McAnally's (The Community Pub) > Author Craft
Is your character a Mary Sue?
Mickey Finn:
"Is your character a Mary Sue? "
Considering what I put them through, I really hope not.
zwinky:
--- Quote from: Maiafay on February 25, 2007, 04:41:53 PM ---
Sorry, just had bad issues with that test...though, I think Laurell K. Hamilton's Anita should take it. I have a feeling Anita would fail...badly. I think one more book and she'll transcend into Demi-goddom.
--- End quote ---
Ok, this is my first post to this list.......... but THAT........
that damned near made me shoot coffee out of my nose........ > holding my sides<
I assumed by the next book or three in the Anita-verse, she'll be the G-d Emperor of Dune.........
no, wait, that's Jack Ryan......
zwinky
The Dread Pharaoh Roberts:
Out of curiosity, I plugged Harry Dresden in. Of course, I don't know Jim, so I left out the questions about "does your character do this thing that you would like to do" and just stuck to character traits from the novels. Harry scored a 68.
Karrin Murphy scored a 36 - still considered a Mary Sue by the test.
Bob is a 31 - "Borderline Mary Sue".
Thomas is a 57 - right up there with Harry as an "Uber-Sue".
Michael is a 35.
I'd say the test is skewed to make almost any interesting character a Mary Sue. Any character that comes up as a "non-Sue" on the test would be too boring to be worth writing about. You don't read novels about store clerks who do nothing particularly well, have no particular skills, and who don't do anything interesting, but that would be the ideal non-Sue to these folks. Hell, Waldo Butters would probably score pretty high here.
recentcoin:
Mary Sue is a standard term for using the main character as your alter ego to insert the real world you into a bit of fiction - be it a fanfic or something else. Only you - the author - knows how much truth there is in that. And even then it might not matter. Anne Rice books = textbook Mary Sues but I'm betting that you've all read at least one of them and liked it. Jack Ryan = Tom Clancy's Gary Stu and again I'm betting that most everyone here as read at least one and liked it. It's all in the skill of the author. Most fandoms hold these quizzes out as the holy grail of what not to be because there is so much utter and total drivel (and I'm being polite because I can't call it what I would normally call it here) that gets written any given fandom. Most of it revolves around taking the author, making them, in the infamous words of Cartman, "Hella-cool", and then reshaping an entire plane of existence to enhance their "Hella-cool-ness".
If you want to write a total Mary Sue - I'd say go for it. What else do you know better than yourself? Who have you spent more time with? Just do us all a favor, and do it well if you do it. Forget being "Hella-cool" and actually write the *real* you into something. That might actually be kinda interesting.
2 cents....
RecentCoin
the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh:
--- Quote from: recentcoin on May 16, 2007, 08:23:29 PM ---Forget being "Hella-cool" and actually write the *real* you into something. That might actually be kinda interesting.
--- End quote ---
Though if the real you is actually Cool, don't feel you have to hold back on those grounds.
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