Character Protagonist and Antagonist
Without character, there would be no plot, therefore no story. most readers
of fiction primarly notices the characters, collection of men and women
whose experiences and adventures form the plots of stories.
we come to know characters of fiction well. in real life the essential
complexity of people’s inner lives can be inferred only after years of
close acquaintance. Fiction, on the other hand, provides us with
immediate access to that inner life – to the intellectual, emotional,
and moral complexities of human personality that lie beneath the
surface.
When we speak of characters in terms of the text interpretation, we are
concerned with three separate but closely connected activities: 1)
with being able to establish the personalities of characters themselves and
to identify their intellectual, emotional, and moral qualities; 2) with the
techniques an author uses to create, develop and present characters to
the reader; 3) with whether the characters so presented are credible and
convincing. In evaluating the success of characterization, the third
issue is particularly crucial, for although the plot can carry a work of fiction to
a point, it is a rare work whose final value and importance are not somehow
intimately connected with just how convincingly the author has
managed to portray the characters,. Naturally, such an evaluation
can only take place within the context of the novel or short story as
a whole, which links character to the other elements of fiction.
Characters in fiction
Although the terms person, character and figure are often used
indiscriminately, modern theoretical discourse tries to be more
accurate.
A person is a real-life person; anyone occupying a place on the level of
nonfictional communication. authors and readers are persons.
A character is not a real-life person but only a “paper being”, created by an
author. they only exist within a fictional text.
The term figure is often simply used as a variation of “character”; however,
some theorists also use for referring to the narrator.
The term character applies to any individual in a literary work. For
purposes of analysis, characters in fiction are customarily described by their
relationship to plot; by the degree of development they are given by
the author, and by whether or not they undergo significant
character change.
The central character of the plot, protagonist is the essential character and
without them there would be no plot. The reader is focused on the
protagonist’s fate (the conflict or problem being wrestled with). The
character against whom the protagonist struggles is the antagonist.
The terms protagonist and antagonist do not, however, imply a judgment
about the moral worth of either, for many protagonists and antagonist
embody a complex mixture of both positive and negative qualities.
For this reason then are more suitable terms then hero, heroine, or villain
which connote a degree of moral absoluteness that major characters in great
fictional works, as opposed, say, to popular melodrama, simply do not
exhibit.
The antagonist can be more difficult to identify, especially if he is not
a human being, as with marlin that challenges the courage and endurance of
the old fisherman Santiago in Ernest Hemingway’s “The Old Man and the
Sea”. In fact, the antagonist may not be living creature at all, but
rather the hostile social or natural environment with which the
protagonist is forced to contend, as with the war in the same
Hemingway’s “Cat in the rain”.
To describe the relative degree to which fictional characters are
developed by their creators, E.M. Foster distinguished between what he
calls flat and round characters. Flat characters are those who embody
or represent a single trait, or idea, or at most a very limited number
of such qualities. Flat characters are also referred to as type characters,
as one – dimensional characters, or, when they are distorted to create
humor, as caricatures. Fiction is full of such individuals, and they are always
immediately recognizable – by their mannerisms, by the recurring words
they utter. Those characters and their deeds are always predictable, for as
Foster notes, they are not changed by circumstances.
Flat characters are usually minor characters in the novels and stories
in which they appear, but not always so. For example, Montresor and
Fortunato are protagonist and antagonist, respectively, in Edgar Allan Poe’s
“the cask of Amontillado”. Yet they are both flat characters.
Round characters embody a number of qualities and traits, and are complex.
They are multidimensional characters of considerable intellectual and
emotional depth who have the capacity of grow and change. Major
characters in fiction are usually round characters, and it is with the very
complexity of such characters that most of us become engrossed and
fascinated. The terms round and flat do not automatically imply value
judgments. Each kind of character has its uses in literature. Even when they
are minor characters, as they usually are, flat characters often prove to be
convenient devices to draw out and help us to understand the personalities
of characters who are more fully realized.
Characters in fiction can also be distinguished on the basis of whether they
demonstrate the capacity to develop or change as the result of their
experiences. Dynamic characters exhibit a capacity to change; static
characters do not. The rate of character change varies widely, even among
dynamic characters. In some works, the development is so subtle that it may
go almost unnoticed; in other s, it is sufficiently drastic and profound to
cause a total reorganization of the character’s personality or system of
values. Change in character may come slowly, or it may take place with a
dramatic suddenness that surprises, and even overwhelms, the character.
With characters who fully qualify as dynamic, such change can be expected
to altar subsequent behavior in some significant way.
Dynamic characters include the protagonists in most novels, that by
virtue of their very size and scope provide excellent vehicles for
illustrating the process of change. So-called initiation novels, such
as “David Copperfield”, “Huckleberry Finn” and “The Great Gatsby”,
are examples.
Static characters leave the plot as they enter it, untouched by the
events that have taken place. in rare cases, A protagonist may prove
to be a static character as well. For the most part, an author creates
static characters as foils to emphasize and set off by contrast the
development taking place in others.
Methods of characterization
TELLING - exposition and direct commentary by the author;
SHOWING – the character is revealed through the dialogue and their actions
The choice of a method of characterization as a rule depends on a
number of circumstances
The author’s temperament
Particular literary conventions of the period in which the author is writing
The size and scope of the work
The degree of distance and objectivity the author wishes to establish to
establish between himself and the characters
The authors literary and philosophical beliefs about how the sense of reality
can be best captured and conveyed to the reader
The kind of story the author wishes to tell
Direct methods of revealing character – characterization by telling –
include the following methods.
Characterization through the use of names
Characterization through appearance
Characterization by the author
Characterization through the use of names
Edward Murdstone in “David Copperfield” by Dickens. A heartless villain whose
character is implied in his name.
Ichabod Crane in “the legend of sleeping hollow” by Irving. Crane means 1. a tall
metal structure with a long horizontal part, used for lifting and moving heavy
objects 2. a tall bird with long, thin legs and a long neck. Both meanings describe
the characters appearance.
Characterization through appearance
In the world of fiction details of appearance – what they wear and how they look
often provide essential clues to the character.
Indirect- SHOWING – characterization through the dialogue and characterization
through their actions
How readers should analyze the dialogues
For what is said
The identity of a speaker
The occasion
The identity of the person or persons the speaker is addressing
The quantity of the exchange
The speaker’s tone of voice, stress, dialect and the vocabulary
