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Complete Writer's Guide to Heroes and Heroines: Sixteen Master Archetypes
All fiction writers want to write stories with great heroes and heroines--characters who leap off the page and capture the reader's imagination. Heroic characters can be broken down into sixteen archetypes. By following the guidelines of the archetypes presented in this comprehensive reference work, writers can create extraordinarily memorable characters and elevate their writing to a higher level. Throughout the book, the authors give examples of well-known heroes and heroines from television and film so the reader can picture the archetype in his or her mind.
At the very core of a character, every hero can be traced back to one of the eight major archetypes, as can every heroine. The core archetype tells the writer the most basic instincts of heroes or heroines - how they think and feel, what drives them and how they reach their goals. Whether you are a seasoned professional or a novice, The Complete Writer's Guide to Heroes & Heroines will help you improve your own writing and help you create truly memorable characters.
At the very core of a character, every hero can be traced back to one of the eight major archetypes, as can every heroine. The core archetype tells the writer the most basic instincts of heroes or heroines - how they think and feel, what drives them and how they reach their goals. Whether you are a seasoned professional or a novice, The Complete Writer's Guide to Heroes & Heroines will help you improve your own writing and help you create truly memorable characters.
300 pages, Paperback
First published June 19, 2000
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 64 reviews
October 15, 2017
". . . we explain these sixteen archetypes, show ways to use archetypal characters in fiction writing and explore how the archetypes interact with each other." (p. xii)
This quote expresses what this broad analysis of character archetypes (eight male and eight female) is about in this book. It's more of a reference book to spark ideas for creating character interaction. Divided into four section, it covers the archetypes in Sections I and II. Section III explores the core, evolving and layered archetypal character. In Section IV, we discuss how these archetypes interact with each other. The authors provide examples from films, television and books to help the writer visualize their characters.
This quote expresses what this broad analysis of character archetypes (eight male and eight female) is about in this book. It's more of a reference book to spark ideas for creating character interaction. Divided into four section, it covers the archetypes in Sections I and II. Section III explores the core, evolving and layered archetypal character. In Section IV, we discuss how these archetypes interact with each other. The authors provide examples from films, television and books to help the writer visualize their characters.
December 31, 2010
Given the size of this book, 200 pages, this cannot be what it claims to be, a complete guide. And it is not. Neither is it an overview. It is an introduction, and for that purpose it is not totally useless. It is rather superficial, and quite frankly, the examples on how the different archetypes interact taught me nothing new, it rather confirmed what I have known since I created my characters. I had hoped for some more depth and hence inspiration. Also the examples are vague, from films almost solely of a certain genre, and do not go into any detail and show different archetypes clash, mesh, and change when met. In this respect, the book is more a light version of psychology for dummies. "Show, don't tell" is a common advice for writers. This book does very little showing, and a whole lot of scratching the surface telling.
July 7, 2012
I couldn't help but be disappointed in this book; if this is what society is telling our writers to produce, no wonder there's nothing original and I very rarely read fiction: it's cookie-cutter, boring and bland. I was hoping for some great insights into using archetypes, but this was extremely shallow.
November 28, 2016
Fun little read. The thesis is that all characters can be fitted into a few basic categories, give or take: eight "archetypes" for the guys, and eight for the girls; some of which mirror each other, and some of which don't.
The authors are pretty upfront about why they think these "archetypes" are powerful - they've bought into Jung's collective-subconscious nonsense. Still, while I don't agree with the reasoning behind why they think these basic character types appeal to us, it was fun to look at the authors' array of little boxes into which they fitted their characters, and to think about which of the boxes my own characters might fit into. In the process I came up with an incredible number of story ideas which had hitherto evaded me (hey, this character is basically a weak Bad Boy! What if I made him a stronger Bad Boy, and made the first part of his story the chronicle of his descent into darkness?).
Other reviewers complain that no wonder characters are so cookie-cutter these days if books like these are used as writing manuals. I agree that if you paid no attention to all the advice given in the book about how to nuance your characters, you will turn out cookie-cutter characters. But sometimes it helps to take story elements, such as plot, theme, setting, or character, and reduce them down to their most basic possible forms. Too vague or too detailed an idea of who these people are, and you'll be unable to communicate the most important things about their story, and possibly miss the strongest possibilities for conflict and development. While a lot of what's in this book may seem to some like common sense, I'm grateful for it: this book helped me walk back to the most fundamental motivations and methodologies of my characters, identified how they change over the course of their story, and generated ideas for how to intensify their conflicts. Generally recommended.
