characters essay

Writing a Character Analysis Essay | Step-by-Step Guide

Chris Drew (PhD)

Dr. Chris Drew is the founder of the Helpful Professor. He holds a PhD in education and has published over 20 articles in scholarly journals. He is the former editor of the Journal of Learning Development in Higher Education. [Image Descriptor: Photo of Chris]

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I’m also going to give you a ton of examples.

This post is split into four parts for easy navigation:

• What is a Character Analysis Essay?
• What is the best Format to Use?
• 11 Character Analysis Example Ideas
• Template, Checklist and Outline for Your own Piece

In this post, I’m going to explain to you clearly and in a step-by-step way how to conduct a character analysis.

1. What is a Character Analysis Essay?

Let’s get you started with some really simple details about what a character analysis is:

• A Quick Definition: A character analysis essay zooms-in on a character in a book, movie or even real life. It provides what we sometimes call a ‘sketch’ of a character.
• The Purpose of a Character Analysis: The purpose of a character analysis is to reveal interesting details about the character that might contain a broader moral message about the human condition. For example, Atticus Finch is not just a lawyer in To Kill a Mockingbird. Rather, he provides us with a moral message about the importance of doing what you believe is right even though you know you will likely fail.

2. What is the best Character Analysis Essay Format?

Character analysis essays do not have just one format.

However, let me offer some advice that might act as a character analysis essay outline or ‘checklist’ of possible things you could discuss:

1. Start with the Simple Details.

You can start a character analysis by providing a simple, clear description of who your character is. Look at some basic identity traits such as:

• Race (if relevant)
• Social class (if relevant)
• Protagonist or Antagonist? A protagonist is the character who is our central character in the plot; the antagonist is often the protagonist’s opponent or challenger.
• Major or minor character?

2. What are the character’s distinctive personality features?

Your character might have some really clearly identifiable character traits. It’s best to highlight in your character analysis the exact traits that this character possesses. Some common character traits include:

I recommend you take a moment to write down what you think the top 3 to 5 words are that you’d use to explain your character’s personality traits. These will be important to discuss throughout your character analysis.

Sometimes a character may start out with some personality traits, but change over the course of the text. This is quite common; and one clear example of this is Lady Macbeth she deteriorates from a cutthroat power player to a guilt ridden shell of a person roaming the halls of the castle. This dramatic character change is something that makes her very interesting, and is worthy of discussion!

3. What are the character’s key relationships?

Does your character have a close relationship with a certain person in the storyline?

You might want to discuss the character’s relationships as a part of your character analysis. These relationships may reveal some key personality traits of your character.

For example, in Shakespeare’s play Hamlet, Horatio is the loyal offsider to Hamlet. Through his actions in staying by Hamlet through thick and thin, we learn that he is a deeply loyal character.

Examining the character’s relationships with their friends and foes therefore is very useful for digging deeper into who this character actually is, and what personality traits they have when they are put to the test within the narrative.

4. What are the character’s motivations?

Another thing you might want to examine are the character’s motivations . What do they desire most in the world? Some common motivations for characters in stories are:

• A simple life
• To serve others

This list really could be endless, but I hope the above examples give you a bit of an idea of the sorts of traits to look out for. By mentioning and examining the motivations of the character, we will come closer and closer to learning exactly what moral message this character might be able to tell us.

5. What are the character’s key conflicts?

Stories tend to have a beginning, a complication, and a resolution.

The complication involves conflicts and challenges that need to be overcome. For Edmund in Narnia, it’s cowardice. For Romeo and Juliet, it’s the conflict between love and family loyalty. Here’s some other common conflicts for characters:

• Whether to stay loyal to a friend;
• To overcome obstacles to love;
• To seek a way out of a challenging situation;
• To escape war or poverty;
• To persevere through imprisonment;
• To overcome personal fear

Again, this list is endless.

Knowing the character’s core conflict gets us even closer to knowing the moral that the character is trying to teach us.

For example, in Romeo and Juliet, the challenge of Romeo and Juliet being together despite their families’ objections teaches us something. Personally, I believe it teaches us the importance of letting go of old grudges in order to let love bloom.

This moral lesson was taught to us through conflict: namely, the conflict that Romeo and Juliet were right in the center of.

6. What are the character’s epiphanies?

Sometimes a character has an epiphany. This often happens towards the end of the story and helps the character overcome the challenge or conflict that we discussed in the point above.

Here’s an example of an epiphany:

• In the Lion King, Simba runs away from his tribe to live in exile. After a chance encounter with his childhood friend Nala, he has an epiphany that he has a duty to his tribe. This leads him back home to fight Scar and return freedom to Pride Rock.

Not all characters have an epiphany. But, if they do, I strongly encourage you to write about it in your character analysis.

7. Examine the moral message the character teaches us.

Finally, conclude by examining the moral message behind the character. Nearly every character has something to teach the reader. Authors put a lot of thought into creating complex characters with whom we can relate. We relate to the character and say “wow, they taught me a lesson about something!”

The lesson might be something like:

• Money doesn’t buy happiness;
• Loyalty to family comes above all else;
• Love gives life meaning;
• Honesty is always the best policy

This is the core of your character analysis essay. If you can pick out exactly what moral message the character teaches you, you’ll be well on your way to writing a strong character analysis.

Below I’m going to give you some examples to help you out. I know it can be hard to really get your head around a character, so sometimes the best thing is to look at some samples!

3. Here’s 13 Example Character Analysis Essay Ideas.

Most times when we create a character analysis, we’re exploring the deeper moral stories / aspects of humanity. Here’s some example ideas. I’ve tried to outline in less than a paragraph exactly what your key point will be about each character:

• Atticus Finch from To Kill a Mockingbird: A character who teaches us a lesson about standing up for what’s right, even if you know you’re likely to lose.
• Huckleberry Finn from Huckleberry Finn: A character who reveals our inner desire for freedom from the elements of society that constrain us.
• Dudley from Harry Potter: A character whose personality tells us a cautionary tale of the perils of middle-class narcissism, parents’ desire to wrap their children in cotton wool, and the lack of discipline we perceive in contemporary childhoods.
• Jack from Lord of the Flies: A character who represents the innate desire for power that seems to lurk not too far from the surface of the human condition. When social structures are stripped away, he quickly reverts to violence and superstition to assert control over his peers.
• Lady Macbeth from Macbeth: Lady Macbeth teaches us a valuable lesson about the perils of contravening our own morality. She starts out a cutthroat killer but is increasingly consumed by the guilt of her own actions. While we may be able to escape full punishment from outside forces, it is the inner guilt that might eat us away to our last.
• The Boy who Cried Wolf: The boy who cried wolf is a character whose fatal flaw is his desire for attention and adulation. His repeated attempts at gaining the attention of others leads the townspeople to no longer take him seriously, which causes him harm when he actually needs the villagers to take him seriously to save his life. He teaches us the virtue of honest and humility.
• Nick Carraway from the Great Gatsby: Nick shows us all the inner conflict between the trappings of wealth, glamor and spectacle; and the desire for simplicity, honesty and community. He is drawn by the dazzling world of East Egg, New York, but by the end of the novel sees live in East Egg as shallow and lacking the moral depth of his former life in small town Minnesota.
• Alice from Alice in Wonderland: In many ways, Alice represents the child within all of us. She is a character of goodwill to all and who looks upon the world (or, rather, Wonderland) with awe. Travelling with a cadre of flawed characters, she learns with them the importance of seeking strength from within.
• The Nurse in Romeo and Juliet: Like many Shakespearian characters, the nurse’s role is both as loyal confidante to a central character and comic relief. Shakespeare uses minor characters to regale his crowd and sustain viewer interest between scenes.
• Lucy in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe: Lucy represents a surprising character whose youthfulness and small stature make her an underrated character by all around her. Nonetheless, she possesses within the bravery and loyalty necessary to carry out the quest for Aslan. Lucy represents the goodness in children and, by extension, all of mankind.
• Anne in Anne of Green Gables: Anne occupies the typical literary role of young girls in many classical novels: she represents innocence and wonder, and her contraventions of rules are seen through a prism of childhood innocence. This frames Anne not as a deviant but as a precious soul.
• Simba from The Lion King: Simba’s story follows his struggle with growing up, embracing his destiny and duty to his family, or fleeing towards freedom and a ‘no worries’ lifestyle. Simba flees Pride Rock and goes through an existential crisis with his existentialist friends Timon and Pumba. When he runs into an old childhood friend, he realizes how shallow his new carefree life has become and reflects upon his obligation to his community back home.
• Woody from Toy Story: Woody starts out Andy’s favorite toy, but when Andy gets a new flashier toy, Woody’s status amongst the toys falls apart. Woody’s key character challenge is to learn to be humble and inclusive living within the group. By the end of the movie, Woody realizes his duty to love and serve Andy is more important than his own status within the group.

4. Here’s an Example Template for your own Character Analysis Essay

Feel free to use this brainstorming template to get you started with your character analysis essay. I recommend filling out as many of these key points as you can, but remember sometimes you might have to skip some of these points if they’re not relevant to your character.

Once you’ve brainstormed the ideas in Table 1, follow the character analysis essay outline in Table 2 to stay on track for your character analysis essay. Do remember though that each assignment will be different and you should adjust it based on your teacher’s requirements.

Here’s Table 1, which is a brainstorming template for your character analysis essay:

And here’s Table 2, which is an example character analysis essay outline. This is for a 1500 word character analysis essay. Change the word count according to how long your essay should be:

Read Also: 39 Better Ways to Write ‘In Conclusion’ in an Essay

Character analyses can be really tough. You need to know your character really well. You might even need to re-read (or watch) your book or movie a few times over to get to know the character really well.

I recommend when you re-read or re-watch the text before you write your character analysis, have the checklist I provided above handy and take notes. Then, use the essay outline I provided above to put all of those notes together into a clear and thorough final character analysis essay.

• Chris Drew (PhD) https://helpfulprofessor.com/author/chris-drew-phd-2/ 15 Green Flags in a Relationship
• Chris Drew (PhD) https://helpfulprofessor.com/author/chris-drew-phd-2/ 15 Signs you're Burnt Out, Not Lazy
• Chris Drew (PhD) https://helpfulprofessor.com/author/chris-drew-phd-2/ 15 Toxic Things Parents Say to their Children
• Chris Drew (PhD) https://helpfulprofessor.com/author/chris-drew-phd-2/ 15 Red Flags Early in a Relationship

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How to Write a Character Analysis Essay

A character analysis essay is a challenging type of essay students usually write for literature or English courses. In this article, we will explain the definition of character analysis and how to approach it. We will also touch on how to analyze characters and guide you through writing character analysis essays.

Typically, this kind of writing requires students to describe the character in the story's context. This can be fulfilled by analyzing the relationship between the character in question and other personas. Although, sometimes, giving your personal opinion and analysis of a specific character is also appropriate.

Let's explain the specifics of how to do a character analysis by getting straight to defining what is a character analysis. Our term paper writers will have you covered with a thorough guide!

What Is a Character Analysis Essay?

The character analysis definition explains the in-depth personality traits and analyzes characteristics of a certain hero. Mostly, the characters are from literature, but sometimes other art forms, such as cinematography. In a character analysis essay, your main job is to tell the reader who the character is and what role they play in the story. Therefore, despite your personal opinion and preferences, it is really important to use your critical thinking skills and be objective toward the character you are analyzing. A character analysis essay usually involves the character's relationship with others, their behavior, manner of speaking, how they look, and many other characteristics.

Although it's not a section about your job experience or education on a resume, sometimes it is appropriate to give your personal opinion and analysis of a particular character.

What Is the Purpose of a Character Analysis Essay

More than fulfilling a requirement, this type of essay mainly helps the reader understand the character and their world. One of the essential purposes of a character analysis essay is to look at the anatomy of a character in the story and dissect who they are. We must be able to study how the character was shaped and then learn from their life. 

A good example of a character for a character analysis essay is Daisy Buchanan from 'The Great Gatsby.' The essay starts off by explaining who Daisy is and how she relates to the main character, Jay Gatsby. Depending on your audience, you need to decide how much of the plot should be included. If the entire class writes an essay on Daisy Buchanan, it is logical to assume everyone has read the book. Although, if you know for certain that your audience has little to no knowledge of who she is, it is crucial to include as much background information as possible. 

After that, you must explain the character through certain situations involving her and what she said or did. Make sure to explain to the reader why you included certain episodes and how they have showcased the character. Finally, summarize everything by clearly stating the character's purpose and role in the story. 

We also highly recommend reading how to write a hook for an essay .

Still Need Help with Your Character Analysis Essay?

Different types of characters.

To make it clear how a reader learns about a character in the story, you should note that several characters are based on their behaviors, traits, and roles within a story. We have gathered some of them, along with vivid examples from famous literature and cinema pieces:

Types of Characters

• Major : These are the main characters; they run the story. Regularly, there are only one or two major characters. Major characters are usually of two types: the protagonist – the good guy, and the antagonist: the bad guy or the villain. 
• Protagonist (s) (heroes): The main character around whom most of the plot revolves. 

For example, Othello from Shakespeare's play, Frodo from The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien, Harry Potter from the Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling, and Elizabeth Bennet from 'Pride and Prejudice' by Jane Austen.

• Antagonist (s): This is the person that is in opposition to the protagonist. This is usually the villain, but it could also be a natural power, set of circumstances, majestic being, etc. 

For example, Darth Vader from the Star Wars series by George Lucas, King Joffrey from Game of Thrones, or the Wicked Queen from 'Snow White and Seven Dwarfs.'

• Minor : These characters help tell the major character's tale by letting them interact and reveal their personalities, situations, and/or stories. They are commonly static (unchanging). The minor characters in The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien would be the whole Fellowship of the ring. In their own way, each member of the Fellowship helps Frodo get the ring to Mordor; without them, the protagonist would not be a protagonist and would not be able to succeed. In the Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling, minor characters are Ronald Weasley and Hermione Granger. They consistently help Harry Potter on his quests against Voldemort, and, like Frodo, he wouldn't have succeeded without them.

On top of being categorized as a protagonist, antagonist, or minor character, a character can also be dynamic, static, or foil.

• Dynamic (changing): Very often, the main character is dynamic.

An example would also be Harry Potter from the book series by J.K. Rowling. Throughout the series, we see Harry Potter noticing his likeness to Voldemort. Nevertheless, Harry resists these traits because, unlike Voldemort, he is a good person and resists any desire to become a dark wizard.

• Static (unchanging): Someone who does not change throughout the story is static.

A good example of a static character is Atticus Finch from “How to Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee. His character and views do not change throughout the book. He is firm and steady in his beliefs despite controversial circumstances. 

• Foils : These characters' job is to draw attention to the main character(s) to enhance the protagonist's role.

‍ A great example of a foil charact e r is Dr. Watson from the Sherlock Holmes series by Arthur Conan Doyle.

How to Analyze a Character 

While preparing to analyze your character, make sure to read the story carefully.

• Pay attention to the situations where the character is involved, their dialogues, and their role in the plot.
• Make sure you include information about what your character achieves on a big scale and how they influence other characters.
• Despite the categories above, try thinking outside the box and explore your character from around.
• Avoid general statements and being too basic. Instead, focus on exploring the complexities and details of your character(s).

How to Write a Character Analysis Essay?

To learn how to write a character analysis essay and gather a more profound sense of truly understanding these characters, one must completely immerse themself in the story or literary piece.

• Take note of the setting, climax, and other important academic parts.
• You must be able to feel and see through the characters. Observe how analysis essay writer shaped these characters into life.
• Notice how little or how vast the character identities were described.
• Look at the characters' morals and behaviors and how they have affected situations and other characters throughout the story.
• Finally, observe the characters whom you find interesting. 

Meanwhile, if you need help writing a paper, leave us a message ' write my paper .'

How Do You Start a Character Analysis Essay

When writing a character analysis essay, first, you have to choose a character you'd like to write about. Sometimes a character will be readily assigned to you. It's wise to consider characters who play a dynamic role in the story. This will captivate the reader as there will be much information about these personas.

Read the Story

You might think that if you already have read the book, there is no need to do so again; however, now that you know the character you would like to focus on, reading it again will have plenty of benefits. It will give you an opportunity to be more precise while reading the scenes that relate directly to your character and are important for his/her analysis. While reading the book, pay attention to every tiny detail to make sure you grasp the whole array of your character's traits. 

Consider the following things:

• What specific descriptions does the author provide for each character?

For example, when J.K. Rowling describes Harry Potter for the first time, she describes his clothes as old and oversized, his hair untidy, and his glasses as broken. It might seem just like a simple description, but she expresses compassion and pity for an orphan neglected by his only relatives. 

• What kinds of relationships does your character have with others?

Think about how Harry builds up his friendships with others. First, he and Ron do not like Hermione because she acts like a know-it-all, but when she gets stuck in the dungeons with a horrendous troll, he rushes to save her regardless. 

• How do the actions of the character move the plot forward?

In 'The Philosopher's Stone,' Harry is very observant of any events taking place at school. He analyzes people's actions, which builds up the plot around the stone and its importance for the magical world.

Get help with your character analysis from our experts.

Choose a Dynamic Character

Choosing a dynamic character is a great idea. This does not necessarily have to be the protagonist, but a character that undergoes many changes has grown throughout the story and is not boring and/or static. This gives you a perfect advantage to fully show the character and make your paper entertaining and engaging for the reader. If you choose a character that is not very dynamic, your essay might seem monotonous because your character will not end up doing much and will not be very involved in the story.

While you are reading, it is useful to take notes or highlight/underline any of the critical elements of the story. This will add depth to your character description(s). By providing vivid and specific examples, you connect your reader to the character, and the character comes alive in their eyes. Review your notes and formulate the main idea about your character when you're finished reading with your character in mind.

Make an initial draft while taking note of the character analysis essay outline provided by your instructor. You may follow the recommended character analysis essay format if you have not been provided with a sample.

Choose a Main Idea

While reading the story, make sure you keep track of your notes. It is a good idea to look at them, choose the ones that are the most representative of your character and find patterns. This will be your thesis. Then, you must support this idea with examples and situations involving your character. 

If your character were Jem Finch from 'To Kill a Mockingbird' by Harper Lee, the main idea would be how his personal character is shaped through racial conflicts, social inequalities, and internal struggles between public opinion, his own views, and what is actually right. Essaypro offers you history essay help. Leave us a notice if you need to proofread, edit, or write your essay.

Character Analysis Questions

Now that you have jotted down some main concepts about your character, here is a list of questions that can help you fill in the blanks you might still have:

• Where do the events involving your character take place?
• What are the relationships between your character and other significant characters?
• What is the primary change your character has gone through throughout the story?
• What is your character's background?
• What is your character's occupation?
• What kind of emotions does your character go through?
• What are your character's values?
• What is your character's value?
• Does your character have friends?
• Is there a lesson your character has learned by the end of the story?
• Does the character achieve the goals he/she has set for himself/herself?

Make a Character Analysis Essay Outline

When you're unsure how to write a character synopsis, remember that creating a literary analysis outline is one of the most critical steps. A well-constructed character analysis outline will keep your thoughts and ideas organized.

Character Analysis Essay Introduction:

Make the introduction to your paper brief and meaningful. It should hold together your entire essay and spark your audience's interest. Write a short description of the character in question. Don't forget to include a character analysis thesis statement which should make a case for the character's relevance within the narrative context.

Character Analysis Essay Body:

Subdivide your body paragraphs into different ideas or areas regarding the character. Look at your professor's rubric and ensure you'll be able to tackle all the requirements. You should also be provided with questions to be answered to formulate your analysis better. The body should answer the following questions:

• What is the character's physical appearance, personality, and background?
• What are the conflicts the character experiences, and how did he/she overcome them?
• What can we learn from this character?
• What is the meaning behind the character's actions? What motivates him/her?
• What does the character do? How does he/she treat others? Is he/she fair or unjust?
• What does the character say? What is his/her choice of words? Does he/she have a rich vocabulary?
• How does the character describe themself? How do others describe him/her?
• What words do you associate with the character? Perhaps a word like 'hope,' 'bravery,' or maybe even 'freedom'?

Character Analysis Essay Conclusion:

It's time to master the secrets of how to write character analysis essay conclusions. Your ending should also hold your ideas together and shape a final analysis statement. Mention things about the character's conflicts that we could experience in real life. Additionally, you can write about how a character should've reacted to a certain situation.

Character Analysis Essay Example

Read our blogs ‘Character Analysis of Jem Finch', 'The Great Gatsby Book Through Daisy Buchanan Character,' 'Analysis of Characters in Beowulf,' or simply use these character analysis essay examples to reference your paper. You might also be interested in a synthesis essay example .

Now that you know what is character analysis, it might be time to choose a character to write about. If you find yourself in a situation where you need to type ' do my homework for me ,' you should contact our writers. You also get a free plagiarism report, formatting, and citing when  buying an essay from us!

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How To Write A Character Analysis Essay?

How to start a character analysis essay, how to write an introduction for a character analysis essay.

is an expert in nursing and healthcare, with a strong background in history, law, and literature. Holding advanced degrees in nursing and public health, his analytical approach and comprehensive knowledge help students navigate complex topics. On EssayPro blog, Adam provides insightful articles on everything from historical analysis to the intricacies of healthcare policies. In his downtime, he enjoys historical documentaries and volunteering at local clinics.

How to Write a Character Analysis Essay?

14 August, 2020

14 minutes read

Author:  Kate Smith

A character analysis essay is one of the most complicated academic assignments that students usually write for Literature or English classes. Generally, this kind of essay writing requires you to describe the character in the context of the story. This can be done through the analysis of the relationship between the major and secondary characters or through your personal opinion of a particular character.

