What do you look for in your protagonists?

[VanEaston011]

Hopefully this is the appropriate place for this topic. Anyways, I'm just curious:
- What do you guys [whether as readers or writers] look for in your dark weird fiction protagonists?
- What kinds of quirks, ticks, and traits do you find most interesting or think would be interesting if it has yet to be explored?
- Also, who are some of your favorite or most remembered protagonists in weird fiction, and why?

Obsession and melancholy appeal to me most in weird fiction characters. I'd say my favourite weird fiction protagonist is the narrator of Poe's Ligeia, whose clearly disturbed viewpoint – particular in regards to women – is ironically one encouraged on some unconscious level by society.

He is a hyperreal romantic whose sensitivity can only ever lead him to torturous oblivion, whether through a malevolent cosmos or the burning madness within his own psyche – which are essentially one in the same. I can almost smell the tears on the page that the author must have put in to the character, and the oh-so-normal spiral in to chaotic sickness is one of many reasons I tend to list Ligeia as my favourite weird tale.

[miguel1984]

Hopelessness, accompanied by a healthy dose of black humor to endure it. Obsession helps, too.

I also like it when the protagonist wins some minor but meaningful victories but loses the war, like the protagonist of The Call of Cthulhu or Jimmy McNulty from The Wire.

[Michael]

- What do you guys [whether as readers or writers] look for in your dark weird fiction protagonists?
For me this is an odd one (meaning I feel I'm odd for having this sentiment) but I tend to like protagonists in weird fiction where all that is happening is either very, very unfamiliar (e.g., Call of Cthulhu) or very, very familiar (e.g., The Divinity Student). The coolest trick I like is when the writer has them go from one to the other throughout the story.

- What kinds of quirks, ticks, and traits do you find most interesting or think would be interesting if it has yet to be explored?
I read somewhere (may have been here) that Poe's development with the Weird Tale was that he brought in the psychological (compared to the Radcliffe Gothic style preceding and contemporary to him); Lovecraft's development was to bring in the cosmic (i.e., humans are NOT the center of all and the universe is, at best, indifferent to us) while retaining the psychological; and Ligotti's development was to take both the cosmic and the psychological and synthesize them into something unique. Specifically, (this writer argued) Ligotti's characters tend to have deep, deep psychological wounds even more so than Poe's characters AND are very, very aware of this (best example I can think of is The Last Feast of the Harlequin, where the narrator is well aware of his Seasonal Affective Disorder). The thing I'd like to see is whereas the psychological wounds and the cosmic intersection in stories typically results in more degeneration in Ligotti's works; I'd like to see the opposite. That is, a deeply psychologically wounded individual interacting with the cosmic to knowingly "build" and "heal" those wounds but resulting in a dark, dark "health" because of that interaction. So not degeneration as a result of the interaction but generation, a dark generation of something altogether new and terrible. I think Ligotti can be read in this way but I'd like to see other writers build on this idea of dark generation and deep psychological wounds/cosmicism.
Sorry don't know if that just all sounds like gibberish.

I also find it fascinating when a writer takes a format of writing a research article. Bob Leman's The Pilgrimage of Clifford M. may be my favorite example of this but there are other great works in this vein (The Cyclonapedia is my favorite long work in this vein).

- Also, who are some of your favorite or most remembered protagonists in weird fiction, and why?
Michael Cisco's Divinity Student. This protagonist was simultaneously at home in the weird and foreign to what was happening. I was fascinated by both Cisco's creation of such a character as well as his ability to maintain this story and character for an entire novel. Brilliant.

And I may be the only person here who actually likes Randolph Carter. I don't know why. I have no argument or defense for this character. I just like him. I was so happy when in Alan Moore's second volume of the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen he made a connection between John Carter being Randolph Carter's distant relative. I'm willing to take the heat for liking Randolph Carter, he's one of my favorite.

[ToALonelyPeace]

-What do you guys [whether as readers or writers] look for in your dark weird fiction protagonists?
Humour, a sense of DOOM, or a unique 'love' for life's abyss.
-What kinds of quirks, ticks, and traits do you find most interesting or think would be interesting if it has yet to be explored?
When they ramble on and on about their surrounding, how terrible everything is...I love complainers.
- Also, who are some of your favorite or most remembered protagonists in weird fiction, and why?
Gregor Samsa. I often remember one of his last lines "I'm hungry enough...but not for these things." Somehow it stuck with me.

In fiction though, Bardamu from Journey to the End of the Night is the most memorable. His vibrancy is palpable through the pages.

[DoktorH]

Quote Originally Posted by VanEaston011

Hopefully this is the appropriate place for this topic. Anyways, I'm just curious: - What do you guys [whether as readers or writers] look for in your dark weird fiction protagonists? - What kinds of quirks, ticks, and traits do you find most interesting or think would be interesting if it has yet to be explored? - Also, who are some of your favorite or most remembered protagonists in weird fiction, and why?

what do I look for in a protagonist? no clue. when i am looking for weird fiction i shop by author and ebook availability. I don't find out what the protagonist is like until it is too late.
what quirks/ticks/etc do I like? a mantra. Work not done. special plan for this world. a song about belonging to you. those little turns of phrase that keep coming up and reveal a good deal about the character through the things that evoke the phrase. i also like them to have a distinct voice from the surrounding weird horror world. Pulver and Barron do this really well. bleak humor, laughing resignation to their fate as they sink into the abyss, is also greatly appreciated.
favorite weird fiction protagonists: Special Agent Dale Cooper, frank dominio, Cardigan, conrad navarro, the narrator of "more dark".

[MoeShinola1]

Quote Originally Posted by VanEaston011

Hopefully this is the appropriate place for this topic. Anyways, I'm just curious: - What do you guys [whether as readers or writers] look for in your dark weird fiction protagonists? - What kinds of quirks, ticks, and traits do you find most interesting or think would be interesting if it has yet to be explored? - Also, who are some of your favorite or most remembered protagonists in weird fiction, and why?

My favorite protagonist is one who possesses latent resoursefulness, hidden strength, and is underestimated, someone who might have been better left alone. A good example of this is Repairman Jack.
Actually, though, the real protagonist in a lot of these stories is none other than the hungry dark, from whose perspective we watch as it invisibly moves it's prey into position, as an ant lion does with sand, for the lunge.