The authors are pretty upfront about why they think these "archetypes" are powerful - they've bought into Jung's collective-subconscious nonsense. Still, while I don't agree with the reasoning behind why they think these basic character types appeal to us, it was fun to look at the authors' array of little boxes into which they fitted their characters, and to think about which of the boxes my own characters might fit into. In the process I came up with an incredible number of story ideas which had hitherto evaded me (hey, this character is basically a weak Bad Boy! What if I made him a stronger Bad Boy, and made the first part of his story the chronicle of his descent into darkness?).
Other reviewers complain that no wonder characters are so cookie-cutter these days if books like these are used as writing manuals. I agree that if you paid no attention to all the advice given in the book about how to nuance your characters, you will turn out cookie-cutter characters. But sometimes it helps to take story elements, such as plot, theme, setting, or character, and reduce them down to their most basic possible forms. Too vague or too detailed an idea of who these people are, and you'll be unable to communicate the most important things about their story, and possibly miss the strongest possibilities for conflict and development. While a lot of what's in this book may seem to some like common sense, I'm grateful for it: this book helped me walk back to the most fundamental motivations and methodologies of my characters, identified how they change over the course of their story, and generated ideas for how to intensify their conflicts. Generally recommended.
August 12, 2007
This book does a great job of dividing characters into eight male and eight female archetypes, as well as explaining how to use and combine them to create unique characters. It gives examples from popular literature or movies or television. There is also a very helpful description of the *relationship* between each pair of male and female archetypes.
I feel like my characters are already distinctly different from one another, but this book helps me explore other types of characters I might otherwise overlook.
I feel like my characters are already distinctly different from one another, but this book helps me explore other types of characters I might otherwise overlook.
May 2, 2017
A Start To Archetyping
This book sets the stage for selecting and determining interactions between personalities tailored to the story you want to tell, to say it plainly. If you don't want to master Jung or Astrology or Numerology, this will do - an organized and exhaustive look at 8 male and 8 female characters common to motion pictures.
This book sets the stage for selecting and determining interactions between personalities tailored to the story you want to tell, to say it plainly. If you don't want to master Jung or Astrology or Numerology, this will do - an organized and exhaustive look at 8 male and 8 female characters common to motion pictures.
March 17, 2009
I serendipitously came across a copy of this book and it was fantastic. I read it a few weeks ago and have thought about it dozens of times a day ever since. Great stuff for us struggling writers! Kudos to the authors!
May 10, 2009
Awesome reference book. Puts into words something you know by instinct when you create characters. I recommend it to any writer, regardless of experience. You'll think harder about your traits and tags and how to use them.
May 23, 2009
This book is really helpful for character creation; if you're trying to interview your characters and getting nowhere, it provides a ton of jumping-off points. I wish I could find my copy; if it doesn't turn up soon, I'll probably buy it again. It's that valuable as a reference.
January 25, 2008
Sixteen master archetypes of characters and how they mix with each other. very useful. I've used it to pair my characters and it's helped me discover how they interact.
October 10, 2015
This apparently self-published handbook of character archetypes effectively addresses the "people" part of writing.
As I recall, this book popped up on the Gooodreads recommendation engine, and, as I have been trying to develop my own method of using the concept of archetypes to help me built dramatic characters, I was immediately drawn to it and knew I had to read it. I bought myself a copy and plunged in.
I was immediately impressed with the authors' command of their material and the level of thought that they had put into their book. According to them, the main characters--the heroes and heroines--of every story are based upon one (or more) of exactly 16 different archetypes: eight male, eight female. Furthermore, each of these archetypes manifests as one of two types, so the storyteller, in creating a principal character for a story, has a palette of 32 different basic types to choose from. These different types are distinct, recognizable, and strongly motivated to behave in consistent, characteristic ways, and it is exactly these features, the authors assert, that make characters fascinating and enjoyable for readers and viewers.
