First post, so be gentle. I’m struggling to define which character arc my protagonist fits into ( not sure I even need to pigeon hole them ). My basic story world is a Dystopian Society, the ruling wealthy minority oppressing the poor majority. My hero, is of course in the oppressed class, living a life of hunger, poverty ill health etc. S/he starts the story wanting to do good, create a more equal and balanced society, but along the way, is slowly corrupted by power and greed and eventually turns into those s/he despised and wanted to bring down. I’ve read through lots of definitions on negative arcs (corruption arc) and non of them seem to fit this scenario. This starts out as positive arc but changes into a negative arc (is that even doable). Because I don’t know the character arc, I don’t know the Goal, the Lie or the Truth. Please help.
Well this right here seems like your character's goal to me. It looks like a textbook corruption arc to me. Your character starts out with the Truth (society should be equal/these oppressors should be opposed) but ends up corrupted by the Lie (something like "I need absolute power to create an equal society" or "I deserve power and wealth for freeing these people").
Hello Nexus6 and welcome to the lot! Character arcs are helpful to make you understand a basic component of building up a story structure but if you, as the writer of the story, are missing major plot points and have no idea where you want to lead your character, then following a generic guide like a character arc isn't going to cut it. Think of it this way actually. Your character arc, isn't supposed to be similar with a specific character arc you've read somewhere. Sure, there might be many stories that can somewhat correspond to a very generic character arc. It's not a sin if yours doesn't. Between the blurry lines of composition all stories could be categorised under generic writing guides. Not knowing the goal or the lie or the truth, can be solved more easily from my POV if you stop stressing so much upon structure and think more upon the human being that is your MC. What is his/hers backstory? What is h weakness and strength? What is h fears? What makes h happy? What is desirable? What seems unattainable? Did h/sh went looking for trouble or did trouble find h? What are h options? What does h need? Do you know how you want the story to end? Without knowing any of those factors upon a story myself, I can't really help you in more depth. You are going to have to say a little bit more about your story.
Hello, everyone operates differently and pigeon holing may be crucial to one writer and not to another. Long story short your character has a negative story arc. They tend to start of in a better place than where they end. Then tend to reject the truth and embrace the lie. You can write your arc having no clue what the story is about, then build your story around your character's journey, I've done this before. Or you can plot build and fit your character's arc in. Your characters goal isn't different. I imagine most people in this society would like it to change and would like to do something but obviously can't for some reason. Use foreshadowing. Maybe others have had the same goal as your character and their lives didn't end well. Maybe being stubborn is your characters fatal flaw. Her goal is to S/he starts the story wanting to do good, create a more equal and balanced society External reasons for that: She wants a better life for her future children. Wants equality and comfort so on Internal reasons for that: everyone told her it's not possible. She'll never change anything and she wants to prove them wrong. The internal goal is her real motivator. This desire to prove everyone wrong makes her myopic and tending to make the wrong choices.
Thanks for the quick and helpful responses guys. I know it was a real Newbie question, but it’s my first ever try at a novel, in fact it’s the first time I’ve atempted writing over a few hundred words since my school days. Malisky I’ve read a million ‘how to’ books and each one extols the virtues of writing in a certain way or formula, often conflicting with each other. I suppose I’ve gotten too bogged down with following a certain structure. X-Equestris Your reply was a perfect example of me taking the guide books to literally. Each one I read regarding the corruption arc, stated that the protagonist arc starts off in a stable and happy place, which didn’t seem to fit my scenario. Thanks for your help, I guess I couldn’t see the wood for the trees. Cosmic lights Thanks for taking the time to give such an in-depth reply, it’s all really helpful and I’ll definately be implementing your ideas.
