Writing Tips and Clichés to Avoid

Character

There are nine character types: confidante, dynamic, flat, foil, round, static, stock, antagonist, and protagonist.

These nine types of characters create the stories we all know and love today whether they be from young adult fiction all the way to horror or psychological thrillers. For today's chapter, I am going to be breaking down the nine basic types of characters by giving their basic definition and an example of each one, giving you advice on how to make a compelling character, and even giving y'all a chart that you could use when you're planning out your future characters.

Let's start with just the simple definitions of each character type;

Confidante- a confidante is someone in whom the central character confides, thus revealing the MC's personality, thoughts, intentions, but this does not have to be a person. It could be an object or even a place. A good example of this could be that your MC has an heirloom passed down to the MC. This heirloom could show the MC's thoughts because it would be held close to them for obvious reasons, perhaps it could show the intention of MC wanting to find their family if they had somehow gotten separated after an unseen event in the story. The object could hold memories MC has of their past that reveals certain character traits of them to the audience.

Dynamic- A dynamic character is someone who changes during the course of the story or novel. The change in outlook or character is permanent and a dynamic character can most often time be referred to as a developing character. Your dynamic character is usually the main character in the story since the main character SHOULD always go through some sort of development. Say, for an example, your MC starts out in the story as someone who is living a life free of conflict and that's exactly how they like it; no problems, no stress. However, certain things will happen to the MC that ultimately reshapes their character to be someone who can and will strike first when the time calls for it and isn't afraid to let themselves be put in the way of danger as long as it means helping others.

Flat- A flat character only reveals a single, maybe two or three, basic personality traits in the course of the story and doesn't go through any sort of character development. An amazing example of a flat character is the internet's punching bag, AKA Mary Sue. Mary Sues only show two or three personality traits and don't change or learn anything along the course of the story and will always be perfect so there is no room for improvement (that was ironic).

Foil- A foil character is a character that is used to enhance another character through contrast. A classic example of foil characters would absolutely have to be the ugly stepsisters of Cinderella. Her stepsisters bring out the beauty in Cinderella with their ugliness both physical and personality and make Cinderella seem like the perfect girl aside from her home life obviously.

Round- These are well-developed characters who demonstrate varied and sometimes contradictory traits (usually called dynamic characters because they change during the plot of a story/novel). This is usually your ideal type of MC and in most well-written stories (use Stephen King's books as examples). They can show contradictory personality traits such as selfishness and whatnot.

Static- This particular character remains primarily the same sort of like the flat character since events do not change their outlook, personality, motivation, habits, etc. A Mary Sue is another example for this.

Stock- A stock character is the embodiment of every cliche ever. I mean, literally. It is a special kind of flat character usually forced into stereotypes sort of like the good girl bad boy cliche where the girl is weak and helpless while the boy is the manly figure that protects her and is not at all accurate. Examples of this are the geeky kids who wear suspenders and always keep a pen on them, the mean blonde haired blue eyed girl who only wears Gucci and makes it her purpose to make others feel like crap.