Eye Color
In honor of MLK, would it be all right to say that I dream of a day when my fantasy characters are not judged of their worthiness to fulfill a prophecy based on the color of their eyes? I'm so sick of "striking" blue eyes and "brilliant" blue eyes and permutations of that. It's not that I dislike blue eyes--I have them, in fact, and I don't know if they're strikingly so or not, but in some pictures they certainly jump out. It's just that every time a character's eye color is mentioned, it seems that it's blue, or once in a while green, especially paired with red hair. My son has the most beautiful hazel eyes, shading toward brown as he gets older (I don't know yet what color my daughter's eyes will be). Why must so many writers point out their character's blue eyes, or why must the fact of their blue eyes be so significant?
To be fair, my fantasy characters are unlikely to ever be the subject of a prophecy at all because I shy away from that, but the point remains--blue eyes far too often signify "good" or "trustworthy" or "important" in fantasy stories. When that assumption is broken, when no ranking is implied by eye color of any type, then go back to having blue-eyed heroes and heroines when there's a reason for it. Until then, question yourself everytime you're tempted to mention a character's eye color.
In honor of MLK, would it be all right to say that I dream of a day when my fantasy characters are not judged of their worthiness to fulfill a prophecy based on the color of their eyes? I'm so sick of "striking" blue eyes and "brilliant" blue eyes and permutations of that. It's not that I dislike blue eyes--I have them, in fact, and I don't know if they're strikingly so or not, but in some pictures they certainly jump out. It's just that every time a character's eye color is mentioned, it seems that it's blue, or once in a while green, especially paired with red hair. My son has the most beautiful hazel eyes, shading toward brown as he gets older (I don't know yet what color my daughter's eyes will be). Why must so many writers point out their character's blue eyes, or why must the fact of their blue eyes be so significant?
To be fair, my fantasy characters are unlikely to ever be the subject of a prophecy at all because I shy away from that, but the point remains--blue eyes far too often signify "good" or "trustworthy" or "important" in fantasy stories. When that assumption is broken, when no ranking is implied by eye color of any type, then go back to having blue-eyed heroes and heroines when there's a reason for it. Until then, question yourself everytime you're tempted to mention a character's eye color.
Comments
Lion, that is definitely a tendency in fantasy also, to have physical beauty be a sign of inner character...and a very dangerous tendency at that. So while I don't typically have characters described as blonde, blue-eyed bombshells (etc.), I do have to watch how I have other characters react to them--it's too easy to hint that a character is attractive by their culture's standards.
You're going to make me paranoid about blue eyes, though. Augh! *grin*