Every character is the hero
While reading, writing, and revising, I’ve had a revelation: every character is a hero. At least, in their own mind. Okay, so I’d heard an inkling of this advice before. If you’re having trouble making your villain realistic rather than total “mwahaha!” evil, try writing from the villain’s point of view, because of course each villain thinks they are the hero of their own story. Of course they have justifications for their motives, no matter how slimily they might carry them out, and the reader needs to feel this, too, in order to believe their role in the story.
Now, my light-bulb moment came when I realized that every character in a story is likely to think they’re the hero. Or, if they’re not self-confident enough for that, they must surely believe themselves to be the protagonist of their own story. The world revolves around them and their own dreams and fears, no matter how super fantastic the other characters might be.
Why was this a revelation to me? Well, like so many writers, I committed the Sin of Cardboard Characters. I focused on my protagonist’s motivations and inner conflicts, but assumed that the best friend was just the best friend, the postmaster was just the postmaster, etc. Everybody had their roles within the story, and they stuck to them. After all, if every character in a book has some sort of inner emotional journey, the whole book would be a mess of feelings and transformations. You need some static characters to provide a solid backdrop to those who are actively undergoing metamorphosis. And if only the protagonist’s motives matter, well, they’re the protagonist, aren’t they?
Or so I thought. Because if you’re intent on railroading your characters into a predefined plot, chances are this plot is going to come across dull and predictable. If you don’t let your characters loose to mingle and fight and fall in love, I doubt your story will evolve from their desires. If your characters don’t even have desires to begin with, they’ll just shuffle around like zombies awaiting orders from their master, the Great High Author. You get the idea.
Characters want things. Every single one of them. Even if they don’t get what they want over the course of the story, even the token sister’s boyfriend’s cousin character is going to be influenced by his wants and how they interact with the wants of others. Otherwise, he’s not really a character at all, but just some sort of prop in the scenery of the protagonist’s journey. And I don’t know about you, but I’d much rather read (and write) a story where people aren’t props, but a fantastically messy tangle of desires. What do you want?
Originally published at KarenKincy.com