Does giving a character things to angst about==angst?

Title might not have been clear, so here's my question.

Is having bad things happen to a character-things that they could and probably do angst about-but not actually showing them angsting about them equivalent to angst in terms of "I didn't like this it was too angsty"?

It depends on your approach and tone.

A milquetoast's answer, but the truth.

Angst? What Angst??

It's less "Angst? What Angst?" and more "Angst Discretion Shot".

Messy question. If characters show no angst about things that could cause something that would cause angst, then the work will technically not be "angsty." But you'll have opened up a potentially worse can of worms.

Flat-out shrugging off things that could cause angst can be justified for a stoic character like a Shell-Shocked Veteran, but unless well-written, someone like a teenager doing the same risks being unbelievable or creepy — I suppose the latter can be used intentionally. But you have to show them dealing with the emotions they'd be feeling in some way. If you want to avoid being wangsty (e.g. obnoxiously angsty), you can display your character's emotional states through Mangst, Bad Dreams, Unstoppable Rage, Tranquil Fury, a "World of Cardboard" Speech and, in cases someone dying, To Absent Friends and/or Manly Tears... but do something to confirm your characters aren't unfeeling automatons. The more skilled a writer you are, the more subtly you'll be able to display their emotions in a way that doesn't interfere with their abilities to do their jobs. It won't be easy, but nothing worth doing ever is.

I'd like to note that the current way I demonstrate the angst without getting "angsty" is I only show the immeadiate aftermath of each angst event when the victim is still in the "denial" phase. Most of the story takes place years later, and they're not so much "angsty" as "unstable".

edited 11th Dec '10 7:16:29 PM by OOZE

Just as long as you don't have the character complaining to the audience about how crappy his life is you should be okay.

It depends. Do you mean you don't show the angst as in "the character never reacts at all", or don't show the angst as in "like a sex scene fading out we know it happened but never actually saw it"?

If its the first one, I'd say no unless there's a perfectly good reason for the character not to react — AKA, the reader feels angst because they realize the character doesn't even know any better, similar to how someone monotonously chopping someone up for a stew can be horrifying simply for the fact that the character never acts like anything is wrong. For the second one, I'd be more inclined to say yes, because if we as readers sympathize with the character, know what happened, and understand that they where hurt by it, it will be a major downer even if we don't know exactly how the character broke down behind closed doors.

Both of these, however, require a lot of good implied information in said angst-inducing scene, which can be a bit of a delicate maneuver to pull off well. They're also some of the things that hit me hardest when I'm reading something, because they can have a tendency to have absolutely no cathartic relief for whatever depression they induce. If I'm sitting with a character or narrative desperately explaining why everything is wrong, I can cry and have it be over with when they're done, but when the angst is never shown or dealt with, it just sits on me like a big heavy cloud of "I'm gonna spend the next three hours in a dreary gloom now", which, while insanely angsty, is not fun or nice, and has led me to stop reading things before.

edited 12th Dec '10 7:31:34 AM by Dec

Personally I like an overarching sense of dread myself, rather then dwelling on needlessly on single tragedy in particular. But it's not for everyone.

Obviously the audience is going to have to have a reasonably good idea why he is angsty if you want them to be sympathetic to his misery. His angst and the events that causes it is got to be a motivation for his actions, rather then the [[{{Wangsty]} being the focus of the story]] in and of in self.

simply put just make sure not to over do it and let him become self indulgent in his sorrows.

edited 13th Dec '10 5:19:43 AM by joeyjojo