creative writing description of girl

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How to Describe a Girl

Last Updated: January 11, 2024 References

This article was co-authored by Kate Dreyfus and by wikiHow staff writer, Megaera Lorenz, PhD . Kate Dreyfus is a dedicated Holistic Love Coach, Holistic Empowerment Coach, Heart-Centered Expert, Intuitive Healer, Workshop Facilitator, and Owner of Evolve & Empower. She has more than ten years of experience supporting her clients successfully entering exclusive, romantic relationships within the USA, the United Kingdom, Canada, and Europe. Kate is devoted to helping others through personal growth and transformation, success in dating and romance, and healing and rebuilding after a breakup. She is also a member of The Biofield Institute, the Healing Touch Professional Association, and the Energy Medicine Professional Association. Kate holds a BA in Psychology from San Francisco State University. There are 9 references cited in this article, which can be found at the bottom of the page. This article has been viewed 130,670 times.

There are many circumstances where you might find yourself needing to describe a girl. Maybe she's a character in a story you're writing, or perhaps you're just trying to tell a friend about someone you met. Whatever the reason, the most obvious place to start is with a description of her physical appearance . If you want to really capture who she is, you can also describe her personality and mannerisms. If you're describing a girl in a creative writing context , choose words that will captivate your reader without swamping them with detail.

Discussing Her Physical Appearance

• Think of the most general description you might start with if you had to describe a suspect to the police, or the types of physical information that you might find on a driver's license.
• For example, your first impression might be that the girl is Caucasian, in her mid-teens, tall, and husky.

• For example, you could say, “She has thick, naturally curly hair that hangs a little bit below her shoulders. It's dark brown with a few caramel-colored highlights.”
• If she has a striking hairstyle or a distinctive dye job, make sure to point that out. For example, “Her hair is cut short and styled into a faux hawk. It's dyed cotton candy blue at the tips.”

• The eyes are one of the most identifiable features of a person's face, so make sure to describe them. Focus on things like their color and shape. For example, “Her eyes are almond-shaped and very dark brown.”
• When describing her whole face, you might say something like, “She has a wide, round face with a pointed chin. Her eyes are big and greyish-green, with dark eyelashes. Her nose is short and a little turned up at the end.”

• You might also make note of other obvious skin features, like freckles or rosy cheeks.
• For example, you could say, “She has fair skin with a few freckles on her nose,” or “Her skin is golden-brown with a subtle rosy glow around her cheeks.”

• You can also describe her posture—for example, does she slouch, or stand tall? [3] X Research source
• For example, you might say, “She's tall and lanky, but she has a slouch that makes her look shorter than she is.”

• You can also mention things like jewelry, accessories, and glasses. For example, “She always wears a pair of simple gold hoop earrings.”

• For example, you might say, “She has a chipped front tooth and a beauty mark next to her nose on the right side.”

• Depending on the context, it might not be appropriate to use these kinds of judgmental or subjective descriptions. If you're describing a real person, be sensitive to how she might feel if she heard or read your description.

Talking about Her Personality and Mannerisms

• For example, you might say, “Sarah is kind of shy at first, but she opens up a lot once you get to know her. She's very smart and has a wicked sense of humor.”

• For example, “Florence loves writing, and she wants to be a published author someday. She's very passionate about social justice issues.”

• You can also talk about the sound of her voice. Is it high and childish, or deep and mature-sounding? Mellow, or harsh?
• For example, you could say, “She has a quiet voice and speaks in a very level tone. Her speech is slow and deliberate, and she always takes a moment to think about what she wants to say before talking.”

• Describe how she uses her hands when she is speaking. Does she gesture a lot, or does she usually sit still with her hands in her lap?
• Discuss whether her stance tends to be open and confident (arms at her sides, head up) or closed off and defensive (arms folded in front of her chest, gaze down or off to the side).
• Talk about her facial expressions. Does she smile a lot and make eye contact? Is she more likely to frown or have a blank expression?
• You could say something like, “She's very animated. Her hands are always in motion when she's talking.”

• For example, maybe she chews her fingernails or twirls her hair around her fingers when she's talking to someone.
• Maybe she clears her throat a lot or uses certain phrases all the time (e.g., starting every other sentence with “Yeah, so, anyway . . .”).

Describing a Girl in Creative Writing

• For example, “She was a young girl, no more than 15, with a narrow face and dark, fierce eyes. She was all straight lines and hard angles except for her cloud of downy brown hair.”
• Don't linger over the minute details of her hairstyle, clothing, and physical dimensions unless they are directly relevant to what is happening in the moment you are describing. Just sketch out the basics.

• For example, instead of saying “She had really pale blue eyes,” try something like “Her eyes were the color of sea foam.”
• Instead of saying “Her hair was long and light brown,” try “Her hair cascaded down her back like a honey-colored waterfall.”

• For example, instead of saying “Lily thought everything was funny,” try something like: “Lily had dissolved into helpless giggles again. It didn't take much to set her off. She once laughed through an entire algebra lecture after the professor sneezed while explaining how to find the slope of a line.”

• For example, “Her voice was like warm molasses poured over fluffy brown sugar.”

• Instead of saying, “She had long, black hair that she wore in a ponytail,” try something like: “'Let's go,' she said, quickly pulling her black hair into a ponytail that swept her shoulder blades as she walked.”

Expert Q&A

You Might Also Like

• ↑ http://www.well-storied.com/blog/the-ultimate-guide-to-nailing-your-characters-appearance
• ↑ https://writersinthestormblog.com/2014/07/writing-about-hair-the-thick-and-thin-of-descriptions/
• ↑ https://writeshop.com/how-to-describe-a-person-descriptive-words/
• ↑ https://www.writersdigest.com/write-better-fiction/11-secrets-to-writing-effective-character-description
• ↑ https://www.fluentu.com/blog/english/describing-people-in-english/
• ↑ Kate Dreyfus. Holistic Love Coach & Intuitive Healer. Expert Interview. 10 September 2021.
• ↑ https://www.helpguide.org/articles/relationships-communication-articles/nonverbal-communication.htm
• ↑ http://www.wright.edu/~david.wilson/eng3830/creativewriting101.pdf
• ↑ https://www.carvezine.com/from-the-editor/10-tips-for-writing-physical-descriptions-of-your-characters.html

About This Article

To describe a girl, start with the things you notice about her appearance when you look at her. For example, you might say that the girl is in her mid-teens, caucasian, and tall. You could also note what her hair is like, such as long and blonde, or dark and curly. When you’re describing her facial features, focus on the features that make her unique, like her almond-shaped, dark brown eyes, or her short nose. Once you’ve talked about her face, tell the other person about her body shape and dress, like by saying, “She is lanky and often wears dresses.” Along with detailing the girl’s physical appearance, describe her main personality traits, like shy, a good sense of humor, or soft-spoken. If you want to give more detail about her character, mention her interests, such as writing or social justice issues. For tips on how to describe a girl in creative writing, keep reading! Did this summary help you? Yes No

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How to Describe a Beautiful Woman in a Story

By Isobel Coughlan

Is a female character in your book particularly good-looking ? Do you need some tips to help you write this person? Check out the post on how to describe a beautiful woman in a story!

1. Alluring

Something or someone very attractive .

“The beautiful woman was alluring . Everywhere she went, eyes followed.”

“He watched the alluring woman as she walked through the room. Her beauty was hard to ignore.”

How it Adds Description

“Alluring” emphasizes the extent of your fictional woman’s beauty and implies that other characters are fascinated by it. You can use “alluring” to show how her beauty catches people’s attention, and the woman could use this to her advantage. If another character describes her beauty as “alluring,” it could hint that they want to get to know her more or find her very attractive.

2. Stunning

Somebody extremely impressive or beautiful .

“The woman was simply stunning . No one could deny her features were carved by angels.”

“The stunning woman always received invitations from model scouts, but she wasn’t interested in that career.”

“Stunning” is another great way to elevate your woman’s beauty. However, this word shows her beauty is universally agreed upon and not linked to being attracted to her. Other characters may be jealous of her “stunning” looks, as these could grant her special opportunities and better treatment from others.

3. Arrogant

Someone who believes they’re more important than others and behaves in an unpleasant way.

“The beautiful woman was nice to look at, but she was too arrogant to talk to. No wonder she had no friends.”

“The arrogant woman used her beauty to get what she wanted. However, many of her peers saw through this act.”

Sometimes, a character with beautiful looks is aware of it and uses it to their advantage, thus making them “arrogant.” If your woman is “arrogant,” she likely has few friends and annoys other people very quickly. Other characters might avoid the “arrogant” woman altogether.

4. Compassionate

Someone who shows understanding and sympathy for others.

“The beautiful woman was compassionate , and this surprised many. It upset her that people assumed she was conceited.”

“The compassionate woman always cared for animals and children. Underneath her beauty was a heart of gold.”

If you want to give more insight into your beautiful woman’s personality, “compassionate” can show they’re a kind person. Some characters might be shocked to hear she’s “compassionate,” as often people assume attractive people are stuck-up.

5. Flawless

Someone that has no faults and is extremely good.

“The team was stumped by the beautiful woman. She was absolutely flawless .”

“She’d never seen such a flawless woman. Until this point, she believed such beauty only existed on TV.”

“Flawless” is an excellent way to reinforce the perfection of your woman’s beauty. Other characters may find her “flawless” beauty amazing, and this could attract lots of attention to her. Alternatively, some characters may be jealous of her looks and act out towards her.

6. Confident

Someone who is sure of their own ideas, qualities, and ideas.

“The beautiful woman was confident , no doubt about it. You could tell she knew her effect on others as she walked through the door.”

“He glanced across the platform and saw a beautiful woman. She was confident and waved back at him.”

If your character is bold or self-assured, “confidence” is an apt word to describe them. Her “confidence” could make her a friendly character, as she’s not scared to talk to new people. This could make her a great leader, and other characters could look up to her for advice or guidance.

7. Captivating

Someone or something that attracts or fascinates others.

“He lay in bed thinking about the captivating woman. Her beauty was driving him crazy, and he needed to see her again.”

“The captivating woman found her beauty frustrating. She just wanted to blend in, but she couldn’t help but draw attention from others.”

“Captivating” shows the effect of the fictional woman’s beauty on others. This means her good looks are unforgettable, and many find them difficult to ignore. She could either love this attention or find it extremely troubling. Other characters may even start stalking her, as her “captivating” looks are hard to ignore.

8. Extraordinary

Something or somebody with extremely special qualities or looks.

“She knew she looked extraordinary , and she basked in the attention. Usually, it made her uncomfortable, but tonight she’d embrace it.”

“The extraordinary woman appeared in her dreams again. Her beauty was unbelievable.”

“Extraordinary” implies that the woman’s beauty is extremely good, which might often make her the most beautiful woman in the room. Other characters may find this intriguing, and it might make her more memorable to others.

Someone who isn’t proud and doesn’t believe they’re better than others.

“The humble woman quietly ate her lunch. She didn’t notice everyone else in the room staring at her beauty.”

“Every time someone complimented her on her beauty, she blushed. In that respect, she was a humble person.”

If you want to show that your beautiful woman doesn’t believe she’s better than others, “humble” is a great word to use. This implies her personality is not affected by her attractiveness, and it might make her popular with others, too. If another describes her as “humble,” they might be impressed with her normal attitude.

10. Conventional

Someone whose opinions and behavior are normal and ordinary.

“Her beauty didn’t affect her politics. She was as conventional as can be.”

“Everyone was surprised at how conventional she was. They’d been blindsided by her impossible beauty, and many were disappointed after meeting her.”

“Conventional” shows that your beautiful woman doesn’t have any radical ideas or behaviors. Other characters might find this disappointing, as they may expect her personality to be unique, like her looks. Being “conventional” could also help the beautiful woman avoid conflicts, as she doesn’t take a polarizing stance.

How to Describe Women Without Degrading Them

The Expanse's Avasarala is too busy looking fabulous for any sexist nonsense.

There’s been a lot of talk lately about the sexist ways women are described in fiction. Given the normalization of the male gaze, this has left some men feeling unsure of how to write a positive description. And it’s not just men who describe women in problematic ways. While women are less likely to objectify female characters, internalized misogyny can still sneak into our work. So let’s look at the cultural baggage that comes into play when we describe a woman’s appearance and how we can make our description women-friendly.

Pushing Back Against Cultural Pressure

The first thing to be aware of is simply that our culture obsesses over the appearance of women much more than it does men. This means that women are held to a higher standard when it comes to their looks, they are expected to invest more time and money into looking good, and the public feels entitled to scrutinize every detail of their appearances. In many places, a woman can’t even walk to the corner store for eggs without strangers commenting as though she’s on a runway and not on a personal errand.

Not only are women expected to look flawless, but they’re also expected to look that way without effort. Most women have to invest in their appearances to meet society’s expectations, but if they don’t hide their efforts, they could be labeled as vain, shallow, or manipulative. This creates a constant Catch-22, making it impossible for the vast majority of women to live up to cultural standards.

Avoid Over-Focusing on Women’s Appearance

To avoid reinforcing this pressure, first compare your description of women to your description of men:

• Are you spending more words on the appearance of women?
• Are women more likely to be described as attractive than men?
• Are some women described as repulsive while the less-attractive men are given more neutral description?

You’ll want to have more physical description the more important a character is. However, if you find that you’re spending more words per woman than per man because you have a slew of minor male characters and no women in similar roles, that’s a big problem that you’d better fix.

Her Appearance Should Reflect Her Effort

Instead of writing women who were born looking photoshopped, be realistic about the amount of effort that goes into a polished appearance.

Not all women put much effort into their looks, so not all female characters should either. But if a woman isn’t paying attention to her appearance, that should show with details like frizzy hair, chapped lips, ruddy skin, or wrinkled clothes . Maybe her hair is cropped short so she doesn’t have to comb or style it, or maybe she has a messy bun that’s actually a half-assed bun and not an artful display. Don’t present these things like they are a problem – women don’t need to look perfect, and some women focus their energy elsewhere. But also don’t use their lack of effort to make them seem special or better than other women, aka, “not like other girls.”

On the flip side, let some female protagonists invest in their appearances. A female character might wear cosmetics, spend some time with her hair in curlers, or hog the bathroom for an hour every morning. Don’t describe this as unattractive or a personal failing. On the contrary, the time she puts into her appearance should make her look good. After an hour in the bathroom, she might emerge with shiny curls, perfect-looking skin, long dark lashes, and a smooth, color-coordinated outfit.

Validate a Wide Variety of Looks

After that, it’s important to give women a wide variety of appearances and treat all of them as valid ways to be.

• Please include some women who are heavy, old, hairy, or have other traits outside the zone of conventional attractiveness. Present those things as neutral in value and just one trait of her appearance, not something that defines the way she looks.
• Don’t penalize women for being feminine . Wearing frills, lace, or pink doesn’t make a woman silly or frivolous. Similarly, rejecting those things doesn’t make her tough or practical; that is, unless she’s changing out of her lacy skirt for practical reasons, like she’s about to go hiking.
• Don’t force white standards of beauty on all women . The darkness or paleness of a woman’s skin should be described as a neutral trait. Let black women have natural hairstyles that are described as normal and professional. If you are writing about a woman of color with blue eyes, don’t single out her eyes as her most beautiful feature.

When working to counter cultural pressure, it’s critical to remember that reverse pressure is still pressure. For instance, if you say that women shouldn’t wear burkas because burkas are sexist, you’re only reinforcing the notion that other people get to decide what women wear. If you say that women should wear whatever they want, burkas or bikinis, now you’re actually removing pressure. The same goes for weight loss or anything women do to meet cultural expectations.

Focusing on the Person in the Body

When narration prioritizes the male gaze, women are presented like they’re on sale at a meat market. The attention goes to the size and shape of all of their body parts, and who they are as a person is ignored – bonus points if their bodies are compared to food or other consumables. This is what is commonly called “objectification,” and it’s what people have been criticizing in narration written by men.

Similarly, many of our stories stress that women must be beautiful, and they aren’t really beautiful unless they won the biological lottery. Women are all supposed to be that fairy-tale princess who is the youngest of three daughters and has lips as red as roses. This once again takes a woman’s personality and agency out of the equation, instead focusing on the inherent value she supposedly has.

Describe Her Persona

A good way to counter this is to focus on the personality your character has and how that’s expressed in a unique look.

• Does she love gardening? Maybe she has grass-stained overalls and tanned arms. Her hair is casually tied back so it’s out of the way.
• Is she artistic? Maybe she expresses her creativity with a carefully color-coordinated outfit with a patchwork skirt she sewed herself from fun patterned fabrics.
• Is she bad and broody? Maybe she wears a leather jacket with chains and black lipstick .

This doesn’t mean you can’t describe her body at all, but keep it general and neutral in value. Go ahead and say whether she’s young or old, but don’t present being young as attractive or being old as ugly. She might be tall or short, dark or pale, thin or heavy.

Use Style for Wish-Fulfillment

Even when women write for other women, it can be hard to escape cultural pressure. Often, wish-fulfillment for women includes a character who thinks of herself as ordinary looking, so she’s relatable, but is still described as attractive – particularly in the eyes of other people. That way, women can still have the wish-fulfillment of being beautiful. This pattern may feel good to some women in the short term, but it still reinforces the pressure to be naturally good-looking.

Instead, you can give women wish-fulfillment by outfitting them with some smashing styles. If your protagonists go to a formal event, describe all the nice things they are wearing. While lots of women like dresses, every woman has different tastes and style preferences. Some women in your story may prefer masculine clothing – make her look dashing in a top hat and tailcoat. While we’re at it, please include male and nonbinary protagonists in the fun.

In addition to clothing, hairstyles, makeup, and jewelry are all good things to highlight. If you’re a style newb, you can look up some pretty pictures online and google things like “types of skirts” so you know what terms to use. Many outlets also write about the fashion choices in popular TV shows, so that can be a great place to get inspiration for speculative-fiction outfits. When in doubt, give an outfit two to three colors total, and choose either gold or silver jewelry – not both. For fun, include embroidery or jewelry featuring symbols such as plants and animals.

You can also give characters wish-fulfillment clothing for situations outside of big social events, but keep things practical. Don’t make her trek overland in a long, delicate skirt . Instead, give her a finely woven cloak that helps her blend in and makes her look mysterious.

If you are going to use physical features to describe a woman as good-looking, I recommend focusing on her face. That’s where we show our thoughts and feelings, so a description of a face is less inherently objectifying than descriptions of other parts of her body. However, resist waxing poetic about her lips unless a kiss is imminent.

Including Sexy Attire in a Positive Way

The most contentious part of designing a woman’s appearance is whether or not she is wearing clothing that is tight or revealing. All too often, sexy clothing is clearly included to please men, and it feels objectifying to women. However, that doesn’t mean that women in stories should never wear sexy attire. Women are often stigmatized for wearing sexy clothing or otherwise taking control of their sexuality, and never showing fictional woman in sexy attire won’t fix that. If you’re reading this article through, considering the issues raised here, and are willing to follow a few guidelines, then I trust you to narrate a scene where a woman is wearing a sexy outfit.

Break the Madonna-Whore Binary

The first thing you need to know is that attractive women are generally sorted into two opposing stereotypes: the “Madonna” and the “whore.”

• The Madonna is virtuous, modest, and chaste. She is naturally beautiful, but she doesn’t know that she’s beautiful or make an effort to enhance her appearance. Female love interests are almost always Madonnas.
• The whore is vain, manipulative, and promiscuous. She uses sexy clothing and makeup to look more attractive to men. She knows that she’s sexy and uses it to her advantage. In stories, she’s used for objectifying eye candy and the occasional one-night stand with a male hero.

Both the Madonna and the whore are unrealistic caricatures. This may shock you, but most women wear fairly modest clothing in their daily lives and then choose to wear something revealing when they go to the beach or to a club. They actually change how sexy their clothing is depending on what’s appropriate in that situation. It’s mind blowing, I know.

However, our stories keep sorting women into these sexist categories. So when a fictional woman wears sexy clothing in situations where it doesn’t make sense or acts really seductive, that’s a big red flag. It means she was designed as a “whore” – a sexual object for men. This is what you need to avoid when you depict women in revealing clothing.

Besides showing regular women occasionally wear sexy attire in reasonable and realistic ways, it’s also critical not to associate sexy clothes with any kind of character flaw. In many stories, villainous women will wear sexier clothing than heroines will, or a female protagonist will start wearing sexy clothing as an indication that she’s morally compromised or acting out . As soon as she recovers, she’ll wear modest clothing again. These depictions support destructive Madonna-whore stereotypes.

She Should Always Be in Control of Her Appearance

The demonization of sexual women is often in conflict with society’s frequent desire to see women be sexy. This desire doesn’t always come from men. For women, occasionally dressing up in sexy clothing can be a fun fantasy. So our stories have concocted a gross way of making female protagonists sexy while maintaining their Madonna status: the sexy clothing is forced on them.

At its most benign, this trope might involve a hired stylist who picks out the sexy clothing for the protagonist, and she grumbles but wears it anyway. Worse, she might have to wear sexy clothing because she’s going undercover as a French maid or because a man has tricked her into putting something skimpy on. Sometimes it’s a full-on Return of the Jedi situation, where the protagonist is a sexy slave who’s forced to put on a gold bikini. Regardless, these stories take away a woman’s control over her body and then treat that like it’s no big deal.

