What do people (as readers) feel they need to know about th eMC, and why?

I'll throw out the following for starters:
Gender
Ethnicity
Nationality/cultural identification
Social class/status
Physical appearance

Gender is harder for me to answer. I can't recall a story where I wasn't sure of a character's gender, so I don't know if it would bother me not to know (assuming the gender doesn't affect the plot). Obviously this only applies to first-person stories; third person requires the use of gender-specific pronouns, and second person, well, that makes the MC me, and I know my gender. (I'm a woman, by the way, for those of you assuming I'm a man from my name.)

I can imagine reading a story set in a universe where the sentient humanoid lifeforms don't have sexes, or have six sexes, or whatever, and being fine with that, so I think gender doesn't matter to me, either - again, as long as it isn't important to the story, and as long as the writer doesn't pull a "you thought it was this way, but it's that way, ain't I clever for fooling you so!" on me.

In fact, I think that's the key element - whatever's important to the story is revealed in a timely fashion, and whatever isn't, isn't.

I try to avoid using outer descriptions to reflect inner character. For example, just because someone has flint-colored eyes shouldn't automatically mark them as a hard soul. I think that's cheating. After all, in real life some bad guys like to wear white, and "waist-length, flame-colored tresses" do not the vixen make. I prefer to characterize through thought and action.

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can imagine reading a story set in a universe where the sentient humanoid lifeforms don't have sexes, or have six sexes, or whatever, and being fine with that

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I find gender important, and I'm one of those people who *REALLY* insists upon a name for the main character. As I said in a previous thread, I strongly prefer a name, even if done in a contrived way.

I feel a lot less specific about physical appearance and ethnicity, but I definitely default to assuming the character is like me unless told otherwise, so I find it jarring to discover in the fourth chapter that the character is of Jamaican descent, which I am not.

I think life station/social status is one of those things that we're not aware of conveying, but for a satisfying story is well conveyed early in the story so that the reader understands what's at stake, where this person is in the local hierarchy. It's one of the things that makes reading stories about far-off alien worlds annoying to me because so much of this has to be explained in the context of the culture, and as much as I like sci-fi, I don't much like alien stuff for this reason (oh, and because most authors/hollywood producers seem to think alien = bug-like. Gross.)

Speaking for myself, I'm not that interested in description for its own sake whether it's about characters or setting. So put my vote with those who say only include what is necessary.

For myself, I'll agree that I really only need what's pertinent to the story. BUT if it's going to be important to the story, I need it pretty close to the beginning. It's disorienting to picture the protagonist one way and then two-thirds of the way through have to re-imagine the character.

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it might be good to consider only including what the current point of view character actually notices in a scene.

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For myself, I'll agree that I really only need what's pertinent to the story. BUT if it's going to be important to the story, I need it pretty close to the beginning. It's disorienting to picture the protagonist one way and then two-thirds of the way through have to re-imagine the character.

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I would like to add a suggestion that for those writing from a particular point of view (even if that changes through the story from one character to another to another), it might be good to consider only including what the current point of view character actually notices in a scene.

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I feel different stories call for different elements to be prominent in different ways.

Generally, and there are many exceptions, I like to see:

• The name of the protagonist--whether it's in narrative or a comment--fairly soon.
• I like also to know gender. Most of the time, the way a person is perceived is gender-specific, so I don't like to be surprised to find out a character is gay or something. I feel it would be cheating me.
• Ethnicity is only an issue when prejudice will be later called into play. Again, a well written character will give some clue to this naturally.
• Nationality only matters when there are contrasts, sources of tension, for me.
• Cultural Identification I feel is a separate issue. I couldn't NOT culturally identify myself. Whether by class, race, creed or education, there will have to be evidence of this in the character's speech, thoughts, motivation or perception.
• Social Class/Status, I feel will also have to be shown...unless the entire story only has one.
• Physical Appearance could be illustration like all exposition, meted out when relevant, as opposed to a few paragraphs or a page that steps out of PoV.
• Education/Intelligence (My add) is valuable for illustrating what challenges or character growth will have to be overcome.
  