This contention I did not find hard to accept; I had arrived at much the same conclusion in my own independent researches and thinking on character creation. What surprised me was the exact identity of these archetypes, for it does not correspond to other lists of archetypes that I have come across, notably those of Carl Jung, who I think was the first to adapt the word archetype to the psychological context, and those of Caroline Myss, who proposes a much longer list of archetypes in her book . A still different list of potential character archetypes can be drawn from Christopher Booker's . And I have derived pleasure and profit from using by zoologist Roy Feinson, a cheeky look at how humans fall into types that resemble certain animals. The "sixteen master archetypes" put forward by Cowden, LaFever, and Viders in their book are different from any of these, but the authors do not explain how they arrived at their list; it is simply presented as a fully worked-out system.
This is probably because Heroes & Heroines is not a book of theory; it is intended as a practical handbook, giving the writer only as much information as he needs to launch on the difficult task of character creation. And this it does very well. After a brief introduction, the authors get down to presenting the character archetypes in the form of a summary or briefing for each one, arranged under a set of fixed headings: qualities, virtues, flaws, background, styles, and occupation. The consistency of the format makes it easy to compare and contrast the different archetypes with each other; it also makes the book pleasurable in itself to read, maybe something to do with the scientific systematizing of the willfulness and messiness of human behavior. The authors start with the eight male archetypes. Curious about what they are? I don't think it's a spoiler to give the list, since it shows up right in the table of contents:
the Chief
the Bad Boy
the Best Friend
the Charmer
the Lost Soul
the Professor
the Swashbuckler
the Warrior
(I was interested to note that the list is alphabetical except for the Chief. My guess is that the authors felt that the only place for the Chief was at the top of the list!)
The authors are liberal and specific with their examples, to help make the archetype clear and vivid for the reader. They characterize the Chief as "a dynamic leader [who] has time for nothing but work," and give as examples Captain Kirk of Star Trek and Henry Higgins of My Fair Lady. These are telling examples, for superficially it might appear that Captain Kirk and Henry Higgins have little in common. One is the intrepid commander of a large spaceship, the other is an eccentric upper-class Victorian social theorist. What they share, according to these authors, are the core traits of the Chief: they are active, strong-willed, focused on their task, and they exact obedience from those around them. They are undeterred by obstacles and make formidable opponents. These traits form the core of the archetype; a menu of other, less central traits comes into play beyond this, helping to distinguish one Chief from another. For example, while Captain Kirk exemplifies more strongly the 3 "virtues" of the Chief, that he is goal-oriented, decisive, and responsible; Henry Higgins probably shows more of the Chief's 3 "flaws," those of being stubborn, unsympathetic, and dominating.
Chiefs are further distinguished by which of the 2 styles in which they manifest: the born leader or the conqueror. The former is a Chief who was born to a life of power and authority, while the latter is a Chief who had to fight his way to the top. I'm not very familiar with the backgrounds of these two characters, but I sense that while Higgins is more of a born leader, Kirk is probably more of a conqueror.
Archetypes are distinguished still further by their backgrounds (the circumstances of their early lives) and their occupation. By tinkering with all of these features, a writer can construct a nuanced and striking character. And there are still further options. For the features of two different archetypes can be combined to create a single layered archetype. The authors point to the example of the John Rambo in First Blood, who combines traits of the Warrior (a principled, fearless fighter) and the Lost Soul (a man carrying an inner wound that won't heal).
A further avenue for writers to explore is that of the evolving archetype. This is a character that changes, in the course of a story, from one archetype into another. Here the authors point to the character Edward Lewis in Pretty Woman, who evolves from a Chief into a Best Friend.
Female archetypes get equal time. They are:
the Boss
the Seductress
the Spunky Kid
the Free Spirit
the Waif
the Librarian
the Crusader
the Nurturer
These are all covered in the same way, also with examples. And while the authors do not really go into this, it's possible to draw parallels between the male and female lists. For the Boss is the female counterpart of the Chief, the female Seductress is the counterpart of the Charmer, and so on. I would say the parallels are pretty close for 6 of the archetypes on each list, with 2 remaining unique to its list in each case.
The book goes on to give brief descriptions of how the archetypes interact with each other; in particular, it shows how every male archetype interacts with every female archetype, discussing in each case how they clash, how they mesh, and how they change. The authors achieve a lot in a short space, and I was impressed with amount and quality of work they put into these interactions. Here too they give examples, mostly from movies, of these archetype interactions. A movie in which a Swashbuckler meets up with a Seductress? Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. How about a Best Friend encountering a Free Spirit? Clueless.
