Atlas Trail
Eight Dramatic Roles in Fiction: A Tour of Literature's Characters
This atlas sorts its literary characters by the dramatic role they play, not by the book they come from. This path visits one representative of each of the section's eight roles, from a tragic hero undone by his own nature to a moral exemplar who never bends.
Stop 1 of 8.
Literary Characters
Tragic Heroes and Doomed Protagonists: Jay Gatsby, undone by his own devotion to a past that was never coming back.
Stop 2 of 8.
Literary Characters
Byronic Heroes and Antiheroes: Heathcliff, a foundling whose love curdles into a lifelong campaign of revenge.
Stop 3 of 8.
Literary Characters
Quest Heroes and Adventurers: Frodo Baggins, an unlikely traveler defined entirely by the journey he accepts.
Stop 4 of 8.
Literary Characters
Villains, Monsters and Antagonists: Count Dracula, the aristocratic predator who gave the vampire its modern shape.
Stop 5 of 8.
Literary Characters
Innocents and Coming-of-Age Protagonists: Jane Eyre, whose plain honesty carries her from an abusive childhood to independence.
Stop 6 of 8.
Literary Characters
Romantic and Star-Crossed Figures: Elizabeth Bennet, whose wit nearly costs her the one match that could actually make her happy.
Stop 7 of 8.
Literary Characters
Satirical, Picaresque and Comic Protagonists: Don Quixote, a country gentleman who reads himself into a life of chivalry.
Stop 8 of 8.
Literary Characters
Moral Exemplars and Social Critics: Atticus Finch, defined by the trial he takes on knowing he cannot win it.
Create an account to keep this trail. Saving copies its stops into a collection of your own, which you can add to, reorder and share.
Where you have got to in this trail is kept by your own browser and is never sent to us. Clearing your browser data clears it. All trails.