Flat Character

Each person’s life contains different types of people. Some will change, some remain constant, and others are predictably stereotypical. These are also types of characters a writer uses to make stories feel realistic. Characters and their personalities are central to almost every story. This makes character development very important to literature as a whole. Guy de Maupassant does a good job of exemplifying this in his story “The Necklace.” Character development is illustrated in “The Necklace” by Guy de Maupassant. A few ways that writers construct characters is through the use of description, action, and setting. Description is what the narrator says directly about a character. “She was a strict woman,” or “He was a happy man,” are both examples of description. The narrator must explain a character’s traits directly to describe them. This

Three types of characters are flat, stock, and round. A character that plays a constant and unchanging role is a flat character. A flat character can still have depth and be unique, though. Peter Pan, from “Peter Pan” by J. M. Barrie, is a flat character, because, in the story, Peter Pan shows a well-defined set of characteristics and is left unchanged by any of the events he faces. Flat characters can have unique personalities, but show no change throughout the story. Stock characters, on the other hand, are based off of stereotypes and clichés. They are similar to flat characters in that they do not change for the entirety of a story. Tiger Lily, also from “Peter Pan” by J. M. Barrie, is an example of a stock character. Her character is constructed from stereotypes commonly associated with Native Americans and she is never very well developed. Stock characters usually exist in the background of a story to support the protagonist and plot. This type of character exists to add a predictable and stereotypical aspect to a