So, there is something you should learn before getting down to work. What is a character analysis and how to approach it? Let’s try to find the answers in the information below.

What is a Character Analysis?

A character analysis is a kind of essay where you examine behaviors, motivations, and actions of characters. Also, a character analysis is an in-depth assignment that makes you think critically about one or more characters and make judgements after analyzing the text. In most cases, it is used for the analysis of literary works. This form of academic writing involves personalities’ descriptions and conflicts with others they experience throughout a story. This analysis aims to provide a critical assessment of characters and build up conclusions based on the storyline. You may analyze a personality through his or her behavioral patterns or internal and external conflicts.

When you’re asked to write a character analysis, you must look at that story from a different angle. How? This is not your average reading for fun. Your task is to focus on the character synopsis and everything that’s associated with the people involved in the story.

Aim of a Character Analysis

A character analysis aims to evaluate a character’s traits, their functions, and the conflicts they have to deal with throughout the story. During the analysis, you will need to think critically, ask questions, and make conclusions about the character. To make your analysis informative, you will have to go beyond available descriptions that are written by the author. To understand the meaning of every event, phrase, and action, you will have to read between the lines. Don’t be afraid of using some additional resources if you feel like knowing more about the epoch a character lives in. If you want to gain an alternative opinion about a character, do not hesitate to find out your friends’ or internet users’ thoughts. Thus, thorough research may help you develop some creative ideas that will add great value to your future paper.

General Types of Characters

You should have a deep understanding of a character before starting an in-depth analysis. While a good character has many sides, there are some standard features to be considered:

• Protagonist: Being the main figure in a story, this character has the whole plot based on their life, actions, events, and feelings.
• Antagonist: Being a villain in a story, this character is positioned as the opposite figure to the major hero. Their basic nature remains negative, which makes them even more interesting than the main character. An antagonist plays a significant role even in short stories.
• Major: This character dominates the story. While they are not the main one in the story, they are involved in all the events.
• Minor: This character appears in a story from time to time. Their role may be significant for the plot development, but then they may disappear for some time and pop up again.
• Dynamic and static characters: The existence of these two opposite characters is determined by their reflection of each other’s specifications. While one character of a story goes through an internal or external transformation, another one may have their basic characteristics unchanged. There is a common idea that an evolving character tends to be more interesting than a static one. However, you can also analyze a static character from the perspective that they are not sympathetic, smart, or deep enough to learn their lessons. Or on the contrary, they remain strong enough and can resist the system without going under it.
• Stereotypical: If you are familiar with stereotypes, you will know what type of character is meant here. Generally, this particular character serves as the representation of the social, national, as well as demographic background of the story.
• Foils: The main goal of this hero in the story is to stay in contrast with main characters and a protagonist in order to highlight the features of the main character.
• Multi-dimensional characters: This group of characters involves an unlimited number of personalities. They are one-dimensional characters in the story who usually are not particularly interesting for the reader or viewer and do not play a crucial role in the storyline.

How Do You Start a Character Analysis Essay?

Before you start writing, you may wonder how to do a character analysis. Of course, you need to select a character to describe. In some cases, your professor will give you a character to talk about. By reading a story several times, you may notice the tiniest details. Ideally, you can use a highlighter or marker to mark each spot where your character is mentioned. Here are some more details of how to start with a character analysis:

• Take notes while reading. Take notes by highlighting every significant element of the story.
• Introduce your character. Introduce your character by providing their detailed description.
• Describe your character. Provide a smooth transition from the general description of your character to the point of convergence of the story.
• Build up a thesis statement. Finish the presentation with your paper’s proposal.

Main Points of a Character Analysis

When you need to analyze one character, you can make it from the perspective of several types at once. The character’s ability to change can create an additional source of analysis. At the same time, the complex and changing personality will be more interesting for the detailed analysis. To make it easier to work with such characters, you should focus on their characteristics, namely their importance for a story, actions, events, and so on. In most cases, you have to cover three major points:

Personality

Reveal the main features of a character to provide the reader with a portrait. By adding some facts and descriptions of actions, you will enable a deeper understanding of the analyzed hero. There is no need to use some words with broad meanings like “bad,” “nice,” “honest,” etc.

Role in a story

Describe the importance of the particular character in the context of the general story. Also, you should pay attention to their actions and their ability to move the events forward.

Character development

Analyze the changes the character has gone through and what features they have now. You should focus on the progress of a person, even if it is regressive.

Character Analysis Outline

In the character analysis essay outline, you should describe two or maybe even three specific character categories. Your mission is to describe the personality of the character, their function in the story, and the value they have.

• Describe the personality of the character. The reader gets familiar with the characters of the story through the words the characters use, the emotions they express, and the actions they take. It is quite easy to build up an opinion about the personality of a character through the prism of their outward behaviors. Eventually, you will understand that the character fits into one of the character categories mentioned above.
• Explore the character’s role . While writing a character analysis, it is important to describe the role of that character in detail. Apart from expressing unique character traits, the character will also perform a specific function in the story. Whether it will be the major or minor role, the analysis should address all the aspects of the performed role.
• Outline the growth and development of the character . In order to write a professional analysis, you will explain how the character matures and transforms as the plot progresses.

The majority of characters will have to go through particular transformations until the end of the story. You should pay special attention to whether the character becomes better or worse, stronger or weaker, rich or poor. Mention any areas or scenes where these transformations occur. In the story, you will recognize them from the cues like “it was then that she understood…” or “for the first time in months, he…”

Do you need a more detailed analysis of your character?

To make your analysis essay correct, you need to explore your character deeply. If you set some points you will follow in your work, you will manage to be consequential in your analysis. So here are some crucial nuances you should remember to describe the character:

You should focus on the reasons that make the character in a story to make a particular decision or take a specific action. You have an opportunity to explore the rightfulness of those actions as well as their reasonability. While you are asked to express your thoughts about certain events and feelings, you should be objective by looking beyond the cover.

Every action taken by a character can say a lot about his/her personality. You should not skip any events because it can be important for the general story and reveal some info about the character, his/her attitude to things, etc.

You should pay attention to the words the person uses because they can say a lot about their personality. Their accents and phrases may provide you with valuable information about nationality, social status, education, or even age of a character.

Descriptions

There are two major sources of the description: from other people in a story and the author. The author can provide the reader with one attitude and description of the major character, while secondary heroes in a story may describe them from their own perspective. At that point, their conclusions may be totally different, yet they’ll provide you with an understanding of the person’s nature.

The way people refer to a person also determines the features of a character. They may have nicknames or other names that will demonstrate their background and the attitude of other characters toward them. You can also define the origin as well as other important nuances.

Character Analysis Examples

By using a readymade character analysis example, you can concentrate on the creative process itself. Here are some nice examples of written character analysis based on a couple of popular stories:

https://literatureessaysamples.com/joe-gargerys-character-analysis/

http://jmendelis.blogspot.com/p/sample-character-analysis-essay.html

Popular Topics for Character Analysis

• Hamlet Character Analysis
• The Crucible Character Analysis
• Macbeth Character Analysis
• Ophelia Character Analysis
• Iago Character Analysis
• 12 Angry Men Character Analysis
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• Lady Macbeth Character Analysis
• Atticus Finch Character Analysis
• Romeo Character Analysis
• Antigone Character Analysis
• Victor Frankenstein Character Analysis
• Pride And Prejudice Character Analysis
• Machinal By Sophie Treadwell Character Analysis
• Of Mice And Men Character Analysis
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• Desdemona Character Analysis
• Fahrenheit 451 Character Analysis
• Willy Loman Character Analysis
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• The Things They Carried Character Analysis
• A Rose For Emily Character Analysis
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• Boo Radley Character Analysis
• 13 Reasons Why Character Analysis
• King Lear Character Analysis
• Jay Gatsby Character Analysis
• Blanche Dubois Character Analysis
• Oedipus Character Analysis
• Claudius Character Analysis

Tips on Writing a Character Analysis from Handmadewriting Experts

Whether you follow a character analysis template yourself or ask a professional essay writer to complete this paper for you, you should not forget the common principles of work. Luckily, Handmadewriting’s specialists always follow the standard rules for character analysis writing:

• Support all your statements with evidence. Y ou should incorporate evidence for every single point you make, although it must be relevant to the story. By means of quotes taken from the story, you can easily support your ideas and increase your credibility.
• Point, illustrate, and explain. The so-called PIE method is a must for character analysis writing. Make sure to make a point, integrate quotations to support it, and explain how every quote creates the point.
• Use your own words to anchor the quote. A quotation should not be left alone in the sentence. You need to explain the eligibility of this quote and its meaning.
• Do not overuse quotes. You are allowed to use up to 10% of quotations in an academic paper, so remember this number. If you overuse quotes, you can hardly hope for a good grade.

Are you ready to proceed with your character analysis paper? Once you learn all writing rules and tips, you will be able to finish an excellent paper before the set deadline.

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How to Write a Character Analysis

Last Updated: May 15, 2024 Fact Checked

This article was co-authored by Jamie Korsmo, PhD . Jamie Korsmo is a Ph.D. candidate in English at Georgia State University. There are 7 references cited in this article, which can be found at the bottom of the page. This article has been fact-checked, ensuring the accuracy of any cited facts and confirming the authority of its sources. This article has been viewed 760,457 times.

Learning how to write a character analysis requires a thorough reading of the literary work with attention to what the author reveals about the character through dialogue, narrative, and plot. A literary analyst writes about the role each character plays in the work. The protagonist is the most important character, while the character who plays the villain in the conflict with the main character is called the antagonist. Great writers create characters with many facets, so character analysis should focus on these complexities. Here are a few things to keep in mind as you write your own character analysis.

Getting Started

• For example, if you are reading Mark Twain's classic Huckleberry Finn , you might consider choosing Huck or the runaway slave, Jim, because they are dynamic characters who show a wide range of emotion, who often act in unpredictable ways, and who move the plot forward with their actions.
• It might be less effective to choose the duke or the king, the tricksters Huck and Jim meet in Arkansas, because they have fairly minor roles in the story, they don't show a wide range of emotions, and, more than anything, they're simply stock characters (the story needs a humorous detour and a way for Jim and Huck to be separated, so that Huck can have his infamous All right, then, I'll go to hell! moment, and the duke and the king fulfill that role).

• For the Huck Finn example, you might think about how Huck is described as a backwoods boy, but he clearly wrestles with larger issues that have complex social implications - like slavery and religion.
• Think about how Huck relates to runaway slave Jim, both in the beginning of the novel and at the end. Think about Huck's relationship with his drunk, abusive father and how it shaped his identity.
• Huck is the main character, so obviously his actions are important. But what, specifically, is special about the way Huck acts? How does he make different decisions than someone else in the same situation might? You could talk about how Huck decides to rescue Jim from the people who intend to return him to his owner because he decides that slavery is wrong, even though this idea contradicts everything society has taught him.
• Think about how Huck grows and learns throughout the story. In the beginning, he is more likely to get caught up in schemes (like faking his own death); but later on, he avoids the trickery he observes (like when he tries to ditch the deceptive duke and king).

• You can also keep a notebook handy while you're reading to help you keep track of your thoughts about the character as you read.

• For the Huck Finn example, you might choose something about the hypocrisy of civilized society since, in essence, the novel is about a boy who was brought up to support enslaving blacks, but decides, through his experiences with Jim on the river, to value Jim as a person and a friend rather than just as a slave. Similarly, Huck's own father captures and "enslaves" Huck, a situation that Huck eventually escapes and mirrors Jim's own quest for freedom. Society views Huck's escape as moral and just, but Jim's escape is a terrible crime to the townspeople. In this contradiction lies a major crux of the story.

• An outline will help keep your thoughts organized and maintain an effective flow as you move through the analysis.

Writing the Character Analysis

• Your introduction should provide the topic of your analysis, enough background information to inform and intrigue your reader, and your thesis idea/claim.

• Think about Huck's ragged clothes and what that says about his character. Discuss how Huck dresses up like a little girl to find out the news in town and how this altered appearance influences your analysis of Huck.

• Discuss Huck's relationship with his father and with the Widow Douglas and Miss Watson, who take him in. How do these characters influence Huck's development? The contrast between Huck's alcoholic father and the conservative ladies who care for Huck later is an interesting continuum of social behavior to analyze and consider where Huck's own beliefs/actions fall on that continuum.

• Huck has an admittedly vulgar attitude for a little boy and often does not speak in a way that the Widow Douglas approves of. He does try hard to obey her and act appropriately in church, but he often missteps and announces himself, through his actions and words, as a person who is far less civilized than he pretends to be, or than the Widow would like him to be.

• Huck Finn tries to abide by the rules of society, but at the end of the day he acts based on emotions. He decides to rescue Jim from being returned to his master, even though it is against the law, because he believes that Jim does not deserve to be treated like a slave. Huck decides this on his own, in direct opposition to the values his society has taught him.

• Huck's external conflict relies on all of the events that take place on his journey down the river - the physical struggle of the trip, his mishaps along the way, getting caught up in various scandals and schemes, etc. His internal conflict reaches its climax when Huck decides to help Jim attain freedom from slavery. This is a crucial moment in the story where Huck follows his heart instead of his social conscience.

Using Evidence in Your Writing

• Using quotes from the text will increase your credibility as an author and will support your ideas more effectively.

• For example, you might say the following: Huck Finn garners a significant new identity from being a raftsman. He insists, "It amounted to something being a raftsman on such a craft as that." This shows the freedom and pride he associates with his raft.

• Incorrect: "It amounted to something being a raftsman on such a craft as that."
• Correct: He insists that "It amounted to something being a raftsman on such a craft as that."
• Correct: "It amounted to something being a raftsman on such a craft as that," Huck insists.

Writing Help

Community Q&A

• Write a rough draft to gather your thoughts about the analysis before polishing your work for submission. Thanks Helpful 5 Not Helpful 0
• Organize the analysis carefully. Write an introduction that will attract a reader to your work. Make sure that each paragraph is unified around a central topic. Tie your work together with a polished conclusion. Thanks Helpful 3 Not Helpful 0
• Use specific details from the text to support every point. Thanks Helpful 4 Not Helpful 2

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• ↑ https://grammar.yourdictionary.com/grammar/writing/how-to-write-a-character-analysis.html
• ↑ https://www.germanna.edu/wp-content/uploads/tutoring/handouts/Literary-Analysis.pdf
• ↑ https://www.tcc.edu/wp-content/uploads/archive/writing-center-handouts/essay-types-character-analysis-essay.pdf
• ↑ https://writingcenter.unc.edu/tips-and-tools/film-analysis/
• ↑ https://examples.yourdictionary.com/character-trait-examples.html
• ↑ https://purdueglobalwriting.center/paragraph-development-with-pie-2/
• ↑ https://writingcenter.uagc.edu/quoting-paraphrasing-summarizing

About This Article

To write a character analysis, first you'll need to come up with a main idea, or thesis statement, for your character, like "Huck Finn embodies the struggles of growing up as a young boy." Then, you'll want to write about each facet of your character, like their appearance, background, personality, relationships, and growth throughout the story, and explain how they prove your thesis. As you're writing your analysis, try to use quotes and examples from the text to back up what you're saying. To learn how to outline a character analysis, scroll down! Did this summary help you? Yes No

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• How to Write a Character Analysis Essay

How to Write a Character Analysis Essay: A Comprehensive Guide

By: Angelina Grin

Character analysis

Character analysis is the process of critically examining and interpreting a fictional or non-fictional character within a narrative, play, novel, film, or any work of literature or storytelling. It involves a comprehensive evaluation of the character's personality, motivations, development, and impact on the story's plot and themes.

Step 1: Choose Your Individual for Analysis

Starting with the basics: writing a character analysis overview, delving into personality traits: the core of character analysis, step 3: understanding internal vs. external traits, character arcs: transformation, growth, or regression, key events that influence the character's evolution, how challenges and conflicts shape the role, how setting influences a character's behavior and decisions, the impact of cultural, social, and historical backgrounds, how a character speaks: tone, choice of words, and mannerisms, actions that define a character: brave acts, betrayals, and sacrifices, objects or symbols associated with the character, recurring themes or patterns linked to the character, how the character stands out or blends in, the significance of character dynamics, step 9: conclude with the overall impact, pro tips for stellar character analysis essays, building the perfect character analysis, what does it mean to analyze a character, what is the purpose of a character analysis, how to write an essay about a character, can i analyze more than one character in an analysis essay, how to start a character analysis in an essay, are there any pitfalls i should avoid, how do i write a character analysis in middle school.

During a character analysis, one seeks to understand the character's internal and external traits, such as their beliefs, values, emotions, behaviors, and relationships with other characters. It aims to uncover the character's strengths, weaknesses, desires, fears, and the evolution of their personality throughout the narrative.

A well-executed character analysis not only reveals the character's multifaceted nature but also provides insights into the author's intentions, the story's underlying themes, and the broader cultural or societal context in which the character exists. Character analysis enhances the reader's or viewer's appreciation of the narrative by shedding light on the character's role in advancing the plot and conveying profound messages about human nature, society, or the human condition.

Character evaluation is the first step to a great analysis. The role or persona you choose for your analysis is crucial to its success. Primary characters are sometimes easier to write since they have well-defined personalities, and their motivations may be evident. Secondary characters can be just as interesting to write, but getting the right evidence within the text to support one's position might be challenging.

The character's significance in the story also plays a part in whether analyzing the persona will be easy or difficult. Important characters have more depth to them that's easily seen. Less significant players require a greater understanding of the background story and setting. Typically, several types show up in a story:

• Protagonist: Also known as the "main character," protagonists drive the narrative. Analyzing their development, motivations, and role in advancing the plot is often richly rewarding.
• Antagonist: The primary opposition to the protagonist, antagonists offer insights into their motivations and the reasons behind their opposition.
• Deuteragonist: These key supporting characters offer perspective and context, enriching the story's depth.
• Tertiary Characters: Smaller roles can still provide unique insights and are worth considering based on their impact on the plot.
• Romantic Interest: A romantic interest's analysis explores their influence on the protagonist and their own personality development.
• Confidant: These characters offer emotional support and guidance, shedding light on the protagonist's inner world.
• Foil: Foil characters highlight the central role's qualities and flaws, aiding in their development.

Another method of separating characters is by their quality. An individual will fall into one of these groups:

• Dynamic: A dynamic character undergoes significant internal changes during the story, and their analysis explores the events and decisions driving this transformation.
• Static: In contrast, static characters remain relatively unchanged. Analyzing them focuses on their consistency and the impact of their steadfastness on the story.
• Stock: Stock characters often adhere to familiar archetypes or stereotypes. Analyzing characters involves exploring how they conform to or subvert these expected roles.
• Symbolic: Symbolic characters represent abstract concepts, values, or themes. Their analysis delves into the deeper meaning and associations they bring to the narrative.

Each persona type offers a unique perspective, allowing you to uncover the layers of complexity that make literary and cinematic characters so fascinating. A character analysis example would offer a great format to see what each of these character types looks like.

Step 2: How to Start a Character Analysis Essay

How do you start a character analysis essay? The blank page is a difficult place for a student to start, but an outline can help arrange your thoughts. Starting your character analysis means looking at the existing work and deciding what parts of the story accentuate or support your decisions on the character's personality.

• Physical Description: Is your character short, tall, or medium-built? Does he or she have muscles? This description should be more than skin-deep; it should capture essential details, such as appearance, gestures, or personal style. These features may offer insights into the character's personality or the author's intentions.
• Role in the Story: Outline the character's role within the narrative. Are they the protagonist, antagonist, supporting role, or something more complex? Summaries of this role provide context for their actions and development.
• Relationship with Other Characters: Characters do not exist in isolation. Discuss the character's views and relationships with other key figures in the story. Take note of significant interactions, conflicts, or connections, as these relationships often influence personality development. In what directions does the character’s decisions drive the other players?

To analyze characteristics, you might be inclined to ask a few questions, such as:

• What is the Value of Your Character? Consider why the individual is essential to the story. How do they contribute to the plot's progression or thematic development? Identifying their value will help you delve into their significance.
• Is Your Character Friends with Anyone? Explore the persona's friendships, as these relationships can reveal their true nature and motivations. Analyze the dynamics of these friendships through a character summary, considering whether they're genuine or superficial.
• By the Time the Story Ends, Has Your Character Learned Anything? Investigate the role's growth and development throughout the narrative. Have they gained wisdom, overcome challenges, or evolved in any way? This transformation can be a focal point of your analysis.
• What Has Been Your Character's Main Transformation Throughout the Narrative? Beyond learning, identify the persona's primary transformation. This could be a change in beliefs, values, or traits. Understanding their journey is vital to a thorough analysis.
• What Motivates Your Character? Delve into the role's motivations and desires. What drives them to act in specific ways? Examining their inner motives can uncover deeper layers of their personality.
• How Does the Setting Influence Your Character? Sometimes, a character's surroundings significantly impact their actions and development. Assess how the story's setting interacts with your character's choices and behavior.

These questions show how to analyze a character to figure out the most critical parts of the individual under analysis and develop their report in a more well-rounded way.

What is the personality of the role you've chosen for your character analysis? Personality traits differ from person to person, and so, too, they differ from individual to individual. How to analyze characters using personality traits is pivotal to gaining a profound understanding of a person's psychological nuances.

Characterization may be divided into internal and external traits. Internal traits pertain to a character's inner qualities, such as beliefs, values, emotions, and thought processes. They influence decision-making and personal growth throughout the story. On the other hand, external traits encompass a character's outward behaviors, actions, and physical manifestations of their personality. Both dimensions play a vital role in shaping the character's identity.

