Who it literary character? We devote our article to this issue. In it we will tell you where this name came from, what literary characters and images are, and how to describe them in literature lessons according to your desire or the teacher’s request.
Also from our article you will learn what an “eternal” image is and what images are called eternal.
Literary hero or character. Who is this?
We often hear the concept of “literary character”. But few can explain what we are talking about. And even schoolchildren who have recently returned from a literature lesson often find it difficult to answer the question. What is this mysterious word “character”?
It came to us from ancient Latin (persona, personnage). The meaning is “personality”, “person”, “person”.
So, a literary character is an active person. We are mainly talking about prose genres, since images in poetry are usually called “lyrical hero”.
Without characters It is impossible to write a story or a poem, a novel or a story. Otherwise, it will be a meaningless collection of, if not words, then perhaps events. The heroes are people and animals, mythological and fantastic creatures, inanimate objects, for example, Andersen’s steadfast tin soldier, historical figures and even entire nations.
Classification of literary heroes
They can confuse any literature connoisseur with their quantity. And it’s especially hard for secondary school students. And especially because they prefer to play their favorite game instead of doing homework. How to classify heroes if a teacher or, even worse, an examiner demands it?
The most win-win option: classify the characters according to their importance in the work. According to this criterion, literary heroes are divided into main and secondary. Without the main character, the work and its plot will be a collection of words. But in case of loss minor characters we will lose a certain branch storyline or expressiveness of events. But overall the work will not suffer.
The second classification option is more limited and is suitable not for all works, but for fairy tales and fantasy genres. This is the division of heroes into positive and negative. For example, in the fairy tale about Cinderella, poor Cinderella herself - positive hero, she evokes pleasant emotions, you sympathize with her. But the sisters and the evil stepmother are clearly heroes of a completely different type.
Characteristics. How to write?
Heroes literary works sometimes (especially in a literature lesson at school) they need a detailed description. But how to write it? The option “once upon a time there was such a hero. He is from a fairy tale about this and that” is clearly not suitable if the assessment is important. We will share with you a win-win option for writing a characterization of a literary (and any other) hero. We offer you a plan with brief explanations of what and how to write.
- Introduction. Name the work and the character you will talk about. Here you can add why you want to describe it.
- The place of the hero in the story (novel, story, etc.). Here you can write whether he is major or minor, positive or negative, a person or a mythical or historical figure.
- Appearance. It would not be amiss to include quotes, which will show you as an attentive reader, and will also add volume to your description.
- Character. Everything is clear here.
- Actions and their characteristics in your opinion.
- Conclusions.
That's all. Keep this plan for yourself, and it will come in handy more than once.
Famous literary characters
At least the concept itself literary hero may seem completely unfamiliar to you, but if you tell you the name of the hero, you will most likely remember a lot. Especially it concerns famous characters literature, for example, such as Robinson Crusoe, Don Quixote, Sherlock Holmes or Robin Hood, Assol or Cinderella, Alice or Pippi Longstocking.
Such heroes are called famous literary characters. These names are familiar to children and adults from many countries and even continents. Not knowing them is a sign of narrow-mindedness and lack of education. Therefore, if you don’t have time to read the work itself, ask someone to tell you about these characters.
The concept of image in literature
Along with character, you can often hear the concept of “image”. What is this? Same as the hero or not? The answer will be both positive and negative, because a literary character may well be a literary image, but the image itself does not have to be a character.
We often call this or that hero an image, but nature can appear in the same image in a work. And then the topic of the examination paper can be “the image of nature in the story...”. What to do in this case? The answer is in the question itself: if we are talking about nature, you need to characterize its place in the work. Start with a description, add character elements, for example, “the sky was gloomy,” “the sun was mercilessly hot,” “the night was frightening with its darkness,” and the characterization is ready. Well, if you need a description of the hero’s image, then how to write it, see the plan and tips above.
What are the images?
Our next question. Here we will highlight several classifications. Above we looked at one - images of heroes, that is, people/animals/mythical creatures and images of nature, images of peoples and states.
Also, images can be so-called “eternal”. What is an "eternal image"? This concept names a hero created once by an author or folklore. But he was so “characteristic” and special that after years and eras, other authors write their characters from him, perhaps giving them different names, but without changing the essence. Such heroes include the fighter Don Quixote, the hero-lover Don Juan and many others.
Unfortunately, modern fantasy characters do not become eternal, despite the love of fans. Why? What's better than this funny Don Quixote of Spider-Man, for example? It's difficult to explain this in a nutshell. Only reading the book will give you the answer.
