Monday, September 24, 2012

The Seven Deadly Sins and Your Hero, Envy

Greetings all and welcome to another addition of The Seven Deadly Sins and Your Hero. Today we will focus on Envy.

We've all been warned. 'Do not covet thy neighbors,' (select something they have and insert it) here.

Envy is a negative force. Or in recent years it has been attached to a good motivational skill that causes a person to achieve above what they would normally do. For more on this go here.

For our purposes though, we will look at the negative and discuss how this energy, envy, can taint your hero.

Your hero is so jealous of his (friend, sibling,  parent, acquittance) that s/he can't see beyond what that character has to become a happy and fulfilled person in their own right. They are miserable. Perhaps then  you will send your hero on a quest, to discover their own abilities and overcome this jealousy. Or perhaps, some tragedy happens to the other character and compassion wells up within your hero motivating them to act for the other characters good. The story lies within the actions of your hero overcoming their envy. If this is a secondary plot in your novel, creating a 3-dimensional character development, then less time will be spent on their envy and how they overcome it, but you still must address it. Leave no unanswered questions.

Envy is a good tool to use to create a villain. Your villain will either get revenge or grow into a hero depending on your story line. It would be thrilling to write such a character.

One thing is for certain, envy is a mighty strong emotion for us writers.

I hope this helps. For more on this Seven Deadly Sin or others go to Wikipedia.

Nancy

Picture link: Wikipedia

I have two openings for a critique partner at this time. If  your interested leave your email in the comments.

Next week: Gluttony

After next week's post I will start a new series on Short Stories that will include Flash Fiction.

9 comments:

Alex J. Cavanaugh said...

Haven't really used envy much in any of my books.

N. R. Williams said...

Hi Alex
It sneaks up on you. Thanks for coming by.
Nancy

Carolyn V said...

Envy is so so evil! And you can use it so many ways in writing! Mwa ha ha! ;)

N. R. Williams said...

Hi Carolyn
You're so right. Thanks for stopping by.
Nancy

Pikes Peak Writers said...

Love this series; interesting way to break down motivations behind main characters.

M Pax said...

Envy is definitely a powerful force. It's a great thing to use in stories, too.

N. R. Williams said...

Hi Pikes Peak
Thanks

Hi M.
It certainly is.

Thank you both for stopping by and leaving a comment.
Nancy

Anonymous said...

Always good to know what drives our characters; we need to know them inside-out, right?

N. R. Williams said...

Hi Milo
You've got that right.
Thanks for stopping by.
Nancy