Character analysis examples will show one or more of these traits as core elements of a character’s personality. By realizing a narrator has these traits, an analysis can discern what an individual is thinking as they perform an action. This makes the persona's decisions and thought process far more "real".

Step 4: Analyze Character Development: How to Do a Character Analysis Through Evolution

Analyzing character development is the most critical way we examine how a role grows and evolves over the course of the story. In a character analysis, you should look at personality arcs, the events that induce their development (or regression), and the impact of their challenges and conflicts.

Character arcs are the trajectories that characters follow, often culminating in transformation, growth, or regression. They represent the role's journey from the story's beginning to its conclusion. Understanding the type of arc a persona experiences, whether a hero's journey of self-discovery or a descent into villainy, provides a lens through which to analyze their actions and decisions.

Identifying pivotal events within the narrative is critical to character analysis. These events can be turning points that alter the role's trajectory. It's essential to scrutinize the impact of these events on the character's beliefs, values, and motivations. For instance, the loss of a loved one, a personal triumph, or a moral dilemma can all catalyze significant changes. Recognizing these moments helps chart the individual's development.

No well-rounded persona is complete without some conflict that plays on their feelings and behavior. The adversity they face can range from internal struggles to external opposition. The individual's response to these challenges, whether they overcome them, are changed by them, or succumb to them, indicates their growth or regression. Examining how characters adapt, learn, or grapple with adversity reveals their resilience, vulnerabilities, and capacity for change.

A character analysis can be built by examining these crucial elements of a persona, looking at where they start and end, and following the decisions that drive their conflict and resolution. By following the characters closely on their journey, one can gain a sense of appreciation for all they went through to get to the culmination of their arc.

Step 5: The Role of Environment in Writing Character Analysis

Whether it's a high fantasy novel or a play set in 1930s Georgia, a role's actions and decisions are driven by their environment. The prevailing social, cultural, and, at times, political climate may be more than just window dressing for a literary work or a film. It's essential to understand that characters don't exist in a vacuum, and the environment is as crucial to understanding their story as is their personalities.

The physical environment, or setting, can significantly impact a person's actions and choices. The story's location, climate, or specific places may influence a character's behavior. For instance, a character raised in a bustling city may exhibit different traits and make different decisions than one raised in a remote rural area. For instance, it's understandable that a protagonist from a poor Chicago family in the 1920s would subject himself to physical harm to ensure he could have a job during an economic depression. Yet that same decision would make no sense in a wealthy family of the same era. Analyzing the setting allows a deeper understanding of why a character behaves the way they do.

Cultural values, traditions, and norms influence their beliefs and actions. Social status, family dynamics, and community ties can determine their roles and relationships. Historical contexts, such as war, economic crises, or political movements, play a significant role in character development. For instance, a character who grew up during the Second World War may exhibit different traits and motivations than one who grew up as the child of a royal family in 17th-century Europe.

Analyzing a character's background within these contexts helps readers and viewers understand the character's identity and the constraints or opportunities that influence their decisions and evolution.

Incorporating the environment into character analysis adds depth and complexity to the examination, revealing the intricate interplay between characters and their world and providing valuable insights into the character's behavior and decisions.

Step 6: Dialogue and Actions in a Character Analysis: Unveiling the True Essence

Most well-defined characters have different layers of personality folded in on itself. To view the true essence of an individual, an analysis must examine how the persona speaks with others and the actions they take that impact other people in the setting.

A character's dialogue is a rich source of insights. Their tone—whether it's sarcastic, earnest, or timid—sheds light on their emotions and attitudes. Their choice of words, such as a formal language or slang preference, reflects their background and education. Mannerisms, like stuttering, nervous tics, or assertive body language, offer cues about their inner struggles and self-confidence. Scrutinizing these aspects of speech illuminates the character's true nature.

A character's actions, whether acts of courage, betrayal, or sacrifice, define their essence. Courageous deeds demonstrate their values and convictions. Betrayals reveal moral complexity or flaws in the persona. Sacrifices demonstrate selflessness or inner conflicts. Character analysis is the process of deducing a person's essential beliefs, their malleability, and the overarching themes of a story from their behavior.

Step 7: Symbolism and Motifs: Key Elements in How to Do a Character Analysis

Authors have always favored symbols instead of blatantly stating something about the role. "Showing, not telling" makes for compelling works, offers us commentary without being open about it, and also gives us a bit of work to unravel the symbolism each persona may carry with them.

Objects or symbols that recur throughout a character's interactions can hold deep meaning. For instance, a character's prized possession, like a family heirloom, can represent their values and connections. One of the most stunning expressions of this is the river in Huckleberry Finn as a symbol of freedom and escape from bondage. Analyzing these symbols within a paragraph or two helps unveil the character's significance in the story and their emotional attachments.

Recurring themes and patterns that revolve around a role provide a window into their role and development. These motifs can encompass elements like repeated actions, words, or situations. One of the more modern instances of this is the use of the Litany Against Fear in Frank Herbert's Dune series. By identifying and interpreting these motifs, character analysis can expose the character's personal growth, impact on others, and broader relevance to the narrative's themes and messages.

Step 8: Compare and Contrast: Enhancing Your Character Analysis Through Dynamics

The compare and contrast approach helps to make for a richer analysis, especially for college-level reports. By focusing on the characters' dynamics and their interaction with their society, we can derive particular insights into the character's mind and behaviors.

Comparing the individual to others in the story can be helpful in illuminating their uniqueness. It highlights distinctive traits, values, and behaviors that set them apart or make them blend in with the narrative's world. This distinction can reveal the character's individuality or their role as a representative of a specific group or archetype.

Exploring character dynamics—how they interact with other characters in a book or film—holds a mirror to their personality and development. Comparing these interactions can unveil power struggles, alliances, and emotional bonds. The significance of these dynamics lies in their impact on the character's evolution, their influence on the plot, and the broader thematic implications for the narrative.

The character's profound influence on the world, the plot, and the other personas should form the basis for your analysis's conclusion. Their place in driving the action forward should be highlighted. Moreover, the emotional impact on the reader or viewer should be emphasized, highlighting how the character's journey, personality, and interactions resonated. Whether it's admiration, empathy, or a sense of closure, examining the character's ability to evoke emotions and engage the audience adds a meaningful dimension to the character analysis, underscoring their enduring significance within the story.

• Provide Evidence: Back your analysis with specific examples from the text or source material to support your claims. Ideally, reference a certain scene if possible.
• Consider Conflicting Traits: Acknowledge contradictions or inconsistencies in the character's behavior, as these can reveal depth and complexity. A good character analysis paper example can help you see how this is done.
• Stay Objective: Your analysis should be done from the point of view of an impassionate researcher, even if the topic is one that is close to your heart.
• Relate to Themes: Discuss how the character's traits, actions, and development relate to broader themes in the work based on your research.
• Compare and Contrast: Compare the character to others in the narrative to highlight unique qualities and relationships.
• Maintain Focus: Stay focused on the character and their impact, avoiding excessive summary of the plot or storyline.
• Don't Overthink: Sometimes, all it takes to see a character's place in a story is to examine the story around the character.

The steps mentioned above will give you a general idea of what your character analysis should look like. However, each character is unique, and each character review will touch on different topics, themes, and interactions. A deep character analysis not only helps you understand the character but also helps to put their struggle and conflict in perspective. To truly understand the art of good character analysis, you should try with a few characters from your favorite books. Reach out to some of the genres that you don't usually read and analyze them. With practice comes perfection.

To start a character analysis in an essay, begin by introducing the character you will analyze, including their name, the work they appear in, and their role in the story. You might start with a compelling description or quote that encapsulates the character's essence. Briefly mention the context of the story and how the character fits into it, including any significant relationships or conflicts. End the introduction with a thesis statement that outlines the main traits or development of the character that you'll be exploring in your analysis.

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A character analysis is a type of essay that requires you to analyze and evaluate the characteristics, traits, motivations, and decisions of a literary character. It involves closely examining such aspects as their personality, thoughts, behavior, and development. You should further explain how a character contributes to the overall meaning of the work.

When writing a character analysis essay, it is important to think critically and look beyond basic understanding of the character. For example, instead of simply describing their physical traits or explaining what happens in the plot, focus on how the characters think, feel, and interact with other characters. Examine the motivations behind their decisions and actions, as well as how they reflect a larger theme or idea in the work. 

In this blog, we will explain how to write a character analysis essay. You will find a strtucture, outline and step-by-step guidelines along with examples.

If you don’t have much time for reading, we’ve got an easy solution for you. Entrust your assignment to essay writing services by StudyCrumb and get a custom paper tailored to your specific requirements.  

What Is a Character Analysis Essay?

The main task of a character analysis essay is showing in detail key characteristics and certain person’s traits. Essay includes not just ordinary situations. It shows possible occasions for describing fictives fully and circumstantial. This type of essay helps understand how a hero will act in this or that situation, why would he do so, what were his reasons for these deeds? Analysis helps in figuring out what role a person plays in a story: great one or just secondary. Moreover, knowing the needed words of an analysis essay will enlarge students’ spoken literature.  

What Is a Purpose of Character Analysis Essay?

Main purpose of a character analysis essay is helping the reader understand who's the bad one and who is among the good guys. This helps catch the idea of the story from the beginning. Knowing how a hero acts in this or that separate case, speaks a lot about his point of view. Essay divides all characters into main and minor ones. Detailed character analysis essay helps readers understand the nature of personages from an early beginning. Very often the story has several chapters, so the reader could discover much about a certain person from his doings/opinions.  

Types of Character Using in Character Analysis Essay

While writing a character analysis essay, students have to remember two central personages: protagonist (key person) and antagonist. These are the main ones. The most striking roles are divided between them. Additional (minor) figures:  

• confidante.

Each hero has special traits and behaviors. The round one is described as a person of passion having depth in feelings. Foil one is opposite one to positive, main one. Flat one is another side of round one: no vivid emotions, no changes while the story is being told. Use our  college essay writing service to turn in the best character analysis your instructor has ever seen.

Protagonist — The Main Character

Protagonist in character analysis essays is the main story’s hero. This is a person all situations revolve around. They are the bearer of truth, the spokesman for the author's ideas, the main drive behind the plot. They don't have to even be a positive hero. After all, there is also an antihero - a protagonist with morally ambiguous or straight-up negative traits. Protagonist is a key figure, all other personages are considered minor ones. For better understanding of the protagonist, consider these examples: Romeo and Juliet, Katniss («Hunger Games»), Harry Potter, MacBeth. You can also consider Walter White («Breaking Bad»), Dexter Morgan («Dexter») and Hannibal Lecter («The Silence of the Lambs») to be antiheroes. All these examples are dynamic.  

Antagonist — Character in the Opposite Position

Antagonist in character analysis essays is an opposite one to the protagonist. This type of character belongs to the dark side. Often, this can be a jealous, envious, bad, villain gossip person. They don't have to be the one ruining good protagonist’s plans, but they alway get in hero's way. Actually, there may even be more than one antagonist who may become hindrance for the protagonist. And if they are neutral in present, in the nearest future they will show their nature. Opposition between both protagonists and antagonists is clearly seen throughout the whole story. There is, of course, a catch. As with protagonists, there's more to know about antagonists' traits. After all, an anti-villain is also a thing! Basically it's when an antagonist has some heroic traits or can be sympathized with. One can also say that it's that type of person who has good intentions or their goal is pretty good, but their methods took a very wrong turn at some point. Othello, Captain Hook and Lord Voldemort — great antagonists’ examples. And those like John Silver, Khan («Star Trek») and Erik Lensherr («The X-Man») can be called anti-villain basically.  

Major Characters

Major characters in character analysis essays are those who create a story. They play main (and clearly - important) parts, and have key roles. They make a so-called key set of personages. They are close confidants to the protagonist. If some conflict appears, major figures are mentioned first. Robinson Crusoe is a bright example.

Minor Characters

Minor characters in character analysis essays are often called supporting. They are important, but rarely are described in the story as key ones. This kind of fictives is represented by Yoda, Samwise Gamgee, Jabba the Hutt. They don’t remarkably influence the actual plot. Why flat? Because of no vivid progression.

Dynamic Characters

Talking about dynamic characters in character analysis essays - Shrek is a fine example. He is a dynamic personage because he changes: becomes softer and opens his heart to people. Fictives like him influence the story and make changes in the course of events. Their main feature: they change and grow throughout the story, making the reader sympathize with them. Another good example: Aladdin, Merida, Simba, Anakin Skywalker.

Static Characters

Static characters in character analysis essays do not change throughout whole story. They remain the same with their thoughts and opinions. Static personages are best described with the likes of Indiana Jones, Robin Hood, Sherlock Holmes. These personages are positive ones - though, unchangeable. Their points of view and tastes remain identical until a story ends.

Foils in character analysis essays are based on stereotypes and are opposite of main heroes. They have several key characteristics: they are wicked, distracted, conniving and scrooge. At the same time main personages are principled, focused, generous, and well-meaning. Foils are depressed and pessimistic, while main heroes — optimistic, kind, and good.

How to Analyze Characters in Character Analysis Essay?

While writing a character analysis essay, you should give a hero a general picture. Description has to grab appearance peculiarities and traits. Students must depict whether personage is good or bad. Are they pessimists or optimists? Do they have negative or positive thoughts? There are 3 main steps for analysis:  

• Describing personality.
• Determining type of protagonist.
• Defining role in story.

To explore tiny personage’s quirks, all characteristics are taken into account. Just like in any  literary analysis essay , you will need to pay special attention to literary devices that help reveal the true nature of a character.  

How to Write a Character Analysis Essay Outline?

Character analysis essay outline includes 3 main parts: introduction, body, conclusion. Below you can find short description to understand some peculiarities:

• Introduction should be meaningful and brief. After reading this piece, essay’s idea should be understood.
• Main body is one that should be divided into paragraphs with described main heroes. It should give detailed answers to different questions concerning personality and appearance. Pay attention, separate paragraph depicts what we learn from hero or situation.
• Conclusion is the one where you should draw the final line of analysis. Summarize points you've given above, loop to your thesis statement or give your reader some food for thought. Just remember that this section should be brief.

Additionally, it will be good to write how a situation changed because of main hero's influence.

How to Write a Character Analysis Essay?

Instruction for writing character analysis essays is based on several steps. First, read a story carefully to find a person whom you are interested in. After reading the book, students should be able to completely grasp a key idea. Next steps include:

• choosing dynamic hero ;
• taking notes;
• defining main idea;
• answering analysis questions.

Concerning last point, think over next questions:

• What is hero's value?
• What kind of emotions does your hero go through?
• Does personage have a profound impact on plot?
• What are relationships between heroes and other significant figures?

Understanding an effect that main hero has on plot, it is easy to grasp the meaning the author put in their work.

How to Begin a Character Analysis Essay?

Character analysis essay introduction is the first step to start. It should describe whole essay in miniature. It's kind of a catchy hook for readers to get interested and proceed to explore chosen book. Introduction shows a completely full story in several paragraphs. To show all necessary information, make use of the thesis statement. These are rounded with text. It is fine to describe some catchy scenes and episodes to fuel readers’ interest.  

Character Analysis Essay Body Paragraphs?

While introduction is a grand way to actually introduce the hero, character analysis essay body goal is identification of main personages features. Body should depict:

• Hero’s personality and physical appearance.
• Conflicts and ways of overcoming them.
• Lessons readers should learn.
• Meaning behind hero's actions.

Dynamic figure is key personage. Separate attention is given especially to them. Additional paragraph should describe a reader's feelings: what words are associated with a hero? Brave, modest, lucky, confident? Answers are key points to create a comprehensive description.

How to End a Character Analysis Essay?

How to write a conclusion paragraph for an essay ? Character analysis essay conclusion contains author’s point of view on course of events. Main ideas should be described shortly and clearly. Final part is a kind of review but with student's opinion. Lessons learned are described. For example, a story might teach how to live honestly, help poor people, feel merciful to others, etc. Remember that sheets’ personages teach us how to behave in real life. Many situations shown will be useful in everyday life. Hero’ deeds teach us how to cope with problems and find ways from tangled situations.  

Character Analysis Essays: Final Thoughts

A character analysis essay is used for composing lines between parallel personages. It shows the present course of events that will make sense in future. Important traits and characteristics that are depicted in the book. They have a hidden idea, some kind of lesson. Comprehensive analysis helps to understand the meaning the author wanted to shed light on. Knowing main heros’ personal characteristics helps to explain their behavior and world perception. Buy essays for college in case this assignment isn't what you wanted to do this evening.  

FAQs' for Character Analysis Essay

1. what is a good thesis statement for a character analysis essay.

Character analysis essay is saturated with essential messages. It appears at the end (in last sentence) of introductory paragraph. Its task is to inform reader about information they will get acquainted with. Every sentence has hidden meaning concerning heroes. Remember, introduction must be brief but meaningful. Student’s thesis statements should be specific — include only points that will be discussed. Good thesis statement should grab readers’ attention, make them read whole story.  

2. What kind of essay is character analysis?

A character analysis essay mostly deals with certain books’ personages, though, figures from cinematography are involved. Its task is to explain in-depth key features of personages. Antagonist and protagonist are main ones. There also exist additional ones. This kind of an essay explains behavior and state of mind. Personal traits and preferences also make up whole picture described.

3. How do you write a literary character analysis essay?

Character analysis essay demands describing chosen personage in detail. Firstly though, it is needed to determine personage’s type. Next step include turning to plot for showing examples. Students have to explain why personages decide do act that way, after all.

Daniel Howard is an Essay Writing guru. He helps students create essays that will strike a chord with the readers.

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Character Analysis Essay Guide: How to Write a Good Character Analysis Essay

Writing in high schools or colleges is one endless activity. And while it may be hectic and frustrating for some, to others, it is a sweet experience because essays provide opportunities for students to show their creativity.

A character analysis essay is one of the most essay types you will probably write, depending on your course. These pieces explain and expound on the characters in plays, cinemas, or other literary forms, but they all follow a similar pattern.

And if you’re looking for a guide to help you write your essay, look no further. I’ll walk you through some simple steps to write a character analysis essay.

Tips on How to Write a Good Character Analysis Essay

Writing a character analysis essay is much more than just describing a character. You must look at how that character’s actions affect the story and what it means for them.

Here are some tips on how to write a good character analysis essay.

Read the entire story

Before you start writing a character analysis, you must read the story from beginning to end. This will help you understand the characters better and give your essay more credibility and structure.

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Further, it helps you get an overall idea of what’s going on in the book or movie so that you know how much information is available about each character before writing your essay.

And even if you have ever read the story, reading it a subsequent time is still encouraged. This is because it helps you focus your mind on the characters, setting, or plot development. Generally, ensure you’re familiar with every detail of a character before beginning your essay.

Identify the character to analyze

An effective character analysis essay goes deep into detailing a specific character. And depending on your essay length, character choice will play a significant role.

If your professor requires a large word count, protagonists or antagonists are the best characters to choose from rather than minor characters. This is because the main characters have more details than the others.

However, you do not have to go for the protagonist. Instead, go for a dynamic character who undergoes several changes because it gives you more meat to write on.

Reread or rewatch the story with perspective on your character

Now that you have a clear idea of your story and what kind of character you’re writing about, it’s time to start thinking about how this character will move through space and time.

Further rereading the story with this character in mind helps you focus on them alone. Some of the questions to ask yourself in this stage include;

• Description of the character by the author
• What are the character’s actions?
• What is the relationship between the character and others?
• What are the character’s failures and successes?

Take notes identifying the central theme

As you read the story, take notes of important themes. The main theme is the story’s central idea and usually involves a problem or conflict that characters face and often resolves itself by the end of the story.

In addition, the central theme plays throughout all three acts of a play or novel, but they’re usually more apparent in Act 1 than in Acts 2 and 3 because those later acts mainly deal with plot complications and resolutions.

Outline and write the paper

Your paper consists of an introduction, body, and conclusion. The opening is a concise brief of the character in question and leads the reader to gain interest in reading the piece. On the other hand, the body has several sections, but it is a good idea to follow your instructor’s guidelines. At the same time, the conclusion ties everything together and summarizes your entire paper.

How Do You Analyze Characters in an Essay

Generally, analyzing a character entails identifying, determining their role, and understanding their actions. Further, you must explore their relationships with others, identify their traits, and finally identify how they evolve through the book or play.

These are six primary ways of analyzing characters in an essay. Let’s now look at each in detail.

• Character identification

This is a significant step, and you should classify your character as static or dynamic. Additionally, you should identify if they are primary or secondary characters.

• Role determination

After identifying the character, you should move to determine their role. If you go for the main character, it means their part is to bring out the theme, while the secondary characters’ role is to support the achievement of the theme.

• Identify the character’s mentioned roles

Next is to identify the mentioned character roles. Some aspects to help you include why the characters are antagonists or protagonists, their first actions in the story, and how they influence the story.

• Character’s relationships

This entails how the identified character relates with others and the significance of these relationships in the story.

• Identify personality traits

Traits of the character emanate from their actions and relationships. They may include bravery, self-centeredness, or generosity.

How to Write a Thesis Statement for a Character Analysis Essay

Writing a thesis statement for a character analysis essay entails four major steps. These are drawing a rough sketch of the characters, their main traits, role, and functions, and summing all these points into one sentence.

The thesis statement is the main idea of your paper, so it is vital to make sure that the thesis statement is specific, direct, and clear. The body paragraphs should support your thesis statement with specific examples. In other words, each body paragraph should provide support for your thesis statement.

For your statement to be effective, it must include all four mentioned parts. The first part describes the character’s appearance, actions, values, beliefs, and tendencies. It then comprises their relationship, role, and functions.

