The Main Character

There are moments in stories—fiction, non-fiction, or whatever space in between--that include a person of limited power who is the protagonist interacting with someone of much greater power. Think Rocky relative to Apollo Creed or Bilbo Baggins going adventuring with Gandalf. Think Chris Gardner accepting an unpaid internship on the prayer he might impress the power brokers at Dean Witter in The Pursuit of Happyness. Think Kermit the Frog leading the not-yet-famous Muppets into a Hollywood exec’s office in the original Muppet Movie.

I could go on and on with these sometimes antagonistic, aspirational, or incidental pairings. It occurred to me once the wild differentials that can exist between power and importance in the context of a story. Watch Aladdin a few dozen times as a kid, then reflect on it as an adult and, like me, you may struggle to remember Jasmine’s father, The Sultan and most politically powerful figure in the movie—what he looked like or if he’s named beyond his title (he’s not). Watch Mr. Smith Hoes To Washington and if you only remember one character afterward, I bet it’s the eponymous one played by Jimmy Stewart and not the political powerhouses he takes on. Do you remember the name of the Notre Dame head coach portrayed in Rudy? Read Carmen Maria Machado’s In the Dream House and the larger than life abusive partner goes unnamed all 250 pages (albeit that it’s hard not to call her a major character).

I thought about how these characters might feel if they stepped off screen or off the page to see themselves in supporting roles, played by less famous actors only brought in for a portion of filming relative to underdog whose face goes on the poster, the cover—who is immortalized in the memories of everyone who knows the story the way a more tertiary character may grow fuzzy, if not forgotten outright.

There’s a lesson in this.

Most of my life, I’ve wanted to be famous to at least some degree. Some of that has to do with prospective intrinsic links between fame and success, financial prosperity, or likability. I’m sure some of its ego-driven, some of it links to the psychology of someone who grew up wanting to earn his father’s approval and putting too much stock in what Hollywood transmitted through the living room television set.

There’s a simpler truth, though, that we’re each the main characters in our own stories. If we’re lucky, we might fall into a few other people’s top ten or so most loved, best known, most cared-about people—our family, friends, people we’ve touched or influenced in some perceptible way.

The idea of not aspiring to more—fame, fortune, power, legend—can feel like settling, and suggestions that everyone matters equally can be dismissed as platitudes. I’ve done it. And yet truisms are true when looked at through the appropriate lens, and maybe it’s up to the person listening to add the nuance appropriate to their experience.