Developing a character can be... complicated. Especially when that character is the hero of your story. On one level, I wanted my main character, Bran, to be a classical hero, not an anti-hero, which seems to be the popular trend right now. At the same time, I couldn’t allow him to be a stereotypical flawless hero, like some character off an old melodrama. He had to have some grit to him.
In the original draft of Legend of the Sword Bearer, Bran was more of a reluctant hero. When he first came to learn about magic, he refused to believe it. He didn’t want to go questing, or anything like that. Then I realized he was behaving like a stubborn, cowardly, jack-wagon that no one would like, including me. So that version went into the round file, and I started again. He needed to have some kind of tragedy in his life in order to be more well-rounded. This next draft, Bran’s father has died in Afghanistan years prior to the beginning of the story. This is why he never appears in the story. This is also why Bran lives with his aunt in West Country instead of Scotland where he grew up. Still, he seemed to have few flaws. I gave him a temper and a rashness which get him in trouble a lot. He also has some issues taking instructions. I think all authors put a bit of themselves into every character that they create; Bran has a bit more of me in him than I’d care to admit. One issue I find with a lot of contemporary fantasy heroes is that they seem to instantly know how to handle weapons like swords and bows without ever having trained with them. I didn’t want that to be Bran. Bran has trained with several types of weapons, including swords. He was trained by his father and has competed in several medieval martial arts tournaments. When he picks up a blade, he knows exactly what he’s doing. They wouldn’t give King Arthur’s sword to just anyone, after all. Bran needed to have both the character traits and the skills necessary to wield it.
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AuthorI'm Ian Wilson; an eccentric comic artist, just telling a story.
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June 2021
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