An interesting quote from James D. MacDonald:

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In a science fiction novel, if I describe what's on a desk, the reader will use this to figure out the level of technology in the society.

In a mystery novel, if I describe what's on a desk, the reader will understand that one of those objects is a clue.

In a literary novel, if I describe what's on a desk, the reader will understand it to be a metaphor for the protagonist's mental state.

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On the "how" the point of view character sees things, this can be used in characterization. A happy person is going to perceive a scene in a very different way from how a depressed person would perceive it. Those were great examples.

When I used to teach a writing class, I tried to give an assignment in which I asked the students to write two paragraphs of description of the same object or scene. They were supposed to use the description to tell the reader how the point of view character was feeling without ever mentioning the point of view character (I believe I got this exercise from John Gardner).

They never seemed to understand my instructions and always included the character, as in "Mike hated the sight of the car" instead of something like "the car crouched there in the driveway, daring anyone to get into it, its grill like gritted teeth" and so on.

Yes, if it's relevant to the story.

I have read a story in Fantasy magazine done in first person and never discovered what the MC's name, description, or even sex was. Didn't like the story but the editor did.

It all depends on whether it matters to the story you are telling. You could conceivably write a piece where not one of the items on your list is satisfied.

Yes please - I would like 1 black top, 1 pair of blue jeans, 2 pink socks, 1 pair white tennis shoes, and can I also have some long flowing blond hair, a pair of blue eyes, tan skin, and a look trouble on the side. Yah, this doesn't work for me. In writing at least.

As long as I can get the basic idea and have no major changes in two seconds - I'm usually happy, but I do admire an author who can visually give you the picture without you really even noticing.

I always liked Tolkien, but some of the detail on every little thing tended to make me sleepy sometimes. I'm a fan of detail, but not to much detail.

The other thing I hate is when its obvious the author sent a character down a path that seems opposite to their nature. This happens a lot in tv to keep series going and kind of drives me nuts. The fastest way to lose me as a reader or watcher is to have main characters do something uncharacteristic without a darn good reason.

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Gender
Ethnicity
Nationality/cultural identification
Social class/status
Physical appearance

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Honestly I'd like to know all of these. All of these including physical appearance give insights into the character (how they dress, if they take care of themselves (clean shaven or straggly), etc.).

If I read an entire novel and I didn't know these things about the main characters, I would be annoyed.

Short stories are different. The author has to be a lot more conservative with details. I understand that not all stories are character focused (but those are the ones I most enjoy), so answering all of these is not necessary. It really depends on what the writer is trying to do.

I think it is interesting how many people here say they only like to know what is important to the plot. Every story can be stripped down to bare bones, but then the story feels hollow to me. Details are what make the story come alive IMO.

The right specific details are important to enrich a story. They need to be carefully chosen and placed in the story, but when done right they make the story believable and memorable. And I agree completely with KDW that these details need to be filtered through the POV.

My point is that just because these details aren't important to the plot doesn't mean they don't add depth to the character and the story.

I like to give names of characters because they can convey a lot of information. If you name a character Suresh, you've conveyed a general sense of ethnicity, gender, nationality in a single word. Some names even convey religion. Once you've done that, I am happy to let the reader imagine what the character looks like. I'd say physical details are usually the least important to convey, unless its important to the story.