I liked all of this very much. But my response to the book went even deeper than that. For I found that when I read certain material in it, I actually teared up; I recognized aspects of myself in these archetypes. When I read the authors' description of the Lost Soul, I recognized myself, which led me to wonder how I got to be that way. But perhaps more than that I embody the archetype of the Professor--the intellectual who has a closer relationship with his books than he does with people. Gadzooks--I'm a layered archetype!
The book does have some faults. Although my copy appears to be a new 2013 edition of the work originally published in 2000, it seems a homemade thing with copyediting problems. Some of the text and paragraph formatting has gone awry, and the names of the archetypes are always given in full caps (CHIEF, SPUNKY KID, and so on). All these things give the book an amateur feeling that it does not deserve. And, as I say, this reader would have appreciated some note on how the authors discovered or developed these archetypes. And why are there exactly 8 of them, broken neatly into male and female? And why are there exactly 2 subspecies of each? These kinds of questions gnaw at the Professor.
But, altogether, I think this book is a valuable tool for anyone who wants to engage in dramatic writing. I've struggled to develop characters in my own writing career, and I am conscious of the amount of thought and analysis that has gone into working out these archetypes and their interconnections. Each of their male-female archetype interactions provides the heart of a good story. There are 64 of these; a writer could just scoop one up and be off to a running start. I wish to heck I'd had this book when I was doing my TV series.
Anyway, I'm using it now. I don't know whether it contains the ultimate truth about characters and archetypes. But I do know that if you structure your characters and their behavior based on these archetypes, you will come a lot closer to having a story that throbs with the pulse of life.
As I recall, this book popped up on the Gooodreads recommendation engine, and, as I have been trying to develop my own method of using the concept of archetypes to help me built dramatic characters, I was immediately drawn to it and knew I had to read it. I bought myself a copy and plunged in.
I was immediately impressed with the authors' command of their material and the level of thought that they had put into their book. According to them, the main characters--the heroes and heroines--of every story are based upon one (or more) of exactly 16 different archetypes: eight male, eight female. Furthermore, each of these archetypes manifests as one of two types, so the storyteller, in creating a principal character for a story, has a palette of 32 different basic types to choose from. These different types are distinct, recognizable, and strongly motivated to behave in consistent, characteristic ways, and it is exactly these features, the authors assert, that make characters fascinating and enjoyable for readers and viewers.
This contention I did not find hard to accept; I had arrived at much the same conclusion in my own independent researches and thinking on character creation. What surprised me was the exact identity of these archetypes, for it does not correspond to other lists of archetypes that I have come across, notably those of Carl Jung, who I think was the first to adapt the word archetype to the psychological context, and those of Caroline Myss, who proposes a much longer list of archetypes in her book . A still different list of potential character archetypes can be drawn from Christopher Booker's . And I have derived pleasure and profit from using by zoologist Roy Feinson, a cheeky look at how humans fall into types that resemble certain animals. The "sixteen master archetypes" put forward by Cowden, LaFever, and Viders in their book are different from any of these, but the authors do not explain how they arrived at their list; it is simply presented as a fully worked-out system.
This is probably because Heroes & Heroines is not a book of theory; it is intended as a practical handbook, giving the writer only as much information as he needs to launch on the difficult task of character creation. And this it does very well. After a brief introduction, the authors get down to presenting the character archetypes in the form of a summary or briefing for each one, arranged under a set of fixed headings: qualities, virtues, flaws, background, styles, and occupation. The consistency of the format makes it easy to compare and contrast the different archetypes with each other; it also makes the book pleasurable in itself to read, maybe something to do with the scientific systematizing of the willfulness and messiness of human behavior. The authors start with the eight male archetypes. Curious about what they are? I don't think it's a spoiler to give the list, since it shows up right in the table of contents:
the Chief
the Bad Boy
the Best Friend
the Charmer
the Lost Soul
the Professor
the Swashbuckler
the Warrior
(I was interested to note that the list is alphabetical except for the Chief. My guess is that the authors felt that the only place for the Chief was at the top of the list!)
