Long term writers and professionally educated throw a lot of terms about that can confuse those not in the know. This is common in most specialties and common talk for them can be another language to outsiders. While it isn’t necessary to learn the lingo, it makes it easier to talk to your fellow co-workers. That might not matter when you are writing from home, but when you decide to find a publisher, editor, or gather advice, you want to sound like you know what you are talking about and can understand them.
To learn a language you start with a few words at a time. Villains are pretty straight forward and antiheroes are fascinating. Heroes, protagonists, and main characters are commonly thought of as the same person. There are instances where one character is all three of these, but they do mean different things.
Hero
The hero is the admirable character. Although they may face complications, a hero rises to the challenge and overcomes them. Heroes are mired in action and move the story forward themselves. These are the people you write legends about for having great talents, whether it be for their strength, courage, or simple humility. Heroes are ordinary people (ordinary as defined by the rules of the story’s world) who accomplish first-time feats and never fail to amaze. Heroes are always the good guys, at least in someone’s eyes.
Superheroes
Conversely, superheroes are heroes with extraordinary abilities. They are often seen as invincible, whether or not they actually are. Society sees the term “superhero” to relate to flashy names, tights, bright colors, and powers. This does fit the definition but does not have to be the only way to describe a superhero.
If you do create a character with superhuman (or whatever race they are) abilities but don’t give them a cape most people will only refer to them as a hero. If you were to describe your story to someone with the word superhero, they will automatically think of the common definition of the word. Then they will feel mislead once they read the actual story. While it is important to be educated, you also have to keep track of the current uses of each word and know their implied meanings as well.
Protagonist
The protagonist moves the story forward through character development and goal driven actions. They often go on adventures and change as the story progresses. They may fail sometimes, but get better as they go along. Protagonists can become heroes but don’t always make it to that point or perhaps their focus is on less honorable goals. Protagonists work towards some goal, destination, or idea that is important to the story as a whole. They may not be able to define their end game themselves, but the writer does. Protagonists are often main characters since you have to follow them closely to see their challenges and changes, but do not have to be.
Main Character
The main character is simply the character in which the story follows most closely. Most of the time you will read the story from their own perspective or only know the things they know. Main characters are who the story is about, whether or not they are a hero or protagonist. Sometimes you will find stories from a villain’s or ordinary person’s point of view. There are pros and cons to using each as the main character and you have to think about what kind of story you want before deciding who the main character is. It can be argued that the main character is the story themselves unless you have a large epic with multiple important players and at that point, you can have multiple main characters.
Examples
There is no strict rule as to who can be a hero, protagonist, or main character and if there were, those rules can be broken by good writers. Perspective is often key there. It is common for these three to be the same person as that is the expectation when reading fiction. Heroes are even necessary in every work. Some stories don’t have any admirable people in them. Those are generally more adult books, however, and have to have other reasons for readers to pick them up. Reading is all about promises, you have to be sure the story will still keep the reader’s attention when you write out of the box.
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Road Dahl follows Charlie as the main character. He is also the hero who keeps the other children alive despite their failings. While it could be argued that Charlie is a little bit of a protagonist since he becomes more confident in himself and takes charge, he does not move the story forward. That part is key.
Willy Wonka is the main protagonist here. Willy pushes the story forward while the other characters are simply reacting to him. Willy is the character with mental problems whose life got stuck, but as the story progresses he finds himself again. The story is not in his point of view, but his actions basically control where the storyline gets to go. Thus we have the main character who is the hero and a separate protagonist.
The Hunger Games
In The Hunger Games series, Katniss is the typical combination of a hero, protagonist, and main character. You read the story from her point of view (the main character), she drives the story with her choices, actions, and ideas (protagonist), and is generally the character everyone is rooting for (hero). This is the standard and it works for many stories. People don’t ever seem to tire of this trend.
Stormlight Archive
The Stormlight Archive is Brandon Sanderson’s epic tale. He plans to write a 13 book series I believe and has published 3. Epic fantasies often have multiple main characters and this series does too. The story moves from first-person point of view between a handful of players. Shallan, Dalinar, and Kaladan are some of the first main characters, but this story just keeps growing as the tale progresses.
It can be difficult to define which character is the protagonist or hero when there are so many people to consider. With a story as large as this I would actually say there are multiple heroes and protagonists as well as main characters. Epic fantasies really consist of multiple storylines that overlap each other which allows for multiple protagonists and heroes. Sometimes a hero can also be a villain depending on whose perspective you are reading from such as Eshonai.
It can be difficult to keep track of everyone in large stories such as this, and it becomes a daunting read. But sometimes that is a feature. You will always find something new every time you read the story. But not every writer can successfully do this. There is a lot of pre-planning and side writing required, but when done right, the story becomes as deep as real life.
Photo by King Lip