How & Why We Should Write Them
I’ve written about how to make villains relatable and I’ve written about handling characters with a negative character arc so that readers are still left with a positive, hope-filled message. But that’s entirely different from what I’m talking about today. Lately in the writing industry, I’ve noticed a substantial rise of amoral and immoral characters. By that I’m mean protagonists who have either no morals whatsoever or depraved character.
Why would we want to write them? And, if we do, how do we handle these types of characters so that readers can relate to them? I also want to talk about how a writer interjects his or her voice into the story’s theme or message so that it stands apart from the protagonist.
Anti-Heroes?
But before we get started, let’s clarify what I’m not talking about.
I’m not talking about heroes [anti- or otherwise]. who begin the novel with very bad character but improve significantly by the end of the story. Anti-heroes are those characters like Tony Stark in Iron Man, who have no desire to be a hero and also have bad character. Tony is a selfish, arrogant, materialistic man who views everyone and everything else as his playthings. He’s a narcissist. However, Tony improves over time. He changes, overcomes his flaws, and becomes a self-sacrificing hero.
Other characters who have more of a villain-to-hero arc might include Rick Blaine in Casablanca, Nux in Mad Max: Fury Road, or Loki in Thor: Ragnarok. These characters are simply exaggerated versions of the traditional [positive] character arc. They start off very flawed (more so than most characters), but move towards being influencers of good.
I’m also not talking talking about characters with a negative character arc. These are the characters like Michael Corleone in The Godfather, who begin as wholesome people and then progressively move towards a villain-like status.
Instead, by amoral or immoral characters I’m referring to those like Norman Bates in Psycho, Amy Dunne in Gone Girl, and Dexter Morgan in Darkly Dreaming Dexter. These are characters who start out with terrible character (whether the reader/ viewer knows it or not) and, though they might nominally improve, they remain largely amoral or immoral from start to finish.
There’s no redemption for them. And they have a relatively flat character arc.
Amoral: An Example
My desire to write this post came from a conversation I had with someone about Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens. We had each read the book and had similar, counter-market perspectives of it. I’ll avoid any plot spoilers to the best of my ability.
In that book, the protagonist is a young girl, Kya, who grows up deep in the marsh along the North Carolina coast. Her mother abandons her as a young girl. Then her older brothers and sisters leave to avoid their very abusive father. Last, but not least, her father disappears, leaving Kya, at ten-years old, to fend for herself.
The book presents the marshland in a lovely light. And the focus on Kya’s ability to grow, learn, and survive on her own will inspire many people. However, Kya has absolutely no sense of right from wrong (apart from defining wrong as any act that threatens her). She’s amoral.
Immoral: An Example
An immoral example would be Dexter in Darkly Dreaming Dexter. Dexter isn’t amoral; he has a distinct knowledge of right from wrong. He knows that murdering people is wrong, but he’s a serial killer and can’t seem to help himself.
In order to reconcile himself with his nature, he has developed something of a code (largely due to his father’s influence). Thus, he only kills those who fall through the justice system – criminals who are violent murderers themselves. In order to make his choice of victims, he demonstrates that he recognizes good from evil. Though he’s also in the wrong, he chooses to redirect his evil nature towards being an instrument for good in the world. He’s a vigilante.
How to Write This Character
I’ve heard many writers talk about their struggle with writing characters with what their readers refer to as no redeeming qualities. Thus, they have determined that there’s no audience for this. But the examples above prove that that’s not the case. There’s definitely a market for them. Instead, there are several things that readers need to see from this type of character in order to relate to him or her.
Motive: Give readers a relatable reason for the character’s amoral/immoral nature. We learn why Norman Bates is a killer: the loss of his mother. We can understand Kya’s amoral nature: her parents’ abandonment of her and her lack of other role models. Even Dexter is understandable. In his case it isn’t so much the fact that he’s had urges to kill since childhood. Rather, it’s his frustration with the justice system. There’s a reason why this TV show was/is wildly popular: so many of us can commiserate with that motive.
Any one of these is something that most readers can understand and relate to.
Relationship: One of the best ways to keep readers engaged with this kind of character is to show him or her in a positive relationship. Don’t underestimate how much Norman’s love for and devotion to his deceased mother (though it’s disturbing) does to redeem him in the viewers’ perspectives. The same can be said of Kya’s love interest, Tate. Through him, we see her as someone with pain and baggage, but someone worthy of love. This is also true of Dexter’s sister, Debra. She’s controversial in her own right with her crass language and promiscuity, but she’s deeply flawed, very vulnerable, and endlessly devoted to her brother. Through her we see Dexter as a person and a family member.