The authors are liberal and specific with their examples, to help make the archetype clear and vivid for the reader. They characterize the Chief as "a dynamic leader [who] has time for nothing but work," and give as examples Captain Kirk of Star Trek and Henry Higgins of My Fair Lady. These are telling examples, for superficially it might appear that Captain Kirk and Henry Higgins have little in common. One is the intrepid commander of a large spaceship, the other is an eccentric upper-class Victorian social theorist. What they share, according to these authors, are the core traits of the Chief: they are active, strong-willed, focused on their task, and they exact obedience from those around them. They are undeterred by obstacles and make formidable opponents. These traits form the core of the archetype; a menu of other, less central traits comes into play beyond this, helping to distinguish one Chief from another. For example, while Captain Kirk exemplifies more strongly the 3 "virtues" of the Chief, that he is goal-oriented, decisive, and responsible; Henry Higgins probably shows more of the Chief's 3 "flaws," those of being stubborn, unsympathetic, and dominating.
Chiefs are further distinguished by which of the 2 styles in which they manifest: the born leader or the conqueror. The former is a Chief who was born to a life of power and authority, while the latter is a Chief who had to fight his way to the top. I'm not very familiar with the backgrounds of these two characters, but I sense that while Higgins is more of a born leader, Kirk is probably more of a conqueror.
Archetypes are distinguished still further by their backgrounds (the circumstances of their early lives) and their occupation. By tinkering with all of these features, a writer can construct a nuanced and striking character. And there are still further options. For the features of two different archetypes can be combined to create a single layered archetype. The authors point to the example of the John Rambo in First Blood, who combines traits of the Warrior (a principled, fearless fighter) and the Lost Soul (a man carrying an inner wound that won't heal).
A further avenue for writers to explore is that of the evolving archetype. This is a character that changes, in the course of a story, from one archetype into another. Here the authors point to the character Edward Lewis in Pretty Woman, who evolves from a Chief into a Best Friend.
Female archetypes get equal time. They are:
the Boss
the Seductress
the Spunky Kid
the Free Spirit
the Waif
the Librarian
the Crusader
the Nurturer
These are all covered in the same way, also with examples. And while the authors do not really go into this, it's possible to draw parallels between the male and female lists. For the Boss is the female counterpart of the Chief, the female Seductress is the counterpart of the Charmer, and so on. I would say the parallels are pretty close for 6 of the archetypes on each list, with 2 remaining unique to its list in each case.
The book goes on to give brief descriptions of how the archetypes interact with each other; in particular, it shows how every male archetype interacts with every female archetype, discussing in each case how they clash, how they mesh, and how they change. The authors achieve a lot in a short space, and I was impressed with amount and quality of work they put into these interactions. Here too they give examples, mostly from movies, of these archetype interactions. A movie in which a Swashbuckler meets up with a Seductress? Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. How about a Best Friend encountering a Free Spirit? Clueless.
I liked all of this very much. But my response to the book went even deeper than that. For I found that when I read certain material in it, I actually teared up; I recognized aspects of myself in these archetypes. When I read the authors' description of the Lost Soul, I recognized myself, which led me to wonder how I got to be that way. But perhaps more than that I embody the archetype of the Professor--the intellectual who has a closer relationship with his books than he does with people. Gadzooks--I'm a layered archetype!
The book does have some faults. Although my copy appears to be a new 2013 edition of the work originally published in 2000, it seems a homemade thing with copyediting problems. Some of the text and paragraph formatting has gone awry, and the names of the archetypes are always given in full caps (CHIEF, SPUNKY KID, and so on). All these things give the book an amateur feeling that it does not deserve. And, as I say, this reader would have appreciated some note on how the authors discovered or developed these archetypes. And why are there exactly 8 of them, broken neatly into male and female? And why are there exactly 2 subspecies of each? These kinds of questions gnaw at the Professor.
But, altogether, I think this book is a valuable tool for anyone who wants to engage in dramatic writing. I've struggled to develop characters in my own writing career, and I am conscious of the amount of thought and analysis that has gone into working out these archetypes and their interconnections. Each of their male-female archetype interactions provides the heart of a good story. There are 64 of these; a writer could just scoop one up and be off to a running start. I wish to heck I'd had this book when I was doing my TV series.
Anyway, I'm using it now. I don't know whether it contains the ultimate truth about characters and archetypes. But I do know that if you structure your characters and their behavior based on these archetypes, you will come a lot closer to having a story that throbs with the pulse of life.