This pattern – wherein women have to avoid the stigma of being voluntarily sexual, and therefore control is taken away from them to make them sexual – is what links slut-shaming to rape culture . So, suffice to say, I really, really don’t want you to do this.

Please note that describing women in scenes where they are dressing or bathing is just a slightly less gross way to accomplish the same toxic goal. Women are not trying to present their half-dressed selves to the world, so don’t make your narration into a Peeping Tom.

Keep It About Her, Not Spectators

A common misogynist stereotype is that women like to weaponize their appearances. Supposedly, every aspect of how a woman looks is carefully designed to manipulate others. Though in real life cleavage is often the unintentional result of a normal V-neck shirt and a chest size that’s big enough, many men will assume it’s a calculated gesture meant for them. This idea is then used to justify harassing women, and it furthers the harmful narrative that women are secretly in charge through social manipulation or that women use seduction to control men.

That’s why it’s important to frame a woman’s appearance as being about her and not about the effect it has on other people. This goes double when she’s wearing something sexy.

• A woman may wear a short dress because she knows it looks good and that makes her feel more confident, but don’t say she wears it to wrap men around her finger.
• She can be wearing skinny jeans because it’s the current fashion, not because walking down the sidewalk will get people’s attention.
• If she’s gotten into shape at the gym, she might celebrate that achievement by buying herself a new bikini that shows off her abs and wearing it out to the beach. But she shouldn’t get the bikini to show up a rival.

This doesn’t mean that women won’t ever use their appearances to make the right impression. But if a character’s doing that in your story, it should be because she’s headed into a high-pressure situation – like a job interview. Don’t treat her clothing like it gives her mind control.

If you’re writing from the point of view of a man nearby, you can say what she’s wearing and that she looks good in it, but don’t describe all her body parts or suggest that men have no choice but to stare. The idea that men can’t help themselves around women is used to justify sexual harassment and assault.

Our culture still has a long way to go in responsibly handling issues of appearance and attraction, and Hollywood is not helping. When in doubt, put lots of women in your story, make them all different, and let their appearance follow their personality.

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Comments on How to Describe Women Without Degrading Them

I think it’s also important to remember that a woman will not pay the same attention to her attire in every situation. Back home after a long day, she’ll most likely lose the bra for comfort and hang out in an old sweater and a pair of sweat pants or yoga pants. Not because the yoga pants are tight, but because they’re very comfortable to wear while you’re doing housework or hanging out on the couch with your dinner. Women generally do not hang out alone at home in lacy underwear and perfect makeup – that’s a male fantasy. Likewise, clothing for bed is usually not chosen for looks, but for comfort. Women also keep ‘period panties’ in their wardrobe – old and cheap panties they wear during their period, because it’s much less of a problem (and cheaper) if they get stained with blood and the stain doesn’t wash out.

On the other hand, a woman going out for a night will pay attention to her looks, will do a makeup as professionally as she can, will carefully choose all parts of her wardrobe and all accessoires to fit together, will colour-coordinate her appearance. A woman just going for a drink with friends, on the other hand, will not make as much of a fuss of it. It always depends where she expects to end up. A woman who goes out a lot in a more or less modern setting and has many formal dinners/parties to go to might have a ‘little black dress’ of sorts – the style depends on fashion and on how confident a woman feels about her body, but in a lot of formal situations, you can’t go wrong with a black dress going down mid-thigh to knee level as a woman. Black can be combined with every colour and, if it’s not patterned itself, every pattern, which means that one dress can be combined with many different types of shoes, purses, shawls, belts, etc. Since all of those are usually cheaper than a dress, that saves money. Likewise, a woman in business may have two or three business costumes in different, but complimenting colours, so she can switch out jackets and skirts or trousers during the week, creating a different ensemble every day. Generally speaking, black, grey, beige, and red or blue fit well with each other and can be freely combined. With white blouses underneath, you can walk around looking a little different, but always professional every day for relatively little money – especially if the cuts of your costumes are more on the classic side which never really goes out of style.

My female characters look and dress very differently. Jane Browne dresses comfy when she can get away with her ‘cargo pants and hoodie’ signature outfit, but she can very well dress up for a social gathering (or wear twin-sets and skirt as the ‘niece’ in one book). She’s aware of the way she dresses herself, because it’s part of her job. Every agent, no matter the gender, should know how they present themselves in a certain situation. Her alter-ego Jane Doe (from an alternate universe series I’m writing myself) prefers leather jacket, tight jeans, and heavy boots for her criminal work, but also knows how to dress up and change her looks for situations where that’s useful (such as conning someone). When going out, once she has gone nominally legal, she prefers an evening suit, since her girlfriend usually wears beautiful dresses. Edith Grand, a soldier/former mercenary who turns up in both series, is very tall and strong in build and usually dresses in uniforms, uniform parts, or similar clothing. She keeps her hair in an altered crew cut and usually doesn’t mind her looks too much – they’re not important for her work or her life. Gabrielle Munson dresses in male clothing, because she pretends to be a man. She wears dark suits, white shirts, a slouch hat, and always gloves, both to hide her not-quite-male hands and because her necromantic power sometimes bleeds into her hands and makes them feel icy cold. Maddie Dempsey, who has a male alter ego in the vigilante known as the Eye, dresses feminine as the girl reporter she is in her official life, but in a baggy suit (with a padded vest to look more male in build underneath) when out as the Eye.

Generally speaking, it pays off to think about what your female character is going to do in their clothing. If it’s more of a party or a formal affair, clothing will be more expensive and they’ll pay more attention to their looks. If it’s for travelling through the country side, clothing will be far more practical and made from fabrics which do not tear easily, they might forego makeup and will usually just gather their hair somewhat. If they’re working, their work will dictate what they wear or how they do their hair – from representative clothing and coiffed hair for a secretary to dungarees and a braid or bun for a mechanic.

Thank you for this article Chris, I think it is much needed!

As a not conventionally attractive woman myself, I’d like to add that having a gorgeous female protagonist often feels alienating to me, even if it was intended as wish fulfillment, as I have trouble identifying with that. I much prefer average-looking protagonists, but maybe that is just a personal preference.

I also think that we should try to get away from the notion that a love interest has to be beautiful (or instantly recognized as beautiful, as this is something I believe develops together with a positive relationship and attraction). Why not have one or two characteristics that are usually considered unattractive (such as a crooked nose, not-great teeth, large ears, whatever) described in a neutral tone, and not mattering at all in the developing romance?

“While we’re at it, please include male and nonbinary protagonists in the fun.” Yes please! I’d also like to see more male and nonbinary characters engaging in the examples of primping and showing off their bodies that you discussed how to describe respectfully.

Additionally, I’d also like to see more men depicted in the sorts of sexualised ways that more often get associated with women (though I don’t think I’d want that for nonbinary characters, since “sex object” is one of the few depictions that gender-ambiguous characters regularly get when they show up at all). Labyrinth is my go-to example for that sort of sexy depiction of male characters, though it does veer into the “sexy costume = villain” trope that you mentioned.

I’d recommend reading this tongue-in-cheek article where men are described as women in literature; https://www.themarysue.com/if-male-authors-described-men-like-women/

That was very entlighting, especially the faux-soical-engineering part. Some concerens about the woman i write and draw are gone – but i found some points to correct too.

I found it always easier to frist think of the personality and archtype of a character and base the cloth around that. I also tend to ask: “Do i belive a character would choose this clothing willingly? And why? When no: then don’t” – sometimes help avoid übersexy BS and other unpractical nonsense.

Hope this makes a little sense ^^’ Thanks a bunch :3

It definitely makes sense. Once your character is fleshed out, you know whether or not they’d wear something. And if they’d wear something in the situation in which you want them to wear it.

One thing I would like to see more is a disabled woman who is considered (and considers herself) beautiful. Preferably w/out fetishization or infantilization. And if possible, w/ enough self-confidence that she is not desperately GRATEFUL to anyone who considers her attractive. Nor should another character get “special points” for considering her attractive, as if that’s not normal

In the erotic graphic novel series “Omaha the Cat Dancer”, the sexually active Shelly Hine did not lose her sexuality or her interest in sex when she lost the use of her legs and started using a wheelchair.

More of that, please

And while we’re at it, can we have a cis character think a trans character is beautiful, w/out freaking out after learning that the beautiful character is trans?

Just to touch on your second point: for the last couple of years the long running webcomic Questionable Content (seriously long-running, it started in 2003 and is still going 4000+ pages later) started a romance between series original, average straight/cis guy Marten and more recent character Claire, who is trans. They gradually become friends, and when Claire eventually tells him that she’s trans (which is also when it’s revealed to the reader) he’s completely accepting of her. It’s not actually until after she tells him that he decides, y’know what, I really like this person and I want to be with her, and the fact that she’s trans is irrelevant to him.

QC is a super long run though, I think Claire first appears around strip #2000 or so, so be prepared for a slow build. Worth it though, IMO.

Not to say that we don’t need more depictions of both kinds of relationships and character building: we absolutely do. I just thought you’d like to know that there are some out there. :)

A good example that I remember of a disabled woman (or girl, given that the heroes in this series are kids) being considered attractive is Thorgil in The Sea Of Trolls, who loses the use of her hand in the sequel.

Also maybe Furiosa in Mad Max: Fury Road? She’s not sexualised or anything, and I don’t remember whether she became a love interest to Max, but a lot of fans certainly found her attractive.

A possible example of an attractive disabled woman could be Paulina in Charlotte Brontë’s “Villette”.

First, Paulina is really small. When she’s first introduced in the novel, she’s only six years old, but seems to be roughly toddler-sized. When she reappears in the plot, the MC Lucy sees “a poor child!” being trampled by panicking people who flee a fire. Turns out it’s Paulina, who’s now seventeen and as big as she’ll ever be.

Second, I thought as I read the novel that she’d probably be diagnosed with something neuropsychiatric if she had lived today. As a child, she clings VERY hard to a VERY small number of people, while indifferent to others. When she becomes super upset, her reaction is to lie face down on the floor, dead still and silent for hours on end. She also has a real savant memory. As an older teen, she’s more socially competent, but she still reacts very oddly and detached sometimes. Like literal minutes after being trampled by a panicking crowd, she calmly points to her arm and says her shoulder has been dislocated. Most people would be scared, crying etc. She’s not generally unemotional, though, since she pours affection over the few people she does feel attached to.

There’s more than one man who thinks she’s both funny and really beautiful, and she ends up marrying a man who the MC Lucy had a serious crush on (in the end, though, Lucy sincerely wishes them luck; she’s really fond of Paulina, who’s incredibly kind, even though she’s a bit odd). Paulina’s DAD, on the other hand, has SERIOUS difficulties realizing his girl is all grown up, and that men might be attracted to her. He says that surely no one can think her a beautiful woman; she’s just a funny little pixie. At one point he says he can’t believe she’s more than twelve years old, and an exaspirated Lucy goes “She’s not twelve, she’s grown up, even though she won’t get any taller!”

I really liked the Paulina character, she was so interesting.

Any advice on describing female love interests?

While they don’t have to be physically attractive, it often helps if they are and the (usually male) protagonist/narrator will be aware of that. On the other hand, it’s extremely easy to overdo. Especially if we are reminded of their sexy looks over and over again. Even disregarding sexist baggage, female readers shouldn’t suffer from the cringe I felt when reading Twilight’s repetitive and purple descriptions of Edward.

Still, having a male narrator get floored by an attractive female love interest without resorting to the male gaze isn’t easy.

Don’t make the attraction about the love interest’s looks. Make it her character or skills instead. Yes, she can be physically attractive, but if the male lead is in love with her because she’s so good with a sword or a great diplomat, the looks can be mentioned and then put aside, they won’t be pulled up over and over again. Assuming that the only reason to love someone is their looks is per se bad. Looks can get you interested, but if there’s nothing more to a person, there’s not going to be a long relationship in it.

I’m aware of this which is why I generally think that looks should only be described in the introduction scene.

I was just wondering if there are any traps to watch out for.

Honestly, I think that “having a male narrator get floored by an attractive female love interest” is the one time where the male gaze can actually be appropriate. If the woman is wearing sexy clothing and it’s a scenario where it seems natural to take in peoples’ appearances (a party, for example), then it doesn’t seem at all disrespectful to mention her beautiful figure and how great her clothes look on her. As long as you steer clear of sexist language, don’t focus on it for too long, and don’t mention it again outside of the first impression, then you’ll be fine.

They can notice her and notice she’s attractive and looks good in those clothes, but if their whole interest in her is based around how ‘hot’ she is, you’re not doing it right.

And, yes, stay away from sexist language, that’s always a good idea.

agreed with 99% of this. but one caveat here: “Not all women put much effort into their looks, so not all female characters should either. But if a woman isn’t paying attention to her appearance, that should show with details like frizzy hair, chapped lips, ruddy skin, or wrinkled clothes.” …that sounds somewhat extreme unless the character is either prone to frizzy hair, ruddy skin, etc. or REALLY not caring AT ALL. characters who spend ~5-10mins in front of the mirror won’t have the ELABORATE styles of those who spend a hour, but implying that any ‘style’ at all is “all or nothing” isn’t helpful either.

(particularly since jeans+t-shirt don’t show wrinkles even if they’ve been tossed on the floor overnight; many issues of frizzy hair are the result of uninformed choices in shampoo/condition or de-snarling methods not time invested per se; it takes maybe a few seconds to apply chapstick and chapped lips are uncomfortable to start with… etc.)

I just think it’s really important for us to get away from the idea of women looking perfect with no effort. If your protagonist only spends five minutes in front of the mirror but readers still see her skin looks good because she spends those five minutes putting on a bit of concealer, that’s all good, you’re still showing that putting in effort pays off.

And if she deliberately makes choices about her appearance so she doesn’t have to put in much effort, that’s good too, but that of course comes with compromises of its own. Women’s clothes generally have higher requirements for care because people expect women to put more effort in. So if she’s mostly limiting herself to t-shirts and jeans because she can throw them on the floor without consequence, that’s something in itself to note.

And I have to ask, if she’s not prone to frizzy hair, chapped lips, ruddy skin… then what natural imperfections does she have? It’s not that women who naturally look gorgeous don’t exist, but right now we have too many of them in our stories and that’s imposing unfair expectations on women.

…the only point I’m trying to make is that female characters shouldn’t always be harped on over their appearance, full stop. That was clearly the intent of the article, but that one section seemed a bit less clear on that point to me because of the emphasis on appearance-related detail, hence the comment.

in other words, the author doesn’t HAVE to make some huge deal out of the characters’ ‘imperfections’ just to avoid her being supernaturally gorgeous without effort. write that the character doesn’t put much emphasis on her appearance, and simply don’t have the narration/other characters fawning over how gorgeous she is for her supposed ‘natural beauty’ or whatever. she’s just average – legitimately average (like the majority of people) and it’s not worth commenting on beyond basic descriptions like “she had red/brown/blonde wavy/straight long/short hair worn loose/in a ponytail/a messy bun/a braid” etc. problem solved. No need to single out that her nose is ‘too big’ or she’s ‘too short’ or ‘not skinny enough’ or ‘looks too masculine’ or she has severely crooked teeth that some people react badly to, etc. – or even to state that she just isn’t seen as attractive WITHOUT having some obvious, specific ‘flaw’ or ‘imperfection’ (…perhaps a more common issue anyway?). Make ‘(un)attractiveness’ a non-issue, with no particular comment on it, because for such a character it IS a non-issue. that’s all.

(obviously, this doesn’t apply to a story where the intent is to explore the specific issue of appearance standards, but that’s by no means a necessary element for every plot. likewise if the character is attending a fancy-dress event.)

to be clear: if the character IS supposed to put a lot of effort into looking attractive to others, then yes: describing how that pays off in terms of people noting how attractive they are, is all fine and good. but if they don’t care, the narrative generally shouldn’t either and certainly shouldn’t penalize them for that by dwelling on each and every ‘imperfection’.

This should be the sequel article to another more important article that is just the words “DO NOT DESCRIBE THE BREASTS” because male authors… sure can be something…

Well that is pretty much what this article boils down to: https://mythcreants.com/blog/five-signs-your-narration-is-sexist/

lol I was thinking about The Magicians when I wrote this comment and its one of the books in the other article. Lev Grossman must be stopped.

Thought exercise, as a proof you don’t need to be a sexist.

“As she put on her favorite shirt, the fit was just too tight. Amber looked in the mirror. She was saddened that it would never again fit her as it once did. She was excited about getting some new clothes today, but knew this would be her last time wearing the only thing she had from the times her parents were healthy.”

I don’t need to describe anything beyond her thoughts, and why she’s sad about this shirt. The concept is that she’s “developing”, but I want the reader to focus on her mind.

In the very first draft of my first book, I did well already by the standards of this article with regards to the female MC and her female platonic friends and acquaintances. But BOY was the female love interest described in a horribly male-gazey way! Fortunately, I realized this myself and rewrote all of that before showing ANYONE ELSE the draft. That first draft is now deleted and gone forever, haha.

I remember a conversation I had many years back with other WLW, about “Inner Terrible Dudes”. Like, you’re with another woman, and suddenly you find yourself slipping into a really stupid male gender role with stupid macho behaviour, etc. (“Terrible” in a sense you could still laugh about in hindsight, I should add, so no one get the wrong picture… but, like, embarrassingly doing stuff just to prove how strong you are, stupid shit like that.) I definitely think only a minority of WLW suffer from Inner Terrible Dude, but alas, I’m one of them. Now I’ve been in a monogamous marriage with a man for ages, so it was a long time since Inner Terrible Dude raised his head in a dating scenario, but I think he came up again when I was writing a female love interest in my first ever novel…

I think it’s all good now, since a number of women have read later drafts or the final version and think the love interest is a good character… but I still cringe thinking about the first version!

Great article! Another thing I find ridiculous is just how many bad descriptions there are of women going “OMG, I’m so pretty/gorgeous/sexy” followed by describing how hot their bodies are, it’s basically a parody of Narcissus falling in love with his own mirror image, except it’s not portrayed as a sad curse but something totally normal for women to do.

Hi my name is Ebony Dark’ness Dementia Raven Way and I have long ebony black hair (that’s how I got my name) with purple streaks and red tips that reaches my mid-back and icy blue eyes like limpid tears and a lot of people tell me I look like Amy Lee (AN: if u don’t know who she is get da hell out of here!). I’m not related to Gerard Way but I wish I was because he’s a major fucking hottie. I’m a vampire but my teeth are straight and white. I have pale white skin. I’m also a witch, and I go to a magic school called Hogwarts in England where I’m in the seventh year (I’m seventeen). I’m a goth (in case you couldn’t tell) and I wear mostly black. I love Hot Topic and I buy all my clothes from there. For example today I was wearing a black corset with matching lace around it and a black leather miniskirt, pink fishnets and black combat boots. I was wearing black lipstick, white foundation, black eyeliner and red eye shadow. I was walking outside Hogwarts. It was snowing and raining so there was no sun, which I was very happy about. A lot of preps stared at me. I put up my middle finger at them.

That description isn’t so much of a problem for describing a woman … it would be just as bad, if it described a man. Yet, yeah, avoid that at all costs.

I read “My Immortal” and now I’m 99 % certain that it’s intentionally bad and written to be funny. :-)

I became convinced that My Immortal had to be an intentional parody when the author called Sirius Black Harry’s Dogfather!

You’ve brought to mind two other types of description that annoy me.

The first isn’t strictly gendered, but it wouldn’t surprise me in the slightest if it’s used more for female characters: the ‘evaluating herself in the mirror’ introductory description. Nobody looks at their own reflection like they’re seeing themselves for the first time and grading each feature based on its attractiveness. (It does, however, make more sense if the character really is seeing their own appearance for the first time).

The second type of description that annoys me is when a character’s conventionally attractive traits are described as if they aren’t. ‘My eyes are too large and my lips are too full to be considered pretty. A light dusting of freckles across my nose ruins my otherwise perfect complexion. I wish my hair was blonde but, alas, it’s only a rich chestnut red.’

A question about always being in control of what they wear – a character of mine marries into a wealthy family to control their army and has to blend in. She never really cared about appearance, only fabric from being a weaver, and I was using it like a homesick thing. No one forces her or anything, she’s kind of chill about it and has way bigger concerns. Is it OK so long as it is never sexy? Is there a way to make sure it’s OK?

Personally I think there’s a huge difference between a scene where a woman has to dress in a disguise (not a sexy disguise, just a regular uniform or the same clothes as the locals) in order to blend in, and a female character being forced against her will (or just randomly lose all her previous modesty) to strip down or dress up in a fetish costume.

To use a bad and a good example, in X-men: first class there’s an awful scene where a female CIA agent completely out of the blue takes off her dress (and just so happens to wear perfectly matching black silk lingerie) in order to follow the villains into a strip club, and the scene has no purpose outside of creepy voyeurism, whereas in the movie Inferno, based on a Dan Brown novel, a female assassin wears a police uniform in order to trick her target into thinking she’s there to protect them, and make local law enforcement think she’s one of them, which I think is a good example of a female character who couldn’t choose how her clothes would look, it’s a uniform, but it’s not portrayed as degrading or any different than the same situation with a male assassin would be.

Yeah, that is just fine.