Read everything you can find from these: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Wurmbrand https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aleksandr_Solzhenitsyn https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Orwell After that you understand how, when, where and why that kind of oppression happens. Then you can make your story world and characters believable. Don't start that project before you have done your reality based research. And remember: ideology based is not reality based. Start with these: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Gulag_Archipelago https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animal_Farm https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17204927-christ-in-the-communist-prisons
Two scenarios I could see playing out: 1: Your main character becomes corrupted sometime after attaining some sort of power. then, he/she should show signs of Authoritarianism and start forcing people to bend to your character's will. (think Anakin Skywalker, without the sand line) 2: Your character thinks he/she is good, but in reality, was never that good, and becomes corrupted by selfishness and greed (think Humphery Bogart in The Treasure of the Sierra Madre)
With this setup.... You will confront this: Typical start of a genocide is this: Some political, ideological or just power hungry and greedy group tries to make big groups of people to believe that they are victims of this and that, that they are oppressed as a class, identity and/or ethnicity. That makes things unbalanced, unstable, chaotic. And that's what power hungry groups need. In unstable situation it's easier to start turmoil that leads to genocide. Every time you see any of that false and/or exaggerated victimisation which is lead by radical ideologically oriented persons or groups, you should ask who and why has an interest to get society to a chaos. If a clear answer pops to your head, it might be right. And if a bunch of closely related ideologies and/or groups have a history of this kind of actions, it's almost certainly right. If your answer has two opposing groups with same but exclusive interests, then there is a puppet master group somewhere behind those two groups. The real meaning of "you are oppressed by him" is always "I want you to hate him and act that hate out independently so that I can't be blamed or put to responsibility". If you want to avoid this, you should know and understand the role of propaganda and casting inside that propaganda before writing that topic. That is one reason to read those 3 books and a lot more from those writers.
Hi Alan With the exception of a few circumstances, every modern society is ruled by the wealthy and powerful minority, and this is generally accepted by the population, as long as the rules and decisions are fair and just and the gap between the two classes is proportionate. The problems and unrest generally start when laws and decisions are made that favours one group, giving them more power/ wealth/security/freedom etc. The gap between the two widens, and you have a ruling elite living in luxury and a population living in abject poverty. Im unsure if I need to show how the dynamics created the current society structure, does the reader always need to know how the current society came about? Isn’t it ok just to show, this is how it is?
It sounds like you're somewhat concerned about what you should do - as if there are rules we can all follow. I feel that if you write this character well you'll eventually come to understand why s/he follows this path. The why is important, and it doesn't need to be stated too explicitly, it just needs to be believable so that the reader never comes out of the spell.
Hi, @Nexus6 You might find it easier to develop your character arc if you can identify the actual events or points where she starts to 'turn.' In other words, just thinking of her evolving from 'good' to 'bad' won't give you much to work with. See if you can be more specific. Is there a point where she decides that the ends justify the means? In other words, she does something that she knows is bad because she thinks it will ultimately be good? And gets caught up in doing yet more and more bad stuff....till she has lost sight of her original goal? Does she do a selfish thing, for selfish reasons (which might be greed on her part, or simply an attempt to keep what she has, or protect somebody she loves, who might be a bit dodgy?) Unless she has an epiphany which makes her SUDDENLY turn to the dark side (and if this happens, it had better be believable) she will be going bad in small increments. If you can decide what these increments are, and maybe who else is involved, or what decisions she has to make that aren't clear-cut, you'll be on your way to developing her arc to a point where you can write it. I'm a big believer in envisioning scenes. So don't be afraid to write scenes out of chronological order. If you can picture her at various points in her development, you should maybe write those scenes. Once you start writing, character emerges. And what emerges leads you to imagine more.