The role and function of the character will form the bulk of your thesis statement. And because the statement answers the why and how question, you should ensure you provide an entirely detailed explanation of the character’s role and functions and how it contributes to the theme and plot.

After having all these parts, it is time to sum them into one sentence.

How to Write the Introduction of a Character Analysis Essay

Writing the introduction of a character analysis essay is probably the most important because it determines if a reader will continue reading the paper or not. As such, following these steps will help you write the best introduction.

• Start with a quote

Quotes are one of the best ways to start an introduction. However, ensure they are related to the character’s trait. For example, if the character is generous, use a quote about generosity.

• Background information

Next is presenting the literature information. This is where you identify the character’s name, author, and title.

• Character introduction

Your introduction should then introduce the character being analyzed. Some of the information included here include their role, whether they are protagonist, antagonist, static, or dynamic.

Further, you should have a few lines giving a general look and description of this character.

• Have a broad assertion

This part of the introduction is the transition between the character description and the thesis statement. It also entails the central theme of the piece of literature being analyzed.

• Thesis statement

This is the last part of your introduction. It includes your fundamental assertion and thus should be clear. You can also highlight what you will cover in your body paragraphs.

How to Write the Body Paragraphs of a Character Analysis Essay

The body of a character analysis essay is also a significant part because it gives more details about the character. Each paragraph has a topic sentence and specific examples supporting the sentence. In addition, the topic sentence supports your thesis statement.

Further, the body paragraphs are where you will develop your analysis. Each body paragraph should have a topic sentence and specific examples from the work of literature to support that topic sentence.

If possible, include quotations from the text and paraphrases of what other people have said about the character in question.

As you write this section, some of the must-answer questions include the following;

• How does the character describe themselves?
• How do others describe the character?
• What does your character do, and how do they treat others?
• What motivates the character to behave in a specific way?
• What lessons can one learn from the character?
• Does the character encounter conflicts, and how do they solve them?
• What are the character’s appearance, background, and other physical features?

How to Write the Conclusion of Character Analysis Essay

This is the last part and involves three major areas; stating a summary of the entire essay, your opinions, and your thoughts and predictions. You can also note how the character is relevant in real-life situations.

Also see: How long should a conclusion be in an essay? 

Also, this is where you will elaborate on those points and explain why they are relevant to your topic. Any quotes from the source material that shows how well you understand the material being studied should also be included in this paragraph.

Further, the conclusion concludes the character’s role in the story, how they changed over time or why they were essential to the plot. You could also expand on other characters and how they relate to your character of choice.

Generally, your conclusion should have the following;

• Give your opinion on the character as well as their role in the book or movie;
• Mention what you have learned about this character
• Tell how your opinion changed after reading/watching the work
• Indicate what other people may think about this character and give your reasons why they might feel differently than you do
• The application on day-to-day life

How to Write a Character Analysis Essay: Step-by-Step Guide

Table of contents

• 1 What Is a Character Analysis Essay?
• 2.1 Protagonist
• 2.2 Antagonist
• 2.5 Dynamic
• 3.1 Introduction
• 3.3 Summary
• 4.1 Read up on the story
• 4.2 Decide on what character to choose
• 4.3 Outline your essay
• 4.4 Define the main idea
• 4.5 Make notes while reading
• 4.6 Compose a list of questions
• 5 Character Analysis Essay Example

Writing can be as interesting as communicating. You can provide your thoughts and in-depth analysis of a character you like. That’s why you can come across various writing assignments in high school or college, including an  analysis essay . Preparing such a work enables you to reveal your creativity and develop your ability to analyze and systemize information.

Like any other  essay types , a character analysis paper sticks to a particular structure and has a certain purpose. It also discloses a range of specific points you should take into account when putting words on paper. So, if you need help starting to write, you landed in the right place. Here, we uncover all you need to know on how to write a good character analysis article.

What Is a Character Analysis Essay?

A character analysis essay is worthy of putting effort into writing. This assignment involves a versatile description of a central character from a book, novel, or whatever storytelling. In such an essay, you must open the main personality traits you choose to write about.

Writing about a character, you should describe their inner world as well as their behavior, actions, and lifestyle. This is detailed work about a person you should study well. To be able to explain their particular behavioral line in the context of a story, you must turn on your imagination and thorough examination.

With this in mind, it is easy to understand the purpose of a character analysis essay. It involves evaluating a character’s pack of traits reflected in the context of the primary source. You might choose whether to disclose the positive or negative side of a character. This depends on the topics and the approach used for composing an analysis paper.

Also, it is possible to call this type of writing a process analysis essay because you are to disclose the character’s emotions along with how actions occur and change during the plot.

Common Types of Characters in Your Essay

When encountering characters’ analysis and defining an objective of your essay, you must know what types of characters exist. This might help you direct your analysis into the correct flow.

Protagonist

The protagonist is the story’s central figure on which the main focus is fixed. Not only one character can be a hero. You can find several of them through the narrative, expressing their experience and engaging scenes.

This character represents an opposite role to a protagonist in the context, bringing some worse experiences to the story. They always create an obstacle for a protagonist to reach a goal.

A major person in a story plays an important role, yet not the central one. These can be characters who are close in relationship with the main hero and accompany them throughout the book.

Minor characters, accordingly, play a minor role in the story. They can show up occasionally in a plot for a while and then disappear.

A dynamic character shows growth and brings some modifications throughout the story. Typically, a protagonist is dynamic, accepting challenges and learning to become better and stronger.

An opposite message to dynamic persons brings a static character. They don’t reflect any story changes and remain with the same traits and behaviors. Minor persons are usually static.

This type of character is specific as they draw a reader’s attention to crucial persons in a story. Their mission is to strengthen a protagonist’s role.

Understanding the role of your character is crucial. You will know how to explain particular actions and scene changes. If you still find it challenging to start writing a character analysis essay, contact our PapersOwl writing service and let professional writers bring you an excellent piece of copy.

Character Analysis Essay Format

In addition to the context you must provide, an essay should look elegant and meaningfully ordered. For this purpose, you should adhere to a particular character analysis paper format. Here is a sample of what compositional elements your work should include.

Introduction

As you deal with a literary composition in different volumes, you should provide a background of what a story is about. Also, you need to mention the author and the title of a book or novel you will describe characters from.

Furthermore, if you put on a character analysis thesis statement, it will be a brilliant idea to make your introductory part more enticing. So think about how to compose a meaningful statement in one or two phrases.

This main component in an essay’s format is the biggest one. You must write all you want to reveal about your characters at this stage. But keep in mind to order your train of thought and present it in a comprehensive way.

An overall description of your personality, specific traits, and influencing factors should be carefully covered in your body section. To confirm some unique characteristics or actions, you must cite a dialogue inside essays as an original reference. Information can be voluminous, so make sure you separate it into several meaningful paragraphs.

Concluding your main points about your protagonist is the final stage of your writing. Highlight the experience your character has gone through in the story.

Whatever question you have about character analysis writing, you can always address our helpful platform. We will help you do your essays in the best way to improve your academic performance.

How to Write a Character Analysis Essay?

There needs to be more than just knowing how to arrange your essay. So, we’ve outlined some helpful steps you should take before getting started.

Read up on the story

If you want to demonstrate good knowledge of the characters and all episodes they were in, you should read the entire story more than once. Thus, you will be able to note some crucial details and cite them. Rereading a story will enhance your knowledge about each scene.

Decide on what character to choose

Your choice might depend on your preferences and the type of narrative you read. Think of whose personality you can easily reveal and build rich judgment around them. It’s up to you to write about a protagonist, major or static characters.

Outline your essay

This is one of the most important strategies in writing. You should create an outline of what you are going to uncover in your article. It is a good idea to draft a structure for your composition and note down the insights in each structural element. This will help you follow the presentation of the material and, at the same time, remind you of the next step.

Define the main idea

Once you select a character you want to analyze in your character analysis essay, you decide what part of a personality you will focus on.

Make notes while reading

To create a comprehensive picture of a character, you should know as much as possible about their traits and behavior. Your outline helps you follow the structure while referring to quotes and dialogues, allowing you to confirm specific situations that best show personalities.

Compose a list of questions

To make your character analysis less challenging, we recommend you make a list of lead-in questions. You can even create those questions for each structural part of your composition. This enables you to be precise in providing relevant information about a character.

In addition to general steps on how to write a character analysis essay, we’ve prepared a range of insightful tips. By following them, we believe you will bring up solid work. Here they are:

• Provide a catchy hook in the introductory part;
• Keep short and simple sentences;
• Split into paragraphs each idea you want to mention about a character;
• Use examples right from the primary source;
• Be concise and clear when estimating your characters.

One of the literary analysis papers is writing a poetry essay and describing a character analysis in poetry. Writing such an essay can be more challenging as students need help understanding this style. No worries. There is always a way out, and you can buy essays online from the best writers as an option.

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Character Analysis Essay Example

Lady Macbeth is one of the most influential female characters in literature. She conveyed an entirely different figure of how a woman doesn’t need to look. Shakespeare created a sick-ambitious character burning to be queen.

Lady Macbeth was pretty rude to her husband. She judged him for not being as brave as she expected from him. We know about his bloody deeds on the battlefields, though. But in public, she acted like a real actress, conveying her best traits to respect her king.

In the scene when she loses consciousness after Duncan’s murder, the audience wonders whether she was playing another role at that very moment. Eventually, she fails each test coming into her life. After the follow-up blaming her husband during the banquet (Act III, Scene 4), the worst turns back into her life. She becomes nervous and unable to control her emotions. We can notice her strange behavior when murmuring in Act V, Scene 1, as she “confesses” her participation in the murder.

Her death became an event that made Macbeth contemplate deeper on the time of nature and mortality in the speech “Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow” (Act V, Scene 5).

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How to Write a Character Analysis Essay in 7 Steps

To analyze a character in a story (whether it’s a book or film) essentially means to discuss three things:

• What the character was like before the adventure
• How the character responded to the inevitable challenges 
• How the character transformed as a result of the adventure

It is very rare that a character in a story doesn’t change. An example of that would be the film The Remains of the Day where the main character never changes. That movie was a bit disappointing 🙂

The most interesting part of any story is what happens to its characters – how they transform as a result of facing difficulties in pursuit of a goal or while trying to solve a problem:

• Rocky faces a world champion to turn from a boxing mediocrity into a respected warrior and athlete
• Mulan helps defeat a fearsome invader to go from an awkward bride to a national heroine 
• Harry Potter must face inner and outer demons to turn from a troubled schoolboy into a real wizard

If you were to write an essay about any of these characters, these would be some of the likely central points in your paper. And in this tutorial, I will show you how to go about the process.

I’m Tutor Phil, and without further ado, let me take you through the…

7 Steps to Writing a Character Analysis Essay

Step 1. Choose the character you will write about

You may already have a pretty good idea of which character you want to write about. Or, perhaps your instructor has given you a prompt with a pre-selected character. 

If not, here are a few tips on choosing a character.

Make sure the character gets ample time and space in the story. Don’t choose a character that barely appears in the book or movie. Pick either the main character or a secondary character who gets a lot of attention from the author. 

You can choose a protagonist or an antagonist. The protagonist is the “good” guy or gal, and the antagonist is the anti-hero. You can analyze either one because both are very important characters in the story.

Choose a character who captivates your imagination. The better your emotional connection to the character, the easier it will be to write about them. If you have more than one story to choose from, pick your favorite character from any of the stories. 

These tips will ensure that you have enough material to write an essay. And let’s pick our character for the purposes of this tutorial. 

The character I’m choosing is the Beast from Disney’s Beauty and the Beast (the animated feature). I absolutely love this animated film, and this also happens to be my favorite story ever.

The Beauty and the Beast as a story appears in many (almost all if not all) cultures of the world in one form or another. But we’ll focus on the Beast in Disney’s animated version because he’s a fascinating hero who undergoes an amazing transformation. 

Step 2. Read (or watch) the story again while taking notes

Even if you have already read the book or watched the movie, go through it again after picking your character. 

This time around, you’ll notice a lot more about this character than you did on the first reading or viewing. If it’s a movie, just watch the whole thing over while taking notes.

If it’s a long novel, you can reread only the key parts that are relevant to your character and what you might write about them. 

Character Qualities and Traits You Can Discuss

Let me give you a list of qualities and character traits you can notice and make notes about as you’re revisiting the story. 

Keep in mind that you can choose any one of these as your main subject in the essay. In the next step, we’ll do exactly that. We’ll also pick another one or more of these as supporting ideas.

So, make sure to take notes that are relevant to any of these aspects of character because they’ll be useful to you as you write the essay. 

Aspects of a Character

• Transformation (how the character changes)
• Strengths and special abilities
• Position/Status and how it changes
• Physical appearance and traits
• Psychological makeup
• Role in the overall message of the story

Additional elements to jot down

Quotations. Make sure to note the exact page number or time stamp in the film because you’ll need that when citing the quotation. Dialog can often reveal clues to the inner world of the character. 

Patterns of behavior. If any of the character’s behavior repeats, that is a clue to a character quality or trait. You may notice that a certain pattern of behavior occurs in more than one character. This is a possible theme you can explore in your essay.

Changes in attitude. If the character does something that is not like their typical behavior, that’s a clue to a transformation. It is interesting to learn why this character said or did something new and different. The character may be showing courage or decisiveness. 

Example of Note-taking

Here is an example of the kind of notes I would take as I’m rewatching Beauty and the Beast :

• The Beast starts out chronically angry. But he calms down as time progresses and he makes progress in his courtship of Belle. 
• The Beast is extremely strong physically
• He also proves to be generous when he gifts the library to Belle
• He is also gentle when he learns how to dance
• The Beast is under a magic spell (a curse)
• He has serious anger issues
• He seems extremely possessive
• He has all the qualities of a prince except the human form
• He exhibits extreme boundaries and prohibits Belle from visiting certain parts of the castle 
• The Beast looks like some kind of a furious animal resembling a lion
• He’s not exactly ugly. But he’s scary and intimidating. 
• He must experience real love before the last petal falls off a rose in his secret room in order to turn back into a human being
• The Beast has anger issues
• He is possessive and has strong boundaries of what is permissible and what is not
• He does not really believe that he can make the curse dispel 
• He is easily frustrated
• His curse came about as a result of arrogance and lack of kindness and compassion, so he has to deal with that, as well
• The Beast must overcome himself in order to become human. Perhaps the message of the story is that in order to be a real human being, you must overcome flaws that prevent you from experiencing real love.
• This last point sounds like a good potential main subject/idea for the essay.

Completing this step will provide you with enough ideas to write an essay of any length. 

Step 3. Choose the main and supporting aspects of the character

In this step you’re really deciding what your essay will be about. Yes, it will be about this character you’ve chosen. But now you need to narrow down your subject matter. 

If you try to write about everything about this character, your essay will seem like it’s about nothing. This is why you really want to pick your main subject, which is something about the character that is going to be the main theme of the essay.

You also want to pick several supporting (lesser) ideas that will help you discuss this character. 

A great thing about this process is that by the time you get through Step 2, you will probably already have a pretty good idea of your main and your supporting points.

Ideas begin bubbling as you take notes. You begin to notice patterns and discern the bigger and the smaller ideas. 

But this step is designed specifically for you to go over your notes and write down two things:

• The main idea you’ll probably turn into the main point in your essay
• Three or more supporting ideas

Here is how to do it in practice. All you need to do is create a simple bulleted list. In this list, the first one or more items will be the bigger ideas. And the second level will contain the smaller, supporting ideas. 

Let’s do it, using our example of the Beast:

• The Beast’s role in delivering the message of the story 
• He is under a magic spell (a curse)
• He seems very possessive
• He is scary
• He is clumsy
• He has enormous physical strength 
• He is generous deep inside 
• He can be gentle
• He lacks self-confidence
• He doubts his ability to experience love
• He has great difficulty controlling his anger

As you complete this step, don’t worry if some of your ideas overlap among these categories or if you seem to repeat some of the points. You’ll sort it all out and get total clarity in the next step.

These first steps are really a brain dump. In Step 3, you simply sift through your initial notes and attempt to bring some order your thoughts. Don’t try to be perfect. Just do it.

Step 4. Take a stand and write down your main point

This is where you must decide on what exactly you’ll be arguing in your essay. This is why it’s probably the most important step of all. Your main point is your thesis. 

A thesis is one main idea usually expressed in one sentence. 

A thesis statement is a full statement that contains the entire argument, including the thesis and the supporting ideas. 

Here’s a short video I made to explain the distinction between a thesis and a thesis statement:

In this step, we’re just writing out the main point in one sentence. We’ll write the entire thesis statement in the next step. 

And we have everything we need to write our sample thesis. We have identified the biggest ideas and the smaller, supporting ideas in the previous step.

Now, we need to focus on the bigger ideas, choose one of them or put two of them together into one, and write it down.

Let’s do it, using our example of the Beast. 

Character Analysis Thesis Example

Let’s think aloud a little:

We have our two big ideas that we identified in the previous step:

• The Beast’s transformation – he must conquer his own anger in order to regain the human form

These are just topics; they are only subjects. We must now turn them into one complete sentence. 

It looks like the Beast must overcome something within himself in order to be human again.  

Can we be a little more specific? We can borrow an idea or two from the supporting, smaller ideas to clarify the main point.

Well, the Beast is cursed, and to lift the curse, he must overcome himself. 

Okay, good. We’re getting there. Let’s add a little more specificity, and the thesis should come out great.

“The Beast must overcome his own anger, lack of compassion, and self-doubt in order to experience love that would lift the curse and turn him back into a human.”  

Bingo! I think we got it. This thesis is virtually flawless:

• The subject is clear – the essay will be about the Beast
• We know exactly what to say about him 
• The reader now has a clear idea of the overall argument of this essay
• This sentence summarizes this essay completely and perfectly.

And that’s exactly what a thesis for a character analysis is supposed to do. Now, we’re ready to write the introductory paragraph which will include the complete thesis statement. 

Step 5. Write the introductory paragraph

Note that a character analysis is really an expository essay. This means that the structure of a character analysis is that of an expository (or an argumentative) essay.

And here is a diagram that depicts the structure of an introductory paragraph:

The first sentence is purely introductory. Its job is to pull the reader into the subject matter of the essay.

The next sentence is the main point. And we just wrote it, so we have this most important part of the paragraph ready to include in the opening paragraph.

Finally, the next one or more sentences must list the supporting points in some detail while still keeping the paragraph very general. That’s because we’ll be digging into the details in the body of the essay. But the intro paragraph should be general. 

Before we get to the introductory sentence, let’s see if we have everything we need to write the rest of the thesis statement. Do we have the supporting points?

It just so happens that our thesis contains three wonderful supporting points that we’ll explore in the essay in detail. Why three?

Well, I usually recommend having three supporting ideas that will correspond with three main sections of pretty much any argumentative paper. I call this the Power of Three:

Why do I use it? Remember what we did in Steps 2 and 3? We listed all the elements of our character and enumerated all the possible ideas we could write about. 

Well, if we don’t set a limit for how many supporting ideas we’ll use, we can end up wandering forever, trying to structure this essay. 

If you go over three supporting points, then the overall structure of the essay won’t be clear to you, and you’ll waste a lot of time and effort trying to organize it.

But if you decide that you’ll have three supporting ideas – no more and no less – this makes your life so much easier. All you need to do is decide. And it’s easy – the Power of Three works!

As I was writing the main point, I already kept the Power of Three in mind because, after all, I’m the one who came up with it 🙂

I use it in almost every essay and article I write, so at this point it’s just second nature to me and will become to you as well the more you use it. 

So, what are the three supporting ideas in this essay? Here they are:

• Lack of compassion

These are three qualities, character traits, or emotional energies which the Beast must overcome in himself in order to experience love and achieve his goal of regaining humanity.

Do you see how this works? Now that we know exactly what we mean to say in the introductory paragraph, let’s write it out.

Example of a Character Analysis Introductory Paragraph

“Disney’s Beauty and the Beast is a story of a miraculous transformation that must be gained through hard work. The Beast must overcome his own lack of compassion, his anger, and self-doubt in order to experience love that would lift the curse and turn him back into a human. The lack of compassion caused the initial disaster, and the Beast must get in touch with his kindness and generosity to remove the root cause of the curse. He must learn to control his anger because if he doesn’t he won’t have a chance to win Belle’s heart. And he must overcome self-doubt as the final obstacle to true love because faith in love is its ultimate test.”

Let’s Examine this Paragraph

So, what have we done here? The first sentence, just like the diagram instructs, is introductory. It doesn’t state the main point – that’s the function of the next sentence, which is the thesis.

The first sentence simply pulls the reader into the essay by stating what it is about in very general terms. We could have written an intro that would be even more general. But this sentence works. 

Remember – you can actually start your essay directly with the thesis. The only reason I teach my students to include an introductory sentence is that teachers and professors expect some sort of an introduction. So, just write it.

But immediately after the intro, we need to state the thesis – the main point. And we do it perfectly well in this paragraph. We wrote this sentence in the previous step, so we know exactly what it states.

Finally, and this is part three of the paragraph, we enumerate the three supporting points that help the reader see how we plan to go about supporting the main point.

We first talk about the lack of compassion, then about the Beast’s anger, and then about his self-doubt. And guess what – that’s exactly how we’ll structure this essay. 

In fact, our thesis statement is the outline of our essay. Let’s take a look. 

Character Analysis Sample Outline

As you can see, we have three main sections, each of which can be a paragraph or more, depending on how many words you need to write.

If you have to write up to about 600 words, then a five-paragraph structure will work great. If you have to write more, then each of the main sections will simply contain more than one paragraph.

