physical description in novels

[curlyqlink]

Why do writers describe the physical traits of characters? The shape of their nose, or the color of their hair, whether they are stocky or tall and lean? It seems to me that this is a relic of an earlier age, a age that still believed in physiognomy and the pseudoscience of phrenology.

Fat men are jolly. Blondes are stupid. Someone with a low forehead belongs to a criminal type. We live in an age that abhors this sort of typing, so it seems extremely odd that literate, sensitive authors persist in the habit of using physical traits to reveal character. I'm guessing that it's a relic of the 19th century novel. The 19th century was the heydey of phrenology.

It seems to me that in earlier writing, physical description was virtually absent. In the Bible and in Icelandic Sagas for example, I don't think people are ever described in a physical sense.

Of course, we all learned in Writing 101 that it's important to set the scene by being specific. "The room was lit by a single lamp. To the left of the doorway was a small table; in the southwest corner was a Chippendale armoire. It had a chip on the corner. There was a potted geranium on the window sill; it needed watering." All filler, in my humble opinion, and a waste of everyone's time.

Of course this can be used to create mood, which is important. And some physical traits do establish character. I'm thinking of Raymond Chandler's General Sternwood in The Big Sleep, a frail old man in a wheelchair, sitting in his greenhouse living mostly on heat, "like a young spider". His age and decrepitude say something about him. But the shape of a nose or an earlobe? It seems very odd to me that novelist persist in doing this.

[amanda_isabel]

I think it makes perfect sense. I like it when writers offer something concrete, something "real". Books tickle the imagination, not just offer some sort of sequence of events, and one of the best ways of stimulating readers is through describing physical characteristics. Also, physical characteristics hold some connotation as to the character's personality, etc., and while these may vary across cultures, there tend to be general associations to physical traits, ex. deep-set eyes=contemplative, etc. and I guess most authors get the idea that this helps establoish the character(s) existence in the readers' minds.

p.s. I have yet to read an earlobe description :D

[PeterL]

Some writers have used descriptions of characters, while others have not. Sometimes a physical characteristic is important. People are unlike books in that one can tell something about the interior by the exterior. Some people do the poorly, while others have done that very well. I enjoyed the descriptions of the characters in The Maltese Falcon for one example, an

I agree with you that that example of filler was a waste of time. I don't read things like that for long, unless I am critiquing a story.


p.s. I have yet to read an earlobe description :D

Keep reading, they are out there, and I have read descriptions of earlobes, which can be indicators of heart health.

[amanda_isabel]

Keep reading, they are out there, and I have read descriptions of earlobes, which can be indicators of heart health.

hmmm.... We learn something new everyday. :)

[JBI]

Appearances are generally unimportant. Realism had such features, because "realistic portrayal" was essential to the mode, and giving graphic details about everything (I am think Balzac here) was the style. Modernism seems to have opened up more to the interpretation of the reader, in the sense that right and wrong, good and bad, villain or hero, believable or unreliable, and such have all been brought into question. Faulkner is probably the best example of using this mode, where he never truly assigns perceptions to his characters, and relies on the reader to act as judge.

In terms of description, post-Hemingway literature seems to have gained a lesser taste of lavish language, and vivid descriptions. The truth is that such things are really pointless, since the reader derives all the description and judgment of the character.

I know there have been books that I have half-read, in the sense that I wasn't focused, and skipped descriptive language, then later looking back, finding that my personal vision was quite different than the author's physical description. At such times I seem to just think that such facts are useless, and my own "vision" was strong enough. Certain details, like Molloy's leg cannot be avoided, but to be honest, how short someone's hair, unless they are deliberately doing it for political reasons, is quite unimportant.

[chasestalling]

An archaic and obsolete devise, the use of physical descriptions to convey a character's true self? I suppose in the hand of a hack or a second rater physical descriptions would come across as tedious and stereotyped, but in the hands of an artist a character's true essence given concrete manifestation is the only thing worth belaboring over.

The following is a quote from Vladimir Nabokov's GLORY:

"Most of all Martin felt sorry for the originality of the deceased, who was truly irreplaceable -- his gestures, his beard, his sculpturesque wrinkles, the sudden shy smile, the jacket button that hung by a thread, and his way of licking a stamp with his entire tongue before sticking it on the envelope and banging it with his fist. In a sense this was all of greater value than the social merits for which there existed such easy little cliches..."

Innovations may start a trend and perhaps even earn the innovator a seat in the pantheon of the greats, but a precise description that reveals a character's essence will always be the lifeblood of poems and fictions.

[SirJazzHands]

Yes but what other good examples can you think of besides that Nabokov piece? It's hard to find something that isn't a bit useless.