The concept of "closeness" of the hero, or My favorite character
Sometimes the hero of a work or movie becomes so close and loved that we try to imitate him, to be like him. This happens for a reason, and it’s not for nothing that the choice falls on this character. Often a favorite hero becomes an image that somehow resembles ourselves. Perhaps the similarity is in character, or in the experiences of both the hero and you. Or this character is in a situation similar to yours, and you understand and sympathize with him. In any case, it's not bad. The main thing is that you imitate only worthy heroes. And there are plenty of them in the literature. We wish you to meet only with good heroes and imitate only the positive traits of their character.
Romantic reflection is only one of the facets of the heroine’s character. Mashenka is all earthly. Sensitive, responsive, she can both protect the memory of her father and understand difficult relationship, formed in the mother's family. This fragile girl knows the value of friendship and defends her human dignity.
At the end of the work, the main characters are faced with the question of who to be with Mashenka - her mother or her grandfather. The loss of Mashenka is unbearable for either side. The author turns the “family matter” so that it ceases to be the personal matter of the characters.
The inner drama of time, conveyed on a family scale, is what attracts the artist. And although in Afinogenov’s plays there are no visible signs of the reconstruction era, the intensity and passion of the ideological and moral quest of his characters, their intransigence towards people who behave unworthily, their admiration for a person who gives his heart to “breaking times”, with impeccable accuracy defines the pathos 30 -s.
Close to “Mashenka” in the depth of psychological revelation of character, penetration into inner world the heroine is one of the best plays by Alexei Arbuzov “Tanya” (1938).
The heroine of the drama, Tanya, absorbed in love for her husband to the point of complete self-denial, gives up everything in life: drops out of medical school, breaks up with friends. She exists only for Herman, breathes his breath. However, the first blow in life (Herman fell in love with another woman, strong, strong-willed) did not break her. Tanya leaves her husband without even saying that she is expecting a child. She gives all her love, just as selflessly little son Eureka. And again the blow of fate is the loss of a child. After the death of her son, Tanya sees the only meaning of life in work. She completes her studies at the institute and goes to Siberia to the mines. In the final edition (1946), the ending of the play was deepened, the image of Tanya became internally more interesting. The loss of her husband, the death of her son, years of study and hard work, doubts, disappointment in herself, the joy of realizing her usefulness to people, the bitter memory of the past, the all-forgiving love for Herman - the heroine goes through all this, gaining a vital incentive - the ability to love and be happy.
A number of unexpected, perhaps not even fully justified, but in their own verified situations deepen the drama of the play, for example, the appearance of a young happy married couple Grishchenko in Tanya’s house at the moment when her son died; trip to the “Rosa” mine to see a sick child who turned out to be her son ex-husband, etc. These scenes, by contrast, convey even more deeply the severity of the turns in the heroine’s fate, revealing the complexity and inconsistency of life.
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Character traits of the main character of the play “Mashenka”
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I hope that no one else has any doubts about how important his goal is for the hero (some of the heroes are ready to kill for theirs).
Now let's talk about character. As I already said, cinema is movement. The hero is the one who moves, the goal is what makes him move. And character is what sets the speed and trajectory of movement.
In the last lesson, I asked you to try to name a character whose character changed during the film.
Anakin Skywalker, Kisa Vorobyaninov, Raskolnikov, Andrea from The Devil Wears Prada, Tyler Durden, Plyushkin, Monte Cristo, D'Artagnan and many, many others were named.
Let's take Raskolnikov as an example. Indeed, at the beginning of the book (film, series, story) he is a poor student who suffers terribly from the thought of whether he is a trembling creature or has the right. In the finale, he is a convict who is convinced that yes, he is a trembling creature and repents of his errors in the arms of Sonya Marmeladova. Frankly, there are two differences. But has his character changed?
In general, what is character?
Here's the definition from Wikipedia:
Character (Greek charakter - distinctive feature) is a structure of persistent, relatively permanent mental properties that determine the characteristics of a person’s relationships and behavior.
I ask you to pay attention to the words of the persistent, relatively constant. What are these properties? Let's try to define them without delving too deeply into psychology:
1)Energy level (strong - weak)
2) Temperament (speed of reactions, excitability)
3) Introvert-extrovert (social behavior)
4) Habits (stereotypes of behavior)
The hero already has all these properties as soon as he is born (I mean the light of a film projector) and all of them remain with him when he goes into ETM.