But let’s keep things simple here and assume that we’re writing a five-paragraph essay of about 600 words. Then, we can distribute our word count this way:

• Introductory paragraph (75 words)
• Body paragraph 1 (150 words)
• Body paragraph 2 (150 words)
• Body paragraph 3 (150 words)
• Conclusion (75 words) 

If we add these up, we’ll get 600 words. Now that we have our introductory paragraph that has given us the main point and the overall structure, we’re ready to write the body of the essay.

Step 6. Write the body of the analysis

The body of a character analysis essay consists of paragraphs of a particular structure. Because we know that an analysis is an argumentative essay, each body paragraph should be structured in a certain way. 

Here’s a diagram of how to structure a body paragraph:

A body paragraph in an expository essay, just like the essay itself, must proceed from general to specific. 

The first sentence in a body paragraph is the lead sentence. It is the most general sentence in the paragraph. It functions just like a thesis does in an essay – it opens and summarizes the contents of the paragraph perfectly.

Then comes the next most general part of the paragraph – the explanation. Here, you should explain a process or describe how or why the point in the lead sentence is true. 

And finally, we have the most specific part of the paragraph, which is one or more examples. Examples are the most interesting and exciting part both for the writer and for the reader because they contain all the details.

Let’s write a body paragraph for our essay. We’ll pick the first body paragraph – the one about the lack of compassion in the Beast.

Character Analysis Body Paragraph Example

“Since the lack of compassion caused the witch to cast the spell, the Beast must discover kindness and generosity within himself to eliminate the root cause of the curse. His lack of kindness and compassion is his original sin. The animated movie opens with a sequence that reveals what happened to the prince that led to him losing his human form. An old woman asked for shelter from the rain, but the prince mocked her and refused her request. She then turned into a beautiful sorceress and punished him by casting a spell, condemning the prince to the form of a beast until he can experience reciprocated love. Unfortunately for him, the Beast retains the lack of compassion well into the middle of the story. He becomes enraged when he has another visitor – Belle’s father – while the weather outside is horrible. This echoes the initial refusal of shelter. He does the same with Belle when he gives her a number of prohibitions. He refuses her food and comfort unless she meets certain conditions. In other words, it looks like he has not learned a thing since the spell was cast.”

Body Paragraph Analysis

What have we done in this paragraph? First, we started with the lead sentence. The way you can write it is just by lifting it straight from the thesis statement and changing it around. 

That’s because the lead sentence is essentially an equivalent of one of the supporting points in the thesis statement. Just take that supporting point, change or expand it a little, and it will make a perfect lead sentence for a body paragraph.

Next, we provide an explanation. We explain why it is necessary for the Beast to conquer his lack of compassion. This was the reason he came under the spell. 

So, he must learn from that experience and eliminate this character trait. If he fails to do that, he’ll never gain Belle’s love and will never turn back into a human. 

Finally, we show that the Beast seemingly hasn’t learned a thing because he shows no hospitality or kindness to Belle and her father in the beginning. This means that he has a problem he must overcome. 

Once we’ve shown this, the paragraph has served its function, and we can move on to the next paragraph. 

To write the body of the essay, all we need to do is write it one body paragraph at a time, following the structure in the diagram. Once this is done, we’re ready for the final step. 

Step 7. Write the conclusion

The simplest and time-proven way to write a conclusion is to restate what you already wrote. In a sense, your conclusion is pretty much your thesis statement rewritten using different words.

Let’s write out our conclusion, and you’ll see what I mean:

“To conclude, the Beast is a prisoner of his own character flaws. His lack of kindness and compassion, his rage, and his self-doubt stand in his way of dispelling the curse and becoming human again. Early in the story, he displays each of these character flaws as if he never learned his lessons from what happened to him. And he must overcome each of these traits one by one in order to get in touch with the best in him, experience love, and achieve liberation from the terrible spell.”

As you can see, we’re not saying anything new here. We’re simply restating what has already been said in the essay. And it works in most cases. 

Some instructors will want you to do more in a conclusion. So, my advice is to approach your instructor and ask her what she prefers. This way you’ll know for sure. 

If you want to learn more ways to write conclusions, here’s a great tutorial I wrote . 

Guess what – we’re done, and I hope this was helpful! Now go ahead and write your own amazing character analysis essay.

Tutor Phil is an e-learning professional who helps adult learners finish their degrees by teaching them academic writing skills.

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How to Write a Character Analysis

Learn to spot and describe character traits and development

DaniloAndjus / Getty Images

• M.Ed., Education Administration, University of Georgia
• B.A., History, Armstrong State University

Being mindful of subtle hints, like mood changes and reactions that might provide insight into your character's personality, can help you write a character analysis.

Describe the Character's Personality

We get to know the characters in our stories through the things they say, feel, and do. It's not as difficult as it may seem to figure out personality traits based on a character's thoughts and behaviors:

"'Say cheese!' the exasperated photographer shouted, as she pointed her camera toward the group of squirming children. Margot displayed her broadest, most convincing fake smile as she inched ever-closer to her younger cousin. Just as the photographer's finger twitched over the shutter button, Margot leaned into her young cousin's side and pinched hard. The boy let out a yelp, just as the camera clicked."

You can probably make some assumptions about Margot from the brief segment above. If you had to name three character traits to describe her, what would they be? Is she a nice, innocent girl? Doesn't seem like it from this passage. From the brief paragraph, we can assume that she's apparently sneaky, mean, and deceptive.

Determine the Character Type of Your Protagonist

You will receive clues about personality through a character's words, actions, reactions, feelings, movements, thoughts, and mannerisms. Even a character's opinions can help you learn more about the individual, and you may discover that the person fits one of these stock character types:

• Flat character. A flat character has one or two personality traits that don't change. The flat character can play a major or a minor role.
• Round character. A round character has many complex traits; those traits develop and change in a story. A round character seems more real than a flat character because real people are complex.
• Stock or stereotype character. Stock characters are stereotypes, such as hot-tempered redheads, stingy businessmen, and absent-minded professors. They are often found in genre fiction (romance novels and mysteries, for example), and are usually flat characters. They are often used as a tool to move a plot forward.
• Static character. A static character never changes. A loud, obnoxious "background" character who remains the same throughout the story is static. A boring character who is never changed by events is also static.
• Dynamic character. Unlike a static character, a dynamic character does change and grow as the story unfolds. Dynamic characters respond to events and experience changes in attitude or outlook. The character might go through a transformation during the course of the storyline, and grow as a result of actions that took place.

Define Your Character's Role in the Work You're Analyzing

When you write a character analysis, you must define that character's role. Identifying the character type and personality traits can help you better understand what the larger role of the character is within the story. The character either plays a major role, as a central element to the story, or a minor role to support the major characters in the story.

Protagonist. The protagonist of a story is another name for the main character. The plot revolves around the protagonist. There may even be more than one main character.

• In "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn ," Huck Finn is the protagonist.
• In "Little Red Riding Hood," the little girl is the protagonist.

Antagonist. The antagonist is the character who represents a challenge or an obstacle to the protagonist in a story. In some stories, the antagonist is not a person but rather a larger entity or force that must be dealt with.

• In " Little Red Riding Hood ," the wolf is the antagonist.
• In "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn," society is the antagonist. Society, with its unfair laws and rules, represents the obstacle to Huck's development as a person.

Foil. A foil is a character who provides contrast to the main character (protagonist), in order to emphasize the main character's traits. In "A Christmas Carol," the kind nephew, Fred, is the foil to nasty Ebenezer Scrooge.

Show Your Character's Development (Growth and Change)

When you are asked to write a character analysis, you will be expected to explain how a character changes and grows. Most major characters go through some kind of significant growth as a story unfolds, often a direct result of dealing with some sort of conflict . Notice, as you read, which main characters grow stronger, fall apart, develop new relationships, or discover new aspects of themselves. Make note of scenes in which character changes become apparent or the character's opinions on a topic change. Clues include phrases such as "she suddenly realized that..." or "for the first time, he..."

Understanding the journey of your character and how it relates to the story as a whole can help you better understand that character's motives and better represent the person in your overall analysis.

Article edited by  Stacy Jagodowski

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How to Write a Character Analysis Essay: Examples & Outline

A character analysis is an examination of the personalities and actions of protagonists and antagonists that make up a story. It discusses their role in the story, evaluates their traits, and looks at their conflicts and experiences. You might need to write this assignment in school or college. Like any other essay, your character analysis should contain an introduction, a conclusion, and a thesis.

Want to know how to write a character analysis essay? Not sure how to start? We understand. Whichever piece you choose – Lady Macbeth, A Rose for Emily, or something else, – analyzing a character for the first time might be challenging. No worries, we are here to help! In this guide by our custom writing experts, you will find a step-by-step guide, outlining and writing tips, as well as a number of character analysis examples.

• 📔 Character Analysis Definition
• 🧙 Types of Characters
• 📝 Writing Guide
• 🖥️ Formatting Tips

📑 Character Analysis Essay Examples

📔 what is a character analysis essay.

A character analysis essay is an assignment where you evaluate a character’s traits, behaviors, and motivations. It requires critical thinking and attention to detail. Unlike descriptions, analyses focus on a character’s personality and internal drives. It explains how those factors shape the narrated events.

So, what you need to do is to see the characters as if they were real people who feel and act just as we do. Ensure there are no baseless assumptions and interpretations: the ideas you present should be supported by quotes from the text.

Character: Definition (Literature)

How do you define a character? It is a person, a creature, or an animal that makes up the story’s world. A character can be based on a real-life person, or it can be entirely fictional. It is someone who thinks, feels, and acts.

We use the word “character” in many different contexts. For instance, it can denote someone eccentric or worthy of our admiration. In both contexts, the term “character” means a distinctive personality. Similarly, in an analysis, your task is to show what makes a character stand out.

Characterization: Literary Definition & Examples

Characterization is the process by which a character’s personality is revealed. It presents characters’ traits, feelings, and motives to the reader. For this reason, characterization is closely connected to character analysis. It helps us to understand the characters better throughout the reading process.

Characterization can be direct and indirect .

• Direct characterization is when the narrator directly tells the audience what the personality of a character is.
• In contrast, indirect characterization shows things that hint at a character’s nature.

Here are some examples of direct characterization taken from Patti Smith’s Just Kids :

“But he always suppressed his real feelings, mimicking the stoic nature of his father.”

Here we see a direct description of a character. The author straightforwardly talks about Robert’s feelings. In comparison, look at the description of a woman taken from John Steinbeck’s The Snake :

“He looked around at her again. Her dark eyes seemed veiled with dust. She looked without expression at the cat’s open throat.”

These lines don’t directly reveal anything about the woman, but the reader can understand that she is cold and dangerous. It’s an indirect characterization that focuses on looks and actions to convey the message to the reader.

🧙 Types of Characters for Your Essay

When it comes to characters, they can be divided into several groups. For example, characters can be:

• Protagonists or antagonists,
• Static or dynamic,
• Flat or round.

These types define how much the characters change through the course of the story and their role in it.

Character Type: Definition

In psychology, a character type is defined by a combination of personality traits that coexist in an individual. Authors incorporate different types of characters into their works to convey the message and make the story more exciting or relatable to the reader.

There are three ways to categorize a character type:

• by archetypes,
• by their role in the narrative,
• by their ability to change throughout the story.

If you are about to write a character analysis essay, being familiar with character archetypes is essential. They have been categorized by a generation of writers, including the Swiss psychologist Carl Jung and the American literary theorist Joseph Campbell. A lot of characters we see in today’s literary works are rooted in them.

Archetypes include the Trickster, the Ruler, the Lover, the Sage, and others. The Hero is one of the most notable archetypes. Hercules or Achilles can be good examples of heroic protagonists. They are strong and courageous; they meet challenges and save the day by helping others.

Main Character: Definition & Examples

The main character and the protagonist often get mixed up. Most narratives also have the figure of the antagonist , whose actions affect the plot and stimulate change. Let’s have a look at the similarities and differences between these types.

The main character is central in the narrative. We experience the story through their eyes. They don’t necessarily have to be protagonists, though it happens in many cases.

The crucial difference between the main character and the protagonist is that the protagonist goes through changes throughout the story. The main character, however, is there to guide the reader through the experience. Often they help to show a different, darker side of the protagonist.

To understand the difference better, let’s turn to some examples.

What’s a Static Character?

Now that we’ve learned about the main character and the protagonist, we will closely look at other types of character classifications. One of the ways to categorize a character is by their ability to change throughout the story.

A static or simple character is someone who undergoes little or no significant changes. They often exist for comedic purposes. Here are some examples:

Complex Character: Definition & Examples

Complex or dynamic characters are the opposite of static characters. Characters of this type change as the book progresses. They display different qualities, emotions, and motives. They become more complicated and interesting to the reader as the story unfolds.

Check out these examples of dynamic characters:

Other Kinds of Characters

You already know about several ways to define a type of character. Now, let’s go over some other types, starting with flat and round characters.

Similar to dynamic and static ones, round and flat characters represent two different ends of a spectrum. Round characters usually come with an in-depth background. They are traditionally protagonists, antagonists, or those close to them. In contrast, flat characters are two-dimensional, and there is not much depth to them.

For the examples, we will turn to the novel Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen.

Finally, here are some bonus character types for you:

• Stock characters have a fixed set of traits and are flat. Most of the time, they exist for comical relief.
• Symbolic characters represent a concept or a theme that goes beyond them. They can be round and flat as long as they symbolize a particular notion or phenomena.
• Sidekick is a secondary character who supports the protagonist.
• The love interest is someone with whom the main character is infatuated.
• Foil is someone who’s set in contrast with the protagonist, thus putting more emphasis on the latter’s qualities.

Characterization Essay: Which Character Type to Choose

Before you start writing a paper, it essential to decide on the character you’re going to analyze. There are different types of characters in every story, so you need to choose which one suits your essay topic the best.

Usually, it’s best to choose a dynamic and round character . With static and flat ones, there may not be enough substance for you to analyze. However, some such personalities can be interesting to work with. For instance, a flat character such as Mr. Collins can be symbolic of something. Then, you can talk about how it embodies a specific idea or notion. You can also look at how they affect other characters in the story.

📝 How to Write a Character Analysis Step by Step

Now, we’re going to discuss how to write your paper step-by-step. But first, here are some pre-writing steps for you to consider:

• Choose a character for analysis.
• Take notes while reading;
• Define the type of the character and their role in the story;
• Pay attention to their descriptions and actions.

How to Analyze a Character: Description Examples

Knowing how to organize your work is an essential skill. Certain things need special attention if you are describing a character:

• physical appearance,
• emotional state,
• how the character speaks,
• behavior and personality traits,
• relationships with other characters.

When you analyze a character, try to look at them as if they were a real-life person. You want to know their motive, learn about how they feel, and understand why they think in a certain way. Ask yourself:

• How did the character change throughout the story (if at all)?
• What do other characters say about them? Can their words be trusted?
• Where is the character physically and emotionally? What brought them here?
• What is the character ready to do to achieve their goal?

Now, let’s look at the character of Franklin from the short story Just Before the War with the Eskimos by J.D. Salinger:

Character Profile Template for Writing

When writing your essay, use this character analysis template:

In the following sections, we’ll discuss each step in detail.

Character Analysis Outline: How to Start a Character Analysis

The beginning of your essay is its crucial part. It sets the mood and grabs the reader’s attention. There are many different ways to write a character analysis introduction, but here are the most effective ones:

• Use a quotation. It’s a great way to make a catchy hook. If it relates to the character and reflects their nature, it can also help to set the tone for analysis. In case you are using a quotation from somewhere else, mention the source in parentheses.
• Talk about the book or story. Mention the author, the name of the story, and the genre. Briefly describe the main events that are taking place in the story.
• Introduce the character. State their role in the story (define whether they are a protagonist, an antagonist, etc.) Then, explain whether the character is static or dynamic. Finally, describe them in 2-3 sentences.

The final part of an introduction is a thesis statement.Read on to learn how to write one!

Character Analysis Thesis Statement & Examples

A thesis is the key component of every essay, and character analysis is not an exception. It’s crucial to develop a good and clear thesis statement that includes all the aspects of your paper. For instance, if you plan to write a 4-paragraph body, including 4 points in your thesis.

What should a character analysis thesis include? Well, try to think of any trait that the character possesses that has to do with their downfall or somehow influences the story. Think about how this trait affects the character’s relationship with others or how it contributes to their motive or aspiration.

Take a look at the following examples:

How to Write Character Analysis Paragraphs for the Main Body

The main body of your essay can include as many paragraphs as you need. In this part, you introduce the character and analyze them. We have already talked in this article about what kind of questions should be answered in these paragraphs. The most important points are:

• Describe the character and their role within the story.
• Give the audience an explanation of the character’s motives.
• Show what message the author wanted to convey through this character.

Keep in mind that every paragraph should have a topic sentence that captures its main idea.

Tsukuru Tazaki’s spiritual rebirth also affects his physical appearance.

Character Analysis Conclusion: How to Write

The conclusion part of your essay summarizes all the information you have mentioned and restates the thesis. Here is some advice for your conclusion paragraph:

🖥️ Character Analysis Essay Format

Most college assignments and essays are written according to the APA or MLA format. Both styles have the same formatting, which requires:

• a double-spaced paper with 1-inch margins,
• a page header with page numbers flush right,
• an 11-12-point font.

While writing an essay on characters, pay special attention to quotations. Here are some tips for APA in-text citations:

• When you summarize or paraphrase the information, mention the author’s name and publication date in brackets. Example: According to Collins (1997.)
• When you quote directly from the source, add the number of the page, as well. Example: “There is a view that…” (Collins, 1997, pp. 134-135.)
• If the source includes three or more authors, use the abbreviation “et al.” after the first author’s name. Example: (Collins et al., 1997)

As for MLA format:

• You can write the author’s name in the sentence. Example: As Collins mentions in his essay<…>.
• You can mention the author’s name in the parentheses at the end of the sentence. Example: (Collins, J.K.)
• The last option is to use either footnotes or endnotes.

Below you’ll find a collection of character analysis essay examples and a downloadable sample to inspire you even more.

• The Grandmother in A Good Man Is Hard to Find: Character Analysis
• Willy Loman in Death of a Salesman: Character Analysis
• Jay Gatsby and Nick Carraway: Character Analysis
• Prospero in The Tempest: Character Analysis
• Agamemnon in the Iliad: Character Analysis
• Lord Pococurante in Candide: Character Analysis
• Andromache in the Iliad: Character Analysis
• Character Analysis of the Knight from The Canterbury Tales
• Essay on Soldier’s Home: Analysis of the Characters

Character Analysis Example (Downloadable)

Roald Dahl’s  Matilda  is one of the most famous children’s novels of the 20th century. The protagonist of this tale is Matilda Wormwood, a five and a half-year-old girl with a brilliant and lively mind that distances her from the rest of the family. Matilda’s character is particularly interesting as she has a powerful personality with extraordinary mental abilities, and she manages to overcome all the obstacles that surround her.

Character Analysis Essay Topics

• Character analysis of Abbas from A.D.: New Orleans After the Deluge .
• Jay Gatsby in The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald.
• Beowulf and Hamlet: similarity and diversity of the characters.
• Personal and social failures of Willy Loman in Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller.
• Character analysis of Othello.
• Analyze the characters of Stanley and Blanche from A Streetcar Named Desire .
• The tragedy of Mathilde Loisel from The Necklace by Guy de Maupassant.
• Character analysis of Huck Finn from Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn .
• Moral force of Kate Lipton from Double Helix by Nancy Parker.
• Character analysis of Thorvald and Nora in Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll’s House .
• Discuss the character of king Creon in Antigone .
• Analyze the personality of Lydia from Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice .
• Compare Nick Carraway and Tom Buchanan from The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald.
• Describe the peculiarities of Lord Pococurante in Candide .
• Sarty Snopes in William Faulkner’s Barn Burning : character analysis.
• Analyze the character of Biff Loman in Death of a Salesman.
• Personality of Nora in A Doll House by Henrik Ibsen.
• Examine the main characters of The Yellow Paper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman.
• Personality change of the main character in Edgar Alan Poe’s The Black Cat .
• Analyze the characters of E. Hemingway’s A Clean, Well-Lighted Place .
• Describe the main characters of the novel The Overstory by Richard Powers.
• Controversial personality of Vladek in Maus: A Survivor’s Tale by Art Spiegelman.
• Character analysis of Victor Frankenstein in Frankenstein by Mary Shelley.
• Discuss the character of Creon in Oedipus the King .
• The manipulative character of Iago in Willian Shakespeare’s Othello .
• Analyze the characters of Nil and Kristine in A Doll’s House .
• Eccentricity of Grendel’s character in Beowulf .
• Describe the main characters of Four Summers by Joyce Carol Oates.
• Examine the characters of Harold Krebs and his mother in Ernest Hemingway’s Soldier’s Home .
• Analyze common and different traits of the characters in The Monkey’s Paw .
• Character peculiarities of Rostam and Sohrab in Shahnameh by Ferdowsi Tousi.
• How does the character of Elizabeth Bennet in Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen differ from the rest of her family?
• The behavior and meaning of the characters in Nicholas Rowe’s The Tragedy of Jane Shore.
• Compare the characters of Victor Frankenstein and the monster in Frankenstein or the Modern Prometheus by Mary Shelley.
• Discuss the differences of main characters in Everyday Use by Alice Walker.
• Examine the character of Connie in Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been by Joyce Carol Oates.
• The influence of social pressure on the characters of Chopin’s Desirée’s Baby and Sedaris’ A Modest Proposal .
• Dynamic feminist characters of Delia and Jig in Sweat by Z. Hurston and Hills Like White Elephants by E. Hemingway.
• Analyze the personality traits of Emily in William Faulkner’s A Rose for Emily .
• Examine the characters of The Quiet American by Graham Greene.
• Henry ΙV by William Shakespeare : analysis of main characters.

