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Q&A How to highlight a main character among several points of view?

I also have multiple POVs in the story I'm currently working on, each mini-chapter switching between main characters and supporting ones, and the way I try to convey who the protagonist is is by ma...

posted 11y ago by Warsin Tamadur‭  ·  last activity 5y ago by System‭

Answer
#3: Attribution notice added by user avatar System‭ · 2019-12-08T03:18:25Z (almost 5 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/10008
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#2: Initial revision by user avatar Warsin Tamadur‭ · 2019-12-08T03:18:25Z (almost 5 years ago)
I also have multiple POVs in the story I'm currently working on, each mini-chapter switching between main characters and supporting ones, and the way I try to convey who the protagonist is is by making her related to all the conflicts that take place, whether her role in each conflict is central or minor. Of course the main story-line is hers, but when I switch to another character's POV there will at least be a mentioning of her, or the actions that happen on the POV character's side of story affect her story, directly or indirectly.

I also read from a writing guide that it's possible to have many POV characters, a huge cast, multiple subplots and still manage to show whose story is the book mainly about by giving the protagonist the most pages or chapters. So for example, if there are twenty chapters, then you can have like ten chapters dedicated to the protagonist, while you split the rest among the other major (or minor) characters. A good example of how this is done is Shōgun by James Clavell.

I hope this helps you in someway.

#1: Imported from external source by user avatar System‭ · 2014-01-12T16:26:50Z (almost 11 years ago)
Original score: 4