Make your Protagonist an Actor

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From Writer Unboxed:

Establishing “agency”—proving to your reader that your protagonist is equal to the journey ahead—is a craft element worthy of fresh consideration each time you begin a new project. This is especially true if you spend a good deal of your initial word count probing the protagonist’s memories and thoughts so you’ll understand the inner conflict that will drive their story.

That’s called “starting to write,” not “opening a novel”—but writers often conflate the two.

Reality is, you-as-author are the one who needs early access to that interiority. Your reader might not. Any reader who has met with an unreliable narrator will know that a character’s actions will speak louder than anything s/he is willing to tell us anyway. In order to earn your reader’s faith and investment, your protagonist must be willing to act.

This craft is based on physical law. As early as 1687, storytelling guru Sir Isaac Newton hinted at the necessity of getting your protagonist off his duff with his principle of inertia, which (sort of) states:

A protagonist at rest will stay at rest, and a protagonist in motion will stay in motion until his story problem is resolved, unless acted on by an external force.

Before submitting your manuscript to publishers, consider having your story open with your character already taking an action that suggests the nature of the journey ahead.

. . . .

Action—not thought—inspires the kind of external conflict that will pressure your character to engage with an inner arc of change.

Action—not thought—will show the character’s agency.

. . . .

Even a dazed woman wandering through a forest is different from one sitting on a stump thinking about how lost she is: the wanderer is looking for a way out.

Link to the rest at Writer Unboxed

1 thought on “Make your Protagonist an Actor”

  1. Yes, but no, and maybe…

    Yes, sort of, depending on genre.

    No, because why should the reader care about the action of a character they don’t know?

    Maybe, if the voice is strong and the character’s problem and response is compelling.

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