When it comes to character descriptions, should the main characters' physical appearance be described in detail? Or should it be left to the reader to imagine what the character looks like? Should the description instead focus on personality traits, to better draw in the reader?
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The first aspect is how the viewpoint character would describe them. That's how they should be described.
On the other hand, viewpoint characters can be changed -- both in that another character can take over, and that the character of the viewpoint character, including what he sees fit to describe, can be revised.
The description should fit the story. For instance, the hero and heroine of a romance should be sufficiently described to make their attractiveness to each other clear. A fantasy about intrigues among nobles should provide the clues to the relative status and riches of the characters that would influence their position in intrigues. A merchant seeing people who want to travel with his caravan should instantly look for clues that these people do or do not know a thing about travel and so might be a danger -- or worse, might be in with bandits, and those are the details the description should provide.
Mary
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Main characters are strongest when they have depth. This argues for sharing both physical traits and personality traits. How much detail to share and how quickly you share it -- dribble it in v. info-dump -- is a judgement call and determined by what your story needs.
Share details of the character description that impact the story or plot. Like if a character needs to be tall to escape from some problem or is too tall to hide in a crowd when they need to hide, then make sure you share that the character is really really tall. The elements of the characters' descriptions that have no effect on the arc of the story or don't interact with plot points don't need to be specified since the reader will supply them.
How you share the information is a balance between showing and telling. Show the important stuff -- the details that impact the story and tell the facts that don't matter.
The same applies to character personality traits. These are often more important details to share since they usually have more impact on the arc of the story. And, character actions and reactions that reveal their inner nature are terrific. If your character is harsh and critical of other people, then your readers will most likely envision the character as someone they know who is harsh and critical.
EDL
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1 Visual appearance
In most situations a few short labels will be quite enough.
Stating that your characters are "tall and menacing" or "beautiful" are often sufficient to trigger the imagination of the reader.
Fiction is not a picture description essay for school. Readers of stories are more interested in what a character does than in their shoe size or haircut. Descriptions slow the reader down, and too much detail may actually hinder their immersion.
If you tell me the love interest of your protagonist is "beautiful", I'll imagine a person who is beautiful to me and identify with the protagonist and their infatuation. If you describe someone who I don't happen to find attractive, because my ideas of beauty differ from yours, I no longer experience what your character goes through.
When it comes to outward appearance, it is usually better to use abstract labels instead of detailed descriptions. Do not show the readers what your characters look like, tell them. Give the reader all the information they require in the context of the story, and allow them to imagine the rest.
Personality
You do not need to describe the personality of your characters at all. It becomes apparent through their actions.
For most readers, a list of personality traits is quite meaningless. I don't know what it means when you write that your protagonist is "honest" or your antagonist "cruel". Does the one always tell the whole truth, even when it is hurtful? Is the other "disposed to inflict pain or suffering" and "devoid of humane feelings"? In what way?
Also, abstract personality labels reduce the complexity of a person's behaviour to the point where it becomes untrue and unexciting. Fiction is fascinating because it allows us to experience the thoughts, emotions, and behaviours of your characters in all their multifaceted complexity and contradictions and to follow them through the changes they have to undergo to achieve their goals. Do not reduce that to a bland word like "honest".
Do not tell us what kind of person your character is, show us.
I strongly advise you to re-read some of your favourite books in the genre you are writing. Observe how those writers use (or omit) descriptions and how that affects your reading experience. That will likely answer all the questions you have.
Ben
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Welcome to stack exchange. I hope you find it useful.
There are those who add many layers of detail and description, which certainly works quite well.
When I am reading, I prefer broad strokes so I can fill in the details myself. Sometimes allowing the reader to create their personal version of the characters is most appropriate.
In one of my works in progress, I mention the hair color and eye color of my MC because his eyes seem to change color depending on his mood - from grey to blue - and that trait is often paired with a particular hair color. He has a tell of which he is unaware and that is important for the reader to know.