As far as “wish-fulfillment clothing” goes, for me personally, a gorgeous evening gown is about the same level of wish-fulfillment as a badass cloak or fancy cape. …something to keep in mind for writers who want to attract a few more readers, maybe? Also, we should bring cloaks and capes back into fashion.

I always second any wish for cloaks and capes to make it back into fashion.

Yes, wish-fulfilment clothing for women can very well include a gorgeous ball gown (cape optional, but always a nice touch) or a bikini or a tight dress. The point is that the woman should wear those clothes because she wants to (and in a fitting setting), not because someone said ‘put that on.’

I also think it’s important not just to make sure it fits the character and the situation, but also looking at stuff like fashion magazines, doll crafting and what female illustrators draw their characters wearing, because from my experience, while revealing, most such things designed by and for women tend to be more intricate and elaborate to reflect one’s style compared to most boring and unoriginal or downright tacky stuff male comic artists and video game designers draw women wearing.

Just compare Bayonetta (designed by a female fashion designer) to Quiet (designed by a man who just wanted to make her sexy) and you’ll see the difference.

Good point. There’s a lot of female designs online by now on oodles of sites (I personally love to watch doll crafting) to get inspired by.

Bayonetta is definitely designed much less male-gazey than Quiet and I like the idea behind her clothing (the design still has some weird parts, but we’re talking about a Japanese action game, so weird design parts are essential – and they’re handled better with Bayonetta). Not to mention that Bayonetta is only mostly naked when calling on her powers, while Quiet is mostly naked the whole time because she ‘breathes through her skin.’ Sigh.

Indeed, and I also think a huge difference between them is that Bayonetta’s design tells something about her character, her color scheme, jewelry and hairstyle are all themed around the classic witchy imagery with black, cats and moons but with a modern twist, whereas Quiet’s outfit is just a bikini and ripped panty hose, and I saw no one actually being able to tell why she she was wearing it before the game came out and explained it.

And Bayonetta does sexy poses because she’s a bold and sassy person who likes to provoke people and lives in an exaggerated magical world, while Quiet is supposed to be a tragic character and her story even involves dark real-life traumas like torture and POW sexual assault, and she’s literally called Quiet because she can’t speak and has to rely on hand gestures and body language, yet 90% of said body language are just random sexy poses, just to show what a can of worms the character is.

I try to don’t keep apart males from females in my writings, so i spend the same amount of detail to describe the main female character’s elegant dress as the MC’s parade uniform. Also, women in my book wear from business attire to dresses to body armour just as every other character. There is one specific character that wears a somewhat skimpy dress under a cape and uses it to entice and manipulate her targets (be it males or females), she is a complex character and i’ll probably save her for another story, limiting her to show up once or twice as a mysterious puppeteer figure.

By the sound of it, you’re doing a pretty good job with your writing.

A lot of authors seem to struggle with treating all characters alike, no matter the gender. If you pay attention to the details of the clothes of all of your characters, it’s fine to describe them. It’s also always great if characters have an actual wardrobe somewhere and wear different clothes throughout the story (unless they’re unable to change them for some reason).

I have no problem with a complex character who works with seduction. Seduction can be a valid option and is sometimes used by male characters as well (cough Bond cough). What I resent is the ‘femme fatale’ type who is only defined by her seductive sexiness and often doesn’t even act because of her own agency, only following another (often male) character’s orders.

I just switch the gender in the description and check if it’s too verbose or seems unfit for either sex. I’m getting good results so far.

The problem i have with her is that i can’t cut the main plot line to tell her story, as is so tangential to the plot that i will need to tell it on another book. she just point the MC in the right direction and set the pieces up for future events. As a mysterious figure i think it will awake the reader’s interest to know more about her, but if it’s not the case, what is known is enough.

Have you ever had a minor character that you like so much you want to tell everyone everything about her, but being nor the time nor the place to do it?

You can certainly use the story to continue with the universe you have created later. Then it makes sense to put a character in as a side character and make them the main character in the other story. Let her be a mystery in this one, but suggest there’s more to her, then it should work out.

Hello! Thank you for the article. However, I have a few questions: 1. What do you think about female characters whose appearance isn’t described at all? What is the “default” in this case, and what should I be careful about? 2. What advice could you give about shapeshifters? How to avoid misogyny in describing a shapeshifter? 3. What do you think as “always beautiful” races (elves, faeries, angels, goddesses)? What pitfalls are there for characters, who, for example, don’t age after certain age? 4. If a characters belongs to a completely sexless and genderless race, is it possible for their description to be objectifying and/or sexist?

Thanks for this article. This is a useful article for writers of non-fiction as well as fiction. While those of us writing essays probably have less reason to describe the physical appearance of people, there are other ways that a similar set of gender assumptions make their way into the text. For example, historical analyses that identify people as “so-and-so and his wife” are still common. Political discussions in which men are acting but women are supporting men are also dismally familiar.

You don’t “Google” something, it is not a verb despite what some webpages claim.

According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, ‘google’ can be used as a verb.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/google

Would it feel sexist to depict a female bartender/salesperson/etc. who dresses up her appearance and lets a little flirtyness come into her demeanor because it gives her an edge in her job? (Also, does it help to show that the same thing can work for a male character in the same position?)

I’m torn on whether that normalizes the “sexy=manipulative” idea or if that’s more equal to a woman taking charge of her appearance and sexuality in an empowering way.

Yes, unfortunately it would. It reinforces tropes about women being seductresses, manipulating others with sex appeal, or sleeping their way to top.

Having a male character that does the same thing may help marginally, but not enough considering the toxicity of this stereotype.

A women taking charge of her appearance and sexuality in an empowering way might include her asking men out because she wants to sleep with them, not because she wants something else from them.

Though I should mention that women are generally expected to dress attractively as part of customer facing positions, so her dressing attractive in itself would usually not be flirty so much as it would be meeting expectations imposed on her by others. By acting flirty is another matter.

Ah, okay! Good to keep in mind. Thank you for the response and the clarification.

Thank you for this article! I like how you broke this down.

Editor’s note: I’ve removed a comment for defending sexism under the iron clad logic of having female friends

Editor’s note: I have removed a comment for doing exactly what we said not to do in this post: pressuring women about what they wear.

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Beyond Tall, Dark, and Handsome: How to Describe Your Characters

• May 26, 2021

The ability to describe is the key to great storytelling, but when it comes to depicting characters, our first impulse is often to go straight to the basics (height, hair color, clothing) and leave it at that. It’s not that those descriptions are bad, it’s just that they provide surface-level characterization rather than truly   characterizing .

Dwight Swain, in his book   Creating Characters , says, “When your wife says a woman is ‘loud and pushy,’ she defines her far more sharply for story purposes than any description of blue eyes, blonde hair, or pug nose.”

The reason “loud and pushy” is meaningful is because it tells us what is going on inside the character, not just what appears on the outside. And the description tells us not only what the woman is like, but reveals something about the wife who characterizes her so.

Which means when you describe your characters, your descriptions are deeply tied to who is doing the describing. A rambunctious kindergartener will be represented quite differently by a patient grade-school teacher than a cranky principal.

And this is true whether you’re writing a story narrated in first or third-person, because even in third-person we see the world through that character’s eyes.

Remember that the goal in creative writing isn’t to give your readers information, but to give them an experience. Here are some tips that will help you tap into what is significant in your characters so that you can evoke feelings in your readers and make the characters in your story come to life.

Tip 1: Choose a dominant impression

Take inventory of the traits of the character you’d like to describe. Are they lazy, sexy, insecure, irritable? Choose qualities that are particularly noteworthy about the character and actually relate to your story. Think about what the character is   like , as much as what they look like. Keep in mind that the earlier you get to these qualities in relation to the character’s appearance in the story, the better. 

In J. Ryan Stradal’s   Kitchens of the Great Midwest , the protagonist has been lamenting his sorry luck with women. On page four, through a third-person narrator, we get more of the character’s perception of himself:

“By this time, he was twenty-eight, growing a pale hairy inner tube around his waist, and already going bald.”

This isn’t an objective description. Stradal conveys the insecurities of the character through the way the character chooses to describe himself.

Tip 2: Convey the attitude of the describer

Pin down the current outlook or perspective of the character doing the describing. Zero in on their state of mind (lonely, curious, offended, prone-to-exaggeration, etc.) at this exact moment in the story. Now write your description through the filter of the consciousness of the character who is doing the describing. 

The male point-of-view character in Grace Paley’s short story “The Contest” is a bit of a player. Here’s how he describes his latest kind-of girlfriend:

“A medium girl, size twelve, a clay pot with handles—she could be grasped.”

Clay pot? Grasping? There’s one thing on this character’s mind and it isn’t a chaste afternoon at an ice cream social. In one short sentence we have insight into his sensibilities about women.

Tip 3: Lean into diction

Now’s the time to get picky with your word choices. The trick here is to pin down not only your character’s perception of other characters, but which words will best convey them. Think about how your character might verbalize the description, even if they aren’t speaking aloud. Choose words from their lexicon that will reveal them as a particular person.

Mattie Ross, the formal-speaking protagonist in Charles Portis’   True Grit , uses words like “beast” and “morn” in describing her father on his horse:

“He was a handsome sight and in my memory’s eye I can still see him mounted up there on Judy in his brown woolen coat and black Sunday hat and the both of them, man and beast, blowing little clouds of steam on that frosty morn.”

Portis could have left out the parenthetical “man and beast,” and of course he could have had Mattie say “morning.” But his attention to the particulars of diction allowed him to characterize this unforgettable fourteen-year-old girl.

Tip 4: Go for gesture or bodily movement

If you tend to use static descriptions when you describe your characters, think about putting them in motion so that the reader can see them doing something. Action adds another dimension to your descriptions. It allows you to take physical traits, which may be general, and incorporate them into specific behaviors.

In “The Lunch Lady and Her Three-Headed Dogs,” essayist Sonya Huber writes about her conflicted relationship with her upper arms and describes them like this:

“I raise my arms to write on the chalkboard, and the skin draped over bone and muscle swings in contrapuntal melody.”

Huber isn’t just present in her classroom setting, she’s active in it. And the boldness of putting that upper arm skin in motion takes the visual from good to great.

Tip 5: Try something figurative

This is a tricky one because a bad metaphor or simile can be cringe-worthy. But a good one will delight your reader. A simple comparison can clarify your image, allowing the reader to think,   Ah, I know exactly what you mean .

Paulette Jiles skillfully uses metaphor in her novel   News of the World   during a scene in which kindly Captain Kidd is first assessing the young girl who is to be his charge:

“Her eyes were blue and her skin that odd bright color that occurs when fair skin has been burned and weathered by the sun. She had no more expression than an egg.”

When you describe your characters, with just a little extra work, you might be surprised at how deeply you can get into the minds of your story people, and how much better your reader will connect to them. More than plot, it’s your characters who are going to sweep your readers away into the world of your story.

Written by  Kim Lozano

Kim Lozano is an editor and creative writing coach from St. Louis. Her work has been published in The Iowa Review North American Review DIY MFA CRAFT and many other publications. You can find out more about her classes and the writing resources she offers at kimlozano.com.

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Tricks for Describing a Character’s Appearance (With Examples)

Introducing a new character to your story can be difficult. There’s a lot that goes into it, and to make matters worse, you only have one chance to give readers a good (and memorable) first impression of that character. One of the ways you can do this is by giving them a distinct appearance, but many writers tend to fall short of describing appearance well. 

We’ve all heard the same cookie-cutter descriptions for characters a million times before. Golden hair, a heart-shaped face, a chiseled body, piercing eyes, yadda yadda… The problem with these descriptions is that they’re bland, they’re cliché, and they don’t really help your characters stand out. 

However, if you break from clichés, you can create uniquely vivid descriptions that will give your characters life. There are endless ways you can describe characters, and I’m not going to walk you through how I would describe every single possible human feature (or humanoid, animal, alien, etc). For one thing, that would take too long, but for another thing, descriptions are based on more than just the character’s physical appearance—their personality plays a part too. 

Tips for Describing a Character’s Appearance in a Story

There are a number of things to keep in mind when describing a character’s appearance. Here are just a few general tips before we dive into some more specific techniques for describing different parts of a character’s appearance. 

Don’t Make Everyone a Supermodel

This is probably one of the most (if not the most) important things to remember when describing a character. You should never objectively describe your characters as flawless. Humans aren’t perfect, so if you describe your characters like perfect little supermodels, they just won’t feel authentic. Worse still, they won’t stand out from the protagonists of every single young adult novel out there. You need to make them distinct, and to do that, you need to give your characters flaws . And I mean real flaws, not fake flaws that are actually just endearing traits packaged like flaws. 

Don’t Dump Everything Out at Once

Describing your characters is important, but you need to be able to keep it concise. No one wants to read a 7-page summary of every detail of a character’s appearance. You can go in-depth, sure, but don’t put your readers through a word-avalanche just for them to figure out what the character looks like. 

Remember, you can reveal more about the characters over time. When you introduce a character for the first time, you should focus on the things a person would naturally notice first, such as their face, hair, clothing, voice, and general energy. You can further elaborate on their appearance later when it is relevant, and describe their gait, posture, temperament, and more. 

There is one exception here I want to highlight. If you are telling a story from the first-person perspective, and you want to illustrate a character’s obsession with another person, hyper-fixating on the details can be a good way to show this. It can make the character seem creepy , and it can foreshadow the protagonist doing something bad to the person they are obsessing over. 

Don’t Sell Them Short

Opposite to the point above, you shouldn’t make your introductions too short. To some extent, it can be good to leave some parts of the character’s appearance up to the reader’s imagination. However, you should give them something to help them visualize the characters in the beginning. Otherwise, if you later reveal that the character has dark hair, all the readers that imagined them with light hair might have a difficult time accepting that. 

Descriptions are important, and they help to include a reader in the narrative. Like a well-described setting, vivid characters can help immerse readers into the world and make them part of the story. 

Use Their Personality

A character’s personality can have a large impact on how they are perceived, and therefore should alter the words you use to describe them. Two characters might have similar features, but based on their personality, you would describe them differently. 

For example, two characters might both be tall, but one would be described as “awkward and long” while the other is “towering.” In this case, the characters’ levels of confidence impact how they are perceived. For another example, think about two characters who both have light skin. You could describe one as looking like “porcelain” and describe the other one as “pasty,” depending on their other traits. Those two descriptions create very different perceptions from each other.   

Use the Point of View

If the character in question is being described from the first-person perspective of another character, then the protagonist’s opinions should sneak into the description. Your protagonist probably isn’t going to objectively evaluate the other person—they’re likely to rely on stereotypes, biases, and things they have heard from others about the character they’re looking at. Rely on that to make the description fit into the story more organically. 

Here are some examples: 

• She had no right to have such a disarming smile.
• His expression was empty—just like his head.
• His dark, tangled hair reminded me of a swamp.
• She didn’t even wear any makeup! But even more frustratingly, she didn’t really need it.
• They looked divine… like I wasn’t even worthy to look upon them. 
• He looked like the type of person to stare at his own reflection before getting in the shower. 
• They were short and stocky, but they could still probably beat me in a fight. 

Remember, your protagonist can make speculative judgments about the character they’re looking at. You’re telling the story as they experience it, so their judgments are part of the narrative!

“…he was greeted by the barista—a young teen who had not yet matured enough to be handsome. Once his soft cheeks hollowed and his jaw squared, and the childish optimism fled his eyes, then he would have the chance to smolder. That crooked smile would win over many hearts in the blink of an eye, but not just yet.”  – excerpt from a draft

Keep the Description Balanced

A good rule of thumb when describing characters (or anything else really) is to create a balance of concrete details and flowery imagery. You should alternate between those two, as well as general and more specific details, to make the description flow more naturally, and to make it more interesting to read. 

Imagine reading a description like: 

“His hair was red and curly. His eyes were large and green. He had freckles, but they weren’t that noticeable. He was tall but very thin.” 

That’s so dry, and it’s not fun to read. Compare that to a description that varies how the information is provided:

“His hair was like a massive red bush surrounding two wide, green eyes. Freckles faintly dotted his cheeks, but they were only really visible in the sunshine. His long, lanky body and large hair made him look a bit like a big red lollipop—which was only heightened by his tendency to blush often.”

Wasn’t that a lot more fun to read? Not only does it make the character description more interesting, but it also influences a reader’s perception of what the character is like. Certain words help readers to gauge what kind of person this character is. The first example gives no indication of personality, but the second one uses words like “sunshine” and “lollipop” to associate the character with lively, happy things. Additionally, using words like “lanky” and “blush” suggests that the character is awkward or shy, saving you the time of having to spell that out for readers. 

Give them Something Special

One helpful thing that I’ve learned over the years is that you should give your main character some distinctive feature that sets them apart from the other characters around them. Diverse descriptions are great, but it never hurts to make your main character a little more unique. This could be something like a distinctive scar, a tattoo, a weird eye color, a patch of silver or white hair, a missing or extra finger, a birthmark, or something else along those lines. That can make them stand out more, and it can be a really clear indicator that they are special. 

Although your story won’t suffer if you don’t give your main character a distinct feature like this, it is usually a good bet—especially if you think your story could ever conceivably be adapted into a visual medium, like a comic, animation, or film. That character could become iconic. People may just see your character somewhere and that alone could motivate them to read or watch the whole story. As another plus, it could give you a cool opportunity for your story’s cover. 

How to Describe a Character’s Face

When describing a character’s face, the easiest way to do that is to first break the face down into its essential parts: the eyes, the mouth, the nose, and the facial structure.

So let’s start with the eyes since they are the focal point of the face. Stay away from the descriptions you’ve heard a million times, like “piercing” or “doe-eyed.” The eyes are the window to the soul, and they can tell a reader a lot about a character. Instead of “piercing,” try “icy” or “sharp,” and instead of “doe-eyed,” try “wide,” “innocent,” or “full of wonder/awe.” The goal is to describe the character in a unique way to make it more interesting to read, while still creating a vivid image of that character. 

You can describe the shape, color, and depth of a character’s eyes, but you should be careful not to rely on insensitive generalizations. For example, instead of “Asian” eyes, use “almond-shaped” or “mono-lid.” Not all Asian people have mono-lids, so simply using the word “Asian” to describe the character’s eyes doesn’t actually narrow down what they look like. 

That goes for all the other features of the face, too. Though it is true that some features are more prominent in certain races, nothing is inherent. You shouldn’t rely on the character’s race or ethnic background alone to be the basis of your description. Saying that a character is Japanese or Jamaican without giving other details doesn’t do any more for the character’s description than saying they are European or white. Doing this only encourages your readers to stereotype your characters, even if that wasn’t your intention. 

With that said, don’t get too caught up in describing every detail of a character’s face. Give the most important information, such as the eyes, face shape, scars, and other notable details or imperfections, then move on. If a character has an exaggerated feature, such as a large nose or bushy eyebrows, then that’s important to mention too.

How to Describe a Character’s Hair

There are lots of different types of hair colors, textures, thicknesses, and shines, so try not to make all your characters have the same kind of hair—unless they’re related or part of a small, isolated community, of course. Hair can be curly and blond, sleek and black, coily and auburn, and even dyed wild colors. Making your characters’ hair more distinct will make them easier for readers to visualize, especially if you introduce many characters at one time. 

Beyond the basics, you can use words to describe a character’s hair that reflects who they are as a person. For example, describing a character’s hair as springy or bouncy could indicate the character is upbeat and moves excitedly. Slick, greasy, or wispy hair could suggest an untrustworthy or sneaky character. The words you use to describe the character’s hair will be subliminally applied to the character themself. 

How to Describe a Character’s Clothes

Clothing is an important element of self-expression, and what your character decides to wear can reflect a lot about them. However, unlike with the character’s face, you should not spend a lot of time describing their outfit. For one thing, they’re probably going to change their outfit at some point in the story—likely more than once. Secondly, readers just won’t care unless you give them a good reason to. 

If you want to describe what your character is wearing, make sure to keep it short. If it’s just a simple way of helping the reader visualize the character’s style, present the information objectively and in only a paragraph or two, such as: 

“She wore short-shorts and a denim jacket, and pink thigh-high socks that she had to keep pulling up because they always slipped down to her knees. Her tennis-shoes were white and bulky, as was the belt bag she wore off to one side. This free, laidback style was completed by the two messy buns her faded purple hair was pulled up into.”

However, there are a few times in which you can use clothing to explore more complex ideas in the story. For example:

• An article of clothing might have special significance to a character. It could have been handed down from a relative, it could be a favorite shirt, or it could be meaningful in other ways. That would merit drawing more attention to it. 
• An article of clothing might have special significance to the story. This could be a type of ceremonial outfit, a piece of magical armor, or something along those lines. That would require a more thorough in-depth description of the item. 
• An article of clothing may be unfamiliar to most of your readers, such as a specific cultural outfit or an unusual costume, in which case a descriptive explanation could help illustrate what it looks like. 
• A particular outfit could draw attention to a character, such as an attractive or surprising outfit, that could merit taking more time to describe it (and explain why it garners the character extra attention). 

How to Describe a Character’s Body

Describing a character’s body is fairly straightforward. Like with many other aspects of a character’s appearance, there are a few methods you can use to approach describing their body. You could take the objective approach, which would do just fine in most cases, or you could toy with your readers’ perceptions. 

