An archetype is a fundamental character pattern that recurs across stories, cultures, and time periods because it taps into something deep in human psychology. The concept comes from Carl Jung, who argued that certain figures - the Hero, the Shadow, the Mother, the Wise Old Man - live in our collective unconscious and shape how we understand the world. Joseph Campbell built on Jung's work in The Hero with a Thousand Faces, showing how archetypal characters appear in myths from every civilization. In fiction writing, archetypes give you access to patterns that resonate with readers on an almost instinctive level.
Understanding archetypes gives you a vocabulary for the deepest patterns in storytelling. When you write a mentor figure or a shadow villain, you're plugging into thousands of years of narrative tradition, which gives your characters instant resonance. But the real power comes from knowing the pattern well enough to play with it - to combine archetypes, subvert them, or use them as a starting point for something entirely your own.
Campbell's landmark 1949 study demonstrated that hero myths across every culture follow the same archetypal pattern, which he called the monomyth. This book influenced everyone from George Lucas to modern screenwriters.
Tolkien's cast is a masterclass in archetypes - Gandalf the Mentor, Aragorn the returning King, Gollum the Shadow, Sam the loyal Companion - all given enough individual texture to transcend their patterns.
Rin begins as a clear Hero archetype but the trilogy subverts expectations by blending in the Shadow and the Destroyer, showing how archetypes can evolve and overlap within a single character.
Miller takes an ancient mythological figure and reframes her through multiple archetypes - outcast, witch, mother, hero of her own story - demonstrating how modern retellings can breathe new life into ancient patterns.
Use archetypes as starting points, not straitjackets. The most interesting characters often blend multiple archetypes or shift between them as the story progresses.
Archetypes are deep psychological patterns; stereotypes are shallow cultural assumptions; stock characters are conventional genre types. An archetype becomes a stereotype only when you stop at the surface level.
Archetypes are a lens, not a requirement. They're useful for understanding why certain characters resonate, but you don't need to assign one to every person in your story.
Take one of Jung's archetypes - Hero, Shadow, Mentor, Trickster, or Shapeshifter - and write a character sketch (200 words) that fits the archetype but is set in a context where you'd never expect to find it. A Trickster in a monastery. A Mentor in kindergarten. A Shadow at a wedding. The goal is to feel the archetype's power even when the setting is completely unexpected.