February 17, 2019
Not enough stars for this treasure! A must-read for any kind of writer. This book should be part of any literature or creative writing curriculum in the world. I wish I'd read it sooner.
June 11, 2009
The first and main part of this book seems superfluous to the average reader's or movie-goer's knowledge. Most astrological profile books are more informative in terms of picking apart human archetypes. I suppose there was some interest in terms of comparing the characters of seemingly disparate works, but the simplicity and superficiality of the coverage rendered it mostly useless. At the tail-end of The Complete Writer's Guide there is a section where they use movie examples to pit the previously profiled archetypes against each other and the simple, workbook-style analysis actually works and is even diverting. I would just skip to that part, which would only take 20-odd minutes of your time.
August 19, 2012
The usefulness of this book depends on using it well. I would never start character creation with this and wouldn't recommend anyone else do so, either, especially main characters. But once the character is developed, archetype is one way to explore further. It's also fun to try fitting film and literary characters into these types (best way to see that the greatest characters won't fit perfectly into any single type).
Awareness of character types is definitely useful to a writer, as long as one doesn't lean on them. And this is the best archetype book I've found.
Awareness of character types is definitely useful to a writer, as long as one doesn't lean on them. And this is the best archetype book I've found.
August 23, 2017
I'm surprised I haven't read more reviews that discuss how sexist this book is. The archetypes listed in this book could apply to anyone of any gender, but are assigned to male or female characters. In many cases, the wording in the "female" archetypes is negative or sexualized, whereas the wording in the "male" archetypes portrays male characters as heroic and human. For instance, the "librarian" archetype (really, a stereotype that is potentially damaging to librarians and intelligent women) is described as feeling "dismay" at not dating in high school and though she "would never have traded her intelligence for their beauty" the authors feel the need to conditionalize this with "Or so she tells herself" -- meaning the librarian, like all of the other shallow female archetypes in this book, is obsessed with her appearance. The common stereotype that women are bossy and men are "take-charge" comes into play when the female archetype is literally called "The Boss" and the male equivalent is called "The Chief". And really, those two could be the same character if the authors hadn't insisted on dividing the book into male and female characters, which would have made this book a lot shorter (meaning that a lot of this book is essentially filler).
Furthermore, this book is really outdated with its references. The book was written in 2000, and even 90s references are few and far between. Most of the examples used come from movies that date before 1980.
I also noticed a few punctuation errors here and there, which usually wouldn't be a huge deal but in a book about writing I would hope that the writing itself would be better than usual.
Furthermore, this book is really outdated with its references. The book was written in 2000, and even 90s references are few and far between. Most of the examples used come from movies that date before 1980.
I also noticed a few punctuation errors here and there, which usually wouldn't be a huge deal but in a book about writing I would hope that the writing itself would be better than usual.
December 27, 2018
5% Jung, 95% Practical Profiles of Archetypes
I like Joseph Campbell, but often you just want to yell, "give me a list of the archetypes already and some modern examples!" If you've ever felt that way, "Heroes & Heroines" is your book. A grand total of 16 archetypes are explored -- eight for men, eight for women. Each one is summarized with a simple four-paragraph character study, followed by a listing of qualities, virtues, flaws, styles, and common vocations. A short, but surprisingly dense section follows, where different permutations of archetypes are put together to explore how they clash, mesh and change. The book is at its best when it references characters from movies you've seen. It was written in 2000, so some of the films named are a bit dated, but if you're a film student, 90% of these would be on your list anyway.
I like Joseph Campbell, but often you just want to yell, "give me a list of the archetypes already and some modern examples!" If you've ever felt that way, "Heroes & Heroines" is your book. A grand total of 16 archetypes are explored -- eight for men, eight for women. Each one is summarized with a simple four-paragraph character study, followed by a listing of qualities, virtues, flaws, styles, and common vocations. A short, but surprisingly dense section follows, where different permutations of archetypes are put together to explore how they clash, mesh and change. The book is at its best when it references characters from movies you've seen. It was written in 2000, so some of the films named are a bit dated, but if you're a film student, 90% of these would be on your list anyway.
November 29, 2020
Not bad. But I didn't like the fact that most of the examples were from American movies and TV series and old ones at that. Why not books?