In that same piece, I have a Secondary Character who was born and raised in Columbia, but is of Irish descent. That detail is one I bear in mind when writing her but never tell the reader except for giving her an Irish name - which could be a code name for all the reader knows.
In another work in progress, I have characters in a relationship. I don't call him handsome or her beautiful, but I do make it clear that they find each other attractive.
It depends on the work itself, the characters and your style. Do you feel it is right to describe everything? If so, do that. Try not to do it in one infodump, as that can disrupt immersion. Go full Tolstoy on them.
If you feel the tone and style of the piece and the character himself is better tended with broad strokes and implied descriptions, go for that.
What is right for your work is what is right for your work. Trust yourself - more importantly, trust your characters and the work.
Rasdashan
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It depends on the kind of story that you want to tell.
Stories that disregard most readers
If you want to go against convention or if you don't care about creating something that others value, then disregard everything I or anyone says. If you go against convention, your readers will have a hard time to understand your text, because humans are creatures of habit and we come to texts (or any situation, for that matter) with expectations.
Many people expect stories to be valuable, and that means different things to different people. That's why we have genres; some people find value in romance while others find value in biographies. Regardless, people will only approach something if they predict that doing that will be valuable.
Disregard expectations, go against conventions, and you will lose readers. But it may reflect your vision. And that is okay to do. It's just important to understand the tradeoffs.
Stories that engage most readers
Most humans can identify with a character whose life went out of balance. The character starts out believing the world to be a particular way, such as "Nemo would never get lost", "Thanos would never snap his fingers", or "I, Rapunzel, will never leave this castle". But when something unexpected happens that throws life off balance, most readers are able to empathize with that. It draws us in.
How does this relate to how specific descriptions should be? It helps to understand that specific descriptions are a type of exposition, a way of describing the world you have built. Descriptions can be used as a way of throwing a character's life off balance or as an attempt by the character to gain balance again.
In other words, exposition can be used in a controlled way to tell dramatic stories. The best way of saying this is that 'exposition should be used as ammunition', as Robert McKee argues. For example, instead of saying "he had cyborg arms that couldn't get wet", you could set up a scene where the character accidentally drops his keys in the street as it was raining, and deliberated on whether to take the risk of getting his arms wet or having his keys washed away by the flow of water.
Exposition, in the best of cases (where "best" means texts that people find valuable to read), is a controlled flow of information that always pushes the drama forward, creating gaps between expectation and reality and changing values from good to bad and vice-versa.
Sometimes this is hard. For example, JK Rowling is known to have extensive private notes on the students at Hogwarts, and is also known to have rewritten multiple times the first chapter of her first book to avoid revealing too much at once.
If you want to learn to do this, trial and error is a way to go. However, studying the masters and learning from them will save you time. If you choose to learn from others, Story by Robert McKee can teach you how to use exposition.
Gabriel
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Focus on what's important for the story.
If it's important that the character is beautiful, say they are beautiful but don't be overly specific, because beauty is in the eye of the beholder. As an oversimplified example, if you really fancy short blonde hair, but the reader prefers longer brunette hair, they might not picture the character as beautiful as you want them to be. So rather focus on the effect than the specifics.
OTOH if certain physical criteria are important for the story (strong, haircolour, a certain freckle or scar, ...) that obviously has to be included into the physical description.
If it doesn't serve the story, I'd only include only minimal details and let the reader form their own picture of the character in their mind. Chances are they will like them better or be able to better identify with them.
infinitezero
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Two schools of thought
There are two schools of thought in writing: minimalism and maximalism. They're also exactly as they sound. Nobel Prize for Literature award winner J. M. Coetzee is a minimalist.
Typically, maximalist writers tend to write stories of ideas especially in Fantasy. This isn't a bad thing, it is just a thing. The important thing to remember is that too little detail is just as bad as too much. While maximalism and minimalism are distinctly different, they have ranges of what can work within those schools of thought. The writer needs to strike a respective balance whether they lean one way or the other.
The technique of description and other approaches
Pacing
When describing a story element, focusing on multiple elements will slow the pace whereas focusing on fewer or just one element will speed it up. Therefore, you need to consider the reader's likely reception to story progression and adjust your writing accordingly.
