Notes from “The Fire in Fiction”
Cardboard villains don’t scare us. Stereotypical antagonists lack teeth. By contrast, an antagonist who is human, understandable, justified, and even right will stir in your readers the maximum unease. In creating antagonists, reject the idea of evil. Make them good. Make them active. Bring them on stage and into your protagonist’s face. An antagonist who merely lurks isn’t doing much for your story.
Step 1: Find five ways and times at which your antagonist will directly engage your protagonist.
Step 2: Write out your antagonist’s opinion of your protagonist. What does your antagonist like about your protagonist? How does your antagonist want to help your protagonist? What advice does your antagonist have?
Step 3: How can your antagonist be summarized or defined? A boss? A senator? A mother-in-law? List five stereotypes associated with such a type. Find one way in which your antagonist is exactly the opposite.
Step 4: Create four actions that will make your antagonist warm and sympathetic.
Step 5: Assume that your antagonist is justified and right. Make her case in writing. Find times in history when things ran her way and were good. Find a passage from theology, philosophy, or folk wisdom that supports your antagonist’s outlook. Choose one character whom your antagonist will win over. In what way does your protagonist agree with your antagonist?