That’s absolutely crucial with this type of character! Readers have to see the character as someone who came from a family like themselves. As someone whom someone else loves and wants to care for (though it may be in the past tense as in Norman’s case).
Interest: Lastly, this kind of character needs to have something that makes him or her interesting to the reader. We see this in Kya’s art and her extensive knowledge of nature. She isn’t just an amoral girl with a desire for revenge. She’s a scientist and an artist. The best feature of the book is her perspective of the marsh. It’s like listening to a teacher who’s deeply passionate about his subject. That makes the subject – at least temporarily – compelling to those who listen (or read in our case).
Dexter is a scientist. Think about his story as one tale in two parts. If Dexter was simply a serial killer who had hacked into the Miami P.D.’s system in order to find cases of injustice, much of the interest in his story would be lost. Instead, most of the book/show is actually his work on blood splatter analysis and his relationships with those around him. Readers and viewers find him fascinating because we learn something about an area in which most of us have never worked. That interest factor actually makes Dexter more likeable.
Why Do We Write Them?
But why, oh why, do some writers want to write about such deplorable characters? And why would we?
The answer to that is probably extensive, but I can think of several.
Sometimes we write about the things that we witness in the world and don’t understand. We put amoral or immoral characters on the page in order to try to make sense of violence around us (like senseless acts of violence such as those Norman Bates commits).
Another answer is that some characters like Dexter answer a heart’s cry that many of us have: for justice to be done. The vigilante character is a long-standing one. However, Dexter takes it in a new direction. Unlike Batman with his upstanding family and desire to work with the police, Dexter takes vengeance in particularly brutal ways. His actions appeal to our own desires to see wrongs righted.
And lastly, sometimes we just want to explore the type of character who’s so unlike ourselves – a person who responds to hard circumstances in ways that might flash through our minds, but which we would never pursue. We want to see what brings a person to that point, what his life looks like, how he or she can live with himself. It’s an exploration of something foreign and yet intriguing.
The Author’s Voice
There are lots of ways to write these amoral or immoral characters. However, there are only two basic ways to present the author’s voice: as neutral/ approving, or as understanding but condemning. By that I mean that it’s one thing to show that a character is inherently bad and why. However, the author’s voice is an entirely separate thing.
I’ll give two examples.
A Neutral/ Approving Voice
We’ve come full-circle to my very counter-market perspective of Where the Crawdads Sing. As I said before, Owens does a great job of showing readers why Kya is amoral. It would be unusual for her not to be given her upbringing. However, the book itself comes across as unapologetically amoral.
What I mean is that the author’s voice is amoral. Owens writes about Kya’s [very bad] actions as if they’re entirely acceptable. As if she approves of them. This is actually consistent with Owens’s very problematic history. I was surprised by readers’ overwhelmingly positive responses to the book. I think she managed it because her beautiful portrayal of nature, Kya’s relationship with Tate, Jumpin and Mabel, and her sense of betrayal and fear overshadowed the writer’s voice.
Keep in mind that this may or may not always work. Writing about an amoral or immoral character as if their actions are good and right (or writing as if the author is neutral, which most people interpret as condoning) is not something many readers can relate to and will approve. However, in her case she managed to win them over.
An Understanding But NOT Condoning Voice
Usually when writers present these kinds of characters, it’s clear that the author (or screenwriter) wants the reader to understand and empathize with the character, but that they don’t condone their actions. This is much more likely to resonate with readers.
My current work-in-process, The Monster of Vienna (not the book that’s scheduled to be released later this year), is about a young violin protegé who becomes a serial killer in Vienna in the middle of the nineteenth century. The book is an exploration of monstrosity: how a person with no clearly identifiable reason can commit heinous acts, and what’s to be done about it.
I love my protagonist, Karl. He’s an enchanting boy at the start of the story. I present his story with a lot of sympathy for him and how he falls so far in the end. However, it’s obvious by how I write the story that I don’t agree with his actions.
One of the ways I make that clear is through his brother’s responses to him. His brother is his closest friend and ally, and the one person who would save him if he could (plus a love interest at one point). Through Josef we see the impact of Karl’s dark preoccupations and how desperately he needs to be redeemed. Easier said than done, of course…
The point though is that authors are narrators. Their perspective lies over the story and presents it in one of two ways. This can make or break the audience’s ability to relate to the novel. If you’re writing this type of character, think carefully about what you want to implicitly say about the protagonist’s actions and why. Whatever you do, do it for a reason.
Conclusion
All this to say that I can see why writers would want to write this character, but they need to be handled more carefully than some. There’s a much greater risk of reader rejection, but there’s also a very big possibility that these characters will be the most memorable.
Write your amoral and immoral characters wisely. And let me if you’ve written this type of protagonist. I’d love to hear about it!
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