[slobone]

I hate long descriptions. I feel as though I should be visualizing the scene being described (exactly where is the house in relation to the stream, where does the road fork, etc) and I'm not very good at that. My mind wanders and eventually locks. I avoid writers who do that too much. I agree that it's usually pretty pointless.

[PeterL]

While long descriptions are dull and not usually useful, people tell a great deal about themselves through appearances, bearing, clothing, hair style, etc. all communicate something about the person. I have never read anything in fiction that described significant characteristics well enough to convey what a person can see in an instant in person.

[stlukesguild]

All filler, in my humble opinion, and a waste of everyone's time.

And your humble opinion would be wrong, IMO:D. The degree of physical descriptive detail is dependent upon what the author's intentions are. Certainly long, descriptive passages can be dull... in the hands of a lesser writer... but Proust? Balzac? Flaubert? A crisp, almost minimal writing manner can be marvelous in the hands of a master such as Borges, Kafka, Hemingway, Calvino, or the Bible... but they can be just as abused in the hands of a lesser writer. Do we ever imagine that physical detail and descriptiveness in the visual arts is a waste of time?

http://i90.photobucket.com/albums/k255/Stlukesguild/proverbssmall123.jpg

Surely not in the hands of a master... but again, in the hands of a lesser artist...:sick: But it depends upon the intentions... and undoubtedly these intentions are impacted by the time in which an artist and his or her audience lives. We have no problem with paintings stripped down to the more elemental:

http://i90.photobucket.com/albums/k255/Stlukesguild/matisse_joy_of_life.jpg

Neither did the middle ages:

http://i90.photobucket.com/albums/k255/Stlukesguild/illuminatedms-1.jpg

This was not true of many other eras. The same holds true of literature. I somewhat suspect that it it the speed of our culture... and perhaps our own laziness... that leads many to avoid the typically lush and descriptive 19th century writing manner.

[stlukesguild]

Yes but what other good examples can you think of besides that Nabokov piece? It's hard to find something that isn't a bit useless.

Absolute nonsense. Of course we can always second guess the author and question whether this word is absolutely essential to the whole... and on the whole, with perhaps the exception of some poetry, you could always remove adjectives here or there from any writer's work... even Shakespeare's... without impacting the overall work. But then why read at all? Is the point merely to "get it"? To understand what the theme or underlying idea? Then why not just read the damn cliff notes? While I'm at it, why not edited some of those overly long musical works as well? I mean does Beethoven really need 80+ minutes for the 9th Symphony? And did he really need that last repetition of the opening motif in the 5th. I bet we could cut them both down to a good solid 3 minutes and they'd get a lot more airplay.:rolleyes: :sick:

[Hank Stamper]

I'm not especially bothered, although I bore easily when confronted with tons of superflous description... and cliches like lantern jaws and aquiline noses

[Aiculík]

I think that depends on the author's ability to use the description. It can be powerful tool that can either enrich the whole book - but it can also destroy it.

For example, Romain Rolland's Pierre et Luce (I don't know if it was translated into English).

On the other hand, I really like descriptions in Murakami, and I don't think the novels would be same without them.

As for writers using "types" e.g. stupid blonds, etc. I think most modern authors use it ironically nowdays, if they use it at all. I can't remember now one book from the last 20 years using this kind of description...

So basically, physical description is OK if it's well done. What I can't stand is use of names as a kind of description. You know what I mean - e.g. an innocent, naive girl is Daisy, a cynical bastard who destroys her is Winterbourne... of course, a daisy cannot survive in winter... :rolleyes:

[Walter]

My finest enjoyment of authors and literature comes when I 'lose myself' in the worlds they are creating, no matter how they achieve that sensation. If the written words on the page are noticeable and interfere with the enjoyment then I am disappointed in the writing, whether it be description, dialogue, syntax, vocabulary or any other aspect of writing. Nabokov's descriptions invariably draw me into his world and I have taken many enjoyable train rides with him, for example, and wandered through many beautiful gardens with flowers and trees that were exotic to me.

[sofia82]

Physical description is a way to visuals thw whole story and the characters for the reader, as creating a picture in the mind of the readers. As it is said, it is used mostly in realistic and naturalistic novels. I myself get tired reading pages after pages just about the description of a single character. But the intention of the author is important here, why the author bothers himself/herself describing about the characters and the setting. For example, a disfigured body may be one of the keys in the story even realted to the identity of the character which is the case with Coetzee's Michael K.

It cannot be said that it is boring so it is not useful. Of course, there is a need for these descirptions and it depends on the period and style of the work, too.

[chasestalling]

Yes but what other good examples can you think of besides that Nabokov piece? It's hard to find something that isn't a bit useless.

Hamlet is bearded and overweight. Doesn't that convey a wealth of infomation? He's a college student in Wittenberg, but he's lost his youth, sort of like a super senior who refuses to graduate and whose general sloth is given testimony to by his paunch.

