Confession No. 13: Fictional Characters are Real People Too

Now before we start I’m not barking mad; I’m well aware fictional characters are exactly that. Purely fictional. But it’s important to consider the profound effect that certain characters can have on a person. For me, it’s important to acknowledge that without many fictional characters I wouldn’t be the person I am today. As unreal and inconsequential they may be in the grand scheme of things, it’s very difficult for me to treat some characters as anything less than living, breathing people.

I had a very lonely childhood, and without delving too deeply into it (this isn’t intended to be a sob story worthy of The X Factor) I relied on book characters a lot. We moved around and maintaining meaningful friendships and relationships was hard simply by virtue of distance. Before I was ten years old I had no idea what it was like to stay in one country for more than two years.

In that situation, books are a Godsend. They don’t change or stop talking to you or just become unreachable because you’ve moved. The characters stay the same and they remain supportive and interesting and with you, regardless. Series like Harry Potter, in which I literally grew up alongside the characters, are something steadily consistent in an admittedly turbulent life.

Aside from that, characters often inspired me to try new things and be my own person. A child who is clever and unashamed, with masses of untamable curly hair and a penchant for using words her peers don’t understand is often left alone on the sidelines. Hermione Granger was the first character I ever read who was like me, and that feeling of solidarity is important and significant, whether you’re seven or seventeen. No one wants to be alone, and, for a long time, characters were my only way of avoiding that.

As I’ve grown up, with a lack of “real-life” celebrities I feel I want to look up to, characters have become my idols. I want to be as loyal and kind as Captain America; I want to be as hardworking and determined as Tony Stark; I want to be as badass as Katniss Everdeen; I want to be as unashamedly intelligent as Hermione Granger.

Finding fandom was another significant step for me that cemented the ways in which literature and theatre and film and fantasy have been so beneficial and significant in my development as a person, but that’s a matter for another post.

I can’t articulate in one coherent post how much many characters mean to me, and how books will forever be important to me, and how there are certain fictional characters that I will always struggle to accept aren’t real. I don’t think there will ever be words for how grateful I am for certain authors. I think ultimately what I’m trying to say is that there are characters who will always be more than fictional to me, and I want, more than anything, to acknowledge how they’ve shaped me as a person. Without books, I wouldn’t be who I am today. 

Confession Time: I have walked through life holding the hands of my favourite characters; I will continue to do so.

Always,

Your teenaged disaster