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The protagonist of any enjoyable story is not the same person at the end of the tale as they were at the beginning. In fact, their development is part of what keeps readers engaged and invested in what they’re reading. As you write your next story, using Plottr’s Character Arc template can help you move your characters from Selfish Jerk to Romantic Jake.
In this article, we’ll cover what a character arc is, why you need to create one for your protagonist (at a minimum), and how to use Plottr’s character template to help you construct your story.
A character arc refers to the transformation (or lack thereof) a character undergoes over the course of a story.
Thanks to the situations and inner battles they encounter or realizations they have during the story, your protagonist is not the same person at the end of the story as they were at the beginning.
There are several types of character arcs, including the “transformational path,” a common arc for following a character’s journey to self improvement — and victory! Tracking these arcs and illuminating them for readers helps build emotional investment and makes your character someone worth cheering for.
The Character Arc template in Plottr, as we’ll cover shortly, provides a simple framework to help you map just these changes.
Quite simply, if your main characters don’t change over the course of the story, then readers are going to be bored and will likely not finish the book. Your audience wants someone they can see growing — someone they can get to know over the course of your narrative.
Here are four reasons you need to create story arcs for your characters:
Plottr’s Character Arc template, located in the Characters section of Plottr, will guide you in creating a solid path to change for your characters.
Plottr’s Character Arc Template will help you identify and organize the following critical steps for each of your characters:
Here are the components of the template in Plottr:
The Character Arc Template doesn’t just take your characters on a well-mapped journey of change. The results will take your readers on a journey as well.
To give you a more concrete example, let’s look at the character arc of Jane Austen’s beloved character Elizabeth Bennet from Pride and Prejudice:
If this sounds like a helpful device for building your own characters and stories, you’re in luck: with Plottr, incorporating an arc into your character building is easy.
Once you have Plottr setup on your computer, just follow these four steps to add the Character Arc template to your character:
The characters in your story are on a journey and their internal progress along that path is as important as their external progress when it comes to inspiring connection and emotional investment from your readers. The Character Arc is a model for capturing that internal journey so it can better inform the plot and execution of your broader story.
As you’re writing, you can use multiple templates to help you build well-rounded characters and capture all the intricacies of their personalities. If you’d like to add more details to your profiles, the Character Arc template pairs well with these other Plottr templates:
With the Character Arc template available to help you craft a journey for your heroes, heroines, and villains, there’s no better time than now to give Plottr a try with a free trial.
© Fictional Devices, 2024. All Rights Reserved.
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