Now you know everything necessary for writing an excellent character analysis. What character would you like to analyze? Let us know in the comments!

Further reading:

• How to Write a Literary Analysis Essay Step by Step
• Literature Review Outline: Examples, Approaches, & Templates
• Library Research Paper: Example & Writing Guide [2024]
• How to Write a Critique Paper: Tips + Critique Essay Examples
• 435 Literary Analysis Essay Topics and Prompts [2024 Upd]
• How to Write a Literature Review: Actionable Tips & Links

❓ Character Analysis FAQ

A character analysis involves:

1. description of a character; 2. explanation of how they change throughout the story; 3. their role in the narrative; 4. relationships with other characters; 5. what idea the author wanted to convey through the character.

A character analysis creates a description that contains their most important qualities. It provides a new perspective of a character that reveals more about what it’s like to be human. It can also point to a moral or a lesson.

Literary analysis uses the technique of tracing the character development. This technique is usually used to understand the theme of the work better. Through tracing a character’s development, we can learn more about the story’s message and how it’s conveyed.

A summary paragraph in a character study should include answers to the questions “what,” “who,” “where,” and “why.” You should mention who narrates the story, where the story is set, its theme, and the message it conveys.

• Critical Concepts: Character and Characterization: Kansas State University
• Analyzing Novels & Short Stories: Texas A&M University
• Guidelines for Writing a Character Analysis Essay: Tidewater Communite College
• Literary Criticism: Thesis Examples: The University of Texas at Arlington
• Writing a Literary Analysis Paper: Germanna Community College
• Flat and Round Characters: Encyclopedia Britannica
• Literature: University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
• How to Write a Book Analysis: Kean University
• Elements of Literary Analysis: Alamo Colleges District
• Defining Characterization: Read Write Think
• APA Style: General Format: Purdue University
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Character analysis essay: informative writing guide with topic ideas.

Many students find a character analysis essay challenging to write. That’s because the task requires them to study a character from a story or a novel, break them down, and analyze them. Ideally, you select the character to focus on and then stroll through their basic strides. That way, you can come up with a detailed essay that presents their thorough character examination.

What Is Character Analysis?

Many students ask this question when their educators assign them this academic task for the first time. Well, different websites and blogs define character analysis differently. But the general definition is:

Character analysis is a process of examining and highlighting the attributes and qualities of a character in a story.

Your educator can ask you to analyze a character from any artistic work, including a novel and cinematography.

It’s a kind of character study in which you tell the audience who the person is and their role in a story. No matter how strong your inclinations and convictions are, you must use reasoning aptitudes while maintaining objectivity towards the character during the examination process. From this character analysis definition, you must be impartial when examining and explaining the relationships a character has with other players. And this includes their different qualities, how they look and talk.

Here’s an example of a character analysis essay to get an idea of what it is:

Character Analysis Example

Character Analysis: Evolution of Mattie Mattie is the main character of “True Grit” – a novel by Charles Portis. It is a story of a strong-willed, independent girl living in the 1920s. Mattie’s experience is a demonstration of how internal conflicts affect the formation of one’s self and contribute to personal evolution. The death of her father, as well as the true grit in her character, is what makes the story of Mattie both strained and inspiring. Regardless of being a fourteen-year-old girl, she is a shining example of courage, independence, and spiritual strength. Mattie’s story is fascinating because of the constant change happening to the girl. It can be traced from several different perspectives. The first one is her relationship with LaBoeuf, whom she found ignorant and hated at the beginning of the story (Portis 47). Later, she opened her heart to him demonstrating kindness. Another storyline pointing to her evolution is courage. At the beginning of the story, she was driven to take vengeance on Tom Chaney for killing her father. But this strive was nothing but a quest, while she was terrified by the sound of shots. However, by the end of the story, nothing could scare her. Another outstanding Mattie’s quality is independence. Keeping in mind that she lived in the 1920s, her worldview differs from that of ordinary women. She loved the idea of being unique and strong-willed and hated the idea of following a common life pattern – marrying and forgetting about self-development. Mattie could not understand why a woman with a frank tongue and brains is perceived as a leper (Portis 149). All in all, Mattie’s story is a story of true grit – a unique combination of inner strength, courage, invincibility, and perseverance, which made her even more powerful than men, regardless of common mockery regarding her sex and age.

Why Writing a Character Analysis Essay Matters

Perhaps, the question bothering you right now is, “what is the purpose of writing a character analysis paper?” Well, this task does more than helping a learner fulfill a graduation requirement. Writing this essay enables the audience to understand a character and their world.

A fundamental motivation for analyzing or examining a character is to understand their life structures within a story. Ideally, the learner analyzes who a character is in the story’s context. Thus, your educator expects you to reveal exciting details about a character that may have a moral message.

Perhaps, one ideal character analysis example is that of Atticus Finch in To Kill a Mockingbird . Atticus is more than a lawyer because he provides a moral message regarding the essence of doing the right thing even when knowing you can fail.

How to Analyze a Character

Before you analyze a character, ensure that you have read and understood the story. And this means paying keen attention to different situations that a character ends up in, their dialogues with the other players, and the role they play in a plot. Also, gather all information regarding themselves on a larger scale and their influences on the others.

Ideally, think outside the box when reading the story and analyzing a character. That way, you can explore the character’s personality or traits from all angles. Your analysis should be devoid of general statements. Instead, it should explore the details and complexities of the literary work’s character.

How to Write a Character Analysis

To have a profound sense of understanding a character, you must immerse yourself in a literary piece or story. That means taking character notes, understanding the settings and climax of the story. Ideally, take your time to understand all essential academic parts before writing. And this includes seeing and feeling through the character that you want to analyze.

Also, consider how the author shaped the character and brought them to life. Notice how the writer described the character’s identity vastly or undersized. Additionally, consider the character’s behaviors and morals and how they affect other characters and situations in the story. Finally, consider exciting characters in the story.

A Step-by-Step Guide on How to Do a Character Analysis Essay

Your teacher or professor may select the character to analyze and write about while assigning you this academic task. Alternatively, they can allow you to pick your character. In this case, choose a character that plays a dramatic role in a novel or story. That way, your character description will most likely captivate your educator or reader. Here’s how to write your character analysis, step-by-step:

• Read or study the story Even if you’ve already read a book and know the character you want to analyze, reread it. That way, you’ll explore the explicit scenes where the character appears keenly. Pay keen attention to tiny details of the literary character to understand their traits. For instance, consider the author’s description of a person in their work, their relationships with others, and how their actions propel the plot.
• Take notes Underline, highlight, or take note of critical elements in the story. Providing specific and vivid examples connects the audience to the character. That way, you bring the character into life in your readers’ eyes. Once you’ve read the story while focusing on the literary work’s person, review the notes to develop the main idea about them. At this point, you can make the first draft using a character analysis essay outline from your educator.
• Select the main idea When reading or studying the story, you will notice an idea that represents your preferred character better. Once you’ve found it, use it to formulate a thesis that you’ll support throughout the essay. Make sure that you have good situations and examples to support your main idea. For example, if you choose Jem Finch in To Kill a Mockingbird as your character, how racial conflicts, internal struggles with public opinions and personal views, and social inequalities shape his character can be your main idea.
• What relationships do the character has with other characters in the story?
• Where do most events involving the character occur?
• What’s the background of the character?
• What are the values of your character?
• Who are your character’s friends?
• Create a character analysis outline Creating an outline for this essay is a critical step that will enable you to organize ideas and thoughts. Therefore, make an overview highlighting the information that will go to your essay’s introduction, body, and conclusion sections.For instance, the introduction should describe the character while sparking interest in the audience. The body should present different areas or ideas about the literary character. For example, answer questions about the physical appearance, background, and personality of the character in the body. Also, tell your readers how the character overcomes different conflicts and what to learn from them.

In conclusion, hold ideas together and make a final statement for the analysis. Here, you can tell the audience how the character’s conflicts compare to those of real life. What’s more, hint at how the character should have reacted better to certain situations. Essentially, your character analysis essay format can compare to other essays, only that you focus on describing their traits and roles in the story.

Sample Character Analysis Topics

Now that you’ve known how to write a character study, you might want to proceed and handle this task. If your educator has not assigned you a topic, consider the following ideas.

• Describe the primary character in A Tale of Two Cities
• Explain The Godfather traits
• Analyze the primary character in Vikings
• Analyze Morgana traits in Merlin
• What are the common characteristics of literary characters in Shakespeare’s work?
• Compare Magical folks and Muggles
• Describe your best static character
• State variations between antagonist and protagonist
• Describe the main character’s role in Daisy Miller
• Explain why Superman has a significant influence on the kinds
• Describe the most irritating character in the best book you’ve ever read
• How do characters in most novels compare to real-life people?
• Describe Holden Caulfield’s wrong sides in The Catcher in the Rye
• Do most authors create characters resembling them?
• Explain the Madame Bovary
• Explain Evalina’s contribution to the story climax
• With an example, explain how the setting affects a character in a story
• Explain how the writer uses metaphors to describe a specific literary character in The Metamorphosis
• Analyze traits that make a character evil- Use examples
• Highlight Charles Dickens’ characters standard features
• How authors create compelling characters- Illustrating with examples
• Why Socrates’ work has so many characters
• How effective has Mark Twain created attractive characters?
• Explain the standard features of characters in Jane Austen’s novel
• Describe the protagonist in A Clockwork Orange
• Analysis of the main character in The Sorrows of Young Werther
• Describe the struggles that motivate a character in an epic poem
• How Gilgamesh organization contributes to the main character’s development
• Compare the main characters in Buffy Summers and Harry Potter
• Describe the essential feature of Othello as a character
• How Charles Dickens criticizes public policy through Oliver Twist’s description
• What can you say about Jay Gatsby?
• Why is King Arthur so famous?
• With examples, explain how flashback brings out the traits of a character
• With a character as your example, explain how a TV series brings out the friendship concept
• Explain how Mrs. Malfoy changes into a good person
• Evaluate Hermione Granger’s qualities as a heroine
• Why Frida Kahio is so attractive in the literary world
• Describe the character traits of Madame Bovary
• With examples, explain how evil characters affect the audiences

Even when you know how to write a character study and have sample topics, you may have difficulties completing your task. That’s because you might lack adequate time to study the literary work and analyze your preferred character. However, this shouldn’t hinder you from scoring the top grade. Instead, seek affordable writing help from experts with a good reputation for helping college students with their essays. That way, you’ll complete this task without breaking a sweat

Character Analysis Essay: Student Guidelines

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Essay writing is an exciting and valuable academic exercise for students at all levels of learning. Basically, such a practice helps in developing students’ critical thinking skills. In principle, when writing a character analysis essay, students use these skills to cover a specific protagonist’s or antagonist’s personality and mannerisms objectively. Moreover, this type of paper aims to analyze a literature figure in a story in such a way that readers can develop a mental picture of them. In this case, a particular secret of writing a good persona analysis essay involves choosing a dynamic literature figure, such as a protagonist or an antagonist. Then, another tip is to write a first draft and read it at least twice to identify and correct errors and mistakes. In turn, a final draft should reflect a perfect document. Hence, students need to learn how to write a correct character analysis essay with its features.

General Aspects

Among many different types of essays is a character analysis essay, a text that describes a particular persona in a story. When writing this paper, students analyze relationships between literary personages in question and other characters, paying particular attention to their mannerisms. Besides, these mannerisms are exemplified by their behaviors, styles of speaking, physical appearances, and many other characteristics. Even though students may offer their personal opinions when analyzing specific figures, they must employ critical thinking and be objective. In essence, what matters in a persona analysis essay is factual information about a protagonist or antagonist in question. Moreover, a writer’s opinion should support rather than challenge specific traits and characteristics of a chosen literature actor. Hence, students write this type of paper when instructions require them to discuss how a particular character is shaped in an observed story.

What Is a Character Analysis Essay and Its Purpose

According to its definition, a character analysis essay is a detailed examination of a specific protagonist or antagonist in a literary work, focusing on their personality, motivation, and development. As such, the main purpose of writing a character analysis essay is to offer a deeper comprehension of a chosen persona’s role and significance within a particular story, theme, and progression (Acheson & Boyne, 2021). Basically, such a composition examines how a literature figure’s traits, actions, dialogues, and interactions with others reveal their personality, ethical stance, and growth. Furthermore, this writing assignment fosters critical thinking and interpretative skills, enhancing a person’s appreciation for a unique complexity and depth of different literary actors (Lauritzen, 2021). In turn, the length of a character analysis essay depends on academic levels and specific assignment instructions, while general writing guidelines are:

High School

• Length: 2-4 pages
• Word Count: 500-1,000 words

College (Undergraduate)

• Length: 4-6 pages
• Word Count: 1,000-1,500 words

University (Upper-Level Undergraduate)

• Length: 6-8 pages
• Word Count: 1,500-2,000 words

Master’s

• Length: 8-12 pages
• Word Count: 2,000-3,000 words
• Length: 16-20+ pages
• Word Count: 4,000-5,000+ words

Types of Characters

When analyzing a character in a story, writers must first understand what kinds of personages are their subjects. Typically, there are different types of characters whose distinctions are based on particular behaviors, traits, and roles that they exemplify within a story (Acheson & Boyne, 2021). In turn, the main character types fall under five categories: major, minor, dynamic, static, and stoic.

Major Characters

In a story, major characters run a storyline, and they define a plot of this composition. For example, there are two types of major characters: protagonists and antagonists (Lauritzen, 2021). In this case, the former represents typical heroes, those literary figures that an entire audience is likely to admire. Then, the latter represents characters that take a specific role of a villain. Basically, a target audience is likely to despise this type of persona. Moreover, it is easier to spot protagonists because a story’s plot revolves around them. In literature, examples of protagonists include Harry Potter from the Harry Potter series by J. K. Rowling, Othello from the famous tragedy Othello by William Shakespeare, Elizabeth Bennet from “Pride and Prejudice” by Jane Austen, and Frodo from The Lord of the Rings by J. R. R. Tolkien. On the other hand, examples of antagonists from literature include King Joffrey from Game of Thrones , Darth Vader from the Star Wars series by George Lucas, and the Wicked Queen from “Snow White and Seven Dwarfs.”

Minor Characters

As opposed to major literary figures, minor characters do not run stories. However, they are ones that help major characters to shine through storylines. In other words, minor literature figures in a particular course of their activities help main actors to create situations and circumstances that reveal central characters’ personalities (Kuijpers & Hakemulder, 2017). As explained, this personality is defined by mannerism. Then, examples of minor characters in literature include the whole Fellowship of the Ring in J. R. R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings . Individually, these literary personages help Frodo, a protagonist, to deliver the Ring to Mordor. In turn, another example of minor characters in literature is the duo Ronald Weasley and Hermione Granger in J. K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series. On several occasions, they help Harry Potter, a protagonist, in his battle against Voldemort.

Dynamic, Static, and Stoic Characters

Dynamic characters are those literature figures that change a particular course of a story in certain respects. In many cases, a protagonist is a dynamic character (Monzani et al., 2021). Moreover, an example in literature is Harry Potter from J. K. Rowling’s book series, who notices that he is similar to Voldemort in many ways throughout a storyline. Nevertheless, he resists ‘dark’ traits that define Voldemort because he is a good person. As such, he resists any temptation to become a dark wizard. On the other hand, static characters never change in a story. In principle, an excellent example in literature is Atticus Finch from “How to Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee. Despite finding himself in controversial circumstances, he remains firm in character and worldview throughout a story. Further on, stoic literary actors draw attention to a main persona, and their role in a story is to fortify a protagonist’s role and image. In turn, a great example of a stoic character in literature is Dr. Watson from Sherlock Holmes by Arthur Conan Doyle. Finally, another example includes:

• Modern Interpretations of Shakespeare’s Female Characters

Note: Some sections of a character analysis essay can be added, deleted, or combined with each other, depending on what and who should be examined. Basically, tracing a particular development of a literary character is an example of a character analysis essay. For example, to structure a character analysis essay, people start with an introduction paragraph and a thesis statement, followed by body paragraphs that analyze protagonist’s or antagonist’s traits, development, and role in a given story, and conclude with a summary paragraph that reinforces a central thesis and main points (Acheson & Boyne, 2021). In this case, a good hook for a character analysis essay is a provocative question or a compelling quote that highlights a key aspect of a chosen literary actor, sparking a reader’s curiosity about their journey and significance in a given story. Finally, to start a character analysis essay, people begin with an engaging hook that captures a reader’s interest, followed by a brief introduction of a specific literary work and personage, and end with a clear thesis statement outlining main points of an entire examination (Hackett, 2021). In turn, people can analyze more than one character in an analysis essay by comparing and contrasting their traits, motivations, and development to highlight their roles and significance within an observed story.

Steps on How to Write a Character Analysis Essay

Like any other academic exercise, essay writing requires students to adopt an effective approach that guarantees high-quality work. In this case, to write a character analysis essay, people thoroughly examine a persona’s background, traits, motivations, development, relationships, and role within a chosen story, using specific examples and quotes from a given text to support their evaluations (Acheson & Boyne, 2021). Basically, a particular writing approach involves four activities: preparation, setting up the stage, actual writing, and wrapping up. Moreover, these activities are essential in ensuring that people have a frame of mind that considers academic writing rules. When writing a character analysis essay, each of the above activities helps students to produce a document that truly reflects an academic text.

Step 1: Preparation

Preparation is a starting step in writing a hero analysis essay. In essence, this step involves planning how to go about writing. Basically, a student reads a story, chooses a specific literature figure, defines a topic, prepares ideas, and considers a target audience and its needs (Lauritzen, 2021). In this case, an actual essence of preparation is that it enables students to “get it right” from the beginning. Moreover, it is by preparing that students take into consideration requirements and seek clarification as necessary.

Reading a Story

In most instances, instructors guide students on which story to read and a hero to analyze. However, if such guidance is not provided, a student should – as a matter of priority – choose a story and a persona in a given story to write about (Hackett, 2021). Considering an assigned text, people should read it at least twice to have a good understanding and analysis of a plot and each literature figure’s role.

Choosing a Character

A standard practice is that a persona analysis essay focuses on major literary personages (protagonist and antagonist) as subjects of analysis. However, as indicated, an instructor may require students to analyze a specific protagonist or antagonist (Hackett, 2021). In this case, instructions can require students to explore how a minor literature figure enhances a major persona’s image in a story. Besides, a student’s major issue is to identify literary personages for writing their analysis and read all about them in an assigned story.

Defining a Topic

Like any essay, a character analysis essay should have a topic. Basically, even though a primary goal is to analyze a specific persona, people must have a topic that underscores their work. When defining a topic, students may follow an instructor’s prompt or develop their own approach (Lauritzen, 2021). Ultimately, a protagonist analysis essay topic should align with a paper’s goal, which is to analyze a specific literary personage.

Preparing Ideas

Typically, students get ideas about their work as soon as they read prompt requirements given by their instructors. When writing a personage analysis essay, a student should generate ideas after reading instructions and reading through them. However, it is the latter exercise that serves as a valid foundation of ideas for writing a text (Kuijpers & Hakemulder, 2017). Indeed, this aspect exemplifies a real essence of such a composition, focusing on how a literature personage emerges from a story. As discussed, such a figure can only be a protagonist, antagonist, minor, dynamic, or stoic. Understanding where literature figures fit helps a writer to generate ideas about effects of their roles in a story. In their analysis, students should apply critical thinking to dissect literary personages objectively.

Considering an Audience

Every form of writing has a specific audience – readers that people have in mind when writing their texts. In essay writing, the main audience is the instructor. However, in an application essay for college, a target audience is an admission board of a college or university (Hackett, 2021). Since instructors determine an overall quality of a hero analysis essay, students should consider their requirements. Ideally, these requirements reflect what instructors, as a primary audience, need regarding a persona analysis essay.

Step 2: Setting Up a Stage

A second step in writing a character analysis essay is setting a particular stage for an actual writing of a text. Here, students engage in several activities, including finding credible sources, making notes, creating an essay outline, and creating an annotated bibliography (Hackett, 2021). As an academic text, a persona analysis essay should satisfy all academic writing conventions, including backing up claims and arguments with evidence. Although a learner can write about a literature personage in a story by simply reading an assigned text, a protagonist analysis reflects an in-depth discussion about a specific actor. Hence, students should write about what others (scholars) have said about a story and a personage.

Finding Sources

Reliable sources are external texts that people rely on to find evidence supporting what they intend to write. Basically, when people make claims or observations during a composition process of a text, they must back it up with evidence to avoid making what they write seems like a personal opinion (Lauritzen, 2021). Notably, subjective opinion is not encouraged in academic writing, unless authors are using their analysis objectively. Moreover, the only way that students can demonstrate that their papers are free of bias is by providing evidence for their claims, arguments, opinions, and observations. In turn, this evidence comes from external academic sources – books and journal articles.

Making Notes

After finding sources, a student should read through them while making notes. Basically, these notes should be relevant to a task at hand. Therefore, when authors of a character analysis essay find sources pertinent to their mission, they should make notes as they read through them and write down what they find interesting about their chosen literary figures (Acheson & Boyne, 2021). Given that a particular writing task at hand involves analyzing a literature figure in question, students’ notes should reflect a deeper understanding of this personage, such as what others say about their manner of speaking or effect in a story.

Creating an Outline and an Annotated Bibliography

Like any other academic text, such as a research paper, a term paper, a Master’s thesis, or a dissertation, essays have outlines that provide a structure. Typically, this outline involves having three main sections: introduction, body, and conclusion (Hackett, 2021). When writing a protagonist analysis essay, a student should stick to this essay structure. Then, an annotated bibliography summarizes study sources that people intend to use to get evidence that backs up their claims and arguments. Although it is not needed in an essay, students who write a personage analysis paper can develop one based on credible sources that they identified in a second step of essay writing. In this case, annotated bibliographies would provide quick access to evidence that learners need to strengthen their papers.