Writing in third-person limited
When writing in third-person limited, the writer needs to consider the viewpoint character. If your protagonist is the viewpoint character, then you shouldn't be describing their expression and face unless they're looking at a reflection or image of themselves. The "camera" is positioned behind the protagonist's eyes not as a window into scene – this is not TV writing. TV writing is where the viewer is separate and apart from the action (i.e. a bystander or voyeur); novel writing is where the reader tends to be inside the head of a character thus closer and part of the experience.
Writing in third-person omniscient
Consider narrative gaze. Where the "camera" points, what is the focus and why. When describing the protagonist, a focus on significant detail in the context of the scene and/or the action taking place is ideal.
For example,
The older girl had Sarah by the hair, dragging her across the room. In that moment, she regretted not having her hair cut short the other day. Now, in this moment of pain, all she could think about was her hair and how vain a creature that made her.
Here, describing hair is important whereas counting freckles or pimples at this point is superfluous to the story. The writer must be selective about detail and when to deliver what and what not to deliver at all.
Writing in second-person
The focus tends to be action not description because it places the reader as the protagonist so details of appearance and traits are not as important.
Writing in first-person
Typical of the YA genre, first-person readily helps the reader to empathise and experience the story through a singular focal that is I. Detail like description will tend to reflect self-view and the reactions of other characters to the self. It is regarded as the easiest narrative point of view to write in so I will not elaborate on it.
Physical versus non-physical
Physical traits
A block of description often breaks away from the action and detracts from immersion. It also has been done to death and is more often than not clichè. You want to avoid clichè.
I think a good rule of thumb is to provide just enough description so as to allow the reader to fill in the blanks with their own imagination. Don't be heavy-handed.
You don't need to use techniques of listing all the time, which is the go to of the amateur writer. We're not going shopping. That is, eyes colour, hair colour, skin colour, height, attractiveness, etc.
You might want to juxtapose some features with an object/subject and/or setting.
For example,
Mary's eyelids were powdered into darkened pits—she felt they made her more formidable. The woman staring back at her in the mirror certainly looked like she could intimidate. The truth though was the makeup was a ruse. Inside, she felt very small especially when confronted with the rowdy men of the pubs.
Do note that describing a reflection in a mirror is also clichè. Some published writers circumvent it by describing a reflection in a water, but this is also getting old. Some prefer a nostalgic interaction with a photo of the protagonist or an ID card being scrutinised. My point is: you can describe a few lines or a single line of description, but you have to integrate it with the story in a way that isn't clichè. This is your chance to be creative.
Non-physical traits
Personality, emotion, vices/virtues, etc., etc. — can all be conveyed through description of action and/or dialogue (another technique where simply having dialogue doesn't make it a technique).
I would suggest using techniques of speech to explore non-physical traits. They are: direct speech, reported speech, free indirect speech, and indirect speech.
The writer must focus on the action from which conflict arises to be resolved.
My answer
The writer needs to consider how to explore both physical features and non-physical traits. You can show or tell – there is a time when one or the other is best. Ideas that showing is better than telling are misconceptions of technique. Showing/telling is one technique amongst many. There are techniques of pacing, techniques of speech, description, focalisation, etc., etc. The writer needs to deliberately use technique to best effect when it is warranted. What is important is that the reader can differentiate a memorable protagonist from other characters. We don't need to know that John Smith has dark eyelashes unless it is relevant to the story, but we do need to know if his height intimidates others, which we can reveal through techniques other than showing or telling or description such as speech.
Importantly, formulaic writing where you describe X amount of physical appearance then Y amount of non-physical traits is likely to disrupt the flow. The narration must be natural, fluid, and flowing. The reader needs to be carried along with the story not abruptly pulled out of it by sudden interruptions in the story that aren't relevant to it. Save the formulae for things like narrative structure, plot structure, and narrative trajectories.
Remember that the reader must be an emotional participant not a clinical observer.
Del
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