The character you create is somehow related to the character creator and implies the emotions and the profound experience of the uncertain fate of the character creator. What is the relationship between character creator and the character is one question always mentioned by readers. This essay is going to exploit the relationship between character creator and the character by comparing “A girl’s story” and “Mr. Truepenny’s Book Emporium and Gallery”. Through elaborating the different connection between “novel writer and Michael” (character creator in “A girl’s story” ) and “Sophie and Mr. Truepenny” (character creator in “Mr. Truepenny’s Book Emporium and Gallery” ), this essay will offer readers a new perspective to understand how the character creator creates the vivid figure in literature.
Michael and Mr. Truepenny are both created figures; however they are created due to different reasons. Michael is a figure created in a form of homology to the novel writer. On the other side, Mr. Truepenny is a figure created in a form of compensatory relation to Sophie. Homology indicates that the character in the novel shows some similarities, such as similar experience, similar characteristics and similar personal habits, etc. Compensatory relation indicates that when the character creator creates the figure, the figure image has something the creator not having, lacking of or yearning for.
For example, in “A girl’s story”, Michael is an alter ego of the novel writer. Michael 1) looks like the writer, 2) smokes the same kind of pipe 3) likes to drink and drink a lot (Arnason, 25). Therefore both Michael and the write wants the romantic encounter between Michael and Linda ends happily (Arnason, 25). In the end of the novel, the write did not offer a so-called happy end to Linda and Michael, but leave them in the brush of a kiss. Just like the life of the novel writer, not easy but can not change.
While in the story of “Mr. Truepenny’s Book Emporium and Gallery”, Mr. Truepenny becomes a form of compensation to Sophie. In her life, Sophie is a girl in a not well-off family and whose mother abandon her family when she was a kid (de Lint). Since they do not have a TV at home, Sophie became super ready. She liked to read but could not afford to buy books. That is why Sophie made up Mr. Truepenny, who has the most perfect shop filled with all of contents ever existed. Mr. Truepenny is the subconscious of Sophie to dealing with the problems she met when she was in trouble.
To conclude, Michael is an alter ego to the novel write, and Mr. Truepenny is the subconscious of Sophie. The characters are all somehow related to the character creator, but in different forms.