I’ll start out with a word of caution. Too many times, I’ve seen unrealistic descriptions of characters’ bodies. Whether it’s a waist that’s impossibly thin or muscles like a bodybuilder on a teenager, people tend to push the boundaries of what the human body is even capable of. You need to keep your characters within the limits of what’s actually possible, unless you have a good reason for doing otherwise (genetically modified supersoldier, not actually human at all, etc). 

Now, as with some other aspects of the character’s appearance, you can get away with a simple, objective description, like “tall and muscular” or “short and curvy.” Honestly, that’s usually all you’ll need to do. However, bodies are commonly associated with physical attractiveness, and if attraction is the point of your description, you need to take a different approach. 

Writing about attraction is tough (which is why I go more in-depth about how to write about attraction in my other article, Romance 101: How to Write Characters Falling in Love ). You’ll want to highlight the positives of the character’s body—the elements of them that have caught your protagonist’s attention. Whether it’s biceps, legs, or a large chest, you’ll want to describe it in detail, as well as highlight what it is about them that has the protagonist so interested. Here’s an example:

“He was tall and sturdy, and even in this relaxed environment, his pose held power. The way his shirt stretched taut around his shoulders when he shifted snagged and held my attention—I couldn’t help but stare. Did he pick that shirt on purpose? He had to know the thin fabric clung close to his body, showing off every rippling muscle underneath…” 

How to Describe a Character’s Posture and Body Language

Body language is an often overlooked element of describing a character, but you should give it some thought even if you don’t intend to draw a lot of attention to it in the story. How does your character stand? How do they emote? Do they gesture when they speak? Do they fidget? Try to envision what they look like when they are waiting, actively engaged in a passionate conversation, and when they are uncomfortable. 

People move in different ways, even if they aren’t thinking about it. Come up with a list of movements and behaviors that are typical for the character, and utilize those movements to make dull scenes and conversations more interesting. Instead of just dialogue, you can give readers more to imagine as your character shifts their weight, runs their hand through their hair, or twists the hem of their shirt. This can also help to establish the tone of the conversation.  

A person’s body, personality, and mood will all influence how they move. If you establish a baseline for how the character stands and behaves when they are in a neutral mindset, this will help you keep them consistent over time by casually mentioning their body language throughout the story. As a bonus, it can also help you tip readers off if you want them to notice that something is bothering the character. If you have established that a character is pretty relaxed in most situations, readers will instantly notice if they exhibit anxious body language even if you don’t draw a lot of attention to it. 

For more tips and tricks on writing about body language, be sure to check out Writing Body Language: Bringing Your Characters to Life next!

How to Describe an Attractive Character

Describing an attractive character isn’t all that different from describing any other character. You still shouldn’t make them flawless, but you can put off mentioning their more negative qualities until later—especially if another character is looking at them through rose-colored glasses . 

One recommendation that I have for describing a character who is supposed to be extremely attractive is to keep their description vague. Beauty is subjective, so each reader is going to have a different idea of what “attractive” means. By all means, describe the basics of their appearance, such as hair color, eye color, skin tone, and whatnot, but don’t dive deep into the shape of their features. This will leave a little bit up to the reader’s imagination, and they will fill in the gaps in the character’s description with the traits that they find most attractive. 

Another helpful tip is to utilize the reactions of background characters to establish that the character is, in fact, attractive. Other people staring at the character or nudging and whispering to each other about them would help your reader understand that the character is good-looking, and alter their mental image of them accordingly. 

The Importance of Creating Vivid Visual Descriptions for your Characters

Creating vivid visual descriptions for your characters is incredibly important for a number of reasons. For one thing, being able to imagine the characters will help draw your readers into the story and immerse them in the world. Additionally, by giving your characters more distinct appearances, they will stand out more from each other, and from characters in other stories. The more complex and interesting the character, the more likely they are to stick in a reader’s mind for years after they finish reading the story. 

Good luck with writing your descriptions! I know you’ll write something great.

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How to Write Teen Girl Characters

Nora zelevansky interviews teens, learns some new hip tricks.

There are moments when I forget that I’m not 15 years old.

I’ll be walking down a New York City street and, suddenly, I’ll hear the sound of a basketball rebounding off the pavement, skateboard wheels skidding across uneven cement or the giggles of huddled girls; and I’ll whip around, expecting to see a teenage crush or my group of posturing best friends. Then, confronted with baby-faced strangers, I remember at once that I’m an adult: I already lived through precalculus and college applications, dorm parties in black light and classes on hungover mornings, assistant jobs and early twenty-something lostness. I planned a wedding, gave birth, wrote a novel or two. That’s when I sigh and move on with my life.

Maybe that’s why, in 2012, when I first sat down to write Will You Won’t You Want Me? , I thought I could do it without research. True, I was envisioning one of my central characters somewhere between the ages of 10 and 14, but I figured I could handle it. I’ve been a preteen before: I’ve navigated the turbulent seas of middle school dances and first kisses, algebra homework and French verb conjugation, bungled makeup attempts and first sips of alcohol. And yet, when I tried to put pen to paper (well, fingertips to keyboard), I realized that there was a lot I didn’t know about teenagers these days: I wondered, at what age do they get cell phones and start dating? Do they all listen to Justin Bieber? What are the cool and lame brands? Do they still use words like “lame”?

The book’s protagonist, Marjorie Plum, is 28 years old, and, so, close enough to my age that I could still conjure up that experience of flailing. She didn’t pose much of a problem. But the character that would be Belinda—a brainy Brooklyn-based nearly 12-year-old with quick wit, but a naive worldview—was proving tricky. I didn’t want to get her wrong.

I decided to call in reinforcements in the form of some preteen and teenage girls. I would talk to as many as necessary until I felt like I had a real understanding of that age, specifically in 2012. I know most people despise teenagers, and perhaps I’ll learn to feel that way too once my own daughter is possessed by that demonic set of hormones, but I’ve always really liked them. They’re creative and interesting, and their impulses—however unchecked—make sense to me. Why not spend all day obsessing over a crush while eating junk food and sampling the occasional illicit drug? Isn’t that what we’d all be doing if we didn’t have society to keep us in line?

I began by reaching out to my young cousins—who ranged at the time from ages 12 to 15—via email. That was my first mistake. I cced their mothers, who responded right away, and the chain turned into a long, fairly funny thread. But about 20 emails in, we realized that the girls hadn’t joined in. I asked what kind of social media and communication platforms the girls used, and one of the mothers quipped: “Apparently not email.” Their advice: I was better off texting to make phone dates.

I started with my 12-year-old cousin, Georgia, who lives in New York City, since I too grew up on the Upper West Side. In a moment of total projection, I went in expecting serious dish from her. She’s beautiful and blonde and social, and she was coming of age in my old neighborhood—she had to be creating some trouble, right?

Nope. She was happily enjoying school, playing soccer, hanging with her friends and being an all around good kid. Preteens, as it turned out, could be upbeat and positive, and even follow the rules. Probably the most important thing I learned from Georgia was that kids do have a shorter leash at an older age these days, even with mellow parents like hers. (Of course, I should have realized that, as I started walking to school by myself at 6 years old—albeit with my father following secretly behind.) Times have changed a bit and maybe that means more delayed delinquency. Either way, the upshot was that I started to envision Belinda with more protective parents, who might not let her loose as much as she wished.

Next I reached out to my California cousins, sisters Noa and Eden, who I knew would be happy to share the dirty details. They’re also well-behaved kids, so figured that they wouldn’t reveal anything too harrowing, but I also knew I’d get the real deal. They were both predictably excited to share, and I mined some very important details from them:

1. Nobody in high school smokes cigarettes anymore. At least not in California. Pot, yes. Alcohol, sure. Cigarettes, barely.

2. What we used to call “indie” kids or even “goth” kids, they called “urbs” as in “urban.”

3. They still said “cool,” but definitely not “dope.”

4. They listened to mainstream pop and wore mainstream clothing lines without apology. (There was no subculture like hip hop or grunge rendering that uncool.)

5. Once you get them going, teenage girls love to talk. And they have lots of insights.

I was starting to get somewhere. I could begin to hear Belinda’s voice.

That’s when my husband and I went out to brunch with a friend of his, who brought his son and his 10-year-old daughter, Sandy. My immediate takeaway from that brunch was simple: Ten year olds are still 100 percent children. Sandy was adorable, sweet and giggly and totally unaware of her own beauty. There was little chance that she liked boys yet—not romantically anyway. She reminded me of a puppy with oversized paws. If I wanted Belinda to feel part-child, part-teen, then she would have to be a little bit older.

Last, I chatted via phone to Lily, who was 13 and lived in downtown Manhattan. She confirmed that, even in New York City, there wasn’t as much cigarette smoking going on. (Why did that shock me so much?) But she had a different attitude towards culture than the West Coast and uptown girls. For Lily—who was clearly very studious, as she copped to spending the majority of her time on homework—indie music introduced via her father was more interesting than anything Lady Gaga. She sounded almost adult as she waxed about bands like Modest Mouse and Death Cab for Cutie that she said no one else at school knew about or liked. I realized I wanted Belinda to be quirky like that too: 11 years old and going on 35, and a little bit on her own tip.

Ultimately, each interview helped shape Belinda’s character more. And, as I expected, life for kids that age has changed some. But, more importantly, chatting with these smart and precocious young women dropped me back inside the emotional vulnerability of that time—the glimpses of openness and self-protectiveness, the desire to share and the fear of sharing too much, the need to fit in but also assert individuality.

These glimpses into their lives allowed me to embody that feeling of being a kid, to envision a character with what I hope is authentic dimension and to channel, with clarity, a former version of myself—all for more than a fleeting moment on the street.

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Master List of Physical Description for Writers

I created this list of ways to describe people

because physical description, when done well, helps the readers see characters in their minds. But sometimes when you’re in the middle of writing, it can be hard to think of physical adjectives and distinguishing features for characters. I find that describing facial features can be especially tricky!

This long list of physical characteristics is kind of like a character description generator, and it’ll help you when you’re trying to think of how to describe a character’s appearance.

Eyes – General

 For all the words about describing facial features, I’m focusing more on physical descriptions rather than emotional expressions, though there’s a little crossover! You can also check out my long list of facial expressions.

heavy-lidded

fringed with long lashes

with sweeping eyelashes

with thick eyelashes

By the way, this post on how to describe (and not describe) the eyes of an Asian character  is really great. Check it out.

Eyes – Color

Brown is the most common eye color by far. Green is quite rare.

chocolate brown

cocoa brown

coffee brown

sienna brown

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cornflower blue

Arctic blue

glacial blue

crystal blue

electric blue

slate blue / slate gray

storm blue / storm gray

silver / silver gray

concrete gray

gunmetal gray

Skin – Color

Josh Roby made a great chart of skin tones and descriptor words, and I got a lot of these words from him. You can get that here .

The quote from N.K. Jemisin interested me: “I get really tired of seeing African-descended characters described in terms of the goods that drove, and still drive, the slave trade—coffee, chocolate, brown sugar. There’s some weird psychosocial baggage attached to that.” 

cream / creamy

rose / rosy

Skin – General

Some of these are better for the face, and some are better for other parts of the body.

translucent

luminescent

with large pores

weather-beaten

Face – Structure

heart-shaped

high forehead

broad forehead

prominent brow ridge

protruding brow bone

sharp cheekbones

high cheekbones

angular cheekbones

hollow cheeks

jutting chin

pointed chin

receding chin

double chin

dimple in chin

visible Adam’s apple

People don’t write much about noses, but they can be distinguishing features for characters!

Cupid’s bow

straight teeth

gap between teeth

gleaming white teeth

Facial Hair (or lack thereof)

clean-shaven

smooth-shaven

mutton-chop sideburns

a few days’ growth of beard

five o’ clock shadow

Hair – General

I threw a few hairstyles in here, though not many.

shoulder-length

neatly combed

slicked down / slicked back

buzzed / buzz cut

widow’s peak

Hair – Color

There are some repeats here from the eye color section!

salt and pepper

charcoal gray

brown sugar

tawny brown

toffee brown

Titian-haired

strawberry blonde

butterscotch

sandy blond

fair-haired

Body Type – General

average height

barrel-chested

heavy / heavy-set

pot-bellied

full-figured

leggy / long-legged

broad-shouldered

sloping shoulders

stubby fingers

long fingers

ragged nails

grimy fingernails

ink-stained

This list and many more are in my book Master Lists for Writers: Thesauruses, Plot Ideas, Character Traits, Names, and More . Check it out if you’re interested!

And if you don’t want to miss future writing posts, follow the blog, if you aren’t already — there’s a place to sign up on the lefthand side of the blog. Thanks for stopping by, and happy writing!

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127 thoughts on “ master list of physical description for writers ”.

Thanks, Bryn! This list has sparked a spark in my brain. I haven’t seen one of those for a while. I was getting worried I’d lost my flint!

I’m so glad you like it!

I love this, do you mind if we share on our blog WritersLife.org ?

Thanks for the positive feedback! You can’t reproduce it on your blog, but you can share an excerpt of 200 words or less plus a link to my site.

As a new novel writer all I can say is thank very much for sharing with us this wonderful list.

Ah you’re welcome! Thanks for visiting!

This is amazing! Thank you very much!

Thanks for the kind words–glad it seems helpful!

Reblogged this on looselyjournalying.

Reblogged this on Of Fancy & Creativity .

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Aw thank you for this it helped so much! I’m 15 and I’m trying to write a novel and this was sooooo helpful so thank you a billion 🙂 Best wishes.

Ah you’re welcome! Thanks for stopping by. Good for you for working on a novel, and good luck–I bet it will go great!

Hi, Bryn Thank you for doing these lists. They helped me a lot. Can you make a list on how to describe emotions like sadness or anger.

It’s funny you should ask 🙂 There’s a list like that in my book MASTER LISTS FOR WRITERS coming out this fall! I haven’t officially announced it yet, but hey 🙂

You can get a free copy when it comes out if you agree to give it an honest review. SIgn up for my newsletter if you’re interested!

Reblogged this on Kalynn Bayron and commented: Yes! This is great!

Was just looking for this type of lists.Great work.

This is so helpful.

I love your blog, btw. Your posts are informative and/or inspirational.

Are you on any social medial where I can follow you?

Oh, thank you so much! I just checked out your blog — I love the dream casting post! http://sbhadleywilson.com/blog/pull-ideal-cast-2/

I’m @BrynDonovan on Twitter, just followed you!

VERY helpful. I need to get basic descriptions of people done and out of the way to move on with plot. This quickens any details that might have taken me a long time to think through, or strain a sentence. Yuck. I know my females characters would pay attention to lots of physical details. not so with the males. Thanks!

Oh, so glad it’s helpful! That’s always what I’m trying to do with my lists — speed things up. I hate getting stuck on a detail and losing my momentum 🙂 Thanks for stopping by!

godsent list! Bryn, I wish you more brains.

Reblogged this on Jessica Louis and commented: This list is beyond helpful. Who knew there were so many eye colors!?

Thanks Bryn your list was amazing. I’m an aspiring writer and it really helped me a lot. When I can I’m going to get a copy of your book. I think it would help me become a better writer. My genre of choice is erotic, but it is so hard to get out there, but I’m hopeful one day I will. It’s what I love to do and I’m going to keep trying.

Hi Beth! Thank you so much for the kind words. If you do get the book, I hope you like it! And good luck on writing erotica — I’m doing a “WIP Wednesday” this Wednesday where you can share a bit of your work in progress, if you like 🙂

That would be great. I have some short stories publish on a site called Literotica. I have some editing issues that I’m trying to work out, nothing a few classes wouldn’t help. How do I share my work.

I am so sorry! I missed this comment before. The next WIP Wednesday on the blog is Dec. 2… if you’re following the blog you’ll see the post! (The follow button is on the righthand side of this page.) Hope your writing’s going well 🙂

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Reblogged this on PRINCE CHARMING ISN'T HERE and commented: what an amazing list! I always have a hard time describing features! words sometimes fail me!

i loved this list! thank you so much for making it! 🙂

So glad it was helpful!

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Thank you! This is so helpful to have for reference. Occasionally I’ll have a particular word in mind and can’t think of it, and I can usually pop over here and find it right away!

I absolutely love your master lists. They have helped me so much in diversifying the words I use when I’m writing. 🙂

Ohhh thank you! That is so great to hear. 🙂 Hope your writing projects are going great!

Thank you, and they are. I’m just about to publish a works I’ve been working on for the past couple of months, which is so exciting. XD Hope all your writing projects are going great as well. 🙂

What a wonderful and thorough list Bryn. Thanks for sharing it! I will at some point ‘link back’ to this fabulous article (I’ll let you know when I do.) I’m new to your site, but will certainly be back for more! I’m fascinated to learn that you’re also a home-grown KC girl. =0) Although, I remarried and moved to California 9 years ago, KC still tugs my heart-strings.

Hey, so glad you like it! Yeah, Kansas City is a special place. Come visit anytime 🙂 And thanks for visiting my blog! — I LOVE your username, by the way. Made me smile.

thanks for following my blog!

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Reblogged this on A Blissful Garden and commented: I find this very important!

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Reblogged this on Insideamoronsbrain and commented: Wow!!

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Thanks for sharing this list! It is amazing and so helpful !

I’m going to save this as a favorite. You always provide great information Bryn. Continue with your success.

Oh, thank you so much, Christopher! I really appreciate the kind words. So glad you like this!

This list is so complete! I haven’t worked on fiction in a long while, but lately I’ve been wanting to get back into it. I know this is going to be a great help when i sit down to create my characters!

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This is absolutely perfect for aspiring writers so that we don’t have to use Microsoft Word synonyms that tend to nit have what we’re searching for. Your introductory paragraph about readers falling in love with characters’ personalities and not theit physical attributes was spot on. Thank you thank you, thank you!

Chunny! Thank you so very much for the kind words. I’m so glad you found it helpful!!

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This is amazing! Thank you! I hope it’s alright if I use this as a reference in a blog post for character development.

Hi Jacquelyn! So glad you like it. That’s fine, just please link to the post!

I read this over and over, thank you for creating this! Can I just ask, when thinking of clothing and how to describe it, what are some things you would put? (I’m making a book draft and have never needed clothing described to me as much as now)

Thank you! It’s so important that we don’t reuse the same words too often, so this will help a lot with that problem.

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Thanks for helping me. It really made a big difference of helping me come up with something.

Hi Joseph! Sorry for the delayed reply! I’m so glad you liked it. Thanks for the kind words!

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Your book “Master Lists for Writers” has helped me incredibly. I’ve always wanted to be a romance writer but didn’t have the nerve until now. I am currently working on a short story about a college girl who is assaulted by a classmate. It was based on a dream I had a few nights ago. I haven’t developed how she gets her revenge on him. I know the story line seems dark but the dream stuck with me so much, I felt the urge to turn it into a story. Thank you again for your awesome book. What a great resource

Rhonda! Thank you so much for the kind words. I am so happy that the book is helpful, and even gladder that you’re going for it and writing! Sending you best wishes on your story!

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Great advice in this post, Bryn! Thank you.

Used this for school! It was really helpful!

Oh yay! So glad it was helpful!

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This is a great list! So comprehensive, and just what I was looking for. I struggle with physical descriptions of people and have a tendency to write the same kins of attributes. So this list is fab!

This is great!

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keep up the good work

Hey thanks 🙂

This is so helpful!!!!!

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Tiptoeing out there to publish my first book (I’ve been writing a long time). This post helped so much. Thanks!

oh my gosh, thank you! You have put a lot of effort in this list. I def appreciate it 🙂

Thank you I´m always using this when I´m creating new characters.

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Incredibly helpful! Thanks a lot :3

Thank you for sharing this!

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More extensive than my general list. My wizened goatee and elder Fu Manchu thank you for sharing your time and devotion to the craft.

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Very useful for ready reference. Thank you very much.

Thanks, Mohan! So glad you liked it!

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I’ve been writing for a while, mostly for fun, but this was the one thing I could never get down, but this list is great! all around solid, and incredibly useful, I see myself using it every time I need to make a new character, good job!

You’re a legend! This is fantastic, thank you!

Hahaha, thanks for the kind words! 🙂 Glad it’s helpful!

I am following your prompts and valuable advice for writing a fantasy teen fiction novel. I think you are amazing. You might not know it but I was able to clear hundreds of my doubts through your help. Please keep up the good work and providing your valuable support to all of us upcoming writers.

Hey, thank you so much for the kind words—you made my day! It’s wonderful to hear that you’re working on YA fantasy. I’m so glad I could help, and I wish you every success!

I honestly would not recommend this as good writing advice. The focus is too much on describing someone’s physical features using analogies for food. That is not a good thing, it becomes trite and overdone. If used sparsely it’s okay but almost every word in this list is food related.

Hi, Larissa! Thanks for taking your valuable time to share your opinion.

You have done a great job preparing this Master List. Those who think such precise words for describing someone hurt their sensibilities, move on to another URL. I appreciate every bit of your effort.

Hi, Pradeep! I am so glad you like the list. Thanks so much for commenting!

Bryn, I love your master list book and use it all the time!

Ohh, thank you so much! I’m so glad it’s helpful!

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This is a godsend. I owe you my soul.

I work 20 hours per day, (regular business and writing the memoir). Just ordered the Master List–seems like having my own research assistant. I may be able to get 5 hours sleep now. Thanks

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No jaw descriptions? ;(

You saved my day with your wonderful, descriptive words! Now I’ve found the perfect features for my handsome male character. Thank you!

