Picking a Protagonist
W hose story is it anyway? One of the easiest mistakes a writer can make is to pick the wrong protagonist and it is also one of the hardest to correct. After several chapters of following the exploits of one character, we discover that he isn’t as interesting as we thought he would be. There is little choice but to rewrite major sections of the manuscript . Or it could be that we have a protagonist forced upon us because the story appears in a series. How we came to make the mistake is immaterial, but one way to avoid this mistake is to ask whose story it is. Consider the Cinderella story. Whose story is it? It could have been that of the prince in search of a bride or it could have been the story of the the fairy, helping her goddaughter. It could have been the story of the step-mother, but it isn’t. This is Cinderella’s story. Or consider the story of the twelve dancing princesses. There are plenty of characters we could have followed, but we follow the soldier who must d...