h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Surely the truth is that real people aren't consistent. A man may behave decently when sober but be capable of violence when drunk. A girl may seem jolly when we first meet her, but be prone to depressive interludes.

So the way to write decent stuff is to get to know your character before you start. During one of my writing courses, the tutor handed out character questionnaires that run to nine pages.

I'm not sure I'd go as far as that questionnaire. But what an interesting idea!

Actually, I think people ARE consistent. It's just that most of the time, we don't see it because we're looking at their behaviour superficially. The cases you mentioned are what I mean - a person who appears decent, but is violent when drunk, is not inconsistent. That's his nature. We just didn't know it yet.

The same is true of the girl with the mood disorder. She's not a different person because she suffers from mood swings - we just read her wrong because we hadn't seen enough of her behaviour.

Or take the present occupant of the White House. People keep expecting him to act differently, to display a range of behaviours that are different from those they've seen before. This will never happen, just as he's not going to sprout pigeon feathers and roost in the Rose Garden.

So people are consistently inconsistent! I suppose that's right. So the girl whose apparently decent boyfriend hits her when he gets drunk needs to know he'll do it again.

As for the current occupant of the White House, I won't say what I think of him, in case GCHQ are watching.

We should do like Leigh Hunt, the British poet. He insulted the Prince of Wales and was jailed for it. For two years, he ran his journal from prison.