That is a lot of hours for books but I guess if you keep pushing it will happen.

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Hi Bryn, thanks so much for this information! I always appreciate your lists because I like comprehensive material all in one location as a reference (then if I decide to break the rules, at least I know what the rules are “supposed to be” first!). Have you considered making comprehensive lists of creative writing genre conventions (tropes, archetypes, settings, devices, etc.)?

Hello, and thank you for the valuable and useful information. I agree with Eleanore regarding the list of genre conventions. I’m more than pleased I found you website.

Thank u so much ❤️ that was so helpful

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How 50 Famous Female Characters Were Described in Their Screenplays

All the surprising ways your favorite roles were introduced on the page..

How do you create a memorable female character? It helps if you get it right from the very beginning, as Joseph L. Mankiewicz did in his screenplay for All About Eve when he introduced the woman who would be played by Bette Davis. “The CAMERA follows the bottle to MARGO CHANNING,” wrote Mankiewicz in his stage directions. “An attractive, strong face. She is childish, adult, reasonable, unreasonable — usually one when she should be the other, but always positive.”

It’s an indelible description of a complicated woman, one so persuasive that you’d even think Margo exists outside the margins of Mankiewicz’s pages … and in a way, she would, since Davis eventually brought to life what the writer first put to words. Not every screenwriter takes the time to pen such a vivid character introduction — some include few details other than an estimated age or a few quick adjectives, preferring instead to let their dialogue do the talking — but many of our most famous screen women were originally created in those carefully composed sentences that few besides the actress, her writer, and their crew were lucky enough to read.

It’s always fun to get a peek behind that curtain, but why settle for just a peek? Vulture has rifled through countless old screenplays to find the descriptions for 50 notable female characters, which we present to you below. The women are young and old, heroine and foe, star and supporting character, but they were all born on the page. Some interesting, sometimes frustrating trends emerge in the details; you may not be shocked to learn that most of these writers spend far more time describing the female character’s level of beauty than they do her male counterpart’s. But whether the descriptions are well-written or problematic, they offer plenty of insight into how Hollywood views women and creates roles for them.

One of the best ones is this wonderfully evocative introduction of the faded movie star played by Gloria Swanson in Sunset Boulevard :

Norma Desmond stands down the corridor next to a doorway from which emerges a flickering light. She is a little woman. There is a curious style, a great sense of high voltage about her. She is dressed in black house pajamas and black high-heeled pumps. Around her throat there is a leopard-patterned scarf, and wound around her head a turban of the same material. Her skin is very pale, and she is wearing dark glasses.

Few women but Audrey Hepburn could truly live up to this description in Breakfast at Tiffany’ s :

The girl walks briskly up the block in her low cut evening dress. We get a look at her now for the first time. For all her chic thinness she has an almost breakfast-cereal air of health. Her mouth is large, her nose upturned. Her sunglasses blot out her eyes. She could be anywhere from sixteen to thirty. As it happens she is two months short of nineteen. Her name (as we will soon discover) is HOLLY GOLIGHTLY.

One of the best screen couples has got to be Nick and Nora Charles from The Thin Man . If you haven’t had the pleasure of falling in love with them onscreen, rest assured that this description of Nora will do it for you:

NORA CHARLES, Nick’s wife, is coming through. She is a woman of about twenty-six… a tremendously vital person, interested in everybody and everything, in contrast to Nick’s apparent indifference to anything except when he is going to get his next drink. There is a warm understanding relationship between them. They are really crazy about each other, but undemonstrative and humorous in their companionship. They are tolerant, easy-going, taking drink for drink, and battling their way together with a dry humor.

You only get one chance to make a first impression … unless there’s a sequel, in which case you’ll have to be reintroduced. Let’s look at the way James Cameron described Sarah Connor over the arc of two Terminator movies, starting with the first film, when this humble waitress had no idea she would go on to become the mother of the resistance:

SARAH CONNOR is 19, small and delicate-featured. Pretty in a flawed, accessible way. She doesn’t stop the party when she walks in, but you’d like to get to know her. Her vulnerable quality masks a strength even she doesn’t know exists.

Compare that to the buff, hardened warrior woman Linda Hamilton portrayed in Terminator 2: Judgment Day …

SARAH CONNOR is not the same woman we remember from last time. Her eyes peer out through a wild tangle of hair like those of a cornered animal. Defiant and intense, but skittering around looking for escape at the same time. Fight or flight. Down one cheek is a long scar, from just below the eye to her upper lip. Her VOICE is a low and chilling monotone.

How about a few other screen women you wouldn’t want to cross? Here’s the description of goth hacker Lisbeth Salander from the screenplay for The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo :

Lisbeth Salander walks in: A small, pale, anorexic-looking waif in her early 20’s. Short black-dyed hair - pierced eyelid - tattoo of a wasp on her neck; probably several more under her black leather jacket - black t-shirt, black jeans, black Caterpillar boots … This isn’t punk fashion. This is someone saying, Stay the fuck away from me.

Meet the young heroine of The Hunger Games , who conveys toughness and grit from the jump:

KATNISS EVERDEEN walks past without turning. She’s 15, lean and hungry, with steel-gray eyes and a long dark braid — a fighter, robbed of her little-girl years long ago.

Mo’Nique’s Oscar-winning role in Precious was just as vivid on the page:

MARY — INCREDIBLY LARGE, OILY SKIN, UNKEMPT HAIR, AND WEARING A GRIMY HOUSE DRESS sits on the couch with her back turned to Precious. This mass of woman looks as if she is one with the furniture — if not the entire apartment.

This description of Faye Dunaway’s Bonnie in Bonnie and Clyde , alone in her bedroom, establishes where the character is headed even before we see her rob a single bank:

Blonde, somewhat fragile, intelligent in expression. She is putting on make-up with intense concentration and appreciation, applying lipstick and eye make-up. As the camera slowly pulls back from the closeup we see that we have been looking into a mirror. She is standing before the full-length mirror in her bedroom doing her make-up. She overdoes it in the style of the time: rosebud mouth and so forth. As the film progresses her make-up will be refined until, at the end, there is none.

And this introduction of Gina Gershon’s character in the Wachowskis’ sexy thriller Bound minces no words:

Leaning against the back of the elevator is Corky, a very butch-looking woman with short hair and a black leather jacket. She is a lesbian and wants people to know it.

Can You Guess This Famous Female Character?

We'll give you the way she's introduced in the screenplay. You tell us who she is.

Rey,  Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Clarice Starling,  The Silence of the Lambs

Trinity,  The Matrix

Leeloo,  The Fifth Element

Princess Leia,  Star Wars

Suzanne Stone,  To Die For

Scarlett O'Hara,  Gone With the Wind

Annie Wilkes,  Misery

Regina George,  Mean Girls

Heather Chandler,  Heathers

Cher Horowitz,  Clueless

Cleopatra,  Cleopatra

Leilana Pierce,  Reality Bites

Lady Bird,  Lady Bird

Elle Woods,  Legally Blonde

Annie Walker,  Bridesmaids

Leticia Musgrove,  Monsters Ball

Aibileen Clark,  The Help

Florence Jackson,  Mudbound

Queenie,  The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Ellie Sattler,  Jurassic Park

Mary,  There's Something About Mary

Karen Sisco,  Out of Sight

Cady Heron,  Mean Girls

Rose DeWitt Bukater,  Titanic

Vesper Lynd,  Casino Royale

Maya,  Zero Dark Thirty

Allie Hamilton,  The Notebook

Vicki Vale, Batman

Nola Rice, Match Point

Alex Forrest, Fatal Attraction

Maria Elena, Vicky Cristina Barcelona

Jackie Kennedy,  Jackie

Elisa Esposito,  The Shape of Water

Tiffany Maxwell,  Silver Linings Playbook

Ada McGrath,  The Piano

Nina Sayers,  Black Swan

Satine,  Moulin Rouge

Mia Dolan,  La La Land

Rachel,  Blade Runner

Film is a visual medium, and a screenwriter might have plenty of reasons to describe a female character’s look beyond simply flattering an actress or enticing the reader. Still, it’s striking to see how often and how thoroughly the female characters’ physical attributes are dissected. (There’s even a Twitter account devoted to it.)

Take this description by Quentin Tarantino of the first woman we see in his film Death Proof , the radio DJ played by Sydney Tamiia Poitier:

A tall (maybe 6ft) Amazonian Mulatto goddess walks down her hallway, dressed in a baby tee, and panties that her big ass (a good thing) spill out of, and her long legs grow out of. Her big bare feet slap on the hard wood floor. She moves to the cool rockabilly beat as she paces like a tiger putting on her clothes. Outside her apartment she hears a “Honk Honk.” She sticks her long mane of silky black curly hair, her giraffish neck and her broad shoulders, out of the window and yells to a car below. This sexy chick is Austin, Texas, local celebrity JUNGLE JULIA LUCAI, the most popular disc jockey of the coolest rock radio station in a music town.

Margot Robbie got her breakout role in The Wolf of Wall Street , and the screenplay essentially treats her character like Leonardo DiCaprio’s avaricious Jordan Belfort would:

We see NAOMI, 24, blonde and gorgeous, a living wet dream in LaPerla lingerie. Naomi licks her lips; she’s incredibly, painfully hot.

There’s no question James Cameron was a bit sprung on the Na’vi warrior he created for Zoe Saldana to play in Avatar :

Draped on the limb like a leopard, is a striking NA’VI GIRL. She watches, only her eyes moving. She is lithe as a cat, with a long neck, muscular shoulders, and nubile breasts. And she is devastatingly beautiful — for a girl with a tail. In human age she would be 18. Her name is NEYTIRI (nay-Tee-ree).

One of the most complicated female protagonists in recent years has to be Lisa, the high-school student played by Anna Paquin in Kenneth Lonergan’s underseen masterpiece Margaret . She is brash, foolish, and passionate, perpetually throwing herself into situations she knows little about but quick to speak on them with total certainty. You might expect some of those attributes to work their way into Lonergan’s description of Lisa. Instead, he simply wrote this:

On LISA COHEN, just 17. Not the best-looking girl in her class but definitely in the top five.

Many screenplays try to hedge their female character’s beauty, lest she seem so gorgeous as to be unattainable. Perhaps the woman doesn’t know how pretty she is, or there’s a slight imperfection added to make her relatable. The exact calibration of these female characters’ beauty begs a reference to Goldilocks: They’re hot, but not too hot.

Take Buttercup from The Princess Bride :

Buttercup is in her late teens; doesn’t care much about clothes and she hates brushing her long hair, so she isn’t as attractive as she might be, but she’s still probably the most beautiful woman in the world.

Or Saoirse Ronan ’s immigrant from Brooklyn :

One of the front doors opens, and out slips EILIS — early twenties, open-faced pretty without knowing it.

Meg Ryan’s character from When Harry Met Sally was similarly naïve to her own beauty:

Driving the car is SALLY ALBRIGHT. She’s 21 years old. She’s very pretty although not necessarily in an obvious way.

While the screenplay for True Lies fusses over the appearance of Helen Tasker (Jamie Lee Curtis) like a henpecking mother:

To call her plain would be inaccurate. She could be attractive if she put any effort into it, which doesn’t occur to her.

Then again, there are plenty of female characters who have an almost apologetic relationship to their own looks and try to mitigate them somehow. Take the Julia Stiles character from 10 Things I Hate About You :

KAT STRATFORD, eighteen, pretty — but trying hard not to be — in a baggy granny dress and glasses.

She’d probably have lots to talk about with Celine, the character played by Julie Delpy in Before Sunrise and its two sequels:

Strikingly attractive, she plays it down by wearing no make-up, a loose-fitting vintage dress and flat shoes.

And maybe they could exchange style tips with Zooey Deschanel’s elusive love interest in (500) Days of Summer :

SUMMER FINN files folders and answers phones in a plain white office. She has cropped brown hair almost like a boy’s but her face is feminine and pretty enough to get away with it.

It’s startling to discover that even some of the most beautiful women in the world, asked to play some of the screen’s sexiest characters, were still not immune to the Goldilocks description. Take Whitney Houston’s besieged singer in The Bodyguard :

RACHEL MARRON finally rises from the sofa. It’s a bit of a shock to see that she is only about thirty years old. A young woman. Not beautiful, not ugly. Unique only in that she is immediately interesting. A Superstar.

Or Sharon Stone’s iconic murderess in Basic Instinct , who is judged against a character introduced in the previous scene and found a bit wanting:

CATHERINE TRAMELL is 30 years old. She has long blonde hair and a refined, classically beautiful face. She is not knockout gorgeous like Roxy; there is a smoky kind of sensuousness about her.

But guess which character is described with care, cinematic attention, and not a single description of her sex appeal? Nomi Malone from Showgirls !

Her name is NOMI MALONE. She looks from a distance like a kid. She stands along the Interstate, outlines in the shadows of the setting sun. She’s got a big American Tourister in front of her with a sign on it that says: “Vegas.” The suitcase looks like it’s been dropped from a plane or something. She’s wearing a baseball cap, a worn black leather jacket, torn jeans, and time-kissed cowboy boots. She’s got her thumb out.

Should we move on from Showgirls to Meryl Streep ? As befits the woman who is considered our greatest living actress, several of the characters she has played have received memorable screenplay introductions. The Devil Wears Prada gives us glimpses of Streep’s intimidating editrix until the full version is unveiled:

We see more flashes of MIRANDA… $2,000 crocodile Manolos, Chanel jacket, perfect hair, fabulous Harry Winston earrings… [until] MIRANDA steps out of the elevator and for the first time we see her head-on. MIRANDA PRIESTLY, in all her glory. She is stunning, perfectly put together, a white Hermes scarf around her neck. MIRANDA’S look is so distinctive you can spot her a mile away. She is unlike any other beautiful woman, singularly MIRANDA.

In the farce Death Becomes Her , here’s how Streep ’s vain leading lady is brought onstage:

CUT TO the Actress’s face, and the picture on the Playbill isn’t exactly from yesterday. MADELINE ASHTON, fortyish, has just reached the point where age is beginning to encroach on her incredible looks. She’s elegant, she’s beautiful, but if you look closely behind her eyes in a quiet moment, you’ll notice something else. She’s terrified. Right now she’s singin’ and dancin’ up a storm, seemingly without benefit of training in singin’ or dancin’.

And this description of Streep’s character in It’s Complicated is a total distillation of writer-director Nancy Meyers and her heroines.

JANE is mid-fifties and has embraced that fact. She knows 50 is not the new 40 and because of that, she is still described by all who know her as beautiful. Everything about this woman’s appearance screams “solid.”

Julia Roberts isn’t necessarily thought of as a fashion plate, but if you peruse the screenplays for her films, you’ll realize that many of her most famous characters express themselves through what they wear. First up, Pretty Woman :

VIVIAN turns and stares at herself in a grainy, cracked bedroom mirror. She is twenty years old and a prostitute. Make-up applied to give her a hard, older look doesn’t quite succeed. She’d be innocently beautiful without it. She is wearing tiny shorts, a tight tube top, thigh high boots. She stares at herself, not really liking what she sees.

In My Best Friend’s Wedding , Roberts is more subtly costumed, but the way she dresses is meant to indicate high-functioning disarray:

JULIANNE POTTER, almost 28, wears her favorite bulky sweater over a bunch of other stuff she pulled together in fifteen seconds. She is unkempt, quick, volatile, scattered, and beneath it all, perhaps because of it all, an original beauty. Dark liquid eyes, a cynical mouth, slender expressive fingers.

And then, of course, there’s her unconventionally costumed legal crusader in Erin Brockovich :

How to describe her? A beauty queen would come to mind — which, in fact, she was. Tall in a mini skirt, legs crossed, tight top, beautiful — but clearly from a social class and geographic orientation whose standards for displaying beauty are not based on subtlety.

Some of the most endearing character descriptions are of girls navigating the path to adulthood. When we meet Jennifer Grey’s character in Dirty Dancing , the script emphasizes how far she still has to go:

Next to Lisa is her sister, BABY, an endearingly unkempt puppy of a seventeen year old, whose face has the unguarded responsiveness of a child. At the moment, she is hunched in her corner and all we see is her shaggy hair, her scruffy sandals, and the book she’s reading — “THE PLIGHT OF THE PEASANT.”

Writer-director Gina Prince-Bythewood introduces the two leads of Love & Basketball as children, but when she fast-forwards to high school, where Monica and Quincy are now teenage basketball stars, her female lead gets this reintroduction:

On the floor, MONICA, dribbles down court. Just EIGHTEEN, her athletic figure has a few curves, but her loose jersey does little to show it off. Her hair is a mess and her knees are dark with bruises. A small scar is visible on her cheek.

In Beetlejuice , Winona Ryder’s Lydia may still be young, but she feels more fully formed as a person than the immature adults around her:

Lydia, age 14, is a pretty girl, but wan, pale and overly dramatic, dressed as she is in her favorite color, black. She’s a combination of a little death rocker and an ’80s version of Edward Gorey’s little girls. She has a couple of expensive cameras around her neck and is already taking photographs of the moving men. Lydia is cool, Lydia is sullen, Lydia is her father’s daughter by his first marriage. Lydia is usually about half-pissed off. But underneath… we like her a lot.

Many screenplays promise us that we’ll eventually like the female character, especially if she’s introduced in a place of conflict. Take Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio’s estranged wife in The Abyss :

A slender woman in her early thirties. She’s attractive, if a bit hardened, dressed conservatively in a skirt and jacket. Meet LINDSEY. Project Engineer for Deepcore. She’s a pain in the ass, but you’ll like her. Eventually.

The character introduction for Rachel Weisz in The Mummy is even more insistent:

Standing at the top of a tall ladder between two of these rows and leaning against one of the bookshelves, is a rather uninteresting British GIRL: eye-glasses, hair-in-a-bun, long boring dress, your typical prudish nightmare. This is EVELYN CARNAHAN. We’re going to fall in love with her.

But not every screenplay feels the need to declaim quite so much when introducing the love interest. Sometimes, the description is so beguiling that you start to fall in love yourself. Who wouldn’t lean forward at this introduction of Susan Sarandon’s character in Bull Durham ?

ANNIE SAVOY, mid 30’s, touches up her face. Very pretty, knowing, outwardly confident. Words flow from her Southern lips with ease, but her view of the world crosses Southern, National and International borders. She’s cosmic.

Or how about Shirley MacLaine’s winsome elevator operator in Billy Wilder’s The Apartment , who you’d like to get to know?

She is in her middle twenties and her name is FRAN KUBELIK. Maybe it’s the way she’s put together, maybe it’s her face, or maybe it’s just the uniform — in any case, there is something very appealing about her. She is also an individualist — she wears a carnation in her lapel, which is strictly against regulations. As the elevator loads, she greets the passengers cheerfully.

In 1944, when Wilder’s classic noir Double Indemnity came out, this description of Barbara Stanwyck’s femme fatale was awfully hot:

Phyllis Dietrichson stands looking down. She is in her early thirties. She holds a large bath-towel around her very appetizing torso, down to about two inches above her knees. She wears no stockings, no nothing. On her feet a pair of high-heeled bedroom slippers with pom-poms. On her left ankle a gold anklet.

Some love interests, like Karen Allen’s in Raiders of the Lost Ark , can be summed up in two sentences:

She is MARION RAVENWOOD, twenty-five years old, beautiful, if a bit hard-looking. At this moment, however, that look does not hurt.

Some don’t even get that much: In the script for Star Wars , Princess Leia is merely described as a “lovely young girl.” When her portrayer, Carrie Fisher, eventually embarked on a successful screenwriting career, she lavished far more attention on the characters she scripted.

One of those characters is the one we’ll end with: Postcards From the Edge ’ s Doris Mann, played by Shirley MacLaine and based on Fisher’s own mother, Debbie Reynolds. You can imagine a slow grin spreading on Fisher’s face as she brought this one home:

A woman is running down the hallway, wailing, everything flying — purse, wig askew, blouse untucked, false eyelashes removed. Clearly this woman was caught mid-something for the apparent emergency. She is DORIS MANN, about 60, formerly beautiful and more than somewhat currently. She was an enormous star in the ’50s and ’60s and bears that mark. She is currently very upset, theatrically so. Cutting a wide swath as she makes her way down the hall — things dropping out of her purse, mostly makeup, a pack of cigarettes. People watch her as she moves by moving aside to avoid impact. Doris Mann is very upset. Perhaps she has lost a shoe.

Kyle Buchanan joined our friend John Horn, host of KPCC radio’s entertainment show “The Frame,” to talk about producing this story and what it reveals. You can listen to their discussion here.

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watermark Member

How to write descriptions of beautiful women.

Discussion in ' Character Development ' started by watermark , Jan 12, 2017 .

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_f5f50fd1a95167666fa8bb2f7f474318'); }); Right now I only know how to write them like this: Jane is beautiful. Jill is very beautiful. Jenny is beautiful too. As you can see, I obviously have a problem. I don't know how to describe beauty in women! (And while we're on the topic, how to describe handsomeness on guys too.) Of course, I can pull up a thesaurus too and change them to: Jane is pretty. Jill is gorgeous. Jenny is stunning. But somehow I think there's more to it than that. How would I go about describing women? Any examples? Any advice? Thanks so much!  