Step 3: Actual Writing

After preparing and setting a particular stage, authors of a character analysis essay begin an actual writing of a paper. Here, students begin with a first draft, which provides an opportunity to organize thoughts, make mistakes, come up with new ideas, find new sources that back them up, and alter a character analysis essay outline (Acheson & Boyne, 2021). Basically, this stage is about putting everything together to develop an essay that addresses specific instructor’s requirements.

Writing a First Draft

When writing a character analysis essay, students are likely to make numerous spelling and grammatical errors and other mistakes, such as inconsistent arguments and illogical conclusions. As such, writing a first draft provides students with this allowance since they would have an opportunity to perfect their work (Hackett, 2021). Nonetheless, a first draft’s content should mirror an expected work, which is dissecting a persona’s personality. In turn, some examples of sentence starters for beginning a character analysis essay are:

• In [Title of a Play], a unique character of [Protagonist’s or Antagonist’s Name] is introduced as a [brief description], and, throughout an entire narrative, their actions and decisions reveal … .
• Throughout [Title of a Poem], [Persona’s Name] undergoes significant changes that highlight their complexity and depth, demonstrating how their experiences shape their … .
• From the first pages of [Title of a Book], [Author’s Name] captivates readers with a unique blend of [persona traits], which play a crucial role in driving an entire plot and uncovering central themes of … .
• A complex nature of [Personage’s Name] in [Title of a Specific Work] highlights various aspects of [theme], as a whole journey illustrates a unique struggle between [conflicting elements] and their ultimate impact on … .
• As a protagonist of [Title of an Epic], [Hero’s Name] demonstrates a remarkable blend of [traits], and their development throughout a discussed story provides a profound insight into an author’s commentary on … .
• [Protagonist’s Name] plays a pivotal role in [Title of a Story], serving as both a [role model 1] and a [role model 2], whose interactions with other characters shed light on … .
• In [Title of a Narrative], a particular evolution of [Central Figure’s Name] reflects a journey of [theme], where a unique transformation from [initial state] to [final state] underscores a central message of … .
• [Protagonist’s or Antagonist’s Name] is a fascinating character in [Title of a Book] because of personality, which includes traits, such as [traits], and their impact on an entire narrative is evident through … .
• A unique journey of [Hero’s Name] in [Title of an Epic] illustrates a specific theme of [theme], as experienced struggles and triumphs reveal important conflicts between [elements], ultimately leading to … .
• Exploring specific traits and motivations of [Literature Actor’s Name] in [Title of a Play] reveals a character driven by [motivations], whose actions and decisions not only influence an overall plot but also highlight broader themes of … .

Step 4: Wrapping Up

After writing a first draft of a protagonist analysis essay, students must read and reread their work to identify all mistakes and errors. As discussed above, potential chances of a first draft having spelling and grammatical errors, illogical conclusions, and inconsistent arguments are high. In turn, this fourth step in writing a personage analysis essay provides students with an opportunity to perfect their work. Here, learners revise and edit a first draft to eliminate all errors and mistakes and ensure their papers reflect a format of an academic text in all aspects (Acheson & Boyne, 2021). Furthermore, body paragraphs should have topic and concluding sentences, transitions, and right formatting. In turn, a summary paragraph in a character study must include a recap of an individual’s traits, development, and role in a particular story, along with a restatement of main points and thesis from an entire evaluation. Additionally, people should subject their analysis to peer review and then write a final draft.

Revising and Editing a First Draft

A primary purpose of reading a first draft at least twice is to identify all errors and mistakes, as explained above. Basically, once authors note them down, they should revise their papers accordingly, ensuring all inconsistencies are corrected (Lauritzen, 2021). Moreover, students should edit all spelling and grammatical mistakes to make a written document look like a professional appeal.

Topic Sentences

A first statement that a student writes in every paragraph in a main text (body) should reflect a topic sentence. Basically, this sentence aims to introduce a single idea that a writer intends to develop in a paragraph (Hackett, 2021). By considering a persona analysis essay, this idea can be a claim or an observation about a subject under analysis. In this case, a standard writing practice is that a single idea that an author expresses in a topic sentence should align with a paper’s thesis statement, as it is developed in an introduction part of a character analysis essay.

Concluding Sentences

While a topic sentence introduces a paragraph, a concluding sentence brings it to a close. For example, a reason why a student writes a concluding sentence is to finalize an intended message captured in a section (Hackett, 2021). As such, such a statement provides writer’s concluding thoughts about a topic sentence and how it advances a thesis. Moreover, a particular content that comes between topic sentences and concluding sentences reinforces a sandwich rule: making a claim, backing it up with supporting facts, elaborating on it, and indicating its relevance in a specific context of a thesis.

Transitions

In writing a character analysis essay, students need to create a document with a natural flow from a beginning to an end. Basically, a key aspect that enhances this flow is a particular use of transitions, which involve words and phrases, like “consequently,” “hence,” “thus,” “nonetheless,” “as such,” and “put differently” (Lauritzen, 2021). In this case, a student can use these words and phrases in any part of a text. However, using them in writing a main text is more appropriate as it is where authors need to create linkages between claims, evidence, and elaborations. Hence, transitions make such connections flawless and logical.

When organizing an academic text, it is critical for students to observe all academic writing rules. For example, one of these rules is writing a literature figure analysis essay according to assigned requirements that guide a paper format that learners are using to write their work (Hackett, 2021). In this case, main paper formats are APA, MLA, Harvard, and Chicago/Turabian, all of which differ in certain ways. Moreover, they all have different requirements for citations and paragraph formation. Hence, when organizing a personage analysis essay, a student should format a paper according to an appropriate writing format. Although learners may observe this rule when writing a first draft, they should certainly do so when creating a final document.

Peer Reviewing

When writing a protagonist analysis essay, students should ensure their work is of high quality. Basically, what makes an academic text of high quality is peer review, which means subjecting a complete work to a critical review by a friend, tutor, or mentor. For example, journal articles are regarded as peer-reviewed scholarly sources for a simple reason that they have been reviewed and made perfect (Lauritzen, 2021). In turn, this perfection entails ensuring an absence of errors and mistakes and a particular use of credible and reliable sources.

Step 5: Writing a Final Draft

A final draft represents a complete work of a student in writing a character analysis essay. Basically, it is a document that students hand over to a target audience by way of submission or publication. As such, authors must ensure their texts are of the highest standard to eliminate a possibility of attracting penalties, such as a low grade or lousy review, in case they publish their work on online platforms (Hackett, 2021). Besides, to be clear that what students have is of the highest quality, they should read and reread their papers. In turn, it is the only way in which they can be sure there are no errors or mistakes.

Simple Outline

As indicated in a previous section, students should take time and create an outline for their analysis when writing an essay. This outline comprises three main sections: introduction, body, and conclusion as below:

• Introduction Paragraph
• Body Section (this part may include several paragraphs)
• Conclusion Paragraph

While most academic texts follow this outline, some papers differ in features that authors address in each section. Basically, when writing a character analysis essay, students should ensure an introduction section highlights its thesis (Acheson & Boyne, 2021). In turn, this statement guides an entire writing, meaning it is a central claim or idea in a paper. Regarding body paragraphs, authors should ensure topic sentences open each paragraph while concluding sentences end them. Moreover, they should ensure sufficient and appropriate use of transitions and observance of a sandwich rule. In a conclusion section, students should restate a central thesis and summarize paper’s main points of their analysis.

How to Know

Generally, a primary purpose of a personage analysis essay is to provide an in-depth analysis of a specific literary personage. As such, people know that they write a character analysis essay if their texts describe a given persona’s personality and mannerisms. In turn, the latter entails how a literature persona in question behaves, speaks, looks like (physical features), and their familial and social relationships, as it is covered in a story (Acheson & Boyne, 2021). As a result, to write a good introduction paragraph for a character analysis essay, people begin with an engaging hook, provide some background information on a chosen literary work and protagonist or antagonist, and end with a clear thesis statement that outlines main points of their examinations.

When it comes to an outline, a character analysis essay is similar to other types of papers. However, regarding a particular content, this type of essay differs from other papers significantly. For example, an argumentative essay focuses on making an author’s argument acceptable to a target audience, meaning its content revolves around an author’s perspective regarding an issue (Hackett, 2021). In contrast, a personage analysis essay focuses on providing an intended audience with a detailed picture of a specific literature figure in a story, meaning its content revolves around a subject (character). In an informative essay, an author’s goal is to educate a specific audience about a topic or an issue, meaning its content revolves around explaining concepts relating to a specific theme in question (Lauritzen, 2021). Moreover, to write a character analysis in middle school, students introduce a chosen hero and story, describe protagonist’s or antagonist’s traits and motivations, use specific examples from an observed text, and conclude with how this personage contributes to a story’s themes and plot. Therefore, a primary point of difference between a protagonist analysis essay and other essay types is content more than structure.

Easy Strategies

When it comes to an introduction paragraph, authors of a character analysis essay should provide a hook, which can be a statement, quote, or joke. Basically, a hook sentence aims to grab a reader’s attention and make them interested in reading an entire paper (Hackett, U. (2021). Then, if students know how to write a hook, they provide a brief background of a text after it. Besides, it is where they introduce a story and a literary personage under investigation. In turn, people should conclude this section with a thesis, thus outlining a main purpose of writing. About a main text (body), if learners are familiar with the rules of how to write a topic sentence, they begin each paragraph with it, which establishes a claim. Further on, a crucial feature that follows is evidence (supporting facts) and then an explanation. As a result, a last element is a concluding sentence. 

Paying an Attention

Based on an above information, it is evident that authors of a protagonist analysis essay must pay attention to several things. In an introduction section, people should pay attention to a thesis, and, in a body section, they should follow a sandwich rule (Lauritzen, 2021). Basically, this rule reinforces a claim-evidence-explanation approach. In a conclusion section, students should pay attention to the main points’ summary to make sure no new information is captured in this paragraph. Additionally, learners should ensure they provide closing remarks, which emphasize their objective opinions about a subject matter.

Major Mistakes and How to Avoid Them

Besides spelling, grammatical, and other mistakes, authors of essays make other errors, leading to the fact that their work becomes less than high-quality. In writing a persona analysis essay, one mistake that students make is to focus on a single aspect, such as personality, thereby undermining a subject’s full image (Acheson & Boyne, 2021). In this case, an effective solution to this mistake for a person is to focus on personage’s mannerisms – behavior, speaking style, and appearance. Then, another mistake that learners make is to focus on aspects that do not advance an in-depth analysis of a subject, such as a story’s plot. In turn, a direct solution to this mistake for students is to focus on subject’s roles in a plot’s context. As a result, students need to write a character analysis essay to gain a deeper understanding of a protagonist’s or antagonist’s role, motivations, and development within a given story and uncover broader themes and messages conveyed by an author through that literature figure.

Character Analysis Essay Example

Topic: Frodo and His Heroic Weakness

Introduction Sample

In literature, characters play an essential role in enhancing the plot of a story. Basically, they do this through their actions, behaviors, relationships, and other aspects of personality. Moreover, their mannerisms define who they are within the context of a story. In The Lord of the Ring , J.R.R. Tolkien captures a heroic conscience that characterizes human existence. Then, the author reveals the destructive power of greed and envy, mainly where promises are concerned. Nonetheless, Tolkien shows how friendship and courage overcome these vices. At the center of a story , The Lord of the Ring, is Frodo Baggins, a protagonist, who, despite undergoing a series of challenging adventures, emerges as a hero.

Example of Body Paragraphs

Frodo as a Hero

Tolkien develops Frodo as a young hobbit with a remarkable character. As a ring-bearer of a fellowship, Frodo has the Ring that belongs to Sauron, the Lord of the Rings. As such, Sauron is an antagonist in a story. For example, he is “a dark lord who lost the one Ring that held much of his power” (Tolkien, 2003, p. 54). Then, the author describes the Ring as precious and powerful enough to enslave Middle Earth. While everybody is scared of the Ring and no one wants to lead its destruction, Frodo courageously overcomes such fear. Despite a myth that absolute evil and frightening dark forces are likely to victimize anyone who attempts to destroy the Ring, the young hobbit is keen to prove everybody wrong. In turn, it is the anger toward myths and oppressions that they seemed to cause people that motivate Frodo to act to restore safety in Middle Earth. 

Frodo’s Weakness

The first indication of Frodo’s inexperience comes when he faces his initial challenges in his quest. Basically, how he deals with them reveals his weak points. For example, when Frodo delays his departure from the Shire, in spite of the urgency of the task ahead, he comes out as an indecisive character (Tolkien, 2003). Although a protagonist has common sense, he lacks wisdom, which is evident when he chooses to face the Old Forest’s dangers. Besides getting himself into harm’s way, Frodo also endangers the lives of his friends. In this case, he comes out as a fool in Bree when he draws unnecessary attention to himself. At Weathertop, the main character gives in to the temptation of putting on the Ring, thus exposing himself to an attack by the Ringwraiths (Tolkien, 2003). Despite all these shortcomings, Frodo survives the dangers of his own mistakes and those of his quest. Moreover, the novel attributes this success to the fact that hobbits are tougher than they look and can endure hardships. More importantly, Frodo himself is not interested in possessing the Ring, which makes him avoid the dark forces it represents. In this respect, he emerges as a hero in the end.

Conclusion Sample

Frodo’s adventure in The Lord of the Ring is a selfless quest to bring good to society despite powerful myths that undermine people’s courage to act when needed. In this case, Tolkien describes specific events that characterize the protagonist’s quest to destroy Sauron’s Ring. Moreover, what is clear is that Frodo is a courageous hobbit who refuses to be defined by his weaknesses. Eventually, his actions display his heroic character, one that defies all odds against him. In turn, a lesson from a story is that people do not need to be perfect to be heroes, but they need to aspire to do what is right.

Arthur, S. (2003). Walking with Frodo: A devotional journey through the Lord of the Rings . Carol Stream, IL: Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.

What to Include

Common Mistakes

• Lack of Thesis Statement: Failing to provide a clear and well-organized thesis statement that outlines main points of an entire analysis.
• Over-Summarizing a Plot: Spending too much time summarizing a whole story instead of focusing on a character analysis.
• Ignoring Character Development: Not discussing how a specific protagonist or antagonist evolves throughout a whole story.
• Insufficient Evidence: Failing to support analysis with specific examples and quotes from an observed text.
• Vague Descriptions: Using vague or general descriptions instead of detailed and specific character traits.
• Ignoring a Character’s Role: Not analyzing a persona’s role and significance within a given story.
• Neglecting Relationships: Overlooking observed figure’s interactions and relationships with other actors.
• Ignoring Themes and Symbols: Failing to connect a character analysis to larger themes and symbols in a story.
• Poor Organization: Presenting a whole analysis in a disorganized manner, making it difficult to follow.
• Overlooking Grammar and Style: Neglecting proper grammar, punctuation, and writing style, which can lower an overall quality of an essay.

When writing a character analysis essay, students must understand that this type of paper is different from all others. While an argumentative composition focuses on convincing an intended audience about an issue, a personage analysis essay covers telling readers about a specific protagonist’s or antagonist’s personality and mannerisms within a particular context of a story’s plot. As such, this text also differs from an informative essay that focuses on educating a target audience about a topic or an issue. Nonetheless, all these essays assume the same outline, which entails three main sections: introduction, body, and conclusion. In turn, when writing a character analysis essay, a student must note the following tips:

• Read assigned instructions carefully.
• Read a given story.
• If there is no instruction about a literature figure, choose a dynamic character, who is either a protagonist or antagonist.
• Reread a story and make notes that are specific to a chosen personage.
• Develop a thesis statement.
• Draft an essay outline.
• Write a first draft.
• Read and reread a first draft to identify and correct errors and mistakes.
• Subject a first draft to a peer review.
• Write a final draft.
• Read and reread a complete essay.

Acheson, K. O., & Boyne, M. R. (2021). Writing essays about literature: A brief guide for university and college students . Broadview Press.

Clement, S., & Bollinger, R. (2017). Accelerating progress: A new era of research on character development. Journal of Youth and Adolescence , 46 (6), 1240–1245. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10964-017-0681-9

Hackett, U. (2021). Brilliant essays . Red Globe Press.

Kuijpers, M. M., & Hakemulder, F. (2017). Understanding and appreciating literary texts through rereading. Discourse Processes , 55 (7), 619–641. https://doi.org/10.1080/0163853x.2017.1390352

Lauritzen, J. (2021). Read, write, and cite . Kendall Hunt Publishing Company.

Monzani, L., Seijts, G. H., & Crossan, M. M. (2021). Character matters: The network structure of leader character and its relation to follower positive outcomes. PLOS ONE , 16 (9), 1–25. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0255940

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How to Write a Character Analysis — Tips and Techniques

A great story is often, if not always, synonymous with great characters. Crafting great characters is not an easy feat. So it’s no wonder that readers and writers alike gravitate toward the best characters in storytelling. Analyzing characters can be incredibly helpful for crafting your own characters or simply understanding your favorite story more deeply. In this article, we’ll dive into how to write a character analysis by asking the right questions, analyzing characterization, and retaining curiosity throughout the process.  

How to Write a Character Analysis

First, let’s define character analysis.

Before we dive into the details of how to write a great character analysis let’s make sure we on the same page by looking at the character analysis definition.  

CHARACTER ANALYSIS DEFINITION

What is a character analysis.

A character analysis is a written body of work that analyzes the qualities and traits of a specific character. These characters are primarily from literary works, but can also be from cinema and television. The purpose of a character analysis is to dissect the various intricacies of a character and their role within a story. A character analysis should focus on the quality and function of a character in a story rather than on personal opinions on how the writer might feel about the character. A character analysis should dissect various types of characterization from the writer of the character to form a well-rounded analysis. 

Example character analysis types:

Protagonist.

First and foremost, it’s important to identify the type of character you're writing about. To identify the character type of your analysis here are two questions that are important to address: What is their function in the story? And how do they change or not change throughout the story?

How to Do a Character Analysis

Determine the character’s function.

A character’s function in a story is incredibly important to understand because it gives context as to why the writer made specific choices around the character such as their goals, behavior, and even outward appearance. 

Depending on a character’s function in the story they will fall under one of the following types: protagonist, antagonist, foil, or mentor.

A protagonist is a character who pushes a story forward. He or she is also the central force of the story. Here's a video where break down the main types.

What is a Protagonist  •   Subscribe on YouTube

Derived from the Greek words prōtos and agōnistēs, “protagonist” quite literally translates to “first actor.” In the Harry Potter series, Harry Potter is the protagonist.

An antagonist is the force of a story that the protagonist contends with; whether it be human, natural or supernatural. Every protagonist needs an antagonistic force. Here is a quick rundown on antagonists.

What is a Antagonist  •   Subscribe on YouTube

Derived from the Greek word agonizesthai, “antagonist” literally translates to English as “to contend with.” In the Harry Potter series, "He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named" is the antagonist. Alright we’ll say it for clarity — Lord Voldemort.

A foil character is a fictional character that serves to expose something intrinsic in another character. Oftentimes, the thing that is exposed is a character folly, like cowardice or greed. 

In the Harry Potter series, Draco Malfoy is often Harry’s foil.

A mentor is a character that serves a guide and/or teacher for the story’s protagonist. The mentor is an integral component of Joseph Cambell’s hero’s journey story structure . 

In the Harry Potter series, Albus Dumbledore is Harry’s mentor.

Analyze the character’s development

This second question will help you write a better character analysis because it addresses whether or not your character changes or does not change over the course of the story. 

Static character

A static character is a character that does not undergo any significant internal change over the course of a story. Throughout a story, a static character largely remains the same and does not grow or develop in a substantial way.

Watch our character analysis of Marty McFly and his "flat arc" for a great example of a character who doesn't change.

Dissecting a "flat" character arc  •   Subscribe on YouTube

Dynamic character.

A dynamic character is a character that undergoes significant internal change over the course of a story. This change can happen subtly and gradually throughout the story and can be a change for better or worse. This is a character who often learns a lesson or changes in beliefs or principles. 

For a few examples that will drive home the differences between dynamic and static characters, check out this video breakdown below. 

Analyzing Characters  •  Dynamic vs Static Characters 

Understanding what a character’s function is and what their development is over time will help you determine the focus point of your character development analysis

Related Posts

• What is a Character Study? →
• Character Archetypes in Literature & Movies →
• Character Development: Write Stronger Characters →

How to Write a Proper Character Analysis

Choose a point of focus.

When learning how to write a character analysis choosing a focus point is important for creating a thoughtful, and poignant analysis. Without a solid focus, you run the risk of writing a character synopsis and regurgitating facts and details the reader already knows about the character. 

To reverse engineer a focus point in your character analysis, ask yourself what the reader can learn from this character from a writer’s perspective? Is this character a complex hero ? What makes this character memorable or iconic?

In the video below, we analyze the character Anton Chigurh from No Country for Old Men and focus on what makes Chigurh the perfect antagonist. 

Why Anton Chigurh is the Perfect Antagonist  •   Subscribe on YouTube

It can be difficult to land on the focus point of your character analysis right away. This is why it is important to first analyze the function of your character and their development throughout the story.

In this process, you will find what makes this character unique and what readers can take away from your analysis. 

Analyzing characterization

Once you have your focus point, it’s time to gather evidence and support for your thesis. These pieces of support will derive from the characterization . 

