Describing the appearance of characters

[Sexualobster]

I've always seen describing the look of your characters to be a bad idea. It enforces an image of a person you might not want to imagine. The point of reading is to allow your imagination to run wild, and keeping the appearance of the characters up to the reader has always been a good idea to me.

But what do you guys think?

[Alexis Rune]

In general, I agree with you for most stories. I think not describing the characters well, but describing the actions in immense detail is a great way to allow people to imagine themselves in the shoes of the characters. On the other hand, some people have fantasies about people with specific physical or character traits. Describing people in detail might appeal to a narrower set of readers, but at a higher level if the characters described fit into their fantasy.

[Sarge90]

It depends entirely upon the story and the audience, but I find when reading a story, no matter how detailed the character descriptions I create my own image of them, sometimes completely different to the intended description.

I think that it can tell you a lot about the writer, but I see it as more of a template, not vital to the story, but it doesn't need to detract from it

[littlegrey]

I completely agree! You shouldn't describe someone. To be honest, if the character is described and I don't like it - 9 times out of 10 I won't read on! It just ruins the story for me! It's strange, I know. But I just think that everyone, including the writer should be able to envision the looks of the characters. I know that the writers want everyone to see the characters the way they see them, I'll admit I struggle with that as well, but it's only fair that the readers can enjoy the story with thier own vision of what the characters, especially the girls, look like!

That's just my opinion!

You know you love me
Xoxo
Littlegrey

[twotothetenth]

When I read a story, I don't care if the author describes someone or not, I will always picture the character the way I want. To be honest, I cannot concentrate on descriptions at all, half a sentence into reading any kind of description, my mind starts to wander (whether I want it or not) and I always end up making up my own picture of the character. When I write something, I provide only as much details on character('s appearance) as is necessary for the story and leave the rest to the reader's imagination.

[Komodo Jones]

I don't mind a description of the character I personally have described the chracters in y sotry. What irritates me though is that at the beginning of a lot of stories I see a format like this:
Name:
Age:
Likes so and so.

Those things irritate me and often times I won't read things like this. If you're going to describe chracters include it in the story instead of a profile you would see in a Final Fantasy instruction booklet. A lot of times I also view the characters as I see them anyway and as long as it's not blatant set in stone, every detail completely described to even the miniscule, the descriptions of a characters' physical appearance is still open-ended. I mean if you don't like brunettes and the character has brown hair, well you can't change this. But if you could care less about the hair character and you have a specific trait on a face that you like that wasn't addressed, you can add it yourself whether the author intended it or not.