Each person’s life contains different types of people. Some will change, some remain constant, and others are predictably stereotypical. These are also types of characters a writer uses to make stories feel realistic. Characters and their personalities are central to almost every story. This makes character development very important to literature as a whole. Guy de Maupassant does a good job of exemplifying this in his story “The Necklace.” Character development is illustrated in “The Necklace” by Guy de Maupassant. A few ways that writers construct characters is through the use of description, action, and setting. Description is what the narrator says directly about a character. “She was a strict woman,” or “He was a happy man,” are both examples of description. The narrator must explain a character’s traits directly to describe them. This …show more content…
Three types of characters are flat, stock, and round. A character that plays a constant and unchanging role is a flat character. A flat character can still have depth and be unique, though. Peter Pan, from “Peter Pan” by J. M. Barrie, is a flat character, because, in the story, Peter Pan shows a well-defined set of characteristics and is left unchanged by any of the events he faces. Flat characters can have unique personalities, but show no change throughout the story. Stock characters, on the other hand, are based off of stereotypes and clichés. They are similar to flat characters in that they do not change for the entirety of a story. Tiger Lily, also from “Peter Pan” by J. M. Barrie, is an example of a stock character. Her character is constructed from stereotypes commonly associated with Native Americans and she is never very well developed. Stock characters usually exist in the background of a story to support the protagonist and plot. This type of character exists to add a predictable and stereotypical aspect to a
This way the reader can know it is a character and know about them. Suzanne Lebstock does a great job of using historical facts and knowledge to re-create historical events and make it into a
How a character acts and what their personality is can describe their character trait. Sometimes characters are different in their traits, oftenly characters can be the same by changing or revising their own character trait. The protagonist is Doug from Okay for Now, by Gary Schmidt. Doug is a teenage boy that is struggling with a rough family. Doug 's father got a new job that was far away from his own town so, Doug has to adapt to the town that he moved to.
A good example of a character is Bertrande. Coras describes Bertrande as “ “given the weakness of sex, (was) easily deceived by the cunning and craftiness of men.” (Davis, pg 110). He (Coras) considered her ignorant of Arnaud 's true identity, hence innocent of wrongdoing.” (Finlay, pg 555) Davis however describes Bertrande as known more as an honorable and independent character who acts more like a hero rather than evil.
One example is Boo Radley. Jem describes the stereotype of Boo, this description of Boo is extremely vivid. They say that he has sharp teeth, blood stains on his hands from feeding off of animals, he’s tall, and scrawny. The three kids were very curious about what Boo was like. People believe that he a bad guy because he allegedly stabbed his dad in the leg with a pair of scissors , but he’s a good character and saves Jem and Scouts life from Bob Ewell trying to get back at Atticus for making a fool out of him in front of the town.
Character is a literary term that is very important when reading any story or poem. The literary term character can be defined as the person or thing that the story or literature focuses on. For example, usually in a story or poem, there is a central character that will experience some type of change. The change can be physical, mental or emotional. In the story “A&P,” which was written by John Updike, Sammy was the central character in the story.
Characters in stories sometimes follow a theme when it comes to their traits. These traits are called archetypes. Archetypes can be as simple as a villain or hero. They can also be used to portray unfathomable human characteristics that exists in everyone. Characteristics such as greed, lust, envy, pride, sloth, and gluttony are examples.
All readers have come across the stereotypical character who is charming, good-looking, and the savior of the story and our hearts, but that is present in commercial fiction. In literary fiction, characters are something greater and deeper. In literary fiction, characterization is considered one of the most important elements in an author’s work. Characterization is the concept of creating a character.
The "Ghost" man is a static character because he has the same personality at the beginning and the end. Mr. Gilbert is a stereotypical character. He is stereotypical because he has a lot of money and he invests in a kid that will make it very far in life and buys him whatever he wants. He knows it will get him a lot of money in the future.
In Tulsa Burning by “Anna Myers” there are a lot of characters that are both flat and round. If you did not know already, a flat character is a character that throughout the story they only show one trait or side and a round character is characters that have many sides and grow and change throughout the story. Two examples of a flat character in the book Tulsa Burning are Sheriff Leonard and Isaac. These characters are flat characters because they never change throughout the book. Two examples of round characters from Tulsa Burning are Nobe Chase and Lester.
Character development is literary device used in every piece of writing. It can be large or small. The characters change in one way or another. Character development can be clearly stated or hinted by the author. Authors explain character developments via dialogue, actions, conflicts, and many other things.
The knowledge of how a character would act throughout a story. This knowledge is the key to understanding the development of the character. The author uses this concept to develop their character’s personality and how they would act in specific situations outside their normal “comfort zone”. This concept also helps the reader understand a character 's motivation and purpose in the story.
Characters should have convincing features akin to living beings. " …characters who are more than devices to be moved about for effect" (Gilman, Laura, Anne: www.laura annegilman.bnet/whats-in-print/osacosanostradamusf-a-q/Web.9July.2013). Unarguably the most important part of the novel writing is creating believable characters in it. A character determines the incidents in a novel. The best way to know a character is to know him inside out, as one knows one's best friend.
Archetypes: The Key to all Literature Characters, almost every book there is has at least one, though there are some repeating of character types or characteristics that they might share. This is called an archetype, it’s basically a typical character or an action/situation that represents patterns of human nature. An archetype could also be a universal symbol, a theme, or it could even be a setting. Overall, to better understand literature, one must be able to recognize archetypes.
Writers use an assortment of ways to describe a character, three of those ways are direct characterization, indirect characterization, and motivation. These methods help authors further explain characters and bring them to life. First of all, direct characterization is directly stating what a character is like. According to the text “The open window” on page 90 states “...a very self possessed young girl of 15” is talkative, cheerful, and outgoing. Those are all descriptions of describing her in a direct way.
Characterization in “Desiree’s Baby” How do you describe a person in writing? It’s simple, you characterize them. Through various uses of tools of characterization, an author slowly reveals the personalities of specific characters.