How Many Labels Have Enabled Your Characters?

I talked about character motivations for the February WriYe prompt. This time, I will continue the psychoanalysis of the main characters of my trilogy while being obscure about their identities. We apply labels to people all the time: the nerd, the geek, the prep, the wallflower, the extrovert (and, of course, many other more stigmatizing labels). These labels can be applied to characters, but I'll be focusing on more specific labels this time around.

Character archetypes are related to character motivation. Whether your character is socially or selfishly oriented will determine what will and will not motivate them.

First, I looked up the 12 main character archetypes. I'm going to list them here for my pleasure:

1. The Innocent
2. The Orphan
3. The Hero
4. The Caregiver
5. The Explorer
6. The Outlaw
7. The Lover
8. The Creator
9. The Jester
10. The Sage
11. The Magician
12. The Ruler

And now, it's time to put the four main characters of my trilogy on the chopping block. Until I release their character profiles, I'll refer to them by their initials. (Then you guys can come back to all the initialed posts and finally know who I was talking about!)

S.W. - The Innocent w/ a bit of The Orphan and a drop of The Sage
L.W. - The Explorer & a teensy-weensy hint of The Outlaw
B. - The Lover
A. A. - a bit of The Hero, & a species-specific bit of The Caregiver, w/ a fading dash of The Innocent.

By far, the hardest character for me to label was A. A. I think it's pretty obvious that B. proved the easiest. (Must be her simple name.) L.W. is the antagonist, but he is connected to a much larger antagonist. The Outlaw seems like a typical archetype for antagonists, but L.W. wants to have a peaceful life and settle down just as much as he wants revenge. S.W. is calm and trusting with a desire to just fit in and make everyone happy, but she also has a nosy, research-loving component. And, of course, when things don't seem right, she steps up that "sage" component to try to make sense of her surroundings. B. is simply searching for her bae, but the world makes settling down the last thing she can do. Everyone she's ever with gets ripped from her arms.

So, according to the "four cardinal orientations," L.W. would be oriented towards freedom, B. towards social satisfaction, S.W. towards order, and A.A. is just all over the place. Somehow, that seems like a logical balance.

Based on my categorizations above, I believe it's possible for characters to fall under a single archetype. At the same time, the more complex a character is and the more experiences they have had, the more likely they are to have multiple archetypes. I don't believe it's possible for a character to be so incredibly unique that they don't fall under any of the archetypes.

I think archetypes and motivations can be very useful ways to think about character development. Really, you can create a solid character just by filling in these two things. Their background is also important, but it can be created around their motivations, as well. After that, everything else just comes. The personality solidifies from the experiences and goals, then it just seems pretty obvious that his favorite color is forest green.

This analysis was actually pretty insightful for me.

Now, an interpretation of my character as the epitome of her archetype? B., I choose you!

B. clenched her unnamed comrade's thick forearm as it slipped deeper into the frigid, dark water. "It shouldn't've been you!" Her voice grew quieter. "...It should've been me. Come back." The cold permeating through her fingertips was her only response. B.'s grip on the limp arm loosened and the body of her comrade sank below the ice. "Come back," she whispered again.

Again, she had been saved. And again, she was alone.

Kudos to people who immediately got the reference! I had to do it (since I wasn't going to reveal any story information just yet).

I mainly used this site for archetype reference. Another blog prompt brought to us by Wriye.