Wreybies Thrice Retired Supporter Contributor

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_f5f50fd1a95167666fa8bb2f7f474318'); }); Ok, first of all, stop telling me she's beautiful. What is her beauty made of? What are the materials? Give me that.  

Homer Potvin A tombstone hand and a graveyard mind Staff Supporter Contributor

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_f5f50fd1a95167666fa8bb2f7f474318'); }); Eyes are always a good place to start, namely the way he/she looks at you and what that makes you feel. Or the way you feel when a beautiful man/woman speaks your name. The latter is my favorite. I used to work dressing rooms in a casino and I nearly melted when Shania Twain looked at me and said my name with a smile. I was down for the count for the rest of the day. Having said that you definitely do not want to go overboard with the description. Nothing brings a narrative to a screeching halt quite like a mini treatise on what a person looks like or what they are wearing (I'm looking at you George R.R. Martin). A blurb here or there is okay, particularly if you need to fill in a dialogue beat or something.  

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_f5f50fd1a95167666fa8bb2f7f474318'); }); Homer Potvin said: ↑ ...Nothing brings a narrative to a screeching halt quite like a mini treatise on what a person looks like or what they are wearing (I'm looking at you George R.R. Martin) . Click to expand...

Lifeline South. Supporter Contributor

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_f5f50fd1a95167666fa8bb2f7f474318'); }); Now, you can start by what is fascinating to the POV character. Why does he think her beautiful? Is it something in her stance and bearing, maybe her laughter? Or the way she seems always poised and elegant of movement? What does attract you about women? What does attract the POV character? 'Beautiful' to one is not beautiful to another. I know for a fact that I, personally, have always been more fascinated by the unusual and imperfect guys. I've never been fascinated by the 'perfect', or even the usually 'handsome' called guys. Good for me and my female friend, because we have never quarrelled over the same guys  

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_f5f50fd1a95167666fa8bb2f7f474318'); }); But descriptions can make great signposts to cue the reader later on in a story. Say, you have serial killer (or something) that always wears an orange vest (nevermind that that would make the killer easy to identify for witnesses, cops, etc). The reader is aware of it, but other characters are not. So later in the story you can have Character A interacting with the killer (say they just met) in an otherwise innocuous scene. If you are in Character A's POV then she does not know he is the killer, and we the reader do not know he's the killer unless your omniscient voice blurts it out. Then in the middle of the scene you can drop a casual reference to the orange vest (remember, you are tight on Character A's POV here) and the reader is immediately cued. Character A has no clue, maybe she just comments that she likes the color, but the audience is like, "Oh no! Stabby stabby time!"  

Seren Writeaholic

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_f5f50fd1a95167666fa8bb2f7f474318'); }); Lifeline said: ↑ Now, you can start by what is fascinating to the POV character. Why does he think her beautiful? Is it something in her stance and bearing, maybe her laughter? Or the way she seems always poised and elegant of movement? What does attract you about women? What does attract the POV character? 'Beautiful' to one is not beautiful to another. I know for a fact that I, personally, have always been more fascinated by the unusual and imperfect guys. I've never been fascinated by the 'perfect', or even the usually 'handsome' called guys. Good for me and my female friend, because we have never quarrelled over the same guys Click to expand...

xanadu Contributor Contributor

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_f5f50fd1a95167666fa8bb2f7f474318'); }); I agree with @Lifeline and @Seren . Use the POV character as your basis, not only for describing beauty, but for describing anything. The last thing I want when I'm reading description is a dry objective narration from the author. Give me the description of the character through the lens of the character whose eyes we're looking through. What matters to one character is not what matters to another. Here's the thing, though. By doing this, you're not only describing the "beauty" of the target character. You're also giving us characterization of the POV character. The things he notices vs the things he doesn't, how he chooses to describe them, how brief or how detailed of a description he gives, all factor into who this character is. And that's way more valuable than a laundry list of adjectives, no matter how poetic those adjectives may be.  

ChickenFreak Contributor Contributor

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_f5f50fd1a95167666fa8bb2f7f474318'); }); watermark said: ↑ Right now I only know how to write them like this: Jane is beautiful. Jill is very beautiful. Jenny is beautiful too. As you can see, I obviously have a problem. I don't know how to describe beauty in women! (And while we're on the topic, how to describe handsomeness on guys too.) Of course, I can pull up a thesaurus too and change them to: Jane is pretty. Jill is gorgeous. Jenny is stunning. But somehow I think there's more to it than that. How would I go about describing women? Any examples? Any advice? Thanks so much! Click to expand...

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_f5f50fd1a95167666fa8bb2f7f474318'); }); Thanks so much for the comments so far! Another question. Any books in particular you can recommend I study to learn how to write descriptions, esp of women, better? (I'm guessing not one of the ASOIAF books... ) Perhaps romance novels?  

amerrigan Active Member

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_f5f50fd1a95167666fa8bb2f7f474318'); }); I'm not sure of any books that would help you. But the people on this forum know a few tricks that you could learn. One of which is the writing technique of 'using description to tell a story'. It not only applies to environments, but to people as well. The following is a classic 'writers lesson' of using description to tell the story: 'In 300 words, describe a street in such a way that you know that one of your character's mothers has just died, without ever saying it.' When beauty becomes a part of the character's story and influences the actions of the people around them, then you start to figure out ways in which to describe the beauty in a storied way. So you could change it to, 'In 300 words, describe how your character looks in such a way that you know that your protagonist is obsessed with them, without ever saying it.'  

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_f5f50fd1a95167666fa8bb2f7f474318'); }); I couldn't help myself but have a practice run: “…then Clare sat down at the dinner table. Clare had the brownest eyes I had ever seen. When you smiled at her, her eyes seemed to light up; and, as they did, I spilled gravy on the table. She laughed. I quickly mopped it up, embarrassed, but knocked over the salt as I wasn’t paying attention, watching her broad smile. Her lips were thin, small, and the top one came together to make a perfect M. She told me that I should pinch the salt and throw it over my shoulder. I did it clumsily, on purpose, tossing it against my shoulder, and asked her if she could show me how it should be done. A stupid game, I know, but she played along. She always played along. Her fingers were slender, nails cut short, she picked up the salt, and with a graceful movement the salt flew past her bare collarbone; exposed for all to see by her strapless floral dress. I watched as a single grain of the salt landed on her dark brown skin and rolled down to her underarm. My eyes traveled along the path of her long black hair back up to her eyes. She was still looking at me, waiting for me to try again. I mumbled something dismissive and quickly picked up my fork and started playing with my food, hiding behind the other conversations, and feeling guilty for watching a grain of salt roll down my wife’s sister’s body…”  

Phil Mitchell Banned Contributor

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_f5f50fd1a95167666fa8bb2f7f474318'); }); watermark said: ↑ Thanks so much for the comments so far! Another question. Any books in particular you can recommend I study to learn how to write descriptions, esp of women, better? (I'm guessing not one of the ASOIAF books... ) Perhaps romance novels? Click to expand...

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_f5f50fd1a95167666fa8bb2f7f474318'); }); @amerrigan Hey I really liked how you used a "guy does something and how girl reacts to that" to describe the girl. That's something I never thought of doing before!  

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_f5f50fd1a95167666fa8bb2f7f474318'); }); Thanks. I tried to capture some of the obsessive behavior within the description. The obsessed person's manipulation of their victims behavior. And also their reading of everything their obsession does as a positive reciprocation of their dark desires. I like doing writing exercises like these. I find them to be a lot of fun.  

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_f5f50fd1a95167666fa8bb2f7f474318'); }); Don't describe a character as the most beautiful or perfect using omniscient pov,  

Oswiecenie Active Member

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_f5f50fd1a95167666fa8bb2f7f474318'); }); 1. Look at descriptions of other beautiful literary characters. 2. Describe what would make your character stand out in this sea of beautiful literary characters.  

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_f5f50fd1a95167666fa8bb2f7f474318'); }); Romance novels don't always go into huge detail in their description, often because they have the whole novel to weave in little comments about certain features of the main characters. But I'm an avid fan of them, so if you do take a look, I'd highly recommend Sarah Morgan's stories, because she writes from the POV's of both the male and female protagonists. It should help you with writing descriptions about both. (She's written a lot of them to varying degrees of quality, so I'd go for one that's still available in paperback and published with either Mills & Boon or Harlequin.)  

123456789 Contributor Contributor

JLT Contributor Contributor

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_f5f50fd1a95167666fa8bb2f7f474318'); }); I can only add Francis Bacon's observation: “There is no exquisite beauty… without some strangeness in the proportion.” Oversized eyes, nose, or ears, long fingers, whatever. They're the features that you notice, that set your character apart from the rest of humanity.  

Sack-a-Doo! Contributor Contributor

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_f5f50fd1a95167666fa8bb2f7f474318'); }); Lifeline said: ↑ 'Beautiful' to one is not beautiful to another. Click to expand...

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_f5f50fd1a95167666fa8bb2f7f474318'); }); Sack-a-Doo! said: ↑ My wife calls me 'handsome' but most would not because I'm not even close to 'movie average' let alone 'movie pretty.' So, yeah, it's subjective as hell and Hollywood has given us a standard so out of whack as to make some cry. But... When someone is truly attracted to someone else—and I'm talking soul-mate attracted—the first bite (to quote Kryton the mechanoid) is with the eye. Eyes are what I saw when I first encountered my wife across a crowded room... literally, it was a crowded corridor at university and for the first few seconds, all I saw was her eyes and I couldn't look away. I was peripherally aware of her smile (still gives me goosebumps, BTW, even after 31 years) but mostly it was that 'hey! how do I know this person?' thing in her eyes that I was aware of. Although time didn't stand still, we both did... and simply stared at each other like we'd both found a long-lost friend. Click to expand...

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_f5f50fd1a95167666fa8bb2f7f474318'); }); Wreybies said: ↑ pulchritude Click to expand...

big soft moose An Admoostrator Admin Staff Supporter Contributor Community Volunteer

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_f5f50fd1a95167666fa8bb2f7f474318'); }); Wreybies said: ↑ The way he clearly did not wash his hair on a daily basis. . Click to expand...

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_f5f50fd1a95167666fa8bb2f7f474318'); }); big soft moose said: ↑ Seriously ? I wash mine about once a fortnight whether it needs it or not ( I do shower more often I hasten to add, its just that I'm very tall so my head doesn't go under the shower head without contortions) On the wider point I also look a bit like a werewolf , or if wearing my shapka 'like a deranged spaniel' this hasn't however over the years stopped various women from getting all fluttery over my looks and manly charm Click to expand...

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• Scriptwriting

How to Write Female Characters — Examples & Tips Explained

C enturies of literature, film, and television written by male writers have often been guilty of employing one-dimensional female character tropes (the “damsel in distress,” the “nagging wife”). But pop culture’s attempts to write more modern female characters often only result in new stereotypes. So, what should we think about when we consider how to write female characters? In this post, we’re going to look at applying the general principles of good character design to female characters — while mapping out tropes to avoid. 

Watch: What is Characterization — 2 Types Explained

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How to Write Female Characters

Let there be flaws.

Interesting, compelling, complex, multifaceted, layered, contradictory, and simply, well-written. These are all terms that describe good characters.  Well, specifically, they describe round characters . 

Round characters  •  How to write female characters

But in place of all of the terms that can indicate a character is lifelike and interesting, we often default to the word “strong.” True, it is not grammatically incorrect to use “strong” to describe a character who has a convincing or credible quality that results in believability. 

However, cultural conditioning leads us to a one-dimensional interpretation of this term when applied to female characters specifically: the “ strong female character .” This video outlines reasons why this trope is problematic:

What’s Wrong with “Strong” Female Characters?  •  How to write female characters

Ironically, rather than increasing women’s credibility as real humans on screen, the requirement that women be strong can put them in a personality straitjacket where their real human flaws, contradictions, and yes, weaknesses, are wiped away. In other words, they become flat and stereotypical . 

The phrase “strong female character” has in fact led to the creation of female characters who are so unrelentingly strong that we have robbed them of their humanity, and, well, their character. 

This tendency in film and television is the origin of the much-maligned, endlessly controversial “ Mary Sue ,” the indestructibly perfect female lead. The Mary Sue can arguably be said to be an attempt (though a failed one) at giving female characters agency. 

But instead, the result is a robotic pillar of human female perfection, who audiences roll their eyes at for their unrelatability. Watch this video below to see some great female character examples who are decidedly not Mary Sue’s. 

The Slow Demise of the Mary Sue  •  How to write female characters

Women are human (yes, it’s true), and humans have flaws . Allow your female characters to be imperfect.

Female character description examples

Lean into complexity.

This is similar to our first point, but complexity doesn’t just mean including flaws. Like any good character, women characters should have a myriad of distinct qualities.

Complexities abound in Lady Bird

Contradictions within a character make them more interesting and more real. Watching a protagonist try to get their dream job might be compelling. Watching them try to do it while also wanting to be there for their ailing sibling certainly will be. 

Losing complexity can easily result in a stereotypical character. Female character tropes are legion. Historical examples often lead us to think of classically sexist examples that render women into mere objects of the male gaze . But modern pop culture is littered with out-of-the box female characters: the aforementioned Mary Sue, the Girly Girl, the Likeable Friend, and the Manic Pixie Dream Girl (which by now has even made its way into the actual Oxford Dictionary, despite widespread cultural rejection of it as a term).

Manic pixie dream girls  •  How to write female characters

This video outlines a few of these tropes:

Writing a female character  •  How to write female characters

While male character tropes also abound, it somehow does not escape critics and audiences that tropes who happen to be male are the result of bad writing. But when we try to critique female tropes, what often results in the backwaters of the internet is a rejection of the female character herself , and not the two-dimensional writing that created her. 

Thus, even trying to tackle a female trope can create more pop culture sexism, rather than help dismantle it. Ultimately, any shallowly drawn lead female character is the result of writing that did not dig deep enough into the human condition and that comes up short in its depiction of people who are female. 

Related Posts

• What is a Mary Sue? →  
• The Manic Pixie Dream Girl →
• FREE: Story Speedometer for How to Write the Best Character Arc →

Female Character Description Examples

Flat female characters with a purpose.

Stereotypical characterizations of women are best avoided, unless the intention from the beginning was for her to be a flat character. Writing a good mix of round and flat characters is necessary for populating any story and shaping the overall narrative without too many characters cluttering the story. 

FLAT CHARACTER DEFINITION

What is a flat character.

A flat character is essentially another term for a one-dimensional character. This is a type of character that lacks complexity, often leans on stereotypes, and can be summarized in a few words. These characters are also called “stock characters.”

However, always defaulting to writing female characters as flat and stereotypical, and always giving male characters the complexity, contradictions, and big mountain obstacles to climb, indicates a lack of imagination at best and at worst, blatant sexism.

Quick tip: if you've named a character Pussy Galore, something went wrong.

Not how to write female characters

If you reflect on your writing and realize you’re relying on female character tropes, you can view it as an invitation to get curious and find threads of human connection which will bring your female characters to life. 

Give her motivation

Great female characters are characters who have an understandable motivation. This doesn’t mean giving a woman a monologue where she explicitly says, “I’m doing this to avenge my dead cat.” It means that, as a writer, you should understand why she is doing what she’s doing.

This often requires knowing your character’s backstory . How did she end up where she is today? What formative moments have made her who she is?

In Millenium Mambo , Vicky stays with her terrible boyfriend Hao-Hao for far too long. Without any backstory, her motivation for sticking with him would strain believability – the audience would lose patience.

Millennium Mambo

But writer Chu T’ien-wen establishes that Vicky flunked out of high school and she and Hao-Hao have grown up together. Therefore, her leaving him is far more difficult and complex.

If you take a look at underwritten female characters, you’ll typically notice that their motivations are muddled or unbelievable. This can be an Achilles heel for bad horror movies where the Final Girl makes the dumbest possible decisions at all times. Why are they doing what they’re doing? In these cases, it’s just to further the plot and fit in some more scares.

We should emphasize again that character motivation doesn’t have to be explicit. Agnès Varda’s Vagabond follows Mona, whose backstory and motivations are never abundantly clear. But she is still a fleshed-out, compelling character because it is clear Varda understands where Mona is coming from and what her psyche is.

We all have a backstory, and we all have motivations for our actions. So should the women in your screenplay.

Include a character arc

Protagonists usually have character arcs . In other words, they are not the exact same person in the beginning of the movie as they are at the end. They change.

A good female protagonist is no different. This gets back to the Mary Sue problem. If they’re a perfect, strong person at the beginning of the script, how can they evolve and grow as the story progresses?

A complex character gives a writer numerous opportunities for change. Let’s go back to Lady Bird . She and her mom begin the film at each other’s necks. But by the end of the runtime, the distance afforded by college has allowed Lady Bird to understand a mother a little better, and appreciate her a bit more.

Lady Bird and her mom

Of course, not all female characters need to have character arcs. A minor female character in a screenplay doesn’t need to have an evolution– doing so may take too much time away from the core journey of the protagonist.

Not even all women protagonists need to change. In Female Trouble , Dawn Davenport refuses to grow or learn. That’s what makes her so fun to watch.

Dawn changes for no one

A character arc should feel organic — it is the natural result of a fully realized character intersecting with the plot. If that doesn’t occur, but your character still feels real and the plot is satisfying, then don’t force it.

Describe her on her own terms

As we’ve hopefully established, you should know your characters inside and out. So this tip is an exercise to really test the knowledge of your leads.

Try writing ten sentences that describe your female character. Sounds easy– but here’s the twist. Do it without mentioning her relationship to others. For many male writers writing female characters, this may prove to be surprisingly difficult.

Take a look at this very male-written woman from Transformers , which we imported into StudioBinder’s screenwriting software . Here’s the introduction of the main female character of the film:

What have we learned about Mikaela Banes in this introduction? First, she’s beautiful. Second, she is the object of Sam’s desire. Third, she’s taken.

What does any of this tell us about her personality? Just about nothing. Instead, the description emphasizes her physical appearance and how she is perceived by the men around her.

Mikaela  •  Describing a female character

Megan Fox is a perfectly capable actor (doubters, check out Jennifer’s Body ), but there’s pretty much nothing to work with here. The result is a flat character — a big problem, especially since she’s supposed to be one of the lead characters.

Now, let’s look at Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s script for the pilot episode of Killing Eve . She introduces one of her protagonists as such:

Female character description examples  •  How do you write women so well

This description isn’t reinventing the wheel — it’s short and succinct. But it already has the trappings of a complex character. “A touch of ennui” is a loaded description, and one which the rest of the series mines.

Note, too, that these adjectives are all about Eve’s interiority. This is much more helpful for an actor, especially someone like Sandrah Oh, who thrives in the subtle contradictions within a character.

Killing Eve  •  Describing a female character

Of course, this doesn’t mean you can’t mention a female character’s physical appearance. Outward appearance can be just as crucial to a character, male or female, especially in film. But if you’re relying on something as boring and rote as “beautiful but doesn’t know it,” it’s time to go back to the drawing board: you may not have a good grasp on your character.

Phoebe Waller-Bridge is the master at character descriptions . The more you can envision who this female character is, what motivates her, and where she is headed, the more compelling any story involving her will be. To dig deeper into how to develop a compelling character arc, check out our video below:

Develop Stronger Characters  •  Women writing

Women in hollywood.

Now that you know how to write female characters, are you in need of some further inspiration about female characters and women in Hollywood in general? Though this is not to say male screenwriters and directors cannot write nuanced and believable female characters, female creatives might have a better shot at this since they have more life experience to pull from. With more female directors working than ever before, the picture for women in Hollywood is changing. Check out our compendium of noteworthy female directors today.

Up Next: Today’s Best Female Directors →

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19,903 quotes, descriptions and writing prompts, 4,965 themes

a young woman - quotes and descriptions to inspire creative writing

• a middle aged person
• being mature
• characterization

A young woman belongs first to herself, for she needs the space to learn whom she is and how her curiosities and passions both direct and build her. After this she can be a great force for good in her community and a blessing to the world.

As a young woman I was learning how to become a strong woman, to become a person who is able to take care of myself and others. Yet when there is so much in society and in the media, advertising especially, giving their notions of "perfection," it becomes very challenging to develop naturally, to let your passions explode, to have real confidence and self belief.

The mittens lay on the radiator, warm and dry. It was where Clara always put them, there with her woollen hat and scarf. They had the look of knitwear that had aged a bit, the once neat rows adorned with lumps and bumps, much like the look of a lamb in spring fields. I don't think I ever saw her in winter without them, and she wore them into spring too, until the weather warmed our skin and called the flowers from the earth. I think she must have liked the feeling of those mittens, something cosy, as if her hand was held and warmed by another. Or maybe it was a hark back to a childhood passed, to the days making snowmen in the backyard. Either way, it was her, beautiful Clara, always looking cosy inside and out.

A young woman she was, still with the sweetness of girlhood yet stepping with confidence into the shoes of womanhood.

As a young woman I struggled with the transition from girlhood to becoming objectified in sexual ways by our society. True development comes when we listen to the inner voice, but it when the volume from every other sector of modern society is so loud, that sacred whisper is lost to tragic consequence for half of humanity. Instead of being led from the soul by the divine, we are 'steered' by a culture that has long forgotten what a woman is.