Raskolnikov was weak. Have you become stronger? No. He was melancholic. Have you become sanguine? No. I was an introvert. Have you become an extrovert? No. Have you gained or lost any habits? No. As he came, so he went.
Character is the main thing that distinguishes one hero from another. The viewer recognizes and remembers the hero by his character, and not by his appearance.
If you know the character of your hero, it will be easy for you to construct a plot - you just need to erect obstacles between the hero and his goal and watch how he, in accordance with the characteristics of his character, will overcome them.
If the hero commits an act that is out of character, the viewer will feel that he is being deceived. Either the hero or the author. If a hero deceives, it is the author’s sacred duty to expose him. Otherwise, the viewer will no longer believe the author. And it needs to be exposed quickly, clearly, rudely and visibly (but not stupidly).
In general, cinema is a rough art. Much rougher than prose, which allows you to devote dozens of pages, for example, to describing the thoughts of the hero. In the depiction of the characters, the roughness of the cinema is manifested like nowhere else.
Why do fans often protest against film adaptations, even successful ones? Because cinema necessarily simplifies and coarsens the characters, sometimes making each of them the bearer of only one, most striking trait. And some heroes are thrown out altogether, like Tom Bombadil from The Lord of the Ring.
Sometimes this simplification kills a movie, as in the case of Johnny Mnemonic, when a great novel turned into an average action movie.
More often, on the contrary, simplification allows one to create a movie, such as, for example, Pudovkin’s “Mother.”
And the story behind the creation of Doctor House? Dr. Lisa Sanders wrote a column for the New York Times for many years in which she described diagnosing a patient as solving a crime. The columns were published as a separate book, and television people bought the rights to create a series based on this book. And for two years they didn’t know what to do with these rights. Until they finally came up with the hero we all know.
Would you watch a series about diagnosing patients if it didn’t include this hero with his obnoxious, but such a bright character? Attention, this was a rhetorical question, not homework!
It is believed that there are two approaches to depicting the character of a hero: Moliere's and Shakespeare's.
Each of Moliere's heroes has one dominant trait - Harpagon is stingy, Scapin is a rogue, Tartuffe is a hypocrite, and so on. This approach is suitable for genre films. For example, if you are writing an action movie, your hero should not, having caught the enemy in the crosshairs, suddenly begin to doubt, like Hamlet.
Shakespeare's heroes are multidimensional: Hamlet is ambitious and modest, decisive and prone to doubt. Shylock is stingy and smart and child-loving. Falstaff is both voluptuous and lazy, brave and cowardly.
Is this why most of Moliere’s plays have long since left the stage, while Shakespeare continues to be staged? The reader and viewer of Shakespeare not only follows the development of history, but he also goes on a fascinating journey into the depths of the character of the hero, gradually recognizing more and more of his features.
What should the character of the hero be like for this journey to be truly exciting?
BRIGHT. It is foolish to expect great feats and unexpected actions out of nowhere.
DEFINITELY. We must understand what the hero wants and why he wants it.
BELIEVABLE. Just don’t need to copy the features of people you know. Life is not a screenwriter; it does not need to worry about verisimilitude. And the screenwriter needs it.
WHOLE. The hero acts only as he can act. For example, at one time in American cinema, action heroes did not kill anyone. Even during the last fight with the most evil villain, the villain had a habit of tripping and falling on his own knife.
COMPLEX. Internal contradiction gives the hero volume (remember Hamlet - probably the most contradictory and most popular hero in the world). In order to become a hero, he must overcome this contradiction. Just don't abuse it. If the character's function is to give the hero cartridges, he must silently (or with the words here are the cartridges) give the hero cartridges and immediately fall with a bullet in his head.
The complexity of a character is directly proportional to the importance of the role the hero plays in the story.
Even an action movie cannot be built on the fact that a single-celled hero is the strongest and shoots without missing a beat. He definitely needs to come up with some kind of ficus tree on the windowsill, a love for John Wayne films and friendship with a little girl.
Conversely, if you delve too deeply into the personalities and stories of characters who play a small role, it will turn out funny. This effect was very well ridiculed in one of the Austin Powers episodes, when they showed in detail how the wife and son of one of Dr. Evil’s henchmen learn about the death of this very henchman at the hands of the main character.
In some screenwriting primers they write that in order for a character to be three-dimensional, the screenwriter must describe in detail his appearance, character and social status.
