write yourself into your characters. i don't think all people do it, but I think a lot of us do to varying degrees. For me, writing stories is kind of a coping mechanism and way to find and understand myself, so a lot of the struggles that my characters go through, I go through.

[Macarenaoftime]

[VApowers]

I see myself in my characters, typically in the way they deal with waves of bad news and crises. Sometimes laugh, sometimes cry. Either way they face it

Avalon Springs 28387 | Tapas

[VibrantFox]

there's a tiny gem shard of a fragment of myself in all the little miscreants so to an extent yes

[BrambleberrySquirrel]

I’d say about half my characters are elaborations or exaggerations of different parts of my personality. Finn from my comic is basically just me though with some of the things I put into Ember taken out. Finn is basically me if I never felt depressed or burned out.

If you want to check out my work nd get to know these characters better you can find it here.

Cup & Quill | Tapas

[Kann]

A tiny bit in most of them.

[jgreene2433]

Absolutely. I'm not 100% my main character(because I would probably be hunted with torches and pitchforks if I were, lol.) But another of my main characters world view comes from thoughts I've held or situations I've experienced. I find writing this way can at times be cathartic.

[Phantomlight]

I put bits and pieces of myself in each of my characters I would say, but none of them are completely me. But you can guarantee that any of them that are crazy about food or like food quite of bit, hooo boy, that's definitely a part of me.

[chiptunemacaroon]

Hm.... Perhaps it's a bit embarrassing but all my characters are somewhat self inserts? Haha. None of them are egregious, but their personalities and life experiences certainly branched off from my own, at least in the beginning. Eventually they morphed into their own independent people, but they still feel like very personal looks into my own self. My two main characters, Violet and Finn, were the most like me when they were made (Finn specifically how I was in middle school and Violet how I was at the time of her creation- 16- though now that I'm 20 the parallels aren't as strong!). I actually don't mind the fact that we're similar! My creations are only the sum of my own experiences, after all. I think it makes them more unique and have more of a personal touch to be given a piece of my own outlook and personality.

[Red_Fran]

I basically put all my insecurities in my main character and used it as therapy lol.