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Nine months Landsman’s been flopping at the Hotel Zamenhof without any of his fellow residents managing to get themselves murdered. Now Somebody has put a bullet in the brain of the occupant of 208, a yid who was calling himself Emmanuel Lasker.
“He didn’t answer the phone, he wouldn’t open his door,” says Tenenboym the night manager when he comes to roust Landsman. Landsman lives in 505, with a view of the neon sign on the hotel across Max Nordau Street. That one is called the Blackpool, a word that figures in Landsman’s nightmares. “I had to let myself into his room.”
The night manager is a former U.S. Marine who kicked a heroin habit of his own back in the sixties, after coming home from the shambles of the Cuban war. He takes a motherly interest

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I've found it difficult to define ethnicity in relation to the contemporary surroundings of [human] characters who are often doing their thing thousands of years in the future---both the notion of what we know now will almost certainly evolve, and the notion that characters in the future would not use or understand ethnic terms of the past.

These things matter to the story because they matter to the people in the story. I think if you show how other characters react to the MC you can give all this information without having to tell the reader that the main character has steely blue eyes and a pronounced chin.

And then continuing, if you show how your MC reacts to the other characters reactions, then you can know the MC's motivation.

None of those guys were actually "Black Irish." I can't think of anybody contemporary...if you remember the actor / comic Pat Harrington, and what he looked like, he came across in appearance as "Black Irish."

Oh, and tell me his name by all means, but make it pronouncable and preferably less than twenty characters. I hate jaw cracking names that are there just because "it's fantasy" and its traditional in your world to have a name starting with 'Xst' that always ends in a 'z' and has no vowels in between.

Anything else, if it hasn't got any releveance to the story or character development, leave it out.

[This message has been edited by pdblake (edited November 03, 2010).]

As a reader I’ve decided that the details that matter to me are those that reveal character. These details may differ from story to story.

Perhaps another way of saying this is “Writers, please leave out any details that do not reveal character until I know the main character’s nature.”

Description of clothing, physical characteristics, even attributes like gender, class, and race are only useful if they reveal something about the character that illuminates the character’s nature.

Describing a character’s dress, for example, can be used to reveal a character’s circumstances as well as character. I would argue that until I understand a character’s nature I, your reader, couldn’t discern the difference between a transitive condition and an important fact about the character’s nature.

As a reader I supply the underlying value judgments. I’m a 21st century westerner; if you're writing a story at odds with my society's conventions then please, spell it out so I don't feel stupid making assumptions that are subsequently proved wrong.

So we get to the laundry list of things readers want to know about characters, those details required by the story. Gender, class, physical attractiveness, the list goes on, and all of them may provide a shorthand for understanding character relative to the cultural norms of the reader or, if the writer makes this clear up front, the cultural norms of the character’s society.

For example, Jane Austen’s women live in a society where class and sex fundamentally defines one’s role in life. Austen must describe a character’s sex and class; they matter immensely in degrees both familiar and alien to most modern readers.

In contrast, sex and class convey much less information about a character in Iain M. Bank’s Culture novels, where one’s sex is mutable and class obsolete for those of the Culture. Banks must focus the reader’s attention on other attributes to reveal character in the context of his stories.

The more alien the culture to the reader, the more thought the writer must put into selecting those characteristics essential to revealing character and focusing my (the reader’s) attention on those defining details. What those defining details are depends upon the story.

Anyway, I thought ‘Black Irish’ meant Phil Lynott as well, or maybe all North Dubliners (“Say it loud, we’re black and we’re proud.” Jimmy Rabbitte, in Roddy Doyle’s THE COMMITMENTS). I didn’t know Pierce Brosnan was part of the tribe until today. He’s very welcome, I'm sure.

I think Timothy Dalton is Black Irish as well, but I can't really say for certain about either of them. That has just been my understanding of what "Black Irish" means.

I'm sure you're right. I've read the phrase in books, but I've never heard anyone use the term in conversation.

If James Bond, Timothy Dalton, and (one presumes) the Corrs are examples of the breed I'll have to revise my mental image.

Belatedly, he're a link to Wikipedia's article on the subject:

That doesn't mean the MC needs to be fully fleshed out mentally or physically in the first few pages, but enough so the reader gets a start of knowing that person.

It increases the readers connection to what is about to happen.

My two cents.