I think Cosmic's point of your MC misjudging her own goals is solid. Oftentimes we don't really know what we want, and some of us may try to put these wants into words. As one take on this, my brain happened upon was something like this: If your character wants to escape the hell that is the lower class, then she might at first want to eliminate the class structure fundamentally, but when she have already escaped it, her personal motivation goes down the gutter. Making the world a better place for everyone is a fine and noble goal to be sure, but it's not an easy one. If you don't stand to gain anything yourself (perhaps even the contrary, if your character gets in a position of power) it might not be worth the hassle. The paradox is that if you need power to be able to destroy power; why would you destroy yourself? Another route is the Psycho-Pass route, where the goal might be noble, but all the methods available are questionable. I'd give an original example, but this show popped up in my head when I read your OP. Here's some Psyco-Pass spoilers. If you haven't seen the show I'm talking about, I'll blurb what I remember, but it was years ago, so it's maybe not 100% accurate: Spoiler It's a dystopian kind of setting where there is a huge database in place to predict criminal behavior in people. Essentially, you (meaning the police force which the MC is part of) can just give them a scan to know the threat risk of someone. This works surprisingly well, but there are a few exceptions to this. One such exception turns out to be a major terrorist, but his threat levels are low. This creates a series of problems, as the rounds the force are issued to take down criminals are ineffective (as to reduce the risk of friendly fire or killing of civilians). They have regular bullets too, of course, but the system is generally trusted, and a few people are sceptical of his criminal behavior. The terrorist plans a massive attack (bio chemical, if I remember correctly) to distract the public and take down the database. At the end of the series the MC finds out that the database consists of thousands brains of past criminals, and they look for similarities in themselves, and cross-reference the scans. The reason there are a few exceptions is because there haven't been a similar enough case yet. She is tasked by the system to bring them the brain of the terrorist, to add to their collection. She is disgusted, learning the true nature of the system she has been taking orders from over the years, but recognize its efficiency. She decides it is a nessecary evil, and complies in the end. I'm not saying that you should implement this plot; I'm talking about the gist of the moral choice. Ambigous stuff like this is my jam. As I also felt uneasy, I still kind of agreed with the choice. Many people didn't like the ending though, but strong and varied opinions on your work is probably a good thing.
It's a tough sell, for a new writer, tbh, especially in dystopian fiction. As others have said, it has been done, but those novels tend to be masterpieces of literary fiction. So, for instance, I don't like the sound of your main character. She seems just like the millions of other greedy and unkind people / politicians in this capitalist society we live in. In fiction, we tend to turn to people who can rise above the mass. It makes us feel that one decent individual can not only retain their own integrity, but inspire others, and change the world. 1984, for example, has a devastatingly downbeat ending. But the rest of the book has been a thrilling celebration of the power of the individual. Also, we accept Winston Smith's crushing defeat (where he betrays the person he loves) because we can clearly see who the real enemy is. In your story, you would be on the side of Big Brother. As I say, it would take a lot to make me want to read your story.
Thanks for all the replies guys, it’s definitely given me some food for thought. I disagree with some of your comments Tralala, I believe you can still root for the MC even if they have turned to the Dark Side, i don’t believe it will be easy, but it can be done aka Walter White. My next question, is it possible to complete this arc convincingly in 400 pages, and can it be done slowly enough that the reader doesn’t see it coming till the very end?
I agree with your stance on morally questionable MC's. Some characters are just impossible to hate, and other characters gets my full love and hate in equal proportion. Your first question is awfully broad, but the simple answer is yes. It's a matter of what you need to happen, and how. I'm taking this as you're slowly revealing small parts of the MC's transformation throughout the book (Maybe starting with some form of event?) then BAM! Those doubts and questions were kind of serious after all! As for your second question: The speed of the arrival (in word count, I suppose? Or did I misunderstand you?) has very little to do with how you pull this off. Tidbits of hints here and there. Maybe in dialogue, maybe internally, or maybe just the description (prose) of the world around her. Where there were slimy bureaucrats there are now worn-out ministers. The opressive government building is now the grand building. I wouldn't be too subtle, though. I love a good twist, but if I re-read a book I'd like to use my prior knowledge to see those hints. The First Law by Joe Abercrombie is a good example for some characters which turn out to be even worse than they were portrayed. And maybe not the characters you'd expect either.
