As a writer, the desire to craft memorable, original characters is one of the strongest there is. Granted, plot and setting are important, but it’s the characters of your story that the reader will almost always grab on to, what they’ll relate to, and what they’ll largely remember. Yes, the wholly original character is an important part of any good story, so why on earth would a writer ever want to spend time writing about characters that are walking, talking clichés?

What’s an archetype?

The blond alpha cheerleader. The tough-as-nails detective. The drunken pirate. None of these three examples are remotely original. They are so easily described, yet each of these characters instantly crafts a rather robust image in the mind of the reader. These are all archetypes and, to put it bluntly, archetypal characters are known quantities. They have certain expectations and are bound by their own set of rules.

Inherent advantages

Therein lies the strength of the archetype. As a writer, archetypes allow you to save time while writing, to maintain momentum without becoming bogged down in details, to allow the reader to safely assume. It doesn’t need to be said that the cheerleader is wearing a red and white cheerleading outfit, or that the detective has facial creases from a constant scowl, or that the pirate smells so strongly that he’s drawing flies. The reader already knows these things.

The tragedy of the archetype

While there are numerous archetypes to draw from, with great differences seeming to spread them across a potential spectrum of clichés and stereotypes, there is one common trait that seems to unite them all. By their very nature, archetypal characters suffer from a heightened sense of gravity, a lack of momentum that prevents from easily growing, from changing.

Yes, archetypes do not have to be static characters; however, they are almost universally linear. They will likely progress, but they will do so along predetermined paths that smack of a distinct lack of free will.

Shifting the cliché

Of course, they don’t have to. But, breaking free of that lemming-like destiny takes effort on the part of the author, and will push the archetype from a periphery player in your narrative and into the foreground. To leverage that type of transition, an archetypal character will likely need to have a distinctive and contrary trait.

Shifting your character from the archetype norm just slightly can provide enough distinction to separate the character from others while still maintaining a sense of familiarity with the reader. This modification of an archetype provides a path for growth, allowing the character to shed the cliché from which they were born, and move towards a meaningful existence.

How you choose to use archetypes is up to you. Like the rest of fiction writing, the only real rules that exist are those applied by you, the author. However, knowing what you’re doing with archetypal characters can make them just as memorable as attempting to create a wholly original creation.

This article was written by P. Bradley Robb http://www.bradleyrobb.net/ P. Bradley Robb is an author and copywriter. He maintains his own personal writer's website, as well as an online site catering towards fiction writing. You can follow him on Twitter as @knownhuman. To see more posts click here

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