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The Gigantic List of Character Descriptions (70+ examples)

The vast majority of character descriptions are simply lazy.

They recycle typical ideas about hair, eye color, and build, giving you more information about the character’s fitting for a dress or suit than the type of information you need to know them intimately.

The first thing you should do when describing a character is to pick a category that isn’t so overused. Such as trying to describe: 

Describing your character in an innovative way will help retain the reader’s interest. You want your reader to be asking questions about this character, to not only learn something about them but to create mystery. What made them like this? How long have they been this way? Is there someone currently after them or is this paranoia because of a past experience?  Questions like these are what keeps the reader reading. 

Not only physical descriptions are needed. Consider: “How is this person viewed by another character?” Do they seem dangerous, alluring, secretive, suspicious? The way another character views someone else gives insight about them as well. Are they attracted? Repulsed? Curious? 

Another thing to take notice of is the type of person they are, despite their appearance.

• How do they think?
• What do they feel?
• How do they view/react to certain situations compared to how others would?
• What is their mental state?

Here is a list of examples of brilliant character descriptions to give you an idea and help you come up with your own:

3 Categories: Modern Literary, Literature, Popular

Modern Literary

1. vladimir nabokov, lolita.

” … Her skin glistening in the neon light coming from the paved court through the slits in the blind, her soot-black lashes matted, her grave gray eyes more vacant than ever.”

2. Marilynne Robinson, Housekeeping

” … in the last years she continued to settle and began to shrink. Her mouth bowed forward and her brow sloped back, and her skull shone pink and speckled within a mere haze of hair, which hovered about her head like the remembered shape of an altered thing. She looked as if the nimbus of humanity were fading away and she were turning monkey. Tendrils grew from her eyebrows and coarse white hairs sprouted on her lip and chin. When she put on an old dress the bosom hung empty and the hem swept the floor. Old hats fell down over her eyes. Sometimes she put her hand over her mouth and laughed, her eyes closed and her shoulder shaking.” 

3. Jeffrey Eugenides, The Marriage Plot

“Phyllida’s hair was where her power resided. It was expensively set into a smooth dome, like a band shell for the presentation of that long-running act, her face.”

4. China Miéville, This Census-Taker

“His hand was over his eyes. He looked like a failed soldier. Dirt seemed so worked into him that the lines of his face were like writing.”

5. Mikhail Bulgakov, The Master and Margarita

“And then the hot air congealed in front of him, and out of it materialized a transparent man of most bizarre appearance. A small head with a jockey cap, a skimpy little checked jacket that was made out of air … The man was seven feet tall, but very narrow in the shoulders, incredibly thin, and his face, please note, had a jeering look about it.”

6. Barbara Kingsolver, The Poisonwood Bible

“Mama BekwaTataba stood watching us—a little jet-black woman. Her elbows stuck out like wings, and a huge white enameled tub occupied the space above her head, somewhat miraculously holding steady while her head moved in quick jerks to the right and left.”

7. John Kennedy Toole, A Confederacy of Dunces

“A green hunting cap squeezed the top of the fleshy balloon of a head. The green earflaps, full of large ears and uncut hair and the fine bristles that grew in the ears themselves, stuck out on either side like turn signals indicating two directions at once. Full, pursed lips protruded beneath the bushy black moustache and, at their corners, sank into little folds filled with disapproval and potato chip crumbs. In the shadow under the green visor of the cap Ignatius J. Reilly’s supercilious blue and yellow eyes looked down upon the other people waiting under the clock at the D.H. Holmes department store, studying the crowd of people for signs of bad taste in dress. Several of the outfits, Ignatius noticed, were new enough and expensive enough to be properly considered offenses against taste and decency. Possession of anything new or expensive only reflected a person’s lack of theology and geometry; it could even cast doubts upon one’s soul.”

8. A.S. Byatt, Possession

“He was a compact, clearcut man, with precise features, a lot of very soft black hair, and thoughtful dark brown eyes. He had a look of wariness, which could change when he felt relaxed or happy, which was not often in these difficult days, into a smile of amused friendliness and pleasure which aroused feelings of warmth, and something more, in many women.”

9. Jonathan Safran Foer, Everything is Illuminated

“He did not look like anything special at all.”

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10. Henry Lawson, The Bush Girl

“ Grey eyes that grow sadder than sunset or rain, f ond heart that is ever more true F irm faith that grows firmer for watching in vain —  She’ll wait by the sliprails for you.”

11. Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man

“I am an invisible man. 
No I am not a spook like those who haunted Edgar Allen Poe: 
Nor am I one of your Hollywood movie ectoplasms.
 I am a man of substance, of flesh and bone, fiber and liquids -
- and I might even be said to possess a mind. 
I am invisible, simply because people refuse to see me.”

12. F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby

“He smiled understandingly-much more than understandingly. It was one of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance in it, that you may come across four or five times in life. It faced–or seemed to face–the whole eternal world for an instant, and then concentrated on you with an irresistible prejudice in your favor.”

13. Thomas Wolfe, Look Homeward, Angel

“My brother Ben’s face, thought Eugene, is like a piece of slightly yellow ivory; his high white head is knotted fiercely by his old man’s scowl; his mouth is like a knife, his smile the flicker of light across a blade. His face is like a blade, and a knife, and a flicker of light: it is delicate and fierce, and scowls beautifully forever, and when he fastens his hard white fingers and his scowling eyes upon a thing he wants to fix, he sniffs with sharp and private concentration through his long, pointed nose…his hair shines like that of a young boy—it is crinkled and crisp as lettuce.”

14. Rudyard Kipling, The Jungle Books

“A black shadow dropped down into the circle. It was Bagheera the Black Panther, inky black all over, but with the panther markings showing up in certain lights like the pattern of watered silk. Everybody knew Bagheera, and nobody cared to cross his path, for he was as cunning as Tabaqui, as bold as the wild buffalo, and as reckless as the wounded elephant. But he had a voice as soft as wild honey dripping from a tree, and a skin softer than down.”

15. Charles Dickens, Great Expectations

“[Miss Havisham] had shut out infinitely more; that, in seclusion, she had secluded herself from a thousand natural and healing influences; that, her mind, brooding solitary, had grown diseased, as all minds do and must and will that reverse the appointed order of their Maker…”

16. John Knowles, A Separate Peace

“For such and extraordinary athlete—even as a Lower Middler Phineas had been the best athlete in the school—he was not spectacularly built. He was my height—five feet eight and a half inches…He weighed a hundred and fifty pounds, a galling ten pounds more than I did, which flowed from his legs to torso around shoulders to arms and full strong neck in an uninterrupted, unemphatic unity of strength.”

17. Ambrose Bierce, Chickamauga

“-the dead body of a woman—the white face turned upward, the hands thrown out and clutched full of grass, the clothing deranged, the long dark hair in tangles and full of clotted blood. The greater part of the forehead was torn away, and from the jagged hole the brain protruded, overflowing the temple, a frothy mass of gray, crowned with clusters of crimson bubbles—the work of a shell.”

18. Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice

“…your manners, impressing me with the fullest belief of your arrogance, your conceit, and your selfish disdain of the feelings of others, were such as to form the groundwork of disapprobation on which succeeding events have built so immovable a dislike; and I had not known you a month before I felt that you were the last man in the world whom I could ever be prevailed on to marry.”

19. Mark Twain, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

“He was most fifty, and he looked it. His hair was long and tangled and greasy, and hung down, and you could see his eyes shining through like he was behind vines. It was all black, no gray; so was his long, mixed-up whiskers. There warn’t no color in his face, where his face showed; it was white; not like another man’s white, but a white to make a body sick, a white to make a body’s flesh crawl – a tree-toad white, a fish-belly white. As for his clothes – just rags, that was all. He had one ankle resting on t’other knee; the boot on that foot was busted, and two of his toes stuck through, and he worked them now and then. His hat was laying on the floor – an old black slouch with the top caved in, like a lid.”  

20. William Golding, Lord of the Flies

“Inside the floating cloak he was tall, thin, and bony; and his hair was red beneath the black cap. His face was crumpled and freckled, and ugly without silliness.”

21. Jane Austen, Persuasion

“Vanity was the beginning and end of Sir Walter Elliot’s character: vanity of person and of situation. He had been remarkably handsome in his youth, and at fifty-four was still a very fine man. . . .”

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22. Andrew Lang, The Crimson Fairy Book

“When the old king saw this he foamed with rage, stared wildly about, flung himself on the ground and died.”

23. Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness

“He was commonplace in complexion, in feature, in manners, and in voice. He was of middle size and of ordinary build. His eyes, of the usual blue, were perhaps remarkably cold, and he certainly could make his glance fall on one as trenchant and heavy as an axe… Otherwise there was only an indefinable, faint expression of his lips, something stealthy — a smile — not a smile — I remember it, but I can’t explain.” 

24. Anne Bronte, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall

“His heart was like a sensitive plant, that opens for a moment in the sunshine, but curls up and shrinks into itself at the slightest touch of the finger, or the lightest breath of wind.”

25. Max Beerbohm, Zuleika Dobson

“He followed with his eyes her long slender figure as she threaded her way in and out of the crowd, sinuously, confidingly, producing a penny from one lad’s elbow, a threepenny-bit from between another’s neck and collar, half a crown from another’s hair, and always repeating in that flute-like voice of hers: “Well, this is rather queer!””

26. Aldous Huxley, Brave New World

“He had a long chin and big rather prominent teeth, just covered, when he was not talking, by his full, floridly curved lips. Old, young? Thirty? Fifty? Fifty-five? It was hard to say.”  

27. Maya Angelou, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings

“Her skin was a rich black that would have peeled like a plum if snagged, but then no one would have thought of getting close enough to Mrs. Flowers to ruffle her dress, let alone snag her skin. She didn’t encourage familiarity. She wore gloves too.  I don’t think I ever saw Mrs. Flowers laugh, but she smiled often. A slow widening of her thin black lips to show even, small white teeth, then the slow effortless closing. When she chose to smile on me, I always wanted to thank her.”

28. D.H. Lawrence, Lady Chatterley’s Lover

“But her will had left her. A strange weight was on her limbs. She was giving way. She was giving up…”

29. Henry James, The Aspern Papers

“Her face was not young, but it was simple; it was not fresh, but it was mild. She had large eyes which were not bright, and a great deal of hair which was not ‘dressed,’ and long fine hands which were–possibly–not clean.”   

30. Edward Bulwer-Lytton, Zanoni Book One: The Musician

“She is the spoiled sultana of the boards. To spoil her acting may be easy enough,—shall they spoil her nature? No, I think not. There, at home, she is still good and simple; and there, under the awning by the doorway,—there she still sits, divinely musing. How often, crook-trunked tree, she looks to thy green boughs; how often, like thee, in her dreams, and fancies, does she struggle for the light,—not the light of the stage-lamps.”

31. Gustave Flaubert, Madame Bovary

“Living among those white-faced women with their rosaries and copper crosses…” 

32. Charles Dickens, Great Expectations

“Though every vestige of her dress was burnt, as they told me, she still had something of her old ghastly bridal appearance; for, they had covered her to the throat with white cotton-wool, and as she lay with a white sheet loosely overlying that, the phantom air of something that had been and was changed, was still upon her.” 

33. Rudyard Kipling, Many Inventions

“He wrapped himself in quotations – as a beggar would enfold himself in the purple of Emperors.”

34. Mark Twain, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

“He was sunshine most always-I mean he made it seem like good weather.” 

35. Hugh Lofting, The Story of Doctor Dolittle

“For a long time he said nothing. He kept as still as a stone. He hardly seemed to be breathing at all. When at last he began to speak, it sounded almost as though he were singing, sadly, in a dream.”

36. Charles Dickens, Great Expectations

“I loved her against reason, against promise, against peace, against hope, against happiness, against all discouragement that could be.”

37. Edwin A. Abbott, Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions

“He is himself his own World, his own Universe; of any other than himself he can form no conception; he knows not Length, nor Breadth, nor Height, for he has had no experience of them; he has no cognizance even of the number Two; nor has he a thought of Plurality, for he is himself his One and All, being really Nothing.”

38. Jamie McGuire, Beautiful Oblivion

“Her long platinum blond hair fell in loose waves past her shoulders, with a few black peekaboo strands. She wore a black minidress and combat boots.”

39. N.K. Jemisin, The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms

“His long, long hair wafted around him like black smoke, its tendrils curling and moving of their own volition. His cloak — or perhaps that was his hair too — shifted as if in an unfelt wind.” 

40. M.L. LeGette, The Orphan and the Thief

“A creature–a frightfully, awful creature–was mere feet from her. Its eyes were enormous, the size of goose eggs and milky white. Its gray, slippery skin was stretched taut upon its face. Its mouth was wide and full of needle teeth. Its hands rested on the rock, hands that were webbed and huge with each finger ending in a sharp, curved nail. It was as tall as a human man, yet oddly shrunken and hunched.”  

 41. Amber Dawn, Sub Rosa

“When he did appear his eyes were as brown as I remembered, pupils flecked with gold like beach pebbles.” 

 42. Julia Stuart, The Tower, The Zoo, and The Tortoise

“His hair had been grown to counteract its unequivocal retreat from the top of his head, and was fashioned into a mean, frail ponytail that hung limply down his back. Blooms of acne highlighted his vampire-white skin.” 

43. James Lee Burke, The Neon Rain

“His khaki sleeves were rolled over his sunburned arms, and he had the flat green eyes and heavy facial features of north Louisiana hill people. He smelled faintly of dried sweat, Red Man, and talcum powder.” 

44. Stephenie Meyer, Twilight

“I vividly remembered the flat black color of his eyes the last time he glared at me – the color was striking against the background of his pale skin and his auburn hair. Today, his eyes were a completely different color: a strange ocher, darker than butterscotch, but with the same golden tone.” 

45. Brian Malloy, Twelve Long Months 

“Whith her hair dyed bright red, she looks like Ronald McDonald’s post-menopausal sister. Who has let herself go.”     (This is one of my favorites, because I find it ridiculously funny)

46. Joan Johnston, No Longer A Stranger

“Actually, Reb had the same flawless complexion as her sister– except for the freckles. Her straight, boyishly cut hair fell onto her brow haphazardly and hid beautiful arched brows that framed her large, expressive eyes. She had a delicate, aquiline nose, but a stubborn mouth and chin.” 

47. Brian Morton, Breakable You

“Without her glasses Vivian did look a little frightening. She had tight sinewy strappy muscles and a face that was hardened and almost brutal – a face that might have been chiseled by a sculptor who had fallen out of love with the idea of beauty.”

48. Anne Rice, The Vampire Armand

“I saw my Master had adorned himself in a thick tunic and beautiful dark blue doublet which I’d hardly noticed before. He wore soft sleek dark blue gloves over his hands, gloves which perfectly cleaved to his fingers, and legs were covered by thick soft cashmere stockings all the way to his beautiful pointed shoes.” 

49. Becca Fitzpatrick, Black Ice

“His brown hair was cropped, and it showed off the striking s ymmetry of his face. With the sun at his back, shadows marked the depressions beneath his cheekbones. I couldn’t tell the color of his eyes, but I hoped they were brown…The guy had straight, sculptured shoulders that made me think swimmer …” 

50. E.C. Sheedy, Killing Bliss

“He stood, which put him eye to eye with the dark-haired woman whose brilliant, burning gaze poured into his worthless soul like boiling tar, whose mouth frothed with fury–and whose hand now curled, knuckles white, around a steak knife.”  (The author gives a lot of details about the characters emotions, but there is not one specific detail about neither of their appearances. Use this as an example of how physical appearances aren’t always the most important thing.)

51. James Lee Burke, The Neon Rain

“His wiry gray and black hair was dripping with sweat, and his face was the color and texture of old paper. He looked up at me from where he was seated on his bunk, and his eyes were hot and bright and moisture was beaded across his upper lip. He held a Camel cigarette between his yellowed fingers, and the floor around his feet was covered with cigarette butts.”  

52. Suzanne Collins, The Hunger Games

“She has bright, dark eyes and satiny brown skin and stands tilted up on her toes with arms slightly extended to her sides, as if ready to take wing at the slightest sound.”

53. Becca Fitzpatrick, Hush, Hush

“He was abominable…and the most alluring, tortured soul I’d ever met.”   (This isn’t describing him physically, but it is giving insight to how the main character views him)

54. J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone

“A giant of a man was standing in the doorway. His face was almost completely hidden by  a long, shaggy mane of hair and a wild, tangled beard, but you could make out his eyes,  glinting like black beetles under all the hair.” 

55. Anne Rice, Violin

“I deliberately thought of him, my violinist, point by point, that with his long narrow nose and such deep-set eyes he might have been less seductive to someone else–perhaps. But then perhaps to no one. What a well-formed mouth he had, and how the narrow eyes, the detailed deepened lids gave him such a range of expression, to open his gaze wide, or sink in cunning street.”

56. Kevin Brooks, Lucas

“As I’ve already said, the memory of Lucas’s walk brings a smile to my face. It’s an incredibly vivid memory, and if I close my eyes I can see it now. An easygoing lope. Nice and steady. Not too fast and not too slow, Fast enough to get somewhere, but not too fast to miss anything. Bouncy, alert, resolute, without any concern and without vanity. A walk that both belonged to and was remote from everything around it.” 

57. Anne Rice, Violin

“And she looked the way he had always hated her–dreamy and sloppy, and sweet, with glasses falling down, smoking a cigarette, with ashes on her coat, but full of love, her body heavy and shapeless with age.” 

58. Kevin Brooks, Lucas

“As we drew closer, the figure became clearer, It was a young man, or a boy, dressed loosely in a drab green T-shirt and baggy green trousers. He had a green army jacket tied around his waist and a green canvas bag slung over his shoulder. The only non-green thing about him was the pair of scruffy black walking boots on his feet. Although he was on the small side, he wasn’t as slight as I first thought. He wasn’t exactly muscular, but he wasn’t weedy-looking either…there was an air of hidden strength about him, a graceful strength that showed in his balance, the way he held himself, the way he walked….” 

59. Iris Johansen, The Face of Deception

“Kinky tousled curls, only a minimum of makeup, large brown eyes behind round wire-rimmed glasses. There was a world of character in that face, more than enough to make her fascinating-looking instead of just attractive.” 

60. Dennis Lehane, A Drink Before the War

“Brian Paulson was rake thin, with smooth hair the color of tin and a wet fleshy handshake…. His greeting was a nod and a blink, befitting someone who’d stepped out of the shadows only momentarily.” 

61. Gena Showalter, The Darkest Night

“Pale hair fell in waves to his shoulders, framing a face mortal females considered a sensual feast. They didn’t know the man was actually a devil in angel’s skin. They should have, though. He practically glowed with irreverence, and there was an unholy gleam in his green eyes that proclaimed he would laugh in your face while cutting out your heat. Or laugh in your face while you cut out his heart.”

62. Sam Byers, Idiopathy 

“Now here he was: sartorially, facially and interpersonally sharpened; every inch the beatific boffin.”

63. Maggie Stiefvater, The Raven Boys

“As always, there was an all-American war hero look to him, coded in his tousled brown hair, his summer-narrowed hazel eyes, the straight nose that ancient Anglo-Saxons had graciously passed on to him. Everything about him suggested valor and power and a firm handshake.” 

64. J.R.R. Tolkien, Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring

“The face of Elrond was ageless, neither old nor young, though in it was written the memory of many things both glad and sorrowful. His hair was dark as the shadows of twilight, and upon it was set a circlet of silver; his eyes were grey as a clear evening, and in them was a light like the light of stars.” 

65. Fredrik Backman, A Man Called Ove

“People said Ove saw the world in black and white. But she was color. All the color he had.”  

66. Frank Herbert, Dune

“…a girl-child who appeared to be about four years old. She wore a black aba, the hood thrown back to reveal the attachments of a stillsuit hanging free at her throat. Her eyes were Fremen blue, staring out of a soft, round face. She appeared completely unafraid and there was a look to her stare that made the Baron feel uneasy for no reason he could explain.” 

67. Orson Scott Card, Ender’s Game

“Ender did not see Peter as the beautiful ten-year-old boy that grown-ups saw, with dark, tousled hair and a face that could have belonged to Alexander the Great. Ender looked at Peter only to detect anger or boredom, the dangerous moods that almost always led to pain.”

68. Caitlin Moran, How to Build a Girl

“He had his head in his hands, and his tie looked like it had been put on by an enemy, and was strangling him.”

69. Graham Joyce, Some Kind of Fairy Tale

“Peter was a gentle, red-haired bear of a man. Standing at six-four in his socks, he moved everywhere with a slight and nautical sway, but even though he was broad across the chest there was something centered and reassuring about him, like an old ship’s mast cut from a single timber.”

70. Brad Parks, The Girl Next Door

“…in addition to being fun, smart, and quick-witted—in a feisty way that always kept me honest—she’s quite easy to look at, with never-ending legs, toned arms, curly brown hair, and eyes that tease and smile and glint all at the same time.” 

71. Dennis Lehane, A Drink Before the War

“Sterling Mulkern was a florid, beefy man, the kind who carried weight like a weapon, not a liability. He had a shock of stiff white hair you could land a DC-10 on and a handshake that stopped just short of inducing paralysis.”