Gone with the Wind was quoted twice, thankfully, so I was able to understand the archetypes better. I disagree with the assessment of Scarlett's character. She was not just a Seductress, she was also a Chief - a goal-oriented person who ruthlessly crushed all opposition. Melanie Hamilton was a Waif first and later on a Nurturer. Rhett Butler was a Bad Boy through and through - a disappointed idealist.
In Jonathan Stroud's Bartimaeus trilogy, Nathaniel was a Lost Soul, while Bartimaeus was a Bad Boy, and Kitty a Crusader.
In Harry Potter, Harry was a Lost Soul-Warrior while Dumbledore was clearly a Professor.
Gone with the Wind was quoted twice, thankfully, so I was able to understand the archetypes better. I disagree with the assessment of Scarlett's character. She was not just a Seductress, she was also a Chief - a goal-oriented person who ruthlessly crushed all opposition. Melanie Hamilton was a Waif first and later on a Nurturer. Rhett Butler was a Bad Boy through and through - a disappointed idealist.
In Jonathan Stroud's Bartimaeus trilogy, Nathaniel was a Lost Soul, while Bartimaeus was a Bad Boy, and Kitty a Crusader.
In Harry Potter, Harry was a Lost Soul-Warrior while Dumbledore was clearly a Professor.
June 28, 2019
This book identifies and analyzes sixteen character archetypes (eight male, eight female) and not only explains them, but also shows how they interact with others. My favorite part, though, was how they took one archetype and showed how it was used in different books/movies in different ways to prevent it from becoming a stereotype. I'm already recommending it to other writers.
One thing worth noting: this book is terribly edited. If you can't look past incorrect punctuation, formatting issues, and more, you won't want to read this book. If, however, you can look past the problems and focus on the content, there's a lot to be learned.
One thing worth noting: this book is terribly edited. If you can't look past incorrect punctuation, formatting issues, and more, you won't want to read this book. If, however, you can look past the problems and focus on the content, there's a lot to be learned.
January 29, 2021
I liked this. As someone who struggles with making characters and how to get them to come to life, this book is fantastic for looking at archetypes and laying out various movies, t.v. series and literature for how and where you see these archetypes appear and interact.
Ultimately it's 8 archetypes that can then be broken down to 16 for masculine and feminine outlooks.
The Kindle edition makes it easy for highlighting sections. Do a once straight-through read and after, it becomes a handy reference for shortcuts.
Ultimately it's 8 archetypes that can then be broken down to 16 for masculine and feminine outlooks.
The Kindle edition makes it easy for highlighting sections. Do a once straight-through read and after, it becomes a handy reference for shortcuts.
July 30, 2018
I've re-read this several times over the years, but even after all this time and a growing collection of writing reference material, this still makes a fantastic resource when I'm in the early stages of building up a set of characters and a plot line.
May 16, 2020
This book was very helpful in helping me identify my heroes and heroines archetype and understanding more or less their inner thoughts. it was helpful that the author gave an example from popular movies to give the reader a better understanding of the types and how they work together or apart.
August 15, 2022
I flip through it all the time to get ideas for my characters. If I need to add conflict, I go for their main flaws and see who clashes fundamentally. When I want them to get along, I look at their virtues and see where they have similar values. So fun!
March 28, 2023
I found this view on heros and heroines useful, especially the section that explained how each might interact with the other. I need to read through it again to mark and tag things I can use with my current works in progress.
January 28, 2017
I think that the title "How movie characters were made in the 1930's" would've been more suitable. I got at lot of ideas on how I didn't want to create characters, so the book was good for something!
May 12, 2017
Excellent read. Helped with character development and with the protagonist's interactions. This book goes on the 'reference' shelf!
July 23, 2017
Good for having some rough ideas for different tropes, but in general this book was very outdated and sexist. Not worth it.
May 3, 2018
Very helpful guide for the writer who is looking for inspiration for the main characters for his/her book.
September 6, 2018
A useful guide to character types, their strengths and weaknesses, and how they work together. Definitely a book I would consult again in the future.
February 2, 2019
Very helpful in understanding character creation and how it is not a rote template, but a guide to what types of characters are available that can be customized to the story you are creating.
August 4, 2020
Great resource for all genres, but particularly helpful for romance. However, the book is littered with typos and the formatting is pretty bad. I would still buy it again in a heartbeat.
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