Here's one by Joyce.

"Phlegmy coughs shook the air of the bookshop, bulging out the dingy curtains. The shopman's uncombed gray head came out and his unshaven reddened face, coughing. He raked his throat rudely, spat phlegm on the floor. He put his boot on what he spat, wiping his sole along it and bent, showing a raw skinned crown, scantily haired."

Joyce could've had the shopman spout a million words about politics, the economy or the meaning of life and fail to convey even a tenth of the stuff that he conveys with the handful above.

[bej6s]

I confess that I read a story for the storyline. While I can appreciate beautifully written language, I do tend to skip over pages of description, as I think others have mentioned. However, I know many people who revel in the lengthy descriptions and could read those all day long. It seems to me to be a reader preference thing, what a person reads for.

I'm also interested in the idea put forth that description stimulates imagination, which I suppose can be true to some extent. I think I choose to skip over descriptions because they inhibit my imagination at times, although this could be when they are extensive accounts, recounting every detail.

[JBI]

There is a spectrum. Lets say Hemingway on one side, Tolkien on the other. Each other good author has at least some idiosyncratically developed sense of style, placing him somewhere along the spectrum. Of course, authors may choose what to expose more, depending on what sort of characters they are drawing.

In traditional theatre, as stage directions and those lengthy character descriptions you see in scripts today did not exist, there was no precise visual description. Another actor may comment on a certain feature, like age, but, as I think I recall, even the actors were free to play Hamlet one night, and then Lear the next, with no one complaining about the age discrepancy. The major focus always seems to be, in English renaissance drama, on the character traits, and not appearances. I am sure that when The Comedy of Errors was first played, the actors didn't even look alike, they just pretended. I even wonder if they wore similar costumes to make them seem more alike, or whether they just purely relied on the audience to make the connection. Either way, physical appearance was not really mentioned.

The novel seems to really emerge around 1750 or so in English literature. The bulk of which are mediocre, with about 5 examples of good ones, coming before Sir Walter Scott, and Jane Austen. Scott seems to be more visual than Austen, relying on the history and backdrop to support his story, whereas Austen relies on character to fill her story. Austen seems to give more description however, to the character traits than the character, but she is not without mentioning appearances. The visual one gets of Elizabeth, or Emma, or Marianne seems to be quite like those portrayed in the movies (this is reading the book first) and formulated well out of the text.

After the romantic period however, the rise of realism, starting mostly with Balzac, brought on a heightened sense of description. That is, it was common to describe everything in detail in the room, including people, what they were saying, and what they were thinking. Omniscient was the style, and it wasn't uncommon to have a lengthy visual description of a character. I'm thinking Tolstoy here, and also Dickens, where the characters are described in such perfect depth that one is certain in our heads of their appearance, and not wondering at all.

Then, along came modernism. Everything changed, and I think that is when style really developed to more of an art than a preference. Early on you see the emergence of such perfect writers as Flaubert, and Conrad, and then you have style taken further with Joyce, Hemingway, Faulkner, Woolf, Nabokov, Mansfield, Fitzgerald, and Beckett. Each one imbues his work with its own style, often many styles throughout a career in many works, as seen in all of these writers (Mansfield being somewhat of an exception, she having written only shorts, and some unread mediocre poems).

Joyce seems to have multiple styles at once, yet visual description is used throughout his works, though less coherently in Finnegans Wake. Hemingway by highpoint used no description at all, pretty much, no adjectives or adverbs, and simply relied on dialogue and the narrator for progression. Faulkner seems to use both to some degree. Everything is reliant on the point of view he is writing, and thereby you get different descriptions for the same characters. Woolf also relies on point of view, and gives detailed sketches. For Nabokov, details were quite essential, however some of his works lacked them all together, such as Pale Fire, which seems to be his strongest work, although not his most popular. Mansfield relied on her descriptiveness too, writing in a somewhat dated style stemming from Chekhov, and realism in general. Fitzgerald's work is rich is descriptions, and even assigns color leitmotifs (I am thinking The Great Gatsby here) to the characters, as a means of expressing certain characteristics. For instance, Gatsby is often associated with Pink, Daisy white, though, after she begins her affair, Lilac, Tom red and brown, Nick Black. Those references run through the entire book, and the only physical description we know nothing about in the story is Nick, the narrator, who distances himself from the story by not revealing his true views. OF course, one can argue that these colors, and other descriptions are not truly physical descriptions, but that is what Fitzgerald's style was. Beckett however, was an intense minimalist. Everyone can see, who reads his work, his lack of "frills".

