Many years back, I read an article in Writer’s Digest that said if you give your characters hobbies or interests, the hobby should reveal something relevant about the character. And that giving them a hobby that doesn’t do this is just a waste of space.
The Long Goodbye is an good example of this approach. Marlowe plays chess; when he has a slow period, he sits and works out chess problems, or replays classic chess games. This shows that he’s intelligent, analytical, and also that he’s very much a loner: I’ve never seen him play chess with someone else in any of the books.
But I still don’t buy the idea—not the idea that you can use hobbies to reveal character, but that they should reveal character.
The fact is, in real life people’s hobbies don’t all derive neatly from their character. Gregarious, outgoing people may get involved in theater, but a lot of actors are quite shy offstage, too (I was at one time). People play chess for no reason other than they like it. TYG likes gardening, which doesn’t tell you anything about her character; I like to cook, which I don’t think says anything about mine other than that I like to cook.
Trying to assume characters must make overall sense is just … unconvincing to me. And even if it doesn’t reveal some deep underlying truth, having a character say “I can’t go out tonight, I’m catching the touring show of South Pacific” gives more detail, more reality to the world than just “I have plans.” On Star Trek: TNG, for instance, the character’s interest—Crusher’s dancing, Riker’s love of jazz, Picard’s fondness for hardboiled detective novels—doesn’t show anything deep about them, but it shows they do have lives and interests away from work, which is a big plus.
Giving characters hobbies and passions is good. If the hobby reveals a hidden truth, that’s just gravy.
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