Character Archetypes

J A Myers
Jul 18, 2017
3 min read

Your characters are all playing a different role through your books. These roles help bind the story together, the good characters and the bad characters. To make it really simple, both sides are needed to cause chaos and conflict throughout.

The Hero-

In most case they are the main character. They are most likely the hero, the obvious example would be Frodo from Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter. In your Crime novels they are the investigators, the policeman or woman who are involved in the case. These are the eyes you would be looking through as you read the book or the point of view you would mostly be focusing on. There doesn't always just have to be one hero in one book, for example, Game of Thrones, each character is a hero in their own right, because they lead their own lives. We are following their story through, not just one character.

The Mentor-

I find the mentor a great character to play with. They can be harsh and pushy, or sweet and almost innocent, 'A man of few words' is a phrase I like. For example Gandalf, from Lord of the Rings, he can be sharp with his comrades when the moment is needed for stern words, but he can be soft and gentle when they need lifting. He never complains throughout, he never gives in, and he never lets the others give up either. There is so much you can with a mentor character, and it is our job to play with these archetypes to make them fresh and different.

The Everyman

This character is a tag along for either side, protagonist or antagonist. They are sometimes in the wrong place at the wrong time and get dragged into the situations. I’ll stick with my example theme of Lord of the Rings, Pip and Merry. They stumble across Sam and Frodo while they are stealing veg in someone's field. They are ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances. But this doesn't mean they have to stay in that role, they can progress through the 'ranks' if you wish. Perhaps the Everyman character might, by the end, be the hero of the story.

The Villain-

Of course the story wouldn't have much point without a bad influence. I say influence because sometimes it isn't a person, it could be a really bad storm, and it could be a disease that destroys nearly all the human race. I don't think I need to go through these, they are just as famous as the heroes. They are evil in the eyes of someone good, because perhaps they don't understand the reasoning for the evil actions.

These are just a few of the many different roles your characters can take on. But there is one thing to remember, these roles aren't rules. Nowhere does it say that says your hero can't become a villain. This is why I love writing, there are no rules, no boundaries, you can swap and change where your characters fit in, sometimes the ordinary character might become the mentor, or the mentor might be a spy for the bad guys. But what if your hero is actually the villain?

It is our jobs as writers to understand the 'roles' and bend the rules. Once you understand something it can be manipulated to what we want and for the readers benefit and enjoyment. So next time you're planning, why not play around with these boundaries, see what you can come up with. What if the mentor for the main character is actually the hero of the story because the lead from the side-lines for their main character.