Guests at the Party: Introducing Supporting Characters
By Victoria Fortune
When my mother turned 60, my sisters and I threw a big birthday party for her. The guest list included representatives from many facets of her life—family, childhood friends, school friends, friends she met working in New York and those she made through our father in Mississippi, as well as family and friends she acquired through her current marriage in Texas. It was a motley crowd. As hostess, I was riddled with anxiety. Could I structure the evening so that this colorful cast of characters blended well, and the focus remained on my mother. I’ve struggled with a similar anxiety writing my first novel. I’m used to writing short stories, but a short story is a small, intimate dinner party compared to the sprawling affair that is a novel.
In her book, Creating Unforgettable Characters, which I’ve had since college (e.g., a long time), Linda Seger writes “Like a painter who keeps adding details to round out the painting, a writer adds supporting characters to give further depth, color, and texture to the story.” She likens characters to figures in a painting of a wedding. The main characters-- the bride and groom—are most prominent. Many of the attendees are “somewhat indistinguishable from each other, but…there are several who are broadly and sharply drawn,” such as the minister, the mother of the bride, a young man in the crowd, an old boyfriend of the bride perhaps. These figures, painted with vivid strokes—the mother’s bright yellow dress, the old boyfriend’s vibrant tie—stand out and reveal something about the main characters.
In my novel, there are three central characters whose stories and arcs all revolve around each other, which is a lot to juggle. I’ve kept the cast small, concerned that adding new characters might take my eye off the balls I’ve already got in the air, throwing everything into disarray. I’ve worried that devoting time and space to their backstories and arcs would draw attention away from my central characters.
In my zeal to put the protagonist center stage, I isolated her, sending her solo on the journey to attend the funeral of her grandmother, a formative yet tyrannical figure in her life. Thus, the opening pages of the book were spent entirely in her head, thinking about the place where she grew up, about the fight she had with her grandmother during her last visit, and about the relatives she would soon be facing. I was conveying everything through internal monologue, exposition and flashback, and it felt flat and static.
The character also has a boyfriend, whom I had left off stage for fear her relationship with him might take over. I was struggling to work him into the story peripherally, through her thoughts about him, but he remained elusive and tangential. I couldn’t quite decide what his purpose was. At last, I decided I’d better invite him along. As soon as I put him in the car with the main character, not only did he come to life, so did she, and his purpose in the story became apparent.
Instead of just thinking about her home and family, she now tells him about them, preparing him for what to expect. The way she characterizes them to him speaks volumes about her, her relationships with her family members, and her relationship with him, none of which could be conveyed through her inner thoughts. Far from detracting from the main character, introducing this supporting character has helped to flesh her out.
Because they don’t have the burden of carrying the full weight of the story, supporting characters can often be more colorful, and a lot of fun to write; however, they can prove dangerous. “The story can become unbalanced, if they don’t know their place,” Seger warns. To avoid the pitfalls of throwing in supporting characters willy-nilly or letting them take over, she suggests keeping in mind the function of each character. Some functions of supporting characters might be to—
• help define the role and importance of the protagonist. (For example, if the protagonist is primarily a mother, she’s going to need some children in the story.)
• act as a catalyst figure, providing crucial information to move the story forward. (For example, Dumbledore, in the Harry Potter series, gradually spools out the information Harry needs to understand his quest.)
• help convey the theme of the story (Seger offers the example of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, in which the main character, McMurphy, represents rebellion. The supporting characters—the other mental patients--represent various other reactions to authority that contrast with and highlight McMurphy’s rebelliousness.)
Each supporting character should serve a purpose. Contrasting the supporting characters, either with the protagonist or with each other, will help make them distinct and set the protagonist apart. Making them similar can be useful if you want them to be part of the background. Don’t be wary of inviting characters to the party. Just be sure to make the guest list carefully, considering what each character will contribute to the story.
For more detail about how to create supporting characters, here are some articles I’ve found useful: How to Write Effective Supporting Characters, 10 Secrets to Creating Unforgettable Supporting Characters, and 5 Archetypes for Supporting Characters.