When I read in the “bible” (technical specifications) of a new project detailed biography hero for ten pages, this makes me at least wary. And if at the same time I see that the hero has an uninteresting and unconvincing character, I immediately abandon the project, because I understand that such a technical assignment does not foreshadow anything but fruitless torment.
In fact, what makes a hero three-dimensional is not his appearance or social status - what difference does it make to a screenwriter whether his heroine is blonde or brunette, if he is not the screenwriter of Legally Blonde? In many films, it doesn’t matter to us what kind of craft the hero does for a living. But the character of the hero is the stone laid in the foundation of any good script.
The screenwriter's task is to make this stone precious.
However, the fact that the character of the hero remains unchanged does not mean that the hero himself does not change. But what does it change?
Plyushkin was a landowner, became a poor madman, Kisa was a registry office employee, became a murderer, D'Artagnan was a poor Gascon, became a field marshal.
All these heroes changed their fate.
And that’s exactly what we’ll talk about next time.
The character traits of the hero are interpreted by the poet as traits of a collective image: Terkin is inseparable and integral from the militant people. It is interesting that all fighters - regardless of their age, tastes, military experience - feel good with Vasily; Wherever he appears - in battle, on vacation, on the road - contact, friendliness, and friendship are instantly established between him and the fighters. mutual arrangement. Literally every scene speaks to this. The soldiers listen to Terkin’s playful bickering with the cook at the hero’s first appearance:
terkin literary poem
And sitting down under a pine tree,
He eats porridge, hunched over.
"Mine?" - fighters among themselves,
"Mine!" - they looked at each other.
I don’t need, brothers, orders,
I don't need fame.
Respect for things as the fruit of labor
Terkin is characterized by respect and careful attitude masters to things as to the fruit of labor. It’s not for nothing that he takes away his grandfather’s saw, which he warps, not knowing how to sharpen it.
Returning the finished saw to the owner, Vasily says:
Come on, grandfather, take it and look.
It will cut better than a new one,
Don't waste your tool.
Terkin loves work and is not afraid of it (from the hero’s conversation with death):
I'm a worker
I would get into it at home.
- - The house is destroyed.
- - I'm a carpenter too.
- - There is no stove.
- - And the stove maker...
Simplicity of the hero
The simplicity of a hero is usually synonymous with his popularity, the absence of exceptional features in him. But this simplicity also has another meaning in the poem: the transparent symbolism of the hero’s surname, the Terkino “we’ll endure it, we’ll endure it” emphasizes his ability to overcome difficulties simply and easily. This is his behavior even when he swims across an icy river or sleeps under a pine tree, quite content with an uncomfortable bed, etc. This simplicity of the hero, his calmness, and sober outlook on life express important features of the people's character.
In sight of A.T. Tvardovsky’s poem “Vasily Terkin” contains not only the front, but also those who work in the rear for the sake of victory: women and old people. The characters in the poem not only fight - they laugh, love, talk with each other, and most importantly, they dream of a peaceful life. The reality of war unites what is usually incompatible: tragedy and humor, courage and fear, life and death.
Proud defiance of fate and daring love of freedom. Heroic character. The romantic hero strives for unfettered freedom, without which there is no true happiness for him and which is more valuable than life itself.
On early stage creativity, the writer turned to romanticism, thanks to which he created a number of bright literary images. This literary direction allowed the writer not only to create perfect image, but also to convey the romantic spirit: the Proud Falcon, dying in a deep gorge, the daredevil Danko, who lit the way for people with the torch of his heart, Radda with his beautiful voice - all these Gorky heroes are united by the desire for freedom, they are not afraid even of death itself. In Gorky's stories, only freedom is a real value for a person. As an example, he tells a legend about the love of two young gypsies, stronger than the love of freedom. The ending of the poem is tragic - Loiko kills Rada in front of the entire camp and dies himself. Gorky draws exactly this ending to the poem because neither Loiko nor Rada wanted to lose freedom.
The heroes of the legends told by the Moldavian Izergil also strive for freedom. The heroes of the story - Larra and Danko - are opposed to each other, but they also have common similarities. Strength of character and pride are emphasized in Lara. But good qualities turns into her opposite because she despises people. Danko also strives for freedom and takes on a difficult mission - to lead people out of the forest. He rips out his heart, thereby lighting the way for them. U romantic heroes Gorky has many positive human qualities - love of freedom, as well as the ability to serve people
Distinctive features romantic images of Maxim Gorky
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