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Anyone who lurks around the writer’s forum for extended lengths of time knows that the regulars in this forum tend to have a serious problem with angst, and that’s been beginning to get under my skin. It could be that I’m just misunderstanding their posts. Actually, that’s probably what it is. But the fact of the matter is, I’m getting very tired of the attitude about angst which seems to be generally upheld; that is, I’m sick and tired of everyone complaining about the angsting in stories, when sometimes, angst is a very necessary emotion that is needed to portray a character properly. Sometimes, people are just whiney by nature.

Beyond that, though, angst can be a very powerful tool in terms of character growth. The best example of this that I can think of is Harry’s general outlook and attitude in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. Harry does nothing but angst in the whole of the novel, I would argue—except, maybe, more towards the end. His parents are dead, he can’t ever see Sirius, he saw Cedric die, he’s failing his classes, Umbridge is out to get him, whine, whine, whine. It’s annoying, and I would argue in many cases made the reader want to kill Harry (everyone I’ve spoken with about the issue hated Harry in book 5), but at the end of the story, and especially in Half Blood Prince, it’s easy to see why the angsting took place. Harry grew significantly as a character in the course of those many, many pages—he somehow changed from a whiney prat into someone who had grown up, realized his lot in life, and graciously accepted it, because there was nothing else to do. By the end of the book, Harry was extremely different, and he needed to be different to face the hardships that faced him in Half Blood Prince. His angsting and general whininess allowed us to see how that transformation took place, and actually made it easier to identify with Harry, even in our extreme hatred of him.

I’m not saying that angst is necessary for all character growth, but for that particular age-group, or at least that particular mind-set, it is necessary, because that’s a very angsty time for anyone to be alive. That doesn’t mean that they’ll all react to it in the same way—some characters will be whiney, some will be grumpy all the time, some will cut their wrists (although I would argue that that goes a little deeper than general angst), and some will write emo poems and expect their friends to worship them for it. In the end, it doesn’t really matter—it’s their way of dealing with angst, and there’s no right or wrong way, even if it is really annoying to read while it’s actually happening.

See, the way I see it, the purpose of angst is to show the reader how far the character has come. It’s such a useful tool for character growth, that it always irks me when I see people condemning it in this forum. I know that, for a good many of the writers out there, they don’t mean condemning angst in all its forms—but there are people who misconstrue words, and suddenly start thinking that any form of angst is a bad thing. Angst in and of itself is not a bad thing! (If you’re experiencing it, it sucks, and it’s annoying to read, but that doesn’t make it necessarily bad.) The problem arises when angst is used as a substitute for characterization. Now, obviously, this is just going to make a flat character that no one will relate to or like, because every person experiencing angst is more than just a big ball of angst. Harry Potter didn’t stop being Harry Potter during those eight-hundred some pages of angsting and whining. He just became Harry Potter, plus angst—and that’s what really allowed him to grow. See, unless you have a character set up that is solid enough to get your readers through the stage where all they want to do is throw your book out a WINDOW, if that will get your stupid character to shut the hell up, then you’re doing something wrong.

Also, if you’re writing pages and pages of angst, and you get to the end of your story, and your character is still an angsty, whiney, annoying little idiot, rethink your character, because you’ve done something wrong. Angst, like I said, is a very useful tool for showing character growth. If your character doesn’t grow, you’ve already got a problem. If your character doesn’t grow and he’s been angsting throughout your entire novel, you’ve got an even bigger problem.

So, yeah. Angst can be very helpful to characterization, in the end. I mean, yeah, it can also do horrible things to a story if not properly handled, but that doesn’t mean that people should ignore its usefulness completely. Even people who can’t handle it well, I think, shouldn’t abandon the whole emotion—because one day, with practice and effort and some help from friendly critics, they just might get better, and their characters could be much richer because of it.

I know it's important, but that really doesn't make it any less annoying -- think of a booster shot at the doctor's. It's needed, but that really doesn't make it feel any better. If anybody's ever watched Neon Genesis Evangelion, one could justify that all the angst was necessary and needed for character development, but it still doesn't make Shinji any less of a whiny little brat.

Now, the idea with angst, though, is that 1) so many writers can't handle it well, and 2) we get enough of it in real life that we don't want it in our fiction. I'd say that 99.999999% of the writers on Gaia would not be able to use angst as character development properly if they tried, and that percentage that could would still have a hard time because people don't read to hear people whine. I've heard it said that 'whining is a difficult thing to do gracefully,' and that is certainly true in this case.

Some angst is necessary for most teenaged characters, for that is what teenagers do.

But it should be used sparingly.

Well, I think its certainly necessary for most modern day teenaged character, but I think characters in an earlier time period would be much less likely to angst, and more likely to take action and do something. Unless of course they're some sort of whiney princess.
cheese_whine

Well, I'd just think that you'd have less time to sit around in your room and cry about your dead dog because you'd have to go out and do things, and be forced to sort of pull it all together and move on. I just think you had to be a little stronger. Depending on how far back in time you go in your story, it'd be considered healthy to feel grief a little, but insane for you to keep sobbing on about it.
There's always going to be some angst, sure. But its going to be done differently, depending on the setting of the story.

I'm not saying that culture wouldn't play a big part, and I completely agree with both of you. I guess it's true, that a piece of historical fiction (or midevil fantasy with roots in history), even one about teenagers, would simply have less angst than your average, everyday story in which modern day teens do....whatever. However, just because people are more conditioned to deal with death doesn't mean that the death of someone important wouldn't cause them to angst for a little while. I mean, if you lose your mom, and you were old enough to really know her, why wouldn't they be angsty about it? Even back then, when people didn't live very long, I can't imagine that there weren't people wailing "Why me?!" whenever tragedy struck.

I think that you wouldn't see the angst in a story with teenage characters in the past, simply because, like Anarchy Rabbit said, they had to do things. If you were the oldest girl in the family and your mother died, you'd have to take over the housekeeping (assuming you were old enough to handle it), because it needed to be done. There'd be people to help you, but you wouldn't be allowed to sit and mope. I see that. However, in a first person story, at least, I think the angst would show through.