Into the post-modern age, style is a lot more free, and one can actually do anything. Genre fiction seems rooted in the Victorian novel heavily, and features often out-of-date writing styles, and clichés that had assembled themselves there. Literary fiction can be quite the opposite though. Rushdie is quite different than Pynchon who is quite different from Calvino who was quite different from Cormac McCarthy.


That being said, on my early point, about it being pointless, to appease the fans;



The artist is the creator of beautiful things.

To reveal art and conceal the artist is art's aim.
...
Thought and language are to the artist instruments of an art.

Vice and virtue are to the artist materials for an art.
...
All art is at once surface and symbol.

Those who go beneath the surface do so at their peril.

Those who read the symbol do so at their peril.
...
We can forgive a man for making a useful thing as long as he does not admire it. The only excuse for making a useless thing is that one admires it intensely.

All art is quite useless.


From the Picture of Dorian Grey's Preface by Oscar Wilde.

As one can tell, if they choose to agree with Wilde, though physical description is "beautiful" in the sense that prose can be beautiful, it is often entirely useless.

[ThousandthIsle]

An archaic and obsolete devise, the use of physical descriptions to convey a character's true self? I suppose in the hand of a hack or a second rater physical descriptions would come across as tedious and stereotyped, but in the hands of an artist a character's true essence given concrete manifestation is the only thing worth belaboring over.

The following is a quote from Vladimir Nabokov's GLORY:

"Most of all Martin felt sorry for the originality of the deceased, who was truly irreplaceable -- his gestures, his beard, his sculpturesque wrinkles, the sudden shy smile, the jacket button that hung by a thread, and his way of licking a stamp with his entire tongue before sticking it on the envelope and banging it with his fist. In a sense this was all of greater value than the social merits for which there existed such easy little cliches..."

Innovations may start a trend and perhaps even earn the innovator a seat in the pantheon of the greats, but a precise description that reveals a character's essence will always be the lifeblood of poems and fictions.


Good quotation, I was going to bring up Nabokov myself. I am rereading Lolita right now, and without physical descriptions, what would be left? Yet Nabokov has created one of the most weighty and moving works in literature through his use of descriptions, observations, and physical traits... These things are significant to us in everyday life - the physical characteristics of people are unique and individual and can be a source of many sorts of thoughts and emotions in others observing them. Appearances hold meaning in life, I don't see why that wouldn't cross over into literature as well.

[kelby_lake]

I think some descriptions are pointless, like the blonde hair, sky-blue eyes. I understand describing key features but sometimes it's just done for the sake of it. I find self-indulgent explanations really dull and I always hated it when we were told to write descriptive pieces- they seem to come up full of cliches.

[ThousandthIsle]

I find self-indulgent explanations really dull and I always hated it when we were told to write descriptive pieces- they seem to come up full of cliches.

Cliches are not a trait of descriptive pieces - that is, they don't have to be.

Description is powerful if you can use it effectively. People are fascinating, not just for WHAT they do but HOW they do things. Mannerisms can reveal so much about any character or person, and the writing I most enjoy usually employs this type of detail. After all, details are what set one human being apart from another, one situation apart from another. Etc.

I still think chasestalling hit it on the head by saying that descriptions are dull, pointless, cliche - maybe at the hand of a "hack" or "second-rater."

[curlyqlink]

Hamlet is bearded and overweight. Doesn't that convey a wealth of infomation?

The beard can mean a million things. Including wisdom and advanced age, neither of which fit the bill regarding the young prince. As for the "meaning" of a paunch, that perhaps takes us into dangerous territory. In Shakespeare, a fat man like Falstaff is defined by his fatness in much the same way as the jewishness of his Jewish characters defined them.

Now I'm not going to go all PC on Shakespeare for "stereotyping" because that's, well, stupid. I just find it interesting that a modern author who would never dream of using jewishness might well use fatness as a shorthand way of conveying character.

It seems based on an exploded belief that a person's character is revealed by their physical appearance. Somehow it's still embedded in modern literature.

[stlukesguild]

I confess that I read a story for the storyline. While I can appreciate beautifully written language, I do tend to skip over pages of description, as I think others have mentioned.

Of course not every book is a "story"... nor can every novel be reduced to a story. The "story" in a play by Shakespeare, for example, is certainly secondary (and rarely even an original invention of the writer) to the character development, the dramatic tension, and the language. Byron's Don Juan and Sterne's Tristam Shandy hardly ever get around to telling the story with all the digressions... but those digressions are so delicious. I often get the feeling that "narrative" is seen as the central issue in literature (or "meaning" if one is discussing poetry) and this is not always true, and misses the point... and the enjoyment that can be found in good writing.

[slobone]

Oops, I misread the original post, you're apparently talking about physical descriptions of characters. Those I like, if they're memorable, for example many of the ones in Dickens. It's lengthy descriptions of landscapes that make my eyes glaze over (and not in a Miltonic way...).