72. Philip Pullman, The Golden Compass

“Lord Asriel was a tall man with powerful shoulders, a fierce dark face, and eyes that seemed to flash and glitter with savage laughter. It was a face to be dominated by, or to fight: never a face to patronize or pity. All his movements were large and perfectly balanced, like those of a wild animal, and when he appeared in a room like this, he seemed a wild animal held in a cage too small for it.”

73. Sherman Alexie, The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven

“I thought she was so beautiful. I figured she was the kind of woman who could make buffalo walk on up to her and give up their lives. She wouldn’t have needed to hunt. Every time we went walking, birds would follow us around. Hell, tumbleweeds would follow us around.”

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29 comments

woowwwwwwwwie

Love the compilation. Thank you for doing this

This is a great compilation! My students are working on writing characters right now, so I’m having them look through your list to see examples of a job well done 🙂 Thanks!

Thanks I’m using these for students to make character drawings from

This is really helpful ! Love it !

Do you have a way, where you could put the characters physical traits in this website?

Thank you for the awesome list. You should add this one; it’s from Robert Louis Stevenson’s Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde: “Mr. Utterson, the lawyer, was a man of rugged countenance, that was never lightened by a smile; cold, scanty and embarrassed in discourse; backward in sentiment; lean, long, dusty, dreary, and yet somehow lovable.” There’s more after, but I thought this was a good description.

And this one: “Mr. Hyde was pale and dwarfish, he gave an impression of deformity without any nameable malformation, he had a displeasing smile, he had borne himself to the lawyer with a sort of murderous mixture of timidity and boldness, and he spoke with a husky, whispering, and somewhat broken voice: all these were points against him, but all of them together could not describe the hitherto unknown disgust, loathing, and fear with which Mr. Utterson regarded him.”

The quote that stood out to me the most was the quote from ‘The Census Taker’. That quote captured the characters feelings so well. The author was able to compare in self worth by saying it was as dirt, so much so that the dirt was written in his skin. I have never seen self worth and failure described as part of a person’s face.

Thank you. I echo Chris’s comment Wowwwwww and add a few!!!!

Wonderful! Reading these enabled me to rewrite the descriptions for my two leading characters.

Thank you for this, very helpful! I don’t know if this is really related, but I’m writing a story including a mean girl who bullies the main character (also a girl). I’m struggling to write what the mean girl uses to bully the main character – what I end up coming up with is way too mean or unreal, etc.

Blinded by tears, she could hear the haze of pink shout, “See, poor baby cries. Great actress, dear. Why do you waste your talent on us, here?”

great great any book for description of physical appearance in narrative

Great list. And I have one to add. It’s from Michael Moorcock, riding the new wave of British sci-fi back in the 1960s. He’s been a favorite of mine for decades. The passage is from “Elric of Melniboné:”

“It is the colour of a bleached skull, his flesh; and the long hair which flows below his shoulders is milk-white. From the tapering, beautiful head stare two slanting eyes, crimson and moody, and from the loose sleeves of his yellow gown emerge two slender hands, also the colour of bone, resting on each arm of a seat which has been carved from a single, massive ruby.”

Thanks for this – very useful compilation for teaching – makes life so much easier! And helps in my writing, to look at expressions and word arrangements… I notice how some writers seem so good in visual description, and some others seem to be much better at character expressions..

wowzers!!! this is so cool!

I planned to just read a few, but I couldn’t stop reading. These are awesome! Thank you.

“Character Description” on The John Fox’s blog is a treasure trove of valuable tips and techniques for crafting compelling characters. The blog explores the art of painting vivid and multi-dimensional personas, adding depth to storytelling. Aspiring writers will find this guide indispensable for creating memorable characters that resonate with readers.

holy MOLY, thank you!

I liked them

wow thanks you have really helped me but can you put something to describe a character that is a tyrant please? that would really help

Absolutely remarkable. So very helpful in every since of the word.

OH HELLL YEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

A killer set of fine examples! Thanks for compiling it!

Please, add sentences that can apply to more characters.

Love it but should be more single sentences

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How to show a crying/sad scene without using sentimentalism?

Previously, I had no difficulty in showing a scene like that, and as for me, to show a crying scene I'd write something like "then a teardrop rolled by her cheek". However, I had read an article from a respected writer (I can't remember who) saying how sentimentalism is bad for a story, and used as an example a crying scene, and said that writing something like "then a teardrop rolled by her cheek" is too sentimental, however, this writer didn't tell how it should be written without sentimentalism, which is hard, because the act of crying is itself something sentimental, making it not sentimental I would be telling, not showing.

And that's what I want to know: how to show (not tell) a crying or sad scene without using sentimentalism?

• creative-writing

• 1 Tears of despondency slowly cascaded down my cheeks leaving me so weak and frail. –  Valerie Commented Apr 24, 2017 at 2:27

9 Answers 9

The problem with sentimentalism is not that it's sentimental. But that it often results in cliche.

This is a sample of non-cliched sentimentalism:

"Once that first tear broke free, the rest followed in an unbroken stream. Naoko bent forward where she sat on the floor and pressing her palms to the mat, she began to cry with the force of a person vomiting on all fours." Norwegian Wood, Haruki Murakami.

As you can see there are tears in this passage, but the part that says "she began to cry with the force of a person vomiting on all fours" (not sure about you, but I've never seen crying being described like this before) removes the cliche and instead of sentimentalism, we have a very strong image.

So, sentimentalism isn't bad. In fact, the main reason we read stories is to feel sentimental, to let our feelings take over.

This is another example:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F9t_1sWBywU

(I was going to explain what Final Fantasy is but then I saw your profile photo.)

This is a scene from FFVII: Crisis Core. Cloud's friend Zack dies and gives him his sword. It's sentimental. And cliched. The part that removes the cliche is Cloud's scream. It's not your typical "Noooooo!" or "Whyyy?!". He screams like he's being ripped off or murdered (again, this is the first time I see something like this). And that, in my opinion, is what makes it a good scene.

• Well, as I can see, the writers/scriptwriters that write a sentimental scene but don't want it to be a cliche scene, they accomplish that by putting something unusual to this type of situation, either words, or the reactions of a character (as in Cloud's case, screaming as if his arms are being cut off). –  Yuuza Commented Jul 19, 2015 at 21:34
• So now I understand, the problem isn't the sentimentalism itself (that is impossible to prevent in some cases), but the cliche that comes along. The quality of the scene, or even the whole story, is determined by the writer's skill to manage this. –  Yuuza Commented Jul 19, 2015 at 21:34

There are three questions you can ask yourself when writing a scene where you intend to convey emotion:

1) How often have I seen this phrase used? If it's something you've seen a lot of, it's probably a cliche and is likely to be read as overly sentimental. If too cliched, it can even distract the reader from what you are trying to convey. (If I NEVER read about how 'a single tear rolled down her face' again....)

2) Could this description be used to convey a different emotion or different context? Your character just 'sniffed and wiped her eyes, while trying to smile.' Is she reminicing about an old flame? Watching Beaches on her DVD while telling a friend how much she loves this movie? Did she just win an academy award and is thanking all the people who supported her? Or is she glad that someone just gave her more medication for hayfever?

And in my opinion, the most important: 3) Is it 'pretty'? Sentimentality is pretty; strong emotions rarely are. Imagine the difference between the female lead crying in a movie, as compared to someone crying in real life. When someone cries, their face gets red and blotchy, their eyes bloodshot, and their eyelids puffy, none of which are attractive. They get a lump in their throat; their voice cracks when they try to speak. They scrub or blow their nose so they don't end up with snot running down their face. Their breath stutters when they try to take a deep breath. While an adult's reaction is likely to be more subdued in most cases (1), it can be helpful to use a search engine to look up images of babies and children crying (or whichever emotion you are trying to convey). It may also help to consider how an adult is subduing a strong display of emotion, rather than trying to 'emotionalize' a subdued display.

(1) Does not include events such as Superbowl or World Series victories by the adult's favorite team.

• 1 +1 for #3. Make it ugly, it would add some real feel to the narration. –  Lew Commented Nov 23, 2016 at 22:18

The probem with a cliché is not what happens but how you describe it.

People cry. Even protagonists cry. And tears do roll down people's cheeks when they cry. This is not a cliché, it is a fact, and it is not rare either but a frequent occurence.

Any advice that tells you not to write about what happens frequently in real ife is bad advice.

Cliché happens when you use an image to describe something that has been used so often to describe this that we are tired of it.

What you need to do, to avoid cliché, is not find uncommon events to describe, but uncommon descriptions to common events.

Look at those aspects of crying that have not been described before. For example, instead of the tear, describe the trace it leaves on the skin: like the trace of a slug on a leaf, or like rain on a dusty pane, etc. (Use an image that tells us more about the character or situation.) Or describe how the person seeing this feels about this or what they think: e.g. how they are surprised that while they are sad they still enjoy the feeling of the tears running down their cheeks and the taste of salt on their lips. Be creative with this.

• 1 Or, when a clichéd description is used because ti seems expected and not because it lends any useful description for the event or scene. –  can-ned_food Commented Oct 12, 2017 at 4:08

I'm thinking it would be kind of easier if it was the protagonist experiencing someone else in that situation. In that sense if they were in a situation (for example) where the protagonist was the best friend, of a girl who had just been dumped, not only would you have to describe her crying but the gestures she makes as well as the gestures the protagonist makes ( Oh, and metaphors help HEAPS .)

For example:

It was painful to see her like this. All I could do was embrace her and let the torrent of her tears to soak through my shirt. I could feel her clench her fists, not knowing whether to be mad or to give up hope all together. I could hear her silently screaming, suffocating with each breath she took holding onto her pride. I ran my fingers through her hair, time and time again, in an attempt to calm the silent war within her mind.

(That's not necessarily much good; I just wrote it in the spur of the moment.)

You need to take into consideration the type of character this person is. It sounds a little weird but everyone cries differently ... like, they might be annoyed that they're crying, so they try to stop, but it makes it worse. Or in this case, they're angry, so their tears are described as a "torrent" because, well, a torrent or (if you want) an avalanche is destructive - a natural hazard which, if you get what I mean, seems "angry"... (I'm sorry if that doesn't make sense)

Also know that:

A person doesn't just "cry," so the way you describe how their tears fall needs to in some way reflect the situation they're in.

Someone may be crying out of happiness, crying out of anger, crying out of disappointment...

I'll give an example for each to make that easier to understand:

It was the best day of my life. My tears overflowed with joy and fell just like the bouquet that I had thrown.

Anger: (just like before)

She tried to hold back the seething torrent/avalanche of tears that had been building up since the moment she had been angered.

Disappointment:

Mot even the steady stream of liquid trickling down my face could cure my thirst for her. After all, she loved him, not me...

anyways yeah...I hoped that helped :)

in an embarrassing situation, for example a bully at school, you could say "I had to blink back tears"

• 1 Helen, welcome to Writers beta. You may want to have a look at our site tour if you haven't already. We prefer answers that are longer and more comprehensive; would you care to expand on this? If not, I can change this into a comment for you. (New users can't leave comments, but keep answering questions and you'll have enough rep to leave comments yourself in no time.) –  Goodbye Stack Exchange Commented Jul 28, 2015 at 1:29

It depends on whether it's the protagonist or non-protagonist is crying. I wouldn't think it's effective to have the protagonist crying.

I haven't done a lot of crying scene, but the ones I have done I have underplayed so much in order to emphasize the inner pain. Crying works best when the protagonist is observing someone else cry. In my opinion the sad or tragic dimension can be revealed by attitude, not by explicitly saying that a character is crying.

If you think about it, every story has its own dose of sadness. You don't need crying to call attention to that fact.

If the crying is interrupting a dialogue, I would make the dialogue really short, have the cry interrupt things, and then switch to third person limited omniscient to get reactions. The scene with the crying needs to be short and use as little dialogue as possible.

I did one particularly effective crying scene. Boyfriend and girlfriend have a serious fight; the girlfriend is incredibly angry, but then they step into a bar with a talented blues player singing. I describe the girl's feeling of isolation during the show and how the boyfriend can see the pain on her face and feels helpless about it. I never say that she is crying, but the reader must surely realize it.

By the way, a lot of the pitfalls for crying scenes apply to sex scenes. You don't need to show the outbursts. You just need to present the sequence of events and if you do it right, the readers will already be in the same emotional state and you won't need to say much about crying because the reader will already feel it.

Offtopic: I'm trying to think about crying scenes which are effective. I'm thinking of the scene in My Antonia where Antonia's father dies a terrible death, and young Antonia is certain to be heartbroken. Willa Cather devotes an entire chapter to telling how the news spread and how funeral arrangements needed to be made. In a way Willa Cather was preparing the reader emotionally for the encounter with Antonia and her distraught family. In the next chapter http://www.gutenberg.org/files/242/242-h/242-h.htm#link2H_4_0018 Chapter 16 (which just breaks my heart -- and I encourage you to read it because it's short), we have the protagonist meet Antonia for the first time since the father's death. Willa Cather mentions crying in just a single sentence!

When grandmother and I went into the Shimerdas' house, we found the womenfolk alone; Ambrosch and Marek were at the barn. Mrs. Shimerda sat crouching by the stove, Antonia was washing dishes. When she saw me, she ran out of her dark corner and threw her arms around me. 'Oh, Jimmy,' she sobbed, 'what you tink for my lovely papa!' It seemed to me that I could feel her heart breaking as she clung to me.

Dr Salinger's approach shadowed over Maria, who was more than ready to shake him for answers. She'd waited over two hours of silence and growing dread for anything on Dad. But when the man hesitated and the lines on his face deepened, she froze in her tracks. Yet, she heard herself ask, "Is he..." Then the words sunk down into her chest at the pitiful shake of his head. The "I'm sorry" that followed choked her breath from her lungs, and suddenly he towered over her. What did he say? She clutched at the gold cross hanging from the chain. It pressed white-hot against her skin. Each gasp tore down her throat and her mind raced even as she lost herself in the storm. But Dad was just fine last night! Didn't Salinger see it? Didn't he see Dad eager to get up and go? She watched the game with him, laughed when he spilled Ginger-ale at a touchdown of his favorite team. No. He couldn't be gone. Not when he promised her he'd fight, dammit! She pounded the cold floor. Hissed a breath through clenched teeth. But the strength left her, even as she attempted to stand. Her throat held back something between a sob and a shout. She had to see him. Through the blur of motion and color she followed the doctor. She would see him. And say goodbye.

(what you want to do is basically set the scene and describe the event in your character's view point. Use enough detail to convey what's going on without going too detailed. Hope this helps.))

• Hi, welcome to the club. Unlike the most sites devoted to the craft, this one favors "telling" (and explaining, why) over "showing"--just for future reference. "set the scene and describe the event in your character's view point" is pretty much how most of the fiction is written, you have to be a little more specific :-) –  Lew Commented Nov 23, 2016 at 22:30

Find a non-cliche way of showing that she was crying. I always think back to Updike's comment about Salinger:

"In an ardently admiring piece on Salinger years back, Updike confessed a misgiving about the Glass family that is difficult to gainsay. He quoted Seymour quoting R. H. Blyth's definition of sentimentality: 'We are being sentimental when we give to a thing more tenderness than God gives to it.' There is Salinger's error, said Updike: he gives to the Glasses more love than God does." [New York Times 09/13/98]

Crying doesn't have to be sentimental. You just need to find a new way of describing it.

Andy vaulted onto his bed, the pillow hugging his face accepting his torment. Once the first tear got away, the rest followed it, creating a huge pool on his pillow. His lungs rummaged for oxygen, and his sobbing had the same force of someone drowning. The flesh under his ribcage throbbed, his cheeks burned, and his mind created memories and scenarios that made the tears continue.

• Heya Karack! Welcome to Writers.SE :) We're a little unusual for a writing site, in that we're all about Q&A - the site takes a little bit of getting used to. I wanted to comment because you've given a fine example of how the original poster's scene might be rewritten -- but there's a larger question in the original post that Bruno's asking about. You've given an example of how one might write, but you don't really explain what you've done, why it works, what Bruno can do in the future. –  Standback Commented Feb 29, 2016 at 8:35
• That doesn't make this a bad answer - it demonstrates some good advice! But if you take a look at other answers here, they usually have examples and advice, which can make them more helpful. –  Standback Commented Feb 29, 2016 at 8:37
• So, welcome! Hang around a bit, browse the site, get to know it, and you'll catch on to the nuances as you go along. We've got a fairly complex system here, but don't be afraid to make mistakes - that's fine, and part of learning the territory :) –  Standback Commented Feb 29, 2016 at 8:38

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Miss Huttlestone's GCSE English

Because a whole class of wonderful minds are better than just one!

2 Grade 9 Creative Writing Examples

I recently asked my year 11s to pen a piece of description and/or narrative writing for their mini assessment. I gave them the following prompts:

Your school wants you to contribute to a collection of creative writing.

EITHER: Write a short story as suggested by this picture:

OR: Write a description about a person who has made a strong impression on you.

The following were two COMPELLING and CONVINCING examples of the second choice – one pupil taking ‘you’ as a fictional invitation, the other as a biographical one:

EXAMPLE ONE:

Gradually, I awake and open my eyes only to see the cracked white ceiling which greets me every day. Here I sit, slumped in the bed with the scratchy white sheets hugging me and muffled beeping noises jumping into my ears. Rubbing the sleep crust from my bloodshot eyes, I observe the scene before me. The sound of footsteps overlapping as nurses rush from bed to bed; the metallic tang from stainless steel invading my nostrils; the cold metal bed rail imprisoning and mocking me; the pungent scent of antiseptic troubling me and the blood-curdling cries and moans utterly terrifying me. Using all my strength, I try to imagine I am somewhere else, anywhere else but here.

Crowds, signs, roars: it was 1903 and the suffragette movement had begun. It was a crisp night, refreshing almost and I had taken to the streets. It was like I was possessed by something that night, some urge and deep desire within me that had led me there, surrounded by women like myself. I stood clueless and lost in the crowd; the women yelling ‘Deeds not words’ in unison; passionately parading with large wooden signs and viciously shattering windows with bricks and stones. Despite the violence that was displayed before me, I was not afraid of what was happening and I didn’t deem it unnecessary or improper, in fact I wanted the same as these women, I wanted equality. Abruptly, all of the roars and cheers became muted and faint, one woman walked slowly towards me, her hair messily swooped into an updo, her clothes somewhat dirtied and her chocolate brown corset slightly loosened. There was a glimmer in her eyes as tears seemed to swell within their hazel pools, she seemed inspired, hopeful. After reaching me in the crowd, she held out her hand, gently passing me a sign. Immediately, I clasped it and the yelling and chanting rang loudly in my ears once more. My journey had begun.

Here however, is where it ends. I am aware I do not have much time left, as the doctors have told me so, and spending my last moments in this hospital room is not optimal. However, as I look around I can see beauty within a room which at first glance seems void of it. The hollow medical tubes by my side remind me of the awful act of force feeding I have faced in the past; the shrieks and bawls of patients reflecting the pain women had felt in my time and the bed bars mirroring the prisons we were thrown into and the gates we would chain ourselves too. I know these things may seem far from beautiful, but I can see my past within this room, the power I possessed and the changes I have contributed to today. I know now that I can leave this earth having had an impact. Slowly I close my eyes, I can see her, the women who changed my life many years ago, her name, Emmeline Pankhurst.

EXAMPLE TWO:

I will never forget that day. The hazel pools of her eyes glazed over, and hands delicately placed at her sides. Nobody in the room could quite grasp the fact that this was happening. The crowds of black attire row on row seemed to mimic the thing she loves most in life, the piano. However, this time she had taken the ivory natural keys with her and left everyone else with the sharp tones. You needed both to create beautiful symphonies but all that filled the room was the excruciating silence of her absense. Even the metronone like ticks of the clock seemed to come to a standstill.

It had all began that day, she seemed to open up this whole new world for us to explore together as she placed my fingers onto the keys for the first time. I knew that this was what I was meant to do. She was the most passionately beautiful pianist I had ever seen in my life. Often, I would peer round the oak doorway before my lessons just to catch a glimpse at her. It seemed like nothing in the world mattered to her at the time.

As the years progressed, so did the scope of this world we were exploring. Each sheet of lovingly handwritten sheet music was like a new section of the map we were slowly creating together. Each of her students had their own map. Each as beautiful and each as unique as the pianist. The crotchets and quavers that adorned the staves directed the different paths we could take as my fingers graced the keys. This may not have been a beautiful ballet routine, but this was our dance and it had been carefully choreographed just for us.

That piano room was the safest place in the world. Every inch of it her: the potent scent of her floral perfume; shelves full of scruffy and well loved sheet music; rows upon rows of framed photos of her and her students; the vintage piano which she always kept in tune, it was home. I couldn’t bear the

idea that someone else was going move in and rip away the music room without a second thought. It was her music room.

It was up to me now. Up to me to finish this journey we had begun together.

She may not be with me in person anymore, but she will always live within the world we built together and nothing could ever change that. For she could never truly be gone since she left a piece of her within every one of her students; the passion for piano.

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gcseenglishwithmisshuttlestone

Secondary English teacher in Herts. View all posts by gcseenglishwithmisshuttlestone

2 thoughts on “2 Grade 9 Creative Writing Examples”

This has helped me a lot, I myself am preparing for a narrative test like this and these prompts and descriptive short stories are marvellous! Thank you for sharing this! 🙂

My pleasure!

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