Characterization is the process through which an artist communicates character to an audience. In writing, characterization is achieved through dialogue, actions, and descriptions. There is both direct characterization and indirect characterization. To help you analyze these two types of characterization, let’s break them down. 

Direct and Indirect Characterization  •  Analyzing Characters

Direct characterization.

Direct characterization is “surface level” characterization. It’s simply the overt information we’re given about a character, such as “what they look like, what their job is, and what they appear to others.” Many literary scholars describe this type of characterization as “what we’re told about a character.”

An example of this can be found in The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway. Hemingway uses direct characterization to describe the main character writing “Everything about him was old except his eyes and they were the same color as the sea and were cheerful and undefeated.”

Indirect characterization

Indirect characterization , on the other hand, is a subtype of characterization that’s defined by “showing” rather than “telling.” It is an important technique used by writers for developing nuanced characters. It is primarily utilized through what the character says, thinks, and does. 

A common acronym for indirect characterization is “STEAL” which refers to speech, thinks, effect, action, and looks. These details often come from dialogue, goals, desires, and the history or background of the character. 

An example of indirect characterization can be found in Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird . Harper writes, “First of all,’ he said, ‘if you can learn a simple trick, Scout, you’ll get along a lot better with all kinds of folks. You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view […] until you climb into his skin and walk around in it.”

• What is a Character Arc? →
• What is a Flat Character? →
• How to Introduce Characters in a Screenplay →

Character analysis questions

As you continue to flesh out and write your character analysis you may hit some road blocks. A valuable tool to overcome these roadblocks are questions. Try to think of the character that you are analyzing as a person that actually exists that you are interviewing.

What questions would you ask them to really understand who they are? Here are a few examples of character analysis questions to get you started.

What are your values?

What is your background? How did you grow up?

How have you changed from what happened to you or through what you experienced?

Is there a lesson you learned from all of this?

While you may not be able to answer all of these questions from the characterization the author provides, it’s a great exercise to uncover what you may not have yet realized about this character. 

Character analyses are not only a dive into the craft of writing and storytelling, but an analysis of psychology and experience. When analyzing a character, it’s important to wear both hats to provide an insightful, well-rounded character analysis that is unique and thoughtfully presented.

Up Next 

What is characterization .

As we mentioned above, characterization is incredibly important to understanding the characters of a great story. In our next article, we take a deeper dive into characterization and more examples of both indirect and direct characterization. 

Up Next: Characterization Explained  →

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Start Writing a Character Analysis Essay with Us

Characters are the cornerstones of stories in the broad world of literature; they are individuals with unique intricacies, motivations, and travels. But taking characters at their value only goes so far in revealing their significance. Exploring character analysis in depth reveals a wealth of knowledge that enhances reading and promotes a comprehensive comprehension of the story’s overall structure. In this article, we set out to discover the fundamentals of a character analysis essay , delving into its definition, significance, and constituent parts.

Understand Character Analysis Essay

What is a character analysis essay? Character analysis is a critical process that involves examining the traits, motivations, and development of characters in a literary work. It goes beyond mere observation, requiring readers to delve into the intricacies of characters’ personalities, actions, and relationships. Characters serve as conduits through which readers explore the depths of human nature, embodying universal themes and aspects of behavior. 

Characters analysis offers profound insights into the human condition and enhances comprehension by enabling readers to grasp the underlying messages, themes, and conflicts within a story. Character analysis fosters critical thinking by encouraging readers to interpret evidence, form connections, and form informed opinions about the text.

Key components of the character analysis essay include personality traits, character development, motivations and goals, relationships, and symbolism and archetypes. Personality traits provide insights into the character’s strengths, weaknesses, virtues, and flaws, while character development examines how the character evolves and changes throughout the story. Understanding these components enhances the reading experience and instills a deeper appreciation for the artistry of storytelling. 

Selecting the Character

What is a character analysis selection process? Selecting a character for analysis is crucial for crafting a compelling and insightful essay about a character . Some tips to guide in choosing the most suitable character include considering their significance, complexity, contrasts, personal interest, availability of textual evidence, and relevance.

Choosing a character integral to the plot is essential for conducting a meaningful character analysis essay that sheds light on the central themes and conflicts of the story. Characters are the driving force behind the plot, shaping events and conflicts that unfold within the story. Analyzing a character central to the plot allows for a deeper understanding of the story’s progression and thematic significance. They often embody the central themes and motifs of the narrative, allowing readers to uncover deeper layers of symbolism embedded within the text.

Analyzing a character central to the plot provides context for understanding the motivations, conflicts, and relationships that drive the narrative forward. Characters who play pivotal roles in the plot are often more compelling and memorable to readers, engaging them deeper and encouraging deeper engagement with the text.

Analyzing a character that resonates with the writer on a personal level can greatly enhance the depth and authenticity of the analysis. The benefits of choosing a character that resonates with the writer include emotional investment, empathy and understanding, authenticity, and insightful reflection.

Emotional investment allows for a deeper level of engagement with the text, fueling the passion for the analysis and inspiring insightful observations. Empathy and understanding enable readers to empathize with the character’s experiences, motivations, and struggles, leading to a more nuanced analysis. 

Authenticity lends authenticity to the analysis, as it reflects genuine thoughts and feelings about the character. Insightful reflection prompts insights into one’s own experiences, beliefs, and values, enriching the analysis and adding depth to understanding both the character and oneself.

By choosing an essay about a character that resonates with the writer personally, one can infuse their analysis with authenticity, empathy, and emotional depth, resulting in a more compelling and insightful exploration of the text.

Gathering Evidence

Character analysis is a crucial process in understanding a character’s personality and behavior. To learn how to write a character analysis essay correctly, it is essential to gather textual evidence, such as close reading, note-taking, annotation, character profiles, comparative analysis, and archetypal analysis. These methods help extract relevant information from the text, providing a foundation for your analysis.

Archetypal analysis can explore how the character embodies archetypal traits or roles commonly found in literature, such as the hero, villain, mentor, or trickster. By carefully identifying and documenting the various traits exhibited by the character, you can develop a nuanced understanding of their personality and behavior.

Supporting details play a crucial role in bolstering your character analysis essay , providing concrete evidence to support your interpretations and arguments. To effectively utilize specific examples from the text to support your analysis, select relevant examples that directly relate to the traits, motivations, and actions you are analyzing.

Provide context by introducing each example with a brief explanation or summary of its significance within the larger narrative. Analyze the example in detail, pointing out specific details or language choices that illuminate the character’s traits or motivations. Incorporate quotations from the text whenever possible, using quotation marks to indicate the exact words spoken or written by the character.

When analyzing supporting details, consider multiple perspectives: Acknowledge alternative interpretations and perspectives, but provide reasons why your analysis is the most valid or persuasive. By effectively utilizing specific examples from the text to support your character analysis essay , you can strengthen your arguments and provide readers with a deeper understanding of the character’s role within the story.

Character Analysis Essay Outline

Let’s have a look at the character analysis essay outline and how to write it perfectly.

• Start with a hook or question about the character.
• Provide background information and the thesis statement.
• Describe the character’s role, appearance, and initial impressions.
• Identify and discuss the primary traits of the character.
• Explore the character’s desires, fears, and motivations.
• Analyze the character’s evolution throughout the story.
• Discuss key events or turning points that shape the character’s development.
• Examine the character’s interactions with other characters.
• Discuss the character’s role in the plot.
• Explore how the character embodies or reflects the story’s themes and symbols.
• Analyze how the character’s actions affect the plot’s progression.
• Provide specific quotes or passages from the text.
• Illustrate key character traits with examples of their actions or dialogue.
• Interpret symbols or imagery associated with the character.
• Restate the thesis.
• Recap key points
• End with a thought-provoking statement.

By following this outline for a character analysis essay , you can structure your essay effectively, providing a comprehensive analysis of the chosen character while engaging the reader from start to finish.

Character Analysis Essay Structure

Character analysis essay format typically follows a three-part format: introduction, body paragraphs, and conclusion. The introduction serves to introduce the character being analysed and provide context for the analysis. Create a compelling introduction, start with a hook, write background information, and introduce the thesis statement. End the introduction with a clear and concise statement that outlines the purpose and focus of the essay. This will set the stage for a compelling and engaging character analysis essay.

The body paragraphs delve into the analysis of the character, each focusing on a specific aspect or trait. Each essay paragraph should begin with a topic sentence, followed by supporting evidence from the text and an analysis that explores the significance of the evidence in relation to the character’s development and role in the story. Organizing the analysis into coherent paragraphs is essential for presenting a logical and persuasive argument. 

The conclusion of the character analysis essay summarises the analysis’s main points and reinforces the character’s significance within the narrative. It restates the thesis statement in different words, provides a brief recap of the main arguments presented in the essay, and offers final insights or reflections on the character’s importance and impact on the story.

By following these guidelines, you can craft a conclusion that reinforces the significance of the character and provides a satisfying conclusion to the essay.

Process of Analyzing a Character

Character Development:

• Initial Impression: Discuss the character’s introduction and personality traits.
• Growth and Change: Analyze how the character evolves and changes over the story.
• Internal Conflict: Explore internal struggles or conflicts the character faces.
• Relationships: Examine the character’s relationships with other characters and how they evolve.
• Resolution: Evaluate the character’s development at the end of the story.

Motivations and Actions:

• Identify Core Motivations: Understand what drives the character to act and the underlying reasons behind their behavior.
• External Influences: Analyze the external factors that influence the character’s motivations and actions.
• Internal Conflicts: Explore any internal conflicts or contradictions within the character that influence their motivations and actions.
• Character Consistency: Evaluate the consistency of the character’s motivations and actions throughout the text.
• Consequences of Actions: Discuss the consequences of the character’s actions and decisions within the narrative.

Impact on the Narrative:

• Plot Development: Examine the character’s role in advancing the plot and driving the story forward.
• Theme Exploration: Analyze how the character embodies or reflects the story’s central themes and motifs.
• Symbolic Significance: Explore any symbolic significance associated with the character and their role in the story.
• Influence on Other Characters: Discuss how their relationships, actions, and decisions impact the development and behavior of other characters.
• Resolution and Conclusion: Evaluate the character’s ultimate role in the resolution and conclusion of the story.

By discussing what is character analysis significance in shaping the story, you can provide a comprehensive analysis of their role and impact within the narrative, highlighting their contribution to the overall meaning and interpretation of the text.

Polishing and Refining

Proofreading is an important step in the editing process, ensuring your writing is free from errors and effectively communicates your ideas. To correct errors in grammar, punctuation, and syntax, take a break, read aloud, use editing tools, focus on one element at a time, print and review, and seek feedback from peers or instructors.

Polishing involves refining language, strengthening arguments, and enhancing the overall clarity and coherence of your work. Techniques for polishing your writing include clarifying your thesis, tightening your writing, strengthening your arguments, enhancing transitions, checking for consistency in tone, style, and formatting, and proofreading carefully.

Afterthoughts on Character Analysis Essay

A profound character analysis essay offers a profound understanding of the human psyche, storytelling, and the timeless relevance of literature. By examining character traits, motivations, and impact on the narrative, students gain a deeper understanding of universal themes, conflicts, and complexities of the human experience.

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Character Analysis Essays

Without characters, there is no story. Without depth, the characters don't always contribute enough to the story, if at all. While character maps allow readers to track information about each character while reading, a character analysis lets them go deeper into the role they play in the story, the conflicts they encounter, and their traits, whether external or internal.

Writing a Character Analysis

Usually character analyses are a more in-depth assignment or short essay that require the student to think critically about one or more characters and make inferences from a careful reading of the text. It helps to have ways to visually organize the different parts of a character analysis with storyboards, graphic organizers, or with a character analysis worksheet . From there, the student can formulate their essay!

Defining the role, or function, of a character is an important first step. Are they the protagonist? The antagonist? The mentor? Do they change? Considering why a character may or may not change and how this affects character traits and conflicts is going to be important in a final analysis. You can ask students questions to guide them through the process of in depth analysis.

• What type of role does the character play in the story?
• How do they serve the story or other characters?
• Based on your initial read of the character, do they even change at all, or do they remain exactly the same as they were at the beginning?

If asked to describe the character, what sort of words would you use to describe them? Are they well educated, impulsive, or quiet? These answers contribute to the personality of the character and how they behave. They offer insight into why a character might make a certain decision, and alert us if something seems out of character. For instance, a quiet and cowardly character might suddenly make an impulsive or brave choice in the face of something. Why would they suddenly change?

• What physical traits define the character?
• How do they behave?
• Do they often fight other characters or are they overly helpful?
• How do they speak? What insight can you gain from their words?

The Conflicts

Without conflict in a story, nothing changes. Conflicts, no matter the type, spur character development in at least one, if not all, of the characters in the story. When considering conflict in regards to an analysis, consider the following:

• What conflict(s) does the character encounter?
• What type of conflict is it?
• How does the character react?
• How is the character changed (or not changed) by the conflict?

Character Maps

Character maps are a helpful tool for students to use as they're reading, although they can also be used after completing a book. In this activity, students will create a character map of the characters in the story, paying close attention to the physical attributes and the traits of both major and minor characters . They can also provide detailed information regarding the challenges the character faces, the challenges the character imposes, and the importance of the character to the plot of the story.

To scaffold or tailor this activity, teachers can change the questions, add more questions (the character map layout can be found under "Scenes" -> "Patterns"), provide the names of characters they want students to track, or let students start from scratch! Teachers may also provide the visuals for each character or let students pick their own from the Characters tab. Be sure to update the student instructions as necessary!

• What are the Character's Physical/Character Traits?
• How does this character interact with the other characters in the story?
• What challenges does this character face?

Many elements of these three main ideas will influence each other to offer further insight into a character. By creating a template for them, students will be able to keep track of the character while actively reading instead of having to comb back through when they've finished. They'll be able to easily see what connections exist between the information, and synthesize that into a comprehensive essay. Create scaffolded digital worksheets or use the spider map templates above as a starting point. You'll be surprised at what incredible things your students will find.

Related Activities

How to Write a Character Analysis Essay

Understand the role of the character.

Begin by defining the role of the character in the story. Determine whether they are the protagonist, antagonist, mentor, or another type of character. Consider how their role contributes to the overall story and other characters. Analyze whether the character undergoes any changes throughout the story or remains the same.

Identify and Describe the Character's Traits

Describe the character's traits by considering their personality, behavior, physical attributes, and speech. Use descriptive words to depict the character's qualities and explain how these traits shape their actions and decisions. Analyze any inconsistencies or changes in the character's behavior and examine the reasons behind them.

Explore the Conflicts Encountered by the Character

Examine the conflicts faced by the character and their significance in the story. Identify the type of conflicts, such as internal or external, and analyze how the character responds to these challenges. Assess the impact of the conflicts on the character's development and whether they undergo any transformations or remain unchanged.

Create a Character Map

Utilize a character map to visually organize information about the character. Include details about the character's physical attributes, traits, interactions with other characters, and challenges faced. Consider using pre-designed character map templates or creating a custom map to suit your analysis requirements. Adapt the questions and layout of the character map based on the specific needs of the assignment.

Synthesize the Analysis into an Essay

Take the gathered information from the character analysis and synthesize it into a comprehensive essay. Use the template or character map as a reference to maintain coherence and ensure all relevant connections and insights are included. Structure the essay with an introduction, body paragraphs discussing different aspects of the character analysis, and a conclusion that summarizes the key findings.

Frequently Asked Questions about Character Analysis Essays

What is a character analysis essay.

A character analysis essay is an assignment that requires the student to critically analyze one or more characters in a text and make inferences based on their traits, role in the story, and conflicts they encounter.

Why is it important to define the role of a character in a character analysis?

Defining the role of a character is important because it helps the student understand the character's purpose in the story and how they relate to other characters. It can also help identify if the character undergoes any changes and how it affects their traits and conflicts.

What are some questions to guide students in analyzing the role of a character?

Some questions to guide students in analyzing the role of a character are: What type of role does the character play in the story? How do they serve the story or other characters? Based on your initial read of the character, do they even change at all, or do they remain exactly the same as they were at the beginning?

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Everything New In Fortnite Chapter 5 Season 4

By Mark Delaney on August 15, 2024 at 8:02PM PDT

GameSpot may receive revenue from affiliate and advertising partnerships for sharing this content and from purchases through links.

Fortnite Chapter 5 Season 4 is here, and just like a season way back in 2020, this season is entirely focused on Marvel heroes, villains, and locations pulled straight from the comics. With several new map locations all based on Marvel lore, plus a battle pass that is top-to-bottom made up of Marvel's best and brightest, comic book fans may be in for one heck of a season--especially if the previous Marvel season is an indication of how fun this will be, as that one was one of the game's best.

In this guide, we'll be showing you around the new season in detail, which can help if you're awaiting Fortnite downtime to end or if you may be waiting to play later today or this weekend.

Join us as we reveal the new Fortnite weapons, map changes, battle pass, and more for Chapter 5 Season 4: Absolute Doom.

Fortnite battle pass in Chapter 5 Season 4

For some players (and I'll admit I'm one of them), the act of unlocking everything in the battle pass is almost as fun as playing the game itself. Fortnite's latest battle pass does not disappoint, with several heroes and villains making their Fortnite debuts, including Emma Frost, Shuri, and War Machine. There are, of course, new Epic-Marvel mash-ups, too, like the instantly iconic Peelverine, a cross between Wolverine and Fortnite's near-mascot, the anthropomorphic banana, Peely.

You can check out all the new skins in our Fortnite Chapter 5 Season 4 battle pass gallery, which will showcase all 100+ rewards to earn this season once downtime ends.

Fortnite new weapons in Chapter 5 Season 4

This season's loot pool is getting a massive overhaul. The new weapons available this time around outnumber the changes seen in many previous seasons. Part of that is owed to how many items are coming straight from the Marvel source material, such as Captain America's red, white, and blue shield, which also serves as a very painful type of frisbee in the right hands.

Check out our guide on Fortnite new weapons in Chapter 5 Season 4 to get a complete rundown of all the new weapons you'll find stashed in chests, dropped by bosses, and pilfered from defeated enemies.

Fortnite map changes in Chapter 5 Season 4

A new season means a new version of the island. And this particular season, of course, means those changes take on the shape of iconic Marvel locales such as The Raft, a supermax prison for the universe's most problematic baddies.

This spot and more can be explored in Chapter 5 Season 4, so use our Fortnite map changes guide to get a closer look at all there is to see on the island this season. Where are you dropping first?

Changes to Fortnite Reload

For players who have migrated to Fortnite's Reload mode, either part- or full-time, will like learning that the sweaty mode is getting new features this season, too, though Epic didn't yet reveal what those would be.

These future changes don't seem to relate to the rumor that Fortnite OG is returning for a second run later this year, this time with an emphasis on Fortnite Chapter 2. It seems Reload is its own standalone mode going forward, with the nostalgic OG event kicking off separately, though we'll need to wait for official details to confirm or disprove our suspicions.

New Medallions

It seems the Medallion system is here to stay, too, as they've been in every season of Chapter 5--albeit once under the name of Aspects instead. This season's Medallions sound less OP than some in the past, which is either good news or bad news, depending on who you ask.

In any event, here's what you'll get with this season's risk-versus-reward toys, Medallions:

• Siphon Medallion - Located in Castle Doom and equipped by the Doombot boss, this Medallion refills your shield by stealing shield HP from eliminated opponents.
• Stealth Medallion - Worn by the Mystero boss within Doomstadt, this Medallion grants temporary invisibility when you're crouched.
• Reveal Medallion - Emma Frost keeps this Medallion on her at all times, unless you defeat her at The Raft, at which point you'll gain the buff of occasionally pinging nearby enemies.

When does Fortnite Chapter 5 Season 4 end?

Epic doesn't formally announce this until it's nearly time to end the season officially, and the date can move between now and then, but judging by the battle pass end date, Chapter 5 Season 4 will conclude on November 2.

After that, we do expect to see a month of Fortnite OG centered around Chapter 2, before a new Chapter kicks off in December. We'll replace our reasonable speculation with facts once we learn more. But for now, plan to be playing on this Marvel-ified island until just after Halloween.

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The life of Samuel Johnson, LL.D. : with occasional remarks on his writings, an authentic copy of his will, and a catalogue of his works : to which are added, some papers written by Dr. Johnson, in behalf of a late unfortunate character, never before published

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10 Moments of Beauty at the Paris Olympics

The Summer Games are known for athletic excellence, but they provide plenty of aesthetic excellence along the way.

Léon Marchand and the rest of the Olympians at the Paris Games have put on a show — in more ways than one. Credit... James Hill for The New York Times

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By Sadiba Hasan

• Published Aug. 9, 2024 Updated Aug. 12, 2024

Some people watch the Olympics for the events. Others watch for the hot athletes.

This is nothing new. Going all the way back to the first century, the orator Dio Chrysostom praised the “beauty” of the boxer Melankomas, who competed in the ancient Greek athletic games .

That same feeling resonates in 2024. A number of participants in the Paris Summer Olympics have distinguished themselves for things beyond their athletic talent. In an extreme case, a pole-vaulter gained a great deal of attention — some might say notoriety — for failing in a unique way. Others caught the public’s attention through moments of love or kindness — a different but equally palpable form of beauty.

There are numerous options to choose from, but here are 10 moments of beauty at the games.

Swimmers and Their Abs

After Italy won bronze in the 4 × 100-meter freestyle relay on July 27, the Italian swimmer Thomas Ceccon, 23, raised his arms in celebration. In doing so, he unintentionally bared his well-cut abs , which had many thirsting on the internet .

(Ceccon, who won gold in the 100-meter backstroke, was later found sleeping on the ground next to a bench in Olympic Village after he had complained about the conditions at the village.)

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