Only You Can Prevent Passive Protagonists!

Protagonists are the engine that drives your story. They may not be the character the fans love the best, and they may not be the most interesting aspect of the story you're telling, but your protagonist (or protagonists if you prefer ensemble casts) are the vehicles that let your readers move through the story, explore the world, and they are often the lens that sets the tone for the tale you're telling.

However, when it comes to your protagonists, it's generally better to have them do than to be done unto.

 

Well, I'm here. May as well get this over with!

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Be A Subject, Not An Object

This is a mistake that a lot of writers (myself included) tend to fall into at some point in our careers. We focus more on the world, events, and characters around the protagonists, instead of on the protagonists themselves, and as a result the story kind of stops being about them. They're present for it, and they may even be necessary in some way, but they're not really doing anything. They're in the passenger seat, rather than behind the wheel.

And that can have a really negative effect on the overall narrative.

Einar... where the hell are we going?

This might seem sort of confusing, but it's a lot like the difference between active and passive language. In active language your subject is in control, taking the action, and doing things. Consider, "Einar slammed his fist into Valgard's face," versus, "Valgard was punched in the face by Einar." Even accounting for the slightly more explosive language of the first example, the second just lacks energy. It's disengaged from the action.

Passive protagonists have the same issue, and they can just suck the energy out of a story.

To be clear, this is not saying that your story has to be solely concerned with characters pursuing their own wants and goals. However, the characters do have to be active participants in the story you're telling, and their reactions, plans, and contributions should be the gas in the story's tank.

I didn't ask to be here... but I've got a job to do.

Consider a detective story. Your protagonist gets up in the morning, gets dressed, puts on their badge, and goes to work. The issues they deal with on the job may not be personal, and they may not even have a choice in the matter, as it's the superiors in the department who assigns the case load to detectives. But how the protagonist approaches the case, who they talk to, what risks they do or don't take, and what drives them on should all be elements of the story. The through line needs to be a product of their actions, rather than a path they're just walking down.

A detective merely going through the motions, walking along the trail of bread crumbs while tracking down a serial killer, ends up making the serial killer the most interesting character in the story. This is what I call the Hannibal Lecter problem, where the antagonist seems to be who the story is really about, and they are who commands the audience's attention and imagination even though they're not supposed to be the protagonist.

To prevent that, ask what your protagonist is doing in the narrative. What is their contribution, and how does it affect the actions they take, or the options they pursue? Do they walk that thin line where they get weird, gut feelings about the killer's motives and intentions, making them obsessed with catching the murderer so the detective can quiet the part of their mind that whispers they aren't all that different from the killers they catch? Are they dedicated to the job, facing down horrors, driven to seek justice, thinking of themselves as something akin to an old-fashioned knight? Do they take a cynical kind of pleasure in it, with killers like this representing the most dangerous beasts one can chase in the wilds of the concrete jungle? Do they do everything strictly by the book? Do they dip into the shady area of the law where their methods are questionable? Do they work until the case is done, or can they leave it at the office when the work day is over?

All of these things play into the struggle of the protagonist through the situation they're in.

The Lead Needs To Be More Than a Lamp

There's a test for several books regarding female characters and representation, asking if the story would be altered in a meaningful way if they were replaced with attractive lamps. The same thing can often be said of your protagonist. If they're nothing more than a lamp that gets carted around from scene to scene where other people ask questions, or make observations, then why is this our protagonist? What are they contributing to this narrative?

If everything in your story seems to be happening to someone, then you might need to step back and ask why. Because for every action there needs to be a reaction, and if the plot hits your protagonist, but they don't swing back at the plot when that happens, you might actually be carting around a lamp in a hat and jacket.

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That's all for this week's Craft of Writing! For more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my cat noir novel Marked Territory, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife, or my